I posted this in the game thread from the ATL game. Felt it bore repeating. Something I would like to change is McHale letting parsons play through his mistakes. He was a little bit off tonight but honestly Chandler is our future & Carlos isn't let him play through his mistakes more in my opinion. Aside from that great win. happy new year.
Of all the players to want more minutes for, why Parsons? He's averaging 36.6 minutes on the season - second highest behind Harden - and is one of the most widely appreciated Rockets player (by coaches and by fans) on the team. Today he was benched for longer than usual due to Delfino's on-court success, but he's also seen minutes at the 4 while Ppat was out. I think there is nothing to worry about when it comes to Parsons.
This has little to do with my post. I wanted McHale to let Parsons play through his mistakes. How many minutes he averages is irrelevant. Only way Chandler will learn is if he plays through mistakes on the court, not sitting on the bench. I realize that he got stuffed at the rim a few times & was struggling from the field but I personally would prefer McHale just lets him play through it so he can learn. We are a young team & we likely aren't making the playoffs & if we do we are a first round exit. I am not fond of McHale's love of if you make a few mistakes you are yanked philosophy particularly when Parsons is being yanked for a player who is not in the teams long term plans.
I rarely see Mchale yank a player because he is playing bad. It seems like when he does yank somebody for playing bad that he waits a few plays before taking them out because he's trying not to hurt their confidence. He did pull Parsons today because he was playing bad and I'm alright with that.
He doesn't always pull them when they're playing bad, when their backup is super hot though he will. and Delthreeno was hot
You don't risk a win to play somebody through, Parsons mightily struggled and Delfino extended the lead. No-brainer.
I know this is what he did/ does. Once again not complaining about the win. I just think Parsons should have still had a chance to learn through his mistakes. Players feel the same way too knowing that if they make three of four mistakes there coach will still keep them out there. Ask Matt Barnes. We have won games before with CHandler playing poorly & more often than not he steps it up in the 4th quarter. Just my thoughts, not really complaining (as I was so inelegantly accused of doing).
Roxxy, I think Parson's has, for about 95% of the games thus far, been allowed to play through his mistakes. I'm pretty sure he is second in minutes played behind Harden. One game here or there is not going to affect his development. If McHale pulled Parson's every single time he played poorly, then I would agree with your stance. Today, he just looked fatigued and out of sync. I'm sure he'll bounce back the next game.
Holy cow man! I write three posts on McHale and all of a sudden its an obsessive hate? What is your problem?
Well the players don't look comfortable running whatever simple things he has them doing when the defensive intensity picks up. It might be that they know they can do more and are feeling limited out there, or that they really are that green and confused. Seems hard to believe that they would struggle with the offense they are doing - it is very very simple. My observations are rather that they struggle with the defenses not doing as they predicted. Meaning that they aren't prepared for the counters that defenses throw at them once they learn their offense. I guess you are saying McHale is ok with that. But seems to me these guys are capable of learning the next step and are somewhat looking for it. I can see the hesitation when another defender pops out or the screen doesn't quite free them up like it's suppose to. Those kinds of things shouldn't be a surprise to the player...but it is. It's like they are nervous....but you know what, it's 30 games into the season. I can only tell you what I see....maybe it's part of the process with a young team, maybe it's not. I dont recall seeing this stuff with Rudy-T and Francis/Mobley....but those guys had a lot of swagger. Maybe Lin/Harden/Parsons are not as confident and assertive as Francis/Mobley were.
If the player is hot, he should never be pulled. But McHale sticks to his stink rotation to the T. I was surprised that he pull Parson, which normally stay out in the game for 40 minutes. Harden only played 35, normally 40+ too.
