Monday the Memphis Grizzlies fired second year head coach David Fizdale. The Grizzlies are 7-12 and have lost eight straight games. The Grizzlies lost mainstays Zach Randolph and Tony Allen to free agency, which the Shock Exchange thought was a recipe for disaster. The team started out 5-1, but has been ailing since point guard Mike Conley went down with a foot injury. The game before the firing Fizdale benched center Mark Gasol for the entire fourth quarter. This led to speculation that an unhappy Gasol applied the knife.
Anyway, LeBron James wants answers:
People want overnight success right now. Everybody wants instant oatmeal … Memphis over the last couple of years has been a real good team … Mike Conley has been in and out … a lot, and we all know he’s the head of the snake … When he gets hurt things just don’t look well. I don’t know the details of it because I’m not around. I know what type of coach Fizdale is. I know how players relate to him and I know what he stands for.
Maybe that’s what it was … Maybe that’s what it was. He ain’t gon’ kiss nobody’s ___ I know that.
LeBron says “everybody in the basketball world” was surprised by David Fizdale’s firing. pic.twitter.com/BjqL5vuFUe
— SLAM Magazine (@SLAMonline) November 28, 2017
The Grizzlies made the playoffs in Fizdale’s first year as head coach but got bounced by the San Antonio Spurs 4-2 in the first round of the playoffs. Had Dirty Zaza Pachulia not purposely hurt Kawhi Leonard then the Spurs likely would have taken the cake last season. The Grizzlies were so embarrassed about losing to the NBA’s best team that they had to let Tony Allen and Zach go … really?
The Grizzlies have been betwixt and between for years – not good enough to overcome the Warriors or the Spurs, but not bad enough to get a top draft choice to change their fortunes. With their previous roster the Grizzlies were not going to get past Golden State or San Antonio. With the current roster they might not make the play offs at all. Teams shuttering coaches who have gotten the most out of their players has worn thin. The Shock Exchange has a feeling the Grizzlies will be irrelevant for the near future.
Trump And The Global Economy
The second installment of Trump And The Global Economy Town Hall took place October 24th in Fort Greene. It Featured Professor Lance Brofman, Coconut Rob (Coconut Rob Smoothies), Wuyi Jacobs (AfroBeats Radio) and Ralph Baker, author of Shock Exchange: How Inner-City Kids From Brooklyn Predicted the Great Recession and the Pain Ahead.
The event was well-received by the community. We parsed through President Trump’s proposed tax plan and [i] how it was pure economic folly and [ii] high net worth individuals could potentially game the system by shifting income around. Apparently, Kansas Coach Bill Self did this when the state of Kansas cut taxes in the past. We discussed the pros and cons of technology on workers and the economy. How will the economy and country prosper under Trump’s leadership vis-a-vis Obama? What’s behind the verbal sparring with black athletes, ESPN’s Jemele Hill and North Korea’s Kim Jong Un?
