[CSN] McHale after Rockets' tough loss to Mavericks

One other note. That 'defensive unit' that McHale threw out there in the fourth gave up by my count, 9-18 shooting and 3 offensive rebounds. I'm starting to think when McHale talks about giving energy, he's looking about individual 'feats' that seem to make an impression on him rather than seeing how the personnel is affecting the overall scheme.

 

People here are hypercritical of McHale.


He is a better coach than people give him credit for. He has obvious flaws, but he took essentially the same roster RA had and improved 1 game -- which the team (much to do with McHale's rotation) ended up bombing the rest of the season (perhaps with the intent of keeping their lottery pick for the year?). RA is one of the greatest to coach (when it comes to getting the most out of the team as a whole).

Then this year, he is the head coach of a team whose average age is below 25 (lowest in the NBA), has only 2 players from last year, and has improved almost every month! You do not become a playoff team with a bad coach considering those facts. Do I want McHale leading our team if we get our second superstar? Well, I'd want a better coach. But, it's silly how much people hate McHale here. I guess that just continues the clutchfans trend towards coaches UNTIL they leave.

 

OK then of the previous coaches that have had Mchale's job which one do you think he is better than? To be clear I am just trying to get an idea of where you rank him in comparison to other coaches.

 

McHale isn't a bad coach, but he's not a particularly loyal one to his starters. Usually your starters really have to play bad to be benched the entire 4th. I've never seen anything like what has happened with Omer and Lin last night.

Might tactically be the right decision - but it's just plain weird.

 

SMFH.

 

Whether or not Beverley's defense was effective enough that it warranted him playing the entire 4th quarter is debatable and I can see why McHale chose to stick with that lineup (though I disagree with it). My beef with him is that he is so damn inconsistent with his players. If McHale thought that Beverley (or TRob or any bench player) was playing well and he wanted to deviate from the normal substitutions with the starters, fine. But why is he so rigid and stubborn on making sure Lin comes out at a certain time in the 1st and 3rd quarters no matter how well he's playing? Lin, especially lately, has a tendency to do well in the 1st quarter and then disappear later on (which is something he must work on), so why not let him play the whole quarter while he's aggressive?

Like I said in the 29/9 thread, I'm fine with McHale calling out Lin on his TOs. Lin makes dumb decisions and loses the ball; he gets called out. But McHale should hold the same accountability to others, such as Parsons and Delfino who by far are the worst offenders at getting stripped while trying to drive to the basket.

 

McFail always blames players for losses. So when they won McFail doesn't deserve any kudo either.

 

Here's the thing.... what accurate measurements can you quantify for coaches other than the end results??.... wins, losses, and championships... right?

Morey has commented multiple times about quantifying coaches metrics, and how difficult it was. What they do prefer to measure is player performance under that coach...

Look at what McHale has gotten out of these guys.... did anyone think that this team would be flirting with the 6th seed, and have a top 5 offense at this point in the season... even after the Harden trade?? Did anyone think that Harden would be the player he is today, or Parsons' name to be in the same sentence as All Star??

Player performance trumps everything because that ultimately leads to wins. Adelman was one the best I have seen at getting the most out of his talent as it shows the drop off of player performance when they left his team and system. The dropoff(if any) from Adelman to McHale in player performance is nil.

Now maybe this is a testament to the players or the development staff more than the actual coaching staff, but you can't argue that the Rockets aren't doing something right here with getting the best performance out of their players when they are here... regardless of coach.

I do personally think that McHale is far from a great coach. However, as a collective organization, the Rockets seem to be doing something right to evalate the play of their players to new levels. That to me is more important then harboring on a questionable subsitution pattern of one player in which is hearly impossible to quantify whether it impacted even one single win over the course of that coach's tenure.

I think NBA coaches(and other pro-level coaches) shoulder way too much blame, and way too much praise for their successes and failures. Its not just one mans single dry erase marker on a clip board that dictates success and failure in professional sports.

Its an organization as a whole from the top to the bottom. Also McHale should never get the blame for all the coaching decisions... it should the coaching staff(McHale, Sampson, Bickerstaff, Finch, Buckner) that you should be criticizing as a whole.... coaching is very much a team game.

