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Friday, December 21
Updated: December 23, 8:29 AM ET
 
Trying to figure out what's going on in Denver

By Frank Hughes
Special to ESPN.com

I recently was e-mailed a list of some classic Hollywood Squares answers, and one of my favorite lines was when Charley Weaver was asked:

"If you're going to make a parachute jump, you should be at least how high?"

Dan Issel
Dan Issel is expected to be coaching the Nuggets on Saturday.
Said Weaver: "Three days of steady drinking should do it."

No, this is not a column about Steve Francis or Maurice Taylor or Lamar Odom.

But my point is this: You don't always get the answer you are expecting to hear.

Which is why it does not surprise me that Dan Issel still is officially the coach of the Denver Nuggets, even though he now is on his requested leave of absence.

But it does confound me.

Only because we have context on which to base my head-scratching. Namely, Golden State's Dave Cowens.

At a time that the two franchises play one another Saturday night (Golden State won 105-101), let us compare:

Cowens, a super nice guy, lost control of his team. He lost his players' respect; they weren't working hard; they had turned a decent team at the beginning of the season into a poor team by the time of his firing, losing 12 of 15; nobody knew what their roles were; and Cowens was not willing or perhaps not able to communicate. So he got fired.

Issel, by all accounts not a super nice guy, lost control of his team. He lost his players' respect last season when they had a mutiny and did not show up for practice; they turned a decent team into a poor team, and now have a worse record (9-15) than the Warriors' (10-16); the only way Issel communicates is by yelling, loudly; and, oh yeah, he told some fan to "go drink another beer, you (expletive) Mexican piece of (expletive)," causing the town to go into a racial uproar and alienating countless number of fans at an arena that already is more than half empty.

He still has his job.

I think I'll take Charley Weaver's advice and go have three days of drinking to try and figure it out.

As much as it pains me -- what I am about to say, not the drinking -- I am not suggesting that Cowens should have been kept around. He simply was not doing a good job with this team -- which is a shame, because he actually did a fantastic job when he was in Charlotte, and he did not get his just due.

I hope it is not his last stop on the coaching circuit, because I really think Cowens is a decent coach who is capable of running a team.

He just was not capable of running this Warriors team. He was not willing to address players' concerns, which in an old-school sort of way I respect. But in this day and age, when, as George Karl likes to say, players can m********k you, a coach needs to have some semblance of communication going on.

In Golden State, Antawn Jamison was unhappy that he was playing mostly small forward, rather than the power forward spot at which he excelled last season.

Danny Fortson was always bitching about his minutes. Bob Sura did not know where he fit in, even when he played well. Erick Dampier, for some reason or another, continues to be given chance after chance, even though he has proven that he is not worth his $49 million contract.

Basically, there were too many guys playing the same spots on the floor, and Cowens was not willing to simply say: This is the way it is going to be, no more arguing.

Interim coach Brian Winters already has done that. He has given the Warriors a nine-man rotation, and told Adonal Foyle he is out of it. That may change now that Dampier is injured again, but Winters at least has the right idea.

In Denver, new general manager Kiki Vandeweghe had the perfect opportunity to get a fresh start, hire his own guy and rid the organization of what has become a circus atmosphere in recent seasons.

Issel gave Vandeweghe the absolutely legimate opportunity to put both sides out of their miseries -- and for some reason, Vandeweghe didn't.

It's not as if the Nuggets are having some sort of surprising season and people can't stop talking about them. They are lousy. They win when Nick Van Exel absolutely goes off, otherwise they are a very mediocre team.

I know, I know, they are going to be good when Antonio McDyess gets back from his knee injury.

Not only has (Issel) alienated the community, he has disenfranchised his players, including Raef LaFrentz, the one true asset of the franchise, who Issel has made into a whipping boy; and (Nick) Van Exel, who said he is tired of losing and wants to be traded.

Why? They haven't been yet. They have been saying that in Denver for how many seasons, and the Nuggets still have not made the playoffs? I couldn't believe it when I recently read that McDyess can opt out of his contract after next season if he wants to. Seems like he just got the thing. And yet, Denver continues to lose.

All of which can be placed on the shoulders of Issel. Not only has he alienated the community, he has disenfranchised his players, including Raef LaFrentz, the one true asset of the franchise, who Issel has made into a whipping boy; and Van Exel, who said he is tired of losing and wants to be traded.

The only thing I can think of is that Issel is the public face of the Nuggets franchise. He has been with them for 25 years, as a player, coach, general manager and president. He was there for the team's biggest playoff win, the 1994 first-round upset of the heavily favored Seattle SuperSonics. His name is, for all intents, synonomous with the Nuggets -- and firing him in disgrace would mean that the team has no recognizable history, or what it does have is badly tarnished.

The best analogy I can think of is this: Go back and watch one of the original Naked Gun movies. You are cruising along, laughing at Leslie Nielsen, and all of a sudden O.J. Simpson pops up on the screen. It is one of the most surreal things in the world to watch, the old happy-go-lucky O.J., getting crunched up in a hospital bed, getting thrown off the upper deck in a wheelchair, getting run over by a car. Then you think about everything else and it is seriously mind-blowing.

In a way -- though certainly not as seriously -- that is what they are looking at in Denver. A once-celebrated hometown hero has become a pariah, and the organization is doing everything it can to save its own image. At some point, you are probably going to see Issel released, and the Nuggets will give him a golden parachute.

Before Issel accepts it, three days of heavy drinking should help.

Frank Hughes covers the NBA for the Tacoma (Wash.) News-Tribune. He is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.





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