Quotes from Mike D'Antoni

To me, a big man has to be able to guard on the perimeter.

I don't care who guards him. He's still going to be Anthony Davis.

I was blessed to have a lot of good point guards throughout.

Well, I don't know one coach in the NBA who doesn't have high blood pressure.

It's basketball. This is great. How do you get scars from something you love? You can get some regrets, 'I wish I would've done that.' But there's no scars. This is too good.

There's always things we could have done better, and it's easier with hindsight.

Players, if you give them the freedom, then they will do remarkable things.

Some of the hard part of coaching is to be able to drag people over to the next side. People are comfortable with doing business a certain way. When that business kind of shifts to get people to change, it's not easy. It's a process.

If you're a ball stopper, usually you're inefficient.

There's some guys in the league that I really want to respect me. I respect the way they play, I respect the way they look at the game, and their respect is more important instead of having a job.

Things don't always go smoothly.

Kobe woks harder than anybody I've seen.

When it came to basketball, I was a fanatic. I started to focus solely on basketball the summer before my freshman year in high school. I worked on my shooting in the driveway, drawing up charts where I recorded each day's performance. I spent hours working alone on ball-handling. I ran five miles a day and played games against my friends.

Every coach in the league does an unbelievable job, and they're prepared and think you're going to outcoach people, or you think that you're going to surprise, but you don't.

Nash was a purist. Steve's a Hall of Fame point guard. He was unbelievably good.

A lot of 3s, a lot of ball movement, a lot of quick movements. Yes, you can win that way.

You talk about winning championships, well championships are won by 12 guys, the organization, being in the right spot at the right time.

Kobe is a unique individual and he is very headstrong.

I don't actually like coffee. But I'm addicted to Starbucks.

I shouldn't have left Nash in the sense that he's special as a player. You've got to nurture that. But New York was great for me.

I don't know of anybody not trying on offense when they're upset.

It was reported that I said I wouldn't, shouldn't have gone to New York. No. I said I shouldn't have left Steve Nash. It's a little bit different on the meaning.

Having Steve Nash running your team makes you a lot smarter.

I think coaching Steve Nash is easy no matter if it's a good or bad start.