 

Correct me, but has Lin ever played a FULL quarter? Either McFail has a gripe with Lin/Asik or with Parsons/Harden. He let's Lin/Asik sit for a full quarter and plays Parsons/Harden to death. Both Lin and Asik have proven to impact the game equally, as much, or even more than Harden and Lin.

 

Yup... you kinda have to take the good with the bad, and if he doesn't manage the game well, it is clear that the players are getting better. Improved play will win more games than bad game management will lose. Compare and contrast with Sacremento.

 

Agreed with what you said. However, he's the head coach so the buck stops with him...so yeah he needs to man up and take and accept all the blame. Otherwise, he needs to start weeding through his staff.

 

Exactly. I just refuse to believe that as a whole unit, there aren't enough smart people surrounding McHale to point the team in the right direction for success.

Morey said himself that good teams dont get in late game situations to begin with. The Rockets are not great at winning close games because they are who they are right now.

They are a young up and coming team that doesn't run any plays in order to simplify the game to make it easier for the young playes to succeed at this point of their careers. They aren't going to win close games because they aren't orchestrated and trained to win close games. They play well, they win.. they play bad... they lose.

You look at a team like Sacramento, or Washington, and maybe this is something those teams could learn from. Maybe they are over-coaching their players early on in their careers, and actually need to make the game more simple for them.... I dunno, but as far as player performance goes... young or old, the Rockets do as good a job as anyone in the league at getting the most out of the least.

 

I think more than a few of us remember last year's collapse leading to the playoffs, and we still wake up bolt upright in bed with the cold sweats, shouting: "And with the 14th pick the Houston Rockets select....!!!"

When we see highly-questionable coaching decisions, which make said coach have to save himself from, well, himself, by calling his favorite play over and over---Harden Please Save My Job---we get a little agitated.

When we see McHale clapping his hands like a seal begging for fish ("come on guys, come on guys!, ARF ARF ARF!") in lieu of real coaching, we pray to the God of Basketball to let the Jazz keep losing. 'Cause the Lakers are moving up.

As Yoda might say, "Hypercritical we are of McHale. But the Force he has not."

 

McHale needs to work on team defense, it's seriously lacking, especially in transition

 

So here we go back to his media persona that so many people seem to despise. You think he should take blame to the fans in his press conference obviously, and admit his mistakes.

I could care less what he says to the media. I simply want the team(players and coaches) to learn from their mistakes, practice to get better at them, and come back the next game as a better team.

If for some reason this team makes the playoffs then that means there was ample growth on this team as a whole... players and coaches. Its a whole team game... McHale going to team, media, or whoever and saying Im the problem, and Im the only one making mistakes implies that the players are doing exactly what they need to do to win a championship, and have no need to get better... that sure as hell isn't the case if you have watched this team play.... as a whole they are far from perfect.

So, that being said... does it REALLY matter that much to you that he makes this statement to the media for you to hear, or can you just admit that it really doesn't make a difference at all to the success of the team if he bows down on his knees to say he's sorry to you for not playing the player you wanted to see instead??

 

I will say this about coach. For most of the interviews, especially after losses, he looked like "I don't give two shiats about yall have to say or write b/c I am so fxxking above you."

 

Haha... yes... I agree.

I was down on McHale last year when they took the collapse at the end of the season too, and it weighs on my mind as well. The night sweats were the worst, and Im pretty sure my dog developed some emotional problems thinking that I was scolding him instead of my TV.

Im just trying to base my judgement as a whole of the team right now and their progression.

Yes, McHale makes some decisions that are head scratching, but if everyone is doing their jobs correctly, they should be progressing well enough to avoid many tie ball game situations in the 4th quarter where you are judging millimeters.

If they are progressing as a unit, they should be playing well enough to secure their spot in the playoffs by blowing out the teams they should blow out, and occasionally surprising a good team.

In the playoffs, and after this team has been together for some time, yes we can start judging the millimeters that coaching decides. Right now I want to see the needle move leaps and bounds by player development first and foremost.

 

can he teach his players, especially lin, those mean attitudes?:grin::grin::grin:

 

You're a clown Mcfail.

 

Stop playing midgets at center and at Power Forward you idiot.