Is Phil Jackson overrated?

The coach with 11 NBA championship rings said after the Dallas Mavericks swept his Los Angeles Lakers that Game 4 was the final game he will coach. Now, the question is where Jackson belongs on the list of all-time great coaches in any sport.

Former Sacramento Kings center Scott Pollard, who battled Jackson's Lakers when they had Shaquille O'Neal, told Grant Napear on KHTK that he thinks Jackson is overrated:

I just think he’s one of the most overrated coaches of our time. He’s only had the greatest players of our era on his teams. Put him in charge of the Sacramento Kings this year, and I don’t mean to offend Sacramento fans, but put him on a team with no Hall-Of-Famers on it at least no one that has established themselves as a Hall-Of-Famer already, put him as the Head Coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers right now and let’s see how he does next year with no Hall-Of-Famers on the team. That’s all I’m saying.

Pollard went on to say that he respects Jackson's championship rings, but he has "never taken a team that wasn’t a playoff team and turned them into a playoff team."

The interview was transcribed by Sports Radio Interviews.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/11/scott-pollard-phil-jackson-overrated_n_860550.html

I agree with Scott Pollard. Phil has been lucky he's been able to coach teams who has star players like Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Shaq, Kobe Bryant. I can't see him coaching a bad team and getting them to the playoffs.

If all it took were great players to win championships, the Lakers would still be in the running this year.

Jackson wasn't the only guy to coach Jordan and Pippen. Besides, neither Jordan nor Pippen ever won anything without having Jackson as their coach.

The 1993 Bulls won 57 games. Then Jordan retired. The next year, with Pippen only, they won 55 games. He lost supposedly the greatest player ever, and his win total drops by TWO games? Nah, no coaching involved there at all.

People like Scott Pollard don't have a clue about what's involved in winning championships. Let's ask Butch van Breda Kolff about how easy it is coaching 3 Hall of Famers (I know we can't because he passed away a few years ago). Doc Rivers has 3 future HOFers on his team, how'd that work out this year?

Besides, Phil Jackson had a lot to do with Pippen being a Hall of Famer.

So what if Phil wouldn't win a title if he coached Sacramento this year? Would Paul Westphal automatically have won a title with this year's Lakers?

How does Pollard know that any coach off the street would have won 11 titles with those particular teams? If any of Pollard's coaches would have been coaching the Bulls in 1996, I guarantee that none of them would have wanted Dennis Rodman anywhere NEAR their locker room, but Jackson knew what Rodman would mean to the Bulls at that time.

For a coach to go 20 years and have at least 50 wins in 17 of those seasons (and never have a losing season) is a remarkable record, regardless of what players you have.

Was Bobby Knight a great coach? Was John Wooden a great coach? Was Dean Smith a great coach? Is coach K a great coach? I guess not, since they had great players.

Pollard is a pin head.

Heck, Houston might have won another title in 1999 with Olajuwon, Barkley and Pippen if Phil was there. He knows how to utilize personnel as well as anyone who's ever come down the pike.

Also, Jackson is the biggest reason why the Bulls won their first title against the Lakers in 1991. Jordan wanted to guard Magic, but Magic torched him in the first game (won by the Lakers), it was Jackson's decision to put Pippen on Magic, and that turned the series around. Even though Jackson hadn't won a title with the Bulls yet, Jordan had enough respect for him to go along with the coaching move. If Rick Adlemann would have told Jordan to "go guard Byron Scott, I'm putting Scottie on Magic", Jordan would have told Adlemann to go pound sand.

Tweety, you make some good points. I didn't see your opinion in that way but you're right.

Tweety, you make some good points. I didn't see your opinion in that way but you're right.

It gets kind of crazy sometimes when people talk about coaches/managers... but in the NBA, there's really only been one time when a team won a championship without an obvious first ballot type Hall of Famer on the roster, and that one time was the 2004 Pistons (I don't really consider Ben Wallace or Chauncey Billups to be potential HOFers).

But if what Pollard says is true, then heck, there are no good coaches OR bad coaches. Just good players and not-so-good players. And the good players win the championships. Just crazy.

Too many writers and fans (as well as a few former players) think that they could easily walk into an NBA arena and win a championship if they had Michael Jordan on their team. Just absurd.

Phil's greatest strength was controlling egos and having multiple stars co-exist on the court. He got Jordan/Pippen 6 rings and Shaq/Kobe another 3 rings. Not to mention he got Kobe to get along with Pau Gasol and won another 2 rings.

And don't take anything Scot Pollard says seriously. This is a guy that told kids to do drugs.

I wonder how come Scott Pollard didn't make any comments about Phil winning 2 championships with the Lakers the last 2 years and Kobe didn't have a all star with him. I would've like to see Phil coach a sorry team though like Washington Wizards, Cleveland Cavs, Sacramento Kings, LA Clippers and get them to the playoffs and win some championships. That would be a challenge for him. If he had done that, then people would say he's a great coach.

I wonder how come Scott Pollard didn't make any comments about Phil winning 2 championships with the Lakers the last 2 years and Kobe didn't have a all star with him. I would've like to see Phil coach a sorry team though like Washington Wizards, Cleveland Cavs, Sacramento Kings, LA Clippers and get them to the playoffs and win some championships. That would be a challenge for him. If he had done that, then people would say he's a great coach.


I wouldn't have been surprised at all if Lebron would have won a title in Cleveland had Phil been the coach. The Wizards, Cavs (current), Kings and Clippers are not championship caliber teams, but I'm sure Jackson could have coached them to better records than they have had lately.

I'll never say that Phil didn't have great players...but it takes more than that to win titles... especially winning 11 of them. I don't know if Miami will come back to win this year's finals, but they sure have their hands full despite having two of the top three players in the league on one team.

I really can't say whether or not he was overrated. It certainly helped for him to have four of the all time greats playing for his teams in Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen, Kobe Bryant, and Shaquille O'Neal. Of course, most of the all time great coaches had the luxury of having extremely talented teams, so you really can't put too much stock into that. The only way to really know whether or not he's overrated, he would have to coach a less talented team, and see how he would do in that situation. Larry Brown is the perfect example of a coach who was able to turn poor teams into fair teams, and fair teams into great teams.