It seems like with the current situation of locker room troubles and growing pains of adjusting to a new coach, a lot of this could have been avoided by not firing Rick Adelman who was overachieving at his job. Overall, I think we would have had more wins out of the team as it is and the players would be happy and people who know Rick's name might actually be open to coming to Houston to play. Also, I think we may not have seen some good things happen; i.e. Parsons getting play time, or any rookie for that matter. So I ask you guys: What if we didn't fire Rick? Where do you think we'd be as a ball club and what do you think could have played out? IBCDFMTC (In before cleverly disguised fire McHale Thread comment)
I just want to remind people that when McHale was hired one of the things said was how he'd be a player's coach and be liked by the players and media. Rick was often mocked for his surly attitude, refusal to play young players, etc. Nicknamed "Rick the Ruler." Now, clutchfans wants him back and says McHale only plays people he likes, is a jerk that players hate, etc. and Rick is the guy that would cure all of that and make everyone happy. Grass is always greener you know. (FWIW, I think Rick is a better coach, one of the best in the game and I wish we still had him. Not for fluff garbage though.)
I wouldn't say that Adelman "overachieved" his last few years. He essentially did what McHale did in the last 2 years (miss the playoffs with a >.500 record. Adelman may have had a few more wins this past season, but certainly not enough to make a large difference. Yeah, the fact that Lowry/Martin aren't happy kind of sucks, but that was because of their situation. Dragic earned the starting spot (like Lowry did) and Martin was hurt. Not to mention that Martin has a man-crush on Adelman. I feel that Adelman is an overrated coach as a whole. He has a lot of wins, but not much to show for it. Is he a better coach than McHale, yes, but I think the mediocrity of the team will be prevalent with any coach right now.
People on Clutchfans would still be b****ing about him not calling timeouts to stop a run. Sometimes I feel like bumping all those threads to remind people how much they complained about Adelman.
Oh I never wanted Rick gone in the first place. I think he doesn't play rookies because he knows that sometimes you have to deal with lockerroom issues. He just does it in a very hands off way and tries to let the rookies develop and beat out the players on the team in practice. Once they prove they earn the minutes and the players understand, I think Rick does give them.
You'll never find me complaining about Rick. I loved him as a coach. I think he is one of the best this game has ever had and it is a shame he isn't still coaching this team. However, I hope none of the "tankers" say they want him back since they also complained that he wasn't a good coach for that.
McHale had real bigs... Adelman had Jordan Hill. Over achieved he did. The record v the lineup is why I say that. McHale had better players and still only got to .500
Dalembert is a real big? He is lazy, unpredictable, and is a career 8/8 guy. Would Parsons have been a bright spot with Adelman? Probably not, Bud would probably still be at the 3.
I never wanted to get rid of Adelman and I never wanted to hire McHale. (Then again, I never wanted to get rid of JVG!) But I'm not a McHale-hater. Hard to say where we'd be now with Adelman as the coach. I was led to believe that there was friction between him and Morey/Les. If that was indeed the case, then I'm sure he'd be pretty disatisfied with the team right now. Instead of having players upset, we'd have the coach upset. Not sure which is preferable.
Sam was unmotivated. Rick could get him to play better. Also we all heard Chase talk about how McHale would only run pick and roll. This is what killed us; a lack of good plays and players killed us.
Such folly. Adelman has always been a coach who coached his team's greatness up. But yes, he's always been foiled in his pursuit of a title by bad luck; be it bad referees, injuries (Yao/Tmac) or running into a team that just had players who were to great to overcome. (Jordan, Shaq, Kobe, etc.) If Adelman had be the coach of the Bulls and Lakers he'd have the same rings Jackson does.
Adelman is a far superior to coach to McHale. The fact that Adelman got us winning records even in his last season while playing 6'6" Hayes as center says it all. McHale had two legit defensive rebounders and shot blockers at the Center position but his affinity to playing Ppat and Scola together for a lot of minutes cost us.
You see, DD? We can agree from time to time. Yes, IMO, we'd be a better team. We'd have more team stability (players knowing and understanding their roles, as an example, something McHale needs some serious work on, imo), we'd have continuity on offense. Heck, we would know what offense we're running. We would still have a decent defense if we had good defensive players, Adelman being very underrated as a defensive coach (look at some of his teams in Portland, as an example). One could go on, but really, what's the point? Haven't we beat this subject to death?
I know MacHale has had his fair share of detractors from day one but he was pretty popular, until the collapse happened; was that something Adelman would have avoided?
i just wanted to focus on how many of the problems of today stem from that decision to can one of the best coaches. It has literally been downhill from that point on.
The only thing that McHale can contribute for last season's record is that huge slump at the end. I still can't seem to forgive him for playing Patrick and Scola the entire second half and letting the true bigs, Sam and Marcus, rot on the bench when we needed defense. Was it the Dallas game that Marcus had a double double in the first quarter and was sent to the bench the rest of the game? if not for his airhead decisions, we would have made the playoffs. Easily. McHale doesn't ever come up with a single play on his own. He is more of an assistant coach if anything. He is the cheerleader on the coaching staff that is limited in his ability to adjust to a game. I'd take JVG's black eyes and defense, Rick's veteran favoritism or Stan Van Gundy's shouting any day of the week. Hell, give me Dell Harris.
