BOSTON – Summer League team guard and Net hopeful Frankie King stepped one foot over halfcourt. Immediately, two defenders converged on a trap. Immediately, Byron Scott blew his whistle.
“Why? Why trap him out here? You’re trapping too high. Let him come down here,” Scott said and then demonstrated by walking 12-15 feet down the sideline in the tiny gym at Suffolk University yesterday. “You’ve got a shorter run, for one thing.”
There has been a lot of that from Scott during the Nets’ mini-camp last week and during workouts for the Shaw’s Pro Summer League at UMass-Boston this week. Through it all, Scott stops, explains, proceeds. It seemed Scott yesterday alone did more explaining, teaching and prodding than the Nets had seen in years.
“Having played for a couple different college coaches, a couple different pro coaches and a couple different Olympic coaches,” said Evan Eschmeyer, the lone player here who was with the Nets in the regular season, “there are coaches who are actively involved and teach at practice and there are coaches who sit back and let the assistants do it. Coach Scott is definitely a coach who is hands on.”
Definitely. But that doesn’t mean he’s a one-man show type, running everything himself while assistants try to recite the 50 states to themselves is reverse alphabetical order.
“We have the same philosophies, Byron, myself and Mike [O’Koren],” assistant Eddie Jordan claimed. “Byron is from the Laker school of thought, Pat Riley. I am too. He’s from the Mike Dunleavy, Don Nelson, Del Harris school of thought. I am too. I respect Larry Brown as one of the brightest coaches and I like to do things he does. We fit very well.”
Scott admits this is on-the-job training. Sure, he forged and molded his game plan and style while an assistant in Sacramento but he’s also learning as he goes. And he’s making sure the players do the same.
“There is a lot more teaching,” O’Koren offered. “Although we want them to go up and down, when Byron sees glaring things, he stops it and tells them what they did right and what they did wrong.”
Like at the end of yesterday’s session. Scott reinforced how pleased he was with the effort at practice but reminded how disappointed he was with some shoddy play Tuesday that resulted in a summer league loss.
“I don’t like losing,” Scott told his players, who resume play today against Milwaukee. “I HATE losing. I especially don’t like losing when you don’t play your best. So let’s have some fun, win some games. You guys are better than you played yesterday.”
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Jerod Ward, late of Michigan the IBL and three knee surgeries, has impressed with athleticism. In his summer league debut, he hauled in six rebounds in 14 minutes … No. 1 pick Kenyon Martin continues hanging around team, watching practices, learning. That has impressed the heck out of Scott. “He didn’t have to be here. I wouldn’t have. I was [picked] fourth,” Scott laughed. “Seriously, though I know a lot of guys wouldn’t have shown up.”
