1. Welcome! Please take a few seconds to create your free account to post threads, make some friends, remove a few ads while surfing and much more. ClutchFans has been bringing fans together to talk Houston Sports since 1996. Join us!

Clearing Up Misconceptions About McHale

Discussion in 'Houston Rockets: Game Action & Roster Moves' started by Patterned919, Mar 31, 2013.

  1. Patterned919

    Patterned919 Member

    Joined:
    Jan 19, 2013
    Messages:
    2,332
    Likes Received:
    163
    1) He advocates isolation

    This is a matter of the team not executing correctly, not the coaches themselves advocating for it. Here are a few quotes and articles to give you a better idea:


    Quotes after the recent Pacer's game:

    After Rockets guard Jeremy Lin had three-consecutive games scoring at least 20 points, he had a fourth-consecutive game in which he failed to score in double figures. But Rockets coach Kevin McHale said that might indicate sluggishness and breakdowns of the Rockets’ offense as a whole more than Lin’s play, especially Wednesday against the Pacers.

    “We’re a little more read and react,” McHale said. “It’s systemic to our team not moving the ball, not moving bodies enough, just being a little bit stagnant. Indiana puts you in positions, they do stymie you a little bit. We have to pick our pace back up. We have slowed back down some. This time of year, everybody is getting a little worn out, a little tired. We have to get our pace up.”


    Parson's on practice drills:

    Q: Are there any drills you run that are different than anything you've done before?

    A: "Practice is hard. We'll do certain drills where we can't dribble, or if we're guarding transition we can't guard the guy that was guarding you. Different things like that to teach you to sprint back and to push the ball."

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5erIPJN8d7A


    Article from November:

    "Typically, when Harden picked up his dribble, there was little movement to give him options. In the fourth quarter when he briefly sat, the Rockets had Parsons handle the ball only to get caught in the same trap.

    Coach Kevin McHale shouted “Move it! Move it! Move it!” Again, no one did."

    http://blog.chron.com/ultimaterocke...l-to-work-out-the-kinks-in-loss-to-grizzlies/


    Quote during the 7 game losing streak:

    "That’s no excuse for it. We still have to do what we have to do. I’ve said it all along; our guys are getting closer to understanding how we have to play and taking ownership of how we have to play.

    “But then we’ll backslide and get into how they want to play, not how we have to play. I think it will be a constant all year, just trying to get everybody on the same page.”

    "We're not getting any easy baskets anymore," McHale explained. "We're not leading the league in scoring; we're not running hard. You know, we're so out of character right now. We have turnovers, guys are open and we're not hitting them. We're really in a funk. And we've got to get ourselves out of it. That's bottom line. And we will.”

    "We have to play with pace. We have to move the ball. The ball can't get sticky. It's got to go from side to side."


    Quote from December:

    After the game, Kevin McHale called the ball "sticky" as the Rockets tried to run their offensive sets, basically saying there wasn't enough ball movement.

    The Rockets' leading scorer for the game, James Harden, was asked about it afterwards.

    "Yeah, it's a mixture of that and guys just not making shots today," Harden said. "So it's a mixture of both. We have to correct those things, watch some film, and get better at it."

    2) He was a bad coach in Minnesota

    In 2005, he fell onto an interim coaching position. Anthony Carter joked how bad he was with X's and O's and said he often relied on his assistant coaches for that. That was McHale's first time coaching and I'm sure he's gotten better at drawing up plays, but that's exactly why you have assistant coaches. Phil Jackson, usually recognized as the greatest coach of all time, admittedly depended on his assistant coaches for X's and O's, namely Tex. Tex Winter is actually the guy responsible for the triangle offense, but Phil has been pretty adamant that that's not what being a head coach is about.

    Here are some quotes from Phil himself for those unfamiliar:

    "I never consider myself to be an X and Os guy as far as a basketball guy," said Jackson. "Tex Winter, my assistant coach and colleague for the last 20 years, really loved the details and execution of basketball and would sit with me and we would do film sessions and we would do planning together. But the reality is basketball is based on chemistry, guys who want to play together, want to share the work together, want to sacrifice for each other and learn how to do that. I recognized that at early age and that was really a part of what I was participating in when I was a New York Knickerbocker player and that's what I took away from that experience."

