Avery Johnson
Avery Johnson
Avery Johnsonis an American basketball coach who is currently the head coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide men's basketball team. Johnson spent 16 years in the National Basketball Association as a player, and subsequently served as the head coach of two NBA teams: the Dallas Mavericks and New Jersey/Brooklyn Nets. He led the Mavericks to their first NBA Finals appearance and to three consecutive 50+ win seasons. During his playing days, Johnson was known as the "Little General" for his...
ProfessionBasketball Player
Date of Birth25 March 1969
CityNew Orleans, LA
I'm not sure Nellie could tell me anything I don't already know about Pop's camps.
They made a run. They're a very good basketball team. The second half, they got it within two, and we just suggested 'stay tough-minded.' And we were able to get somewhat of a cushion.
They have two really terrific players in Shaq and Wade.
These two teams have a lot of pride. Memphis doesn't back down from anybody, and it has not played its best game yet.
In my opinion, looking at that game and looking at some of our recent All-Star games, the game was much more serious. Now, they still scored a lot of points. But the games were a little bit more physical from what I can tell.
He's out for an extended period of time. We've lost an important part of our rotation.
He's our guy who penetrates and gets to the basket. We definitely don't want any hesitancy there. The goal is to get him as healthy as we can for the playoffs.
He's proven he can go two weeks and jump out there and do something, but as we get closer toward the end of the season, I'd like to try to plug him in here and there. You can't expect him to always get out there and be Superman.
He's not underrated in our book. He does a lot for us. And when you do things on a more consistent basis, you tend to catch people's attention.
He's made some improvement, but we don't know how bad it is yet. We just know he's out (Sunday).
I'm glad to get this series over. Obviously, we would have had four swings at it. I'm glad to get it on the first swing. Now it's time for us to try to get some rest and get some bodies healed and get back to practice, because that's my favorite part of this whole deal.
I'm going to think that I won't have him, then hopefully we will.
I'm going to stop saying every time we have games like this that I failed. I've been waiting 79 games to get some internal leadership. I haven't gotten it yet.
I'm not going to do what I did last year. He's been on me about how I managed his minutes last year and he seems to think that that had an effect on him going into the first round. So Coach is going to accommodate him.