So did you not read my last post about what we run in our half-court sets? How we don't fill strong side corner, how we run in to a lot of our sets (like our pistol action, causing people to think it's more of a fast break situation even though it's not), how we have court balance and spacing on a lot of nights when we blow other teams out. Go ahead if you want to criticize his offense; please do so in a way that isn't "it looks bad," but rather what you think is actually wrong with it from a coaching perspective. Name one team in the league not named the Spurs with a top tier player that doesn't get sticky on offense at times. The Washington Wizards get sticky every night with Jordan Crawford out top. It happens in the NBA. With James's defense, there are nights that I would not consider him to be a top 10 player in the league. I would take Kobe, Lebron, KD, CP3, and Carmelo over him on a nightly basis just because they are at a point in their career where they roll up their shorts on defense. Now he has more potential and is a lot younger than some of those guys, but that doesn't make him an all-NBA first teamer right now. When teams throw counters on us defensively, our young players have a much harder time figuring out what the next offensive counter is to what the D is doing. The fact that we are finally getting some weak side basket cuts for lay ups is encouraging because for too long we had no weak side action when James or Jeremy was dribbling the ball around (everyone was ball watching -- offense and defense). Is that a coaching thing? To some extent, but at the end of the day, do we really think that practices are composed of people standing around watching James take isolation 3s and the coaches slapping hands with one another going "We got so lucky!!!" The execution falls on the player's shoulders. From every interview and voice over I can hear, I don't get the slightest inkling that our coaching staff wants our guys to be stagnant or the ball to be "sticky" at any point in time. That said, the team is getting better at figuring out how to move without the ball when our set runs its course.
What mistakes did Parsons make other than not hitting on his shots? It's the coaches job to figure out during the game what combination of players that night needs to be on the floor to win the game. McHale was perfect last night, he played the players that had the hot hand and we won the game. All players have good and bad shooting nights in the NBA, no big deal. Delfino was on fire last night, and you want him pulled for a guy that was ice cold? Wow.
Sigh. Here are some of the things I look at when judging a coaching staff: 1: Do the players come to every game and give intense effort? 2: Are the offensive sets appropriate for the personnel? 3: Is the offense displaying good ball movement most of the time? 4: Are the defensive rotations appropriate for the personnel and their experience level? 5: Is defensive effort consistently high? 6: Are the teams areas of weaknesses gradually improving as the season goes on? 7: Are the coaches and team showing cohesiveness? 8: Is the coaching staff sure enough of themselves to let a second stringer stay in the game when they are lighting things up? Do they have the confidence that the starter will support the move, and be an enthusiastic participant from the bench, congratulating the sub for playing terrifically? According to those metrics IMHO McHale and his staff are doing a very good to excellent job. The team is surpassing even the most optimist projections.
Well don't you get it? Everything he does do is incorrect, and everything he doesn't do would've been the correct thing to do. I mean, winning by 20 against a team that was on a streak had absolutely nothing to do with coaching, and moreover, if we had an "elite" coach, we would've won by at least 30. A lot of people have a hard time leveling real criticisms and can always fall back on rotation patterns. For all we know, Chandler went up to coach and said "Carlos is feeling it tonight coach, let him go." I've been on teams where we have had cats that would do that. Actually, those were the best teams I was on. But I digress... there is always a way to long for more with regard to the substitution pattern. And there always will be "rotation-only" haters who can't talk about the veracity of high siding a drag screen vs. sliding it.
Dear Kevin McHale: Please ride the hot hand except for the following situations: 1. in favor of Parsons 2. in favor of Lin 3. in favor of [insert other current fan favorite here] Also, please substitute yourself for a better coach. Clearly, that's the only substitution pattern CFers would like to see. I bet this team would be 26-5 with a collective CF coaching staff. CF.net - come complain about coaching offense when we're losing games on defense.
First time reading this thread in quite a while, and I just have to say that HadToDoItCF is destroying Sweet Lou 4 2 (among others) the last couple pages. Dude is dropping great knowledge. Post more often man.
i have freaking heard it all. at one point last night carlos had a +/- of +48. and he was supposed to be taken out of the game so someone could play through mistakes? im not sure i have ever even seen a +/- that big before. i understand what you are saying of course, but under the context its ridiculous.
Parsons took himself out of the game in the 3rd quarter. He called for a sub. It just wasn't his night and he knew it.