    "I think the most important thing about coaching is that you have to have a sense of confidence about what you're doing. You have to be a salesman and you have to get your players, particularly your leaders, to believe in what you're trying to accomplish on the basketball floor."

    Morey seems to subscribe to a similar theory, here are some quotes from Morey during the search for a new head coach:

    "Whenever Morey was asked about his requirements for the next coach, he’d begin by saying, “A leader of men.”

    "We're all evaluated on wins and losses, that's how it should be," Morey said. "But when you look at a coaching record, you've got to look deeper. You've got to look at when Kevin took over for those franchises, they did better with him than the person he took over for"

    Here are the records Morey is referring to, and indeed, McHale led the Wolves to a better record than the coach before him and the one after him:

    [​IMG]

    [​IMG]

    He also won coach of the month in 2009.

    Much of the criticism you hear of McHale from Minnesota was actually for his woes as a GM, or people not being able to separate the two things.

    Here are a few threads at the time he was let go as a coach. People, despite hating him as a GM, gave credit to him as a coach:

    http://www.insidehoops.com/forum/showthread.php?t=136023
    http://www.footballsfuture.com/phpB...4&start=0&postdays=0&postorder=asc&highlight=
    http://forums.realgm.com/boards/viewtopic.php?f=22&t=914490
     
    11 people like this.
  2. Pieman2005

    Pieman2005 Member

    Joined:
    Sep 30, 2009
    Messages:
    4,070
    Likes Received:
    188
    Kevin McHale advocates iso ball and was a bad coach in Minnesota!

    jk

    Well written OP :)
     
  3. DBRox

    DBRox Contributing Member

    Joined:
    Jan 11, 2013
    Messages:
    723
    Likes Received:
    17
    Good stuff. Thanks for posting that, very interesting.
     
  4. durvasa

    durvasa Contributing Member

    Joined:
    Feb 11, 2006
    Messages:
    37,912
    Likes Received:
    15,377
    Thank you. Blaming McHale in ISO-ball makes no sense. He's constantly talking about how we need to move the ball and not let it "stick".

    Harden is going to have the ball in his hands a lot because he's our best shot creator (and guess what, we're a top 10 offensive team mostly due to him). But that doesn't mean the other guys should just stand around and watch.
     
  5. flamingdts

    flamingdts Member

    Joined:
    Feb 23, 2008
    Messages:
    11,550
    Likes Received:
    4,488
    I disagree.

    It's pretty obvious that McHale advocates Iso-ball because he wants to prop up Harden's stats, otherwise Morey will look terrible for giving Harden the max contract.

    Now, obviously Iso-ball is not a sound offensive strategy and McHale using it to prop up Harden's stats would also mean he is sacrificing the team's wins, in turn affecting his resume as a coach. That doesn't matter, for McHale has ulterior motives. Reliable sources (Vanilla Ice's Twitter, TMZ comment page and internet user "McHaleSux") have stated that they believe McHale and Harden are having an affair, supposedly McHale told Harden he "wanted 29 kisses, not 9 wins".

    I think we should fire McHale and trade Harden as the team's success is not their priority.
     
    2 people like this.
  6. rocketsballin

    rocketsballin Member

    Joined:
    Nov 23, 2012
    Messages:
    8,041
    Likes Received:
    1,483
    good analysis op, it was a good read

    but, the coach before and after mchale had a lot more games. im not gonna get too into that tho

    i have no problem with mchale as the coach next year. just hate some of his rotations. automatically think of the lockout year. last month of the reg season and patterson finishes the games at center, instead of camby or dalembert.
     
  7. J Sizzle

    J Sizzle Member

    Joined:
    Feb 27, 2012
    Messages:
    43,478
    Likes Received:
    29,493
    The dudes who want him fired simply blame him for anything they can think of. Nothing new...
     
