1) He advocates isolation Spoiler 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 Spoiler 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: 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
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.
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.
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.
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.
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:
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.
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.
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.