If the reason for Adelman's departure boiled down to Morey vs Adelman...

i think morey had an equally tough job during the yao/mac era. building a competitive team around 2 superstars isn't easy when neither play. he has had to find cheap pieces that can produce big because of that $40M on the bench. i think he's done a great job given the hand he was dealt. just like adelman. 42 and 43 wins don't look great but consider what he had to work with and you realize both coach and GM did great jobs.

as for choosing one over the other, this reminds me of the kobe/shaq situation. we know morey and rick are superstars, but you stick with the guy who has his whole career ahead of him. if les chose rick, we may not get another great GM, and where would we be in a few years when rick retires?

rick is an elite coach, but this team needs to rebuild and needs a coach who can grow with the team. rick needs a team ready to win. parting ways sucks, but makes sense for both sides.

 

Personally, I wish Rick Adelman the very best, in whatever he decides to do next. There were very few coaches who could have accomplished what Adelman did with the Houston Rockets, given the chaos and flux of the team dynamic created by the end of both Yao Ming and Tracy McGrady as competitive cornerstones for the franchise.

I have always held that both the general manager and the head coach have to communicate thoroughly if the franchise is going to have any level of sustained success. And that communication has to boil down to similar short-term and long-term goals. I felt that, by and large, that happened very well between Daryl Morey and Rick Adelman.

But the initial impetus for that relationship, in my view, MUST come from your head coach.

The coach is on the front lines every day, and sees and understands more of the landscape that his team faces moreso than any other front office person, including the general manager. There have been several players (GREAT players, in fact) who were miserable general managers precisely because they were, after a fashion, removed from the action of competition. A coach not only has to understand his team, but the opponents they face. Whatever the general manager decides to do in terms of roster building must be driven by a desire to assemble the team his coach envisions will make the franchise successful.

Metrics will never be a substitute for instinct. Phil Jackson is the Zen Master, not the stat master.

Knowing the game and playing the game are two different things. But they can work together, if the goals are clear from the very beginning.

I suspect that the goals for the Rockets (for the immediate future) irrevocably changed when Yao was injured again this season. Yao cannot be relied upon to anchor your team. But the Rockets gambled that he would be able to if he could remain healthy. With that decision, the Rockets were fundamentally committed to winning now. Rick Adelman would have no illusions about what that would mean. With Yao Ming healthy, and an adequately constructed roster around him, the Rockets expected to be outside darkhorse playoff competitors.

And even after Yao was hurt, Adelman did little, if any, to adjust his expectations, for this season at least. And for that, I totally commend him.

Winning in any way at a consistent level at the professional ranks is highly undervalued today, because of the microwave mentality of a good many of fans. The only way to build an winning environment and winning culture is to actually WIN. Accumulating assets and haggling over talent is all meaningless if your team does not win. Both the long term and short term goal of any professional team should be to win as many games as possible.

You will not do that at this level of competition without the very best talent you can acquire, of course. But there are perennial lottery teams who amass talent and do not win, because the environment is not conducive to winning.

The Rockets have, organizationally, been mired in between rebuilding the roster totally and simply overhauling it to complement its "star" or "stars". I believed from the moment that Tracy McGrady was finished here that the Rockets should have been more concerned with rebuilding the team than trying to continue to tread water. McGrady will, unfortunately, never be appreciated for what he managed to do, holding together an inept roster for the majority of his time and prime here, but it should have been obvious that the Rockets were going to need more than just Yao Ming if they were serious about challenging for a championship.

Things may have been different if Yao could be relied upon to remain healthy. And perhaps that would have been enough to keep Rick Adelman on as coach. This is a players league. They players win the games. They players give you a chance to win. The coach cements away expectations and execution.

And Rick Adelman was as solid as anything the Rockets have had the past two seasons.

But at least a decision about the future direction of the club has been determined early enough to implement it effectively. Any coach will expect, himself (as all coaches who are worth their titles do), to win games.

But the organization will not be, it seems. It remains to be seen how that works out.

But the "rebuilding" has officially begun.

Although.....

...I never really could understand what you were looking to build if you weren't looking to win.......

 

anyone can stock pile pieces, which morey has failed in his initial attempt to trade them for a star, but its how you use those pieces that ultimately is the deciding factor.

I don't know where you got the idea that the General Manager is more important to a team than the coach considering its the coach that goes down in history.

