5-Point Bucks Has Perfect Stotts Analogy

All season long I've been of two minds about these Bucks and their fledgling coach. Are they a talented team of underachievers or are they a scrappy but flawed bunch of overachievers? I can't make up my mind. In fact, if you read this blog on a consistent basis you will see that the only consistent thing about my writing is the inconsistency of my opinions.

For example, a couple of weeks back I posted a defense of Coach Stotts. Most readers were probably stunned by this post given the fact that I ridiculed Stotts throughout the season. Part of the reason I posted my defense of him was in reaction to what I was hearing on Milwaukee talk radio. It was over-the-top. They were treating Stotts as though he were completely to blame for the Bucks up and down season. They were basically labeling him the Town Idiot. I thought some balance needed to be interjected into the conversation, so I did a 180 degree turn.

Truth be told, I still held doubts about Stotts, which is why I really wasn't put off when people rained criticism down on me. Part of me was saying the exact same things. But I couldn't quite go back to the dark side and condemn Stotts completely. I was in a state of cognitive dissonance.

Well, sometimes a good analogy is all you need to provide clarity to a murky situation. I've finally gotten that, thanks to Sam at 5-Point Bucks. He recently called Stotts "The Tim Thomas of NBA coaches". Perfect. He has hit upon the perfect Stotts analogy.

The name "Tim Thomas" holds special meaning for Bucks fans. It conjures up feelings of acute frustration brought on when great promise meets maddening inconsistency. You see, as a prospect, Thomas had everything you could ask for. Skills, height, quickness, mobility, shooting touch. And yet, as a player on the court, he couldn't seem to leverage those gifts into consistent solid performances. He was a basketball cocktease. He would show you just enough to make you believe he could be great (remember the Indiana play-off series?), and then broke your heart with piss poor effort after piss poor effort. And now Stotts is starting to fall into that category.

Stotts seems to have it on the ball, but he makes so many maddening mistakes. He has the acumen to keep a flawed and injury-prone Bucks team in playoff contention, but then he can't seem to make the simple moves needed to get them past that level. He won't bring the hammer down on TJ or Magliore, he won't settle in on a winning rotation, and he can't seem to reverse the momentum of a game when the game starts to get away from the Bucks. Until he gets those flaws corrected then Sam is right, he is the Tim Thomas of NBA coaches.