Think of it what you may, but the fact that the only head coach in the bj-league's Eastern Conference (10 teams) who held a position as a head coach with the same team last season comes from ... the Toyama Grouses, a team that has never been a winner, never finished at .500 or better, never even came close since joining the league in 2006.

Wait a second. Let me clarify my point. Kazuaki Shimoji, then the assistant, became Toyama's head coach last spring after Kohei Eto was relieved of his coaching duties. Now he's the longest tenured head coach among the Eastern bench bosses.

Kazuo Nakamura, you may recall, left the Hamamatsu Higashimikawa Phoenix after winning his second title there, landing a job as the coach of his hometown Akita Northern Happinets. That was set in motion by backroom dealings in Akita, where Bob Pierce was shown the door after one season in charge. He landed in Sendai, taking over for Honoo Hamaguchi, who had been the only coach in Sendai 89ers history.

Another "only coach in team history," Masaya Hirose, had his long tenure with the Niigata Albirex BB end after his team fell in the Final Four to the Phoenix. Former Albirex player Matt Garrison's first pro coaching job is in Niigata.

Longtime NBA coach Bob Hill and the Tokyo Apache are out of the league this season due to their well-documented money problems, i.e., ownership that refused to invest for the long term.

Bob Nash and the Saitama Broncos parted ways after the March 11 earthquake. The Broncos' fourth coach in as many seasons, Dean Murray, is now guiding the team toward its first possible playoff berth or the team's seventh consecutive failure.

Elsewhere, American Eric Gardow is the man in charge for the expansion Chiba Jets. He coached in Qatar last season.

Ex-NBA guard Reggie Geary is the first coach in Yokohama B-Corsairs history. The team also begins play next month.

Greek mentor Vlasios Vlaikidis will lead the expansion Iwate Big Bulls this season.

Which brings us back to the Phoenix, who'll aim for a third consecutive title, this time with longtime assistant Ryuji Kawai at the helm. He'll fill big shoes left by the departed Nakamura.

A quick recap: 90 percent of the East's coaches are new this season, in one way or another. That's the bj-league in a nutshell; nothing in place that encourages stability. (And for those keeping track of what's written above, I'm sure you have a headache, too, just thinking about it.)

The future success of the league -- attendance, sponsorships, media covearge --  demands greatly on some type of stability being in place, but the mentality of those in charge -- team GMs/presidents and the league office big wigs -- hasn't embraced any stability or expressed anything that indicates a basic level of understanding that patience is needed to build something special in pro sports at all levels.

A few quick notes on a national holiday, the first day of autumn:

*Today's basketball report in its entirety from The Japan Times.

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/sk20110923n1.html

*Featured interview on FIBA.com with ex-Tokyo Apache coach Bob Hill.

http://wuhan2011.fibaasia.net/TournamentInterviewDetails.aspx?id=131

*Former Niigata Albirex BB coach Masaya Hirose is now serving in a supporting role as a coach on Japan Under 18's boys national team.

*On a related note, this may be the worst website in the history of pro basketball. It belongs to the JBL's Levanga Hokkaido.

http://www.hssc.or.jp/

***
Today in Sendai, the 89ers greeted fans before the Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles baseball game at Kleenex Stadium.

As Sendai coach Bob Pierce observed, "Warm response. We lined up on the field and (guard Takehiko) Shimura said a few words. Many fans knew who the players were and asked to take pictures outside the stadium."

Good chance for free publicity and to connect with the community.

The Sendai 89ers hadn't played a game since March, just prior to the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake. The team's first game under new coach Bob Pierce on Monday, a 90-51 setback against the host Saitama Broncos, was the first step in getting the team put together.

Coach Pierce spoke about this challenge in a hot room inside of Hanno Civic Gymnasium on Monday.

Specifically, he spoke about the team's first post-March 11 game.

He said: "I wish I could say we were trying to play this like a real game. But we really haven't had any practice. Obviously coming back from what happened last (season), so many things are behind schedule. ... We haven't had our whole team together until Sunday's practice -- to have all our members that were here practice -- we're still missing one or two.

"We're really very far behind in preparation. I'm disappointed we couldn't make a better performance. ...

"All we could do is come out and try to do some of the things we worked on. I held them back a lot. A lot of the things we worked on, I wouldn't let them do in the game because we just needed to find out with steps A, B and C how wellwe do that, and then move to steps D, E, and F the next time we play.

“So it's definitely a work in progress. I hope the fans will be patient."

The 89ers, a symbol of courage, have a difficult journey ahead. But Pierce has displayed the right mind-set to lead this team at a difficult time.

 

It's been six months and a week since the Great East Japan Earthquake, and now the Sendai 89ers are back on the court, preparing for the 2011-12 season. Today, Monday Respect for the Aged Day in Japan, a national holiday, Sendai's preseason opener takes place at Hanno Civic Gymnasium in Saitama Prefecture, out in the suburbs.