  8. SMROX

    SMROX Member

    Joined:
    Jan 31, 2013
    Messages:
    23
    Likes Received:
    3
    You just forget about the 7 game losing streak.
     
  9. CertifiedTroll

    Joined:
    Feb 1, 2012
    Messages:
    3,103
    Likes Received:
    924
    I really think Van Gundy is going to lead us deep into the play offs this year.
     
  10. tminusrex

    tminusrex Rookie

    Joined:
    Aug 3, 2012
    Messages:
    671
    Likes Received:
    35
    even mchale's own players want him ousted
     
  11. LosPollosHermanos

    LosPollosHermanos Houston only fan
    Supporting Member

    Joined:
    Aug 25, 2009
    Messages:
    28,582
    Likes Received:
    12,520
    how so?





    Cool post btw OP.
     
  12. gengar

    gengar Member

    Joined:
    Nov 19, 2012
    Messages:
    310
    Likes Received:
    25
    There was one game where he called time-out and the play right after that (which he drew up) was a Harden-iso play. A lot of people were smh on that.
     
  13. Kiddsir

    Kiddsir Member

    Joined:
    Jan 31, 2013
    Messages:
    1,734
    Likes Received:
    69
    It doesn't matter what he said, it does matter what he did.
     
  14. ngazi

    ngazi Member

    Joined:
    Mar 14, 2013
    Messages:
    186
    Likes Received:
    4
    Yeah if you don't want to ball to get sticky you run a set.
     
  15. Clutch

    Clutch Administrator
    Staff Member

    Joined:
    Feb 13, 1999
    Messages:
    22,644
    Likes Received:
    31,824
    I took a look at your posting history and found that you've brought absolutely nothing of substance to this board. Not a single quality post. No loss here at all:

     
  16. HOUSTONJS

    HOUSTONJS Member

    Joined:
    Jan 22, 2013
    Messages:
    1,070
    Likes Received:
    18
    I personally think it is harder to do with a young team. I know that instead of practicing sets, the Thunder would just scrimmage against each other since that would get across way better than the sets. They experienced a lot of the same woes the casual fan would bring up. Stickiness, Iso-ball, turnovers. This seems the way that we run the machine. I just want to see this team develop to see what they can become. McHale knows how to draw up a great play, also, just like Scotty Brooks. That is a misconception as well. I loved the double flare screen to give Jeremy that first bucket in that NY game at the Garden to ease him into it. He is a coach that doesn't get enough credit. Imagine having to mend fences last year with the players that were going to get traded in his first year here. He weren't projected to win 30 games with Harden and we are at 40, now. It is crazy.
     
  17. dantian

    dantian Member

    Joined:
    Jul 21, 2012
    Messages:
    357
    Likes Received:
    7
    There is a difference between "preaching ball-movement" and implementing sets to have successful ball movements. Without the latter, it'd be kinda freelancing offense. Coach needs to instill more structure and sets like what Sloan used to do.
     
  18. mig0s

    mig0s Member

    Joined:
    Feb 26, 2008
    Messages:
    3,894
    Likes Received:
    687
    good job clutch! Random Fan should be next!
     
  19. daspydamayn

    daspydamayn Member

    Joined:
    Feb 20, 2008
    Messages:
    477
    Likes Received:
    17
  20. ngazi

    ngazi Member

    Joined:
    Mar 14, 2013
    Messages:
    186
    Likes Received:
    4
    Yeah I know the players have to buy in to running the set and someone has to have the leadership to call it out too. But however we get there, sets are what I think we need the most.
     

Share This Page

  • About ClutchFans

    Since 1996, ClutchFans has been loud and proud covering the Houston Rockets, helping set an industry standard for team fan sites. The forums have been a home for Houston sports fans as well as basketball fanatics around the globe.

  • Support ClutchFans!

    If you find that ClutchFans is a valuable resource for you, please consider becoming a Supporting Member. Supporting Members can upload photos and attachments directly to their posts, customize their user title and more. Gold Supporters see zero ads!


    Upgrade Now