Will Cuban retain Don Nelson? My take is if Dallas comes back and ties it 3-3, Nelson will stay irregardless of game 7. 4-2 nnnya maybe. But if they go down the next game thus 4-1 I think Cuban will look elsewhere.
re Philly:
O'Brien: I'm a 'fairly easy person to play for'
PHILADELPHIA -- Jim O'Brien will have the same rules for all of his Philadelphia 76ers: Be punctual, treat people with respect and treat everyone fairly.
"I don't think it's very complicated, frankly," he said.
Tell that to All-Star Allen Iverson, who has combined a habit of making practice optional with frequent run-ins with his coaches. Still, O'Brien figures he'll have more success getting along with Iverson than his predecessors.
"I have never had difficulty leading people and having people understand the expectations that I have," O'Brien said. "I'm a fairly easy person to play for."
The 76ers will find out soon enough about O'Brien, the former Boston Celtics coach who was introduced Wednesday as Philadelphia's 20th head coach and the third to lead the 76ers since Hall of Famer Larry Brown stepped down last May.
A Philadelphia native who attended Roman Catholic High School, the 52-year-old O'Brien was a three-year starter at Saint Joseph's and is the son-in-law of former 76ers coach Jack Ramsay. O'Brien said he has fulfilled a childhood dream by becoming the coach.
Winning a championship is the next dream, although it won't be easy right away with the present group of 76ers.
Under Randy Ayers and Chris Ford, the 76ers missed the playoffs for the first time since the 1997-98 season. Philadelphia's veteran lineup was creaky and undependable with Iverson, Derrick Coleman and Glenn Robinson missing big chunks of the season with injuries.
Some of those high-priced veterans could be dealt or left unprotected in the expansion draft this offseason. O'Brien wants to keep Iverson around, and the former Celtics coach would like Eric Snow and Aaron McKie to stick around also.
"You know the guys in this league you want on your side and you know the guys in the league that you don't want on your side," O'Brien said. "They were three guys that I just had a feeling it would be fun to compete with and be on their side."
Sixers president Billy King reiterated Wednesday that he will not try to trade Iverson, a former league MVP and scoring champion who is signed through 2008-09. Although the promises of being a better team player have been heard before, King said he believes Iverson is ready to change.
"I want to take the positive approach," King said. "Allen doesn't want to see his career go where it's been. People say he's breaking down, but last year he played all 82 games. I think he can get back healthy. I don't think he's lost it at 28 years old."
O'Brien, who said he had a brief and amicable conversation with Iverson on Wednesday, said whatever problems the All-Star had with previous coaches and management would stay in the past.
"We had open discussions about everything that happened last year," O'Brien said. "I'm satisfied that was then, and the future is the future. Clearly, what happened last year did not scare me from wanting to lead this team into next season."
King said O'Brien was always his first choice, and that he did not meet with any other potential candidates. King said he never asked Portland for permission to talk with coach Maurice Cheeks, a former 76ers' star.
King first met with O'Brien on March 25 in Boston and finalized the deal Monday, not wanting other teams to call O'Brien after the playoffs. O'Brien wanted to return to Philadelphia -- not that he was waiting for the only other team with an interim coach to come calling.
"Boston didn't want to hire me," he said, joking.
O'Brien stepped down as coach of the Celtics on Jan. 27, midway through his fourth season with the team after clashing with Danny Ainge, Boston's executive director of basketball operations. Ainge wanted to build a younger, more offensive team. O'Brien relied on veterans who were strong defenders.
O'Brien was 139-119 with the Celtics and led them to the Eastern Conference finals and semifinals in the last two seasons. He spent the last seven seasons with the Celtics, joining them as an assistant coach in 1997 and replacing Rick Pitino in 2001.
Assistant coach Dick Harter, a defensive specialist, was let go when O'Brien quit. O'Brien wants to hire Harter, though no deal has been finalized.
"Our goal right off the bat would be to be a top-five team in field-goal defense," O'Brien said. "In order to do that, they've got to work. Now can we do that with the current roster? That's something Billy and I will talk about in depth about over the next couple of months."
