Rudy had some awesome players - Horry, Cassell, Elie - all went on to win rings with other teams Throw in Olajuwon - perhaps the greatest center of his era, either Maxwell / Thorpe or Clyde Drexler....and you can't even begin to compare.
I always liked JVG, he seemed to always have a good relationship with his players. Yao really likes him. Sure he's a Rockets fan, but it doesn't hurt to have someone show the Rox some love. Nobody else does on national tv.
JVG took a bunch of scrubs to the NBA finals from the 8th seed. His best player on that team was freaking Latrell Sprewell! Adelman has had tons of talent and never won a ring. JVG has taken crappy teams and nearly done the impossible. Jvg had Yao and T-mac for 1 season together, and a bunch of scrubs. I mean scrubs. No Brooks, No Chase, No Landry, No Scola. Imagine if you took brooks, chase, landry and scola off this team? And lowry too for that matter, and even Ariza! If you gave JVG those players he'd have won a few rings in his tenure here.
Speaking of doing more with less, how many games has Adelman had Yao and McGrady together during his time here so far? If I recall they've only played somewhere just north or 220 games together themselves.
Adelman's/Drexler's Blazers faced Jordan and the Bulls in the Finals. Not many teams won titles in the 90's besides those dominant Bulls teams with Jordan. Some around here may also view the Kings/Lakers WCF with a pretty suspicious eye and would say that the Refs screws the Kings.
JVG is awesome man, i mean he protected his players as son. I really respect that Do you remember how he protected YAO? be fined 100k for the purpose? anything else? If he was given a good PF, Rox would have a good run under JVG . I think never-say-die, never-give-up culture was first from him, then Battier, now Rox team
I agree. You can still find lessons from JVG still used by the rockets organization and the product on the floor wasn't done by him but its the type of players he liked. Hard workers. Morey did an interview with rockets.com not too long ago that the thing he uses when evaluating players is a quote he remembers JVG telling him. That's probably why he likes to cheer for us. Not so much a homer thing as much as it is the connection. Would love to see the other ex rockets players now broadcasting to talk about us in a positive way
Exactly. His 3 best teams lost to the Bulls with Jordan, the Bad Boy Pistons, or the Lakers in the Donaghy-gate series. JVG's best is taking an 8th seed from the strike shortened season and losing to the Spurs with a rookie Tim Duncan, an aging Robinson, and Avery Johnson at the point.
Yeah, and who did those Knicks go against? Eastern Conference was trash back then. Adelman has been to Finals twice and lost to some great teams, one of which featured Jordan. Adelman was also robbed of a championship when the Dick Bevetta and his team pretty much handed Lakers the series (a well known series). But we dont even have to go that far. Like I said, both Gundy and Adelman faced the Jazz in the playoffs, and Adelman's team played defense and better offense with one less star. Gundy's team set some really nasty records scoring wise and were absoltely blown away in Utah. Gundy also had homecourt advantage and his team is one of the few that lost game 7 on their own homecourt. If anything, I give credit to Adelman (a rookie coach for Rockets) for quickly incorporating new young players and rookies and giving Utah a run for the money. And therein lies the dilemma. Gundy was absolutely in love wtih Juwan Howard and Rafer Alston. He trusted them. When you trust the players you are calling scrubs and you are playing them major minutes, you have to take some of the blame. When Adleman was hired, one of the things I was looking forward to Juwan and Rafer being let go. And sure enough, neither of them are with the Rockets now. It took Gundy one friggin year to realize that Hayes could contribute. It would take some of these younger Rockets players the same time before they would get minutes. As for Brooks, you can thank Adelman for that. Adelman had been eyeing Brooks since he was in Oregon. In the end it comes to this. Gundy was an excellent defensive coach but he was average at best when it comes to offense. In Adelman we have a coach who is very good at both ends of the floor. Gundy's teams are known to play hard and play defense, two of his trademark. Well, Adelman's Rockets are playing hard, playing defense, AND displaying better offense, AND have ZERO superstar, or even star for that matter! Simply better basketball.
In terms of JVG's comments about the Rockets (or any other team), I believe he just calls is as he sees it. If he says he thinks the Rockets are the hardest playing team, then I think it's because he really believes it -- and he's certainly got the professional background/credentials to lend plenty of credibility to his assessments. I was never a huge JVG fan while he was coaching here and had a lot of love/hate conflicts in the way I felt about his coaching style (some of his style grated on me, but he still had a lot of success in wins -- and I appreciated that). At the same time as not being an all-out JVG fan, I had a lot of respect for the man as a coach, and considered him one of the smartest coaches (while active) in the game. Because of the way I perceive the man, I have little doubt now that the commentator in him just expresses what he actually thinks and feels.
On the third game last night(Jon Barry I think) they were praising the Rockets and in the last game too. I think ESPN regrets not getting us on tv.
Both ex Rockets....they probably want to see the team on the mother ship. Greening you up - for a great comment and thought. DD
he didn't have many options...the man had so little to work with. And it was JVG that discovered Hayes. Imagine if you paired JVG with Morey. Wow. Adelman has really benefited from Morey's magic. JVG didn't have all these great role players. He had what - Vspan??? Ha!
Yeah and JVG was robbed on that Michael Finely missed out of bounds call. We still lost. Adelman still lost. He has had 15 years in the league of coaching with talented players and never won a ring. He's a great coach, but he's not a miracle worker. He never took a mediocre team far. JVG has. I like Adelman, but to me, JVG proofed what a great coach he is with nearly taking Dallas and Utah down with a couple of stars and a total bunch of scrubs. Ryan bowen, luther head, mike james.....wow. And Yao wasn't nearly as dominant in those series as he later evolved too. Adelman has done a great job, but I think JVg with this team would have us playing Detroit bad boy type defense on the league. It wouldn't be pretty, but I think we'd have a few more wins.
Your great coach as a Rocket: -40 point blowout in game 7 -Being up 2-0 in 7 game series and blowing it, TWICE! Once with homecourt advantage! -Record low points scored performance against Utah -Record (only 4 players scored) against Utah -One of the few coaches to lose game 7 on homecourt -Failed to advanced to second round on multiple tries with Yao and McGrady playing. Ouch! Ouch! Ouch! Sorry but this guy cant be greatest Rockets coach with so many black spots on his resume, especially when he was partly to blame for the scrubs on the team. You gotta sleep on the bed you make. Nope, sorry again. Defense would have been perhaps better but offense would have absolutely sucked. Gundy's offense relies on giving a player the ball and let him create. A very very predicatble offense. One of the many reasons why Jerry Sloan was able to expose his team. This team under Adelman moves the ball around along with player movements. The offense is much more unpredicatable to opponents which is why we are winning despite not ahving any stars on this team. Gundy - better defensive coach. Adelman - better overall coach, and its showing.
To this day, I REALLY, REALLY wished that Morey's arrival in Houston had coincided with JVG's. I honestly believe that had Morey been filling Houston's cupboard rather than CD, we could've seen what JVG does with REAL young talent. I think he's a better coach than JVG. But on a personal level, I like Van Gundy more. And it really sucks that you can't solve the chicken-egg dilemma with regards to whether he never developed young players, or that such players were not unavailable.