The host Saitama Broncos, led by veteran American coach Dean Murray, faced the Chiba Jets on Saturday to kick off their new season.

A few familiar faces dot Saitama's roster: two-time bj-league scoring champion John "Helicopter" Humphrey, who last played in the upstart circuit when Joe Bryant patrolled the sideline for the Apache in the 2008-09 season; ex-NBA point guard Kenny Satterfield, a favorite on the NYC streetball scene; backup point guard Darin Satoshi Maki; forward Daiki Terashita, a versatile, speedy athlete and guard Yuki Kitamuki, who can drain 3-pointers in a hurry when he's on top of his game. Rookie forward John Flowers (West Virginia), whose mom Pam is a Hall of Fame legend in her own right, is one of the new bright faces in the league.

The Broncos have their fourth head coach in as many seasons. The last three: Bob Nash, Masato Fukushima and David Benoit. (Nobody said the Broncos value continuity, and the verdict is still out on the front office's commitment to winning.)

The new-look 89ers include Sudanese-born center Longar Longar (University of Oklahoma), former Marquette forward Dan Fitzgerald and forward Johnny Dukes (San Francisco). Popular guards Kenichi Takahashi, Hikaru Kusaka and Takehiko Shimura rejoined the 89ers after spending time as temporary rental players following the March 11 disaster. Saitama players also were picked up by other teams in the league for the season's stretch run last season. Now, many have rejoined their previous teams.

For Sendai, Bob Pierce is making his coaching debut. He previously ran the show from the get-go for two expansion teams: the Shiga Lakestars (2008-10) and the Akita Northern Happinets (last season). If there’s a better ambassador for the bj-league among the foreigners who’ve been involved in the league over the years, I haven't met him.

 

It's beyond my comprehension why the bj-league would choose to exclude 18 of its 19 head coaches from this season's media day on Sept. 26 in Tokyo.

Actually, it's not that big of a surprise.

This is a league, after all, that does little on a consistent basis to generate publicity in the media or create a buzz about what it's accomplished in its first six seasons. Player quotes after games remain unavailable for the national media and fans; they are not archived, distributed or posted online anywhere. So hundreds of games each year have little insight from the actual participants; call it a point of disgust for yours truly, but the league office has made no effort to work on this.

And remember this: It’s a league that is struggling mightily in several markets to attract enough fans to spend money to attend their games. People, it says here, do not have enough knowledge about the teams, players, coaches, quirky trends and history about the league.

In addition, with seven new teams in the past two seasons, including the expansion Chiba Jets, Iwate Big Bulls, Shinshu Brave Warriors and Yokohama B-Corsairs for 2011-12, you'd think the league office would insist on having its coaches do as many media functions as possible. Get the word out, would be the rationale, about the new teams. Give people with notepads, digital recorders and cameras endless opportunities to document the new coaches' hopes and aspirations.

But this is not the way the bj-league operates. Spending as little money as possible on things that matter is the normal way of doing things.

It's stunning, then, that even player representatives from each of the teams will be in Tokyo for next week's media event. Sure, players can say interesting, meaningful things. But first and foremost, this is the role of head coaches.

A year ago, it was a progressive move for the bj-league, which rarely does progressive things, to have player and coaching representatives from all 16 teams. In just a few hours, I was able to cram in enough interviews for a dozen or so stories; other reporters also greatly benefited from this. It was time well spent. And it was a necessary activity.

For a league spread out over 19 prefectures and three islands, having all of the coaches in one location at one time is time well spent and enables journalists in the nation's media capital an opportunity to do their job properly.

If the league isn't willing to provide these types of opportunities for journalists, it could adapt this motto: Sorry, media, your job doesn't matter to us."

But seriously, the league takes one step forward for every three steps it takes backward.

A media day without all the coaches is a horrible idea. This, however, would be at least a decent one: Set up a press teleconference (using Skype or a similar service). It could be done for free -- a policy I have been advocating for a few years now -- with each of the league's coaches. Give them 10-15 minutes to answer questions from reporters, many of whom are not in Tokyo, and may not get the OK from their editors to travel to Tokyo for a media event. Instead, a press teleconference would save money, and league staff could transcribe these comments in English and Japanese and post them on the league's website. Bam! Simple. It's a win-win concept, but it won't happen.

Why? The bj-league's media relations/PR staff personnel don’t see the big picture. Their energy and efforts are misguided and focused on other things.

It's time for common sense to prevail.

In a league with a high turnover of coaches (11 of 16 bench bosses to begin the 2010-11 season were not in those spots to kick off the previous campaign), a once-a-year event is not too much to ask for. Coaches are the public face of their franchises, and should fill that role as often as possible -- on the phone and in person.

Somewhere along the way, from its humble beginnings with six teams for the 2005-06 season to its 20-team (dropped to 19 after the Tokyo Apache bailed out of the league) planned setup for this season, the league lost track of what matters.

But it's never too late to recognize the importance of media. Often, media attention is the driving force in new fans' developing a passion for a sports league.