Adelman Adelman is a good offensive minded coach. He deserves a lot of credit for holding this team together. However, he is not a good defensive minded coach. In his four years, every year the team defense got worse. Defense wins championships. Also, he was too loyal to his starters and refused to give younger players a chance. Only after Battier and Brooks were traded did Patterson and Lee got regular minutes and they delivered. He was forced to give these players minutes not because he wanted to. He did not, before the trade. So, he does not deserve credit for that. In fact, it shows he is an old timer who operates by loyalty to starter whether they are producing or not. That is not a good quality in a coach. It was time for a change. Hopefully we can get a coach who is good both offensively and defensively and can produce results.
I think people are really blowing out of proportion the "turnover" problem. Every team in our situation would have been trying to work a lot of trades. It's not like Morey was talking openly about who would be traded and how he really wanted to get guys outta here or something. He even said on numerous occasions that he liked our squad and would be OK with keeping the same core together, but he's just "always looking for ways to improve the team". And really, WTF. Isn't that true for every team that didn't just win a championship? I really don't understand all the hate. Somehow this guy has become underrated around here.
I'm definitely not a Morey hater--I really like his use of stats to help evaluate talent and his understanding of negotiation strategies (like leveraging a third party like the Kings in the Knicks deal). But I'm really disappointed in the coaching change and how they did it. I thought the Rockets were making progress at the end of the season under RA's system finally and am worried that the lack of continuity that comes with a coaching change may mess things up. I'm also concerned that we won't be able to get anyone as good at Adelman, especially with the reputation the the Rox now have of making it inhospitable to coaches when they want to get rid of them (see Rudy T, JVG, and RA's exits). The primary reason we didn't make the playoffs was that we lost Yao and T-mac, not because of the coaching. HoF caliber coaches will probably look at the Rox job and think to themselves why they should go to a place where they just unceremoniously dumped RA and blamed him for not making the playoffs. Instead, the type of coach we'll likely attract is a Mike Brown or a young upstart. Maybe we get lucky with a young coach. But we already had a great coach whose system was making lemonade out of lemons. We have Chuck Hayes as the starting center. No disrespect to him cuz he's a great player, but it's Chuck Hayes at center!
You forgot to mention that the Rox had a top-caliber defense in RA's first two years, which also coincided with having a giant 7'6" center instead of a 6'6" "center". His Portland teams were good defensive squads too where he almost won a championship except for the fact that his team was beaten by Jordan.
the liabilities outweighed the 'assets'. i would blame the players by default, after all isn't it a "players league" (according to adelman). morey and adelman both did their best assembling the team and putting the best lineup out there(the second half of the season at least), and the players were resilient and played hard. injuries got in the way. the rockets are groundhog day-esque
I'm not brainwashed. I'm convinced anyone willing to push for the GM to sign Brad Miller and then play him for over 20+ minutes and during crunch time has a distorted perception of reality. He sucks.
Besides Morey didn't even fire Adelman. If you read the interview, Morey and Les will decide together which coach to hire. It is obvious that Les trusts Morey. It is his team; if Les trusts Morey and didn't want Adelman, nothing we can do as fans. Adelman is a good coach but his refusal to play certain players can be frustrating. Squid will B. Free next year. Maybe Jordan Hill can get more minutes over Miller.
I knew Morey was fool's gold when the Gay for Battier trade went down. He is so overrated by Rockets fans that it is truly ridiculous.
It's going to be pretty funny seeing Morey make his next big move, and watching the two-faced monster that is Clutchfans come back to beg for forgiveness.
I'm gonna be honest, I think Morey's done a fantastic job in selling Rocket fans on absolutely nothing. I don't believe a system predicated on +/- stats can win championships. I also don't believe a MIT math nerd can have the pure basketball knowledge to make solid basketball decisions. Adelman's a pure basketball guy who knows has more experience than Morey could dream. I just think think you guys have been sold a pipe dream from con artist GM
DM himself created the poison environment before the trades where everyone was playing scared all season. Giving him credit for the success after the deadline when players could finally relax and concentrate on basketball is a simpleton approach.
