Grading Mike Brown's Performance with Los Angeles Lakers at Halfway Mark

Mike Brown is in the middle of his first season as the head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. It's time to give him his midseason report card. 

For Brown, there have been some good things, some not so good things, some bad things and, well, some downright non-existent things. 

I've broken his coaching down into five categories and graded him accordingly.

In Game Adjustments: Incomplete

The biggest problem with Mike Brown is that he doesn't seem to make in-game adjustments. 

That's what makes them so hard to grade. How do you grade what's not there? Brown hasn't even "earned" an F. 

The only question I had was whether he should get an Incomplete or a Withdrawn Failing. For now, I'm giving him the Incomplete because there's still another half of the season to at least try an in-game adjustment. 

Offense: D+

Mike Brown gets a passing grade, but barely, for offense. The Lakers are 15th in the NBA in offensive rating, which isn't bad. However, when you consider that he has the best offensive tandem in the NBA in the middle, it is mind boggling that they are only 15th.

Of their players, the Lakers have gone to Kobe Bryant 896 times, compared to 265 for Bynum and 514 for Gasol. That's 120 more plays run for Bryant than Gasol and Bynum, two of the best scoring big men in the NBA, combined. 

Both Bynum and Gasol are averaging .98 points per play compared to Bryant's .91. 

Furthermore, in spite of the fact that Gasol is one of the best post-up players in the game, scoring 1.02 points per play, Brown has gone to Gasol the fewest of the three. In spite of the fact that Bynum is one of the best pick-and-roll players in the NBA, Brow has only gone to Bynum 10 times this year as the roll man. 

You're going to have an above average offense if you're just letting Kobe Bryant do whatever he wants every time down the court, but you're not going to fully utilize the talent you have. Brown and the Lakers could have a top five offense if he did a better job of utilizing his bigs. 

Advance Game Planning: B-

What he lacks in in-game adjustments, Brown makes up for in advanced scouting. He normally has his team ready to play well against the opponents. 

Brown is one of the better coaches in the game in terms of advanced scouting, but he loses some points for letting Jeremy Lin school them for 38 points. 

If Kobe Bryant didn't really know who he was, that's on the coaching. I was a bit skeptical that was true until Lin went off on them. If they'd scouted him appropriately, it's doubtful he would have gotten that many points. 

Of course, when you have Derek Fisher "guarding" someone, there's only so far scouting goes. 

Player Management: B-

For the most part, Brown has done a good job of player management. He inherited a situation that could have easily been a mess. Kobe Bryant was mad about Lamar Odom being traded, Pau Gasol was mad about getting traded (but not traded for basketball reasons) and Ron Artest was Metta World Peace. 

That's a lot of personalities to juggle, and for the most part, Brown has done a good job. There have been some grumblings, though. Gasol has complained about his role, and Metta World Peace has complained that Brown pays too much attention to stats.

Brown says that if he paid attention to stats, Metta wouldn't be playing. Good answer. 

He's doing a good job of managing the grumblings, but if he was doing an "A" job, there wouldn't be grumblings. 

Defense: A-

The Lakers are 10th in the NBA in defensive rating in spite of the fact that Derek Fisher is their starting point guard. Brown has to be doing something right defensively.

Thy are giving up an effective field-goal percentage of just .453—third-best in the NBA. 

However, they have a defensive rebound percentage of just .737, which is just hard to justify when you have two seven-footers underneath the basket. The Lakers need to improve their rebounding. They have the players to be a good rebounding team.

That's why Brown gets lowered from an A to an A- on defense.