Well, we've been done for a while, but with the next round of elections fast approaching, wanted to post a quick note on the NT status.
First, this season. We had another successful repechage beating Portugal (again) to advance to world's. Unfortunately, we ran into some good teams. We had decided that if we were going to advance to the second group round, we wanted to do so with a legitimate chance at the semi-finals. As such, we made a few decision that ultimately cost us (normal vs France and Hungary, both losses, a TIE vs Australia that worked, but left us short on PD). We ended up finishing at 2-3 (with 2 of our 3 losses coming against higher efforts) and missing out on advancing based on point differential. A disappointing end, but I'm glad we went for it, and I'm happy with the decisions we made.
Second, the team. I think these past two seasons showed just how close the top world's teams are. No longer can you sit back and take a team from a small country lightly. There's just too many good players, and the salary restrictions mean that almost every country's best players are very similar. That said, we continue to make huge strides in our personnel quality: Joe Bronson may be the best PG in the world at this point, and we now have a solid core of guards around him, all of whom can score, pass and defend at elite levels. Madrid, who not long ago was our clear top player, may not even be a top-4 guard for us by the time next season starts up. Velasco is finally approaching world class ability at SF, and we've found a number of SG's and PF's with the skills to play there as well when the situation calls for it. Our bigs have been a bit stagnant lately, as Renteria and Arzapalo have been hard to unseat when in good GS, but there's still some nice looking big men on the horizon.
Lastly, I wanted to take this opportunity to thank everyone that's been involved in the NT over the past four seasons. When elections start up later this week, I won't be running for another term. I've had less and less time available to devote to the NT, and while I think we still had adequate time scouting and discussing game plans, I haven't done as much community outreach as I had wanted, and I think that left a lot of potential interest on the sidelines. Plus, Coco's been getting a little too comfortable atop the NBBA, so I think it's time I devoted some effort towards dethroning him.
Over my time in charge, and in particular this past season, we've accumulated a great "staff" of people helping out with all aspects of the NT. jfarb provided some absolutely fantastic opposition scouting reports this season that provided the basis for many of our game plans that not only saved me a ton of time, but provided some fantastic insights into the teams we were playing. oriolekid, jfriske03 and stalzag have done a great job of keeping our scouting lists current, as well as communicating with people training future NTers. mfork00's database tools are just... phenomenal. And the community of people who have contributed to the planning and discussion on the offsite (fatcurry, jelme, coco, brian, sherlock, rambo, smedlock, namssor, peluin and more) have been a huge help. Whoever ends up as the next coach will be inheriting a terrific group of people, and I hope they're put us to good use.
Good luck to those who decide to run, and I heartily encourage everyone to read the speeches and ask some questions when the election starts up. I know we're going to have some great candidates, so it should be fun to watch!
Last edited by wozzvt at 1/10/2011 2:47:35 PM