He orchestrates the game plan, makes decisions on a day to day basis as the games in the NBA are so close together and the direction ultimately lies with him.

 

It's not that simple. If I had to choose between having Adelman and having Morey, I'd choose Morey every day. That's because I think long term a good GM is more important than a good coach.

BUT that doesn't mean I side with Morey on this rift between him and Adelman. I think Morey made a big mistake letting "philosophy" get in the way of retaining a great coach, and I think he is underestimating the impact of such a mistake.

 

Keep Morey, he made more good decisions than Adelman on the trades of the players, Adelman should go to the lakers for his title run, which is good for both sides.

 

but in the end, we have a below medicore roster.

 

fixed.

 

Morey is not God, he can not do anything he want without a good draft, and star player on the team. But he did not overpay any player, and keep getting good young players for the next moves. If you know what have been done by former GM (CD), then you should know Morey has done a very good job for the team.

 

Morey is overrated and I would have choosen RA...but I don't own the rockets...sux for us as we have no talent and RA is a better coach at getting the best of everyone than anyone we bring in...

 

I think it is below mediocre roster.

Without Adelman, this current roster will have a hard time to win 30 games.

 

I just want to say that everyone that is upset with Morey...even though the coaches coach the players, people need to give Morey credit for being the one bringing the players in that he knew would outperform their contracts...he specifically went after these underrated players.

As much as Adelman loved Battier and Brooks, Battier is declining and was bought in assuming Yao and Mcgrady would be healthy...Brooks in his short career seems like he's declining physically and emotionally...

i believe that Morey felt, despite Thabeet being raw and unpolished offensively...that it was worth the sacrifice with his defensive presence alone. With the offense they ran, they were going to score points, they just needed stops and rebounding. Which is probably the reason it took them so long to send him to the D-league.

That is all.

 

coaching has always been overrated. spolestra might very well have a trip to the ECF in his near future. mike brown was coaching a contender year after year, doc rivers won 24 games in 07, then in 08 they sign Allen & Garnett and he wins a championship.. phil has coached a collection of the greatest players ever.. Player decide a coaches legacy..

what happens when the rockets win 42 games next year with "fill in the blank coach" heading the team?

 

That's the biggest question yet to be answered. But I don't understand why this situation has been turned into Morey vs. Adelman. It's abundantly clear that this happened because Les no longer wanted Adelman around. As for Morey I honestly feel that he simply doesn't know WHAT to do to get out the hole he finds himself in and for now, it seems that his efforts are merely making said hole that much deeper.

 

Morey tried to get Gortat, Chandler, and Asik. He wasn't relying on Yao only. However, he was smart enough not to give up too much just to make us a 6th-7th seed team.

 

You're still bitter about AB being traded, eh? DM is the guy that got Scola for peanuts. Traded Rafer for a potential top 10 PG in Lowry. Got Landry with a second round pick. Then acquired Martin for that second round pick. Traded Mcgrady for a few assets. Traded a terrible player in AB for a younger, better talent in Dragic. Got Budinger in the second. Swapped an inefficient Ariza for another young talent in Lee. Shall I continue?

Yes he has made some mistakes. Drafting Dorsey, signing Miller and other low risk, high reward moves like signing Francis but DM is the backbone of our franchise. The best thing he did was not mortgaging our future for a player like Gerald Wallace. He has bigger plans in his mind. A first or second round exit is not it.

Morey has proven that his way works. Adelman did a great job but Morey is the one that has found tremendous value through the NBA draft and trades. Look at the talent we've had aside from Mcgrady and Yao.

 

He signed Miller to please Adelman. If he had a choice, Miller wouldn't have been signed unless it was for fewer years and less money. But Rick pushed Miller as a must have. The years and money had to be there to match the Bulls and other offer.

 

It's a tough choice, but if you're looking for the long term viability of a franchise, a good GM trumps a good coach.

Given the talent, you can make an average coach successful.

You can always find a good coach, not so with GMs.

 

so you're saying that the team with the 5th best record since the all-star break, the team that succeeded beyond expectations after the loss of two of adelman's favorite players, battier and brooks, would be a 30 win team next season without him. ha.

 

Give me Morey every day of the week

 

What you're missing is that even crappy GMs acquire superstars all the time, while Morey hasn't done that yet. It doesn't really matter how smart your GM is. Win the lotto by being terrible and you're already ahead of Morey. Would you take Ray Patterson ahead of Morey? He sure produced a hell of a lot better results.