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Rajon Rondo admits he’s not easy to coach

Boston Celtics head coach Doc Rivers gestures to Rajon Rondo in the second quarter as the Celtics play the Miami Heat during Game 5 of their Eastern Conference Finals NBA basketball playoffs in Miami, Florida

Boston Celtics head coach Doc Rivers (R) gestures to Rajon Rondo in the second quarter as the Celtics play the Miami Heat during Game 5 of their Eastern Conference Finals NBA basketball playoffs in Miami, Florida June 5, 2012. REUTERS/Andrew Innerarity (UNITED STATES - Tags: SPORT BASKETBALL)

REUTERS

Rajon Rondo is really good at Connect 4. Seriously. He showed that skill off in an interview put together by Red Bull.

He also knows that he is not the easiest guy in the world to coach. When asked if he was hard to coach when he came into the league he owned up to it and more (you can see the interview here).

“I still am. It’s not that I’m hard to coach, it’s just that I may challenge what you say. I know the game myself, I’m out there playing the game. So I may have saw something different versus what you saw from the sideline. I’m going to be respectable. I’m going to let the coach talk.”

Well, we all know coaches love to be challenged... Rondo has had his run ins with Doc Rivers over the years, but now they seem to be on the same page most of the time.

Mike Krzyzewski and other coaches have said that the biggest difference between much of the current generation of athletes and older ones is that today’s guys want to know why? If you’re running a drill or installing some wrinkle in the offense, they want to see the reason, they want the big picture. Explain the context and they will still run through a wall for you, now they just will not do it without reason. I think that’s a good thing. The era of “do it because I said so” should be gone the way of old Rutgers basketball coaches. If you can’t explain why you want guys to do something you need to think about why your are asking it to be done. Because I said so isn’t good enough anymore.