[nba.com]Adelman lacks vote of confidence from Rockets

I still don't understand this argument. If RA wants to stay, then we need to do whatever we can to keep him (hell, if he wants to leave, we need to convince him to stay. He is a proven coach, a damn good coach and easily the best coach available for us).

We have a great coach. By gambling on a rookie coach, we are just hoping that he can turn into somebody of Adelman's caliber. What is the point of that when we already have Adelman? Without a great coach, we can potentially suck for many years no matter who is on the roster (and unknown coaches really are a crapshoot).

Utah kept Sloan during their rebuilding process (following the Stockton/Malone era)
LAL brought back Jackson during their rebuilding process (following the Shaq era).
Denver extended Karl following the Melo deal.
High caliber coaches are rare and difficult to find and you can't build a great team without them. The above mentioned teams understood/understand that.

I think Adelman still has several good years in him. And Morey is stockpiling assets (picks, former lottery picks, youth, capspace) to build a winning product. This is Morey's chance to put together a winning team (never really had the chance before since he inherited a team which was built around the huge contracts of Yao/Tracy) and I doubt Les is going to give him more than 2-4 years to do it. I think it makes perfect sense to keep Adelman during this period.

I don't want to see the team use "rebuilding" as an excuse to suck for the next decade (or more. I think the Clippers have been rebuilding for the past 30 years now).

 

It's whatever. Wouldn't mind him staying.

 

This is speculation but may be this is what has upset Les and as a result he is thinking about going in different direction?

 

It took about 3 years for Morey and Adelman to assemble a group of players that play to the strength of Adelman's coaching style. Apart from TWill, I can't think of any player on this roster who is not a good fit to Adelman's system.

If we change coach now, Morey will have to reshuffle the roster AGAIN.

I don't get the logic of "we are rebuilding so we need to change the coach" idea. First off, we are NOT rebuilding. We are reloading. We are looking for a center piece when all the other pieces are already in place. Rebuilding means blowing up the team and start over. Even if, for argument's sake, we are rebuilding, why isn't Adelman a good coach for a rebuilding team (if he doesn't mind staying)?

 

Not true at all, the real difference maker on the court has been Courtney Lee. Adelman adjusted his rotations to make solid minutes for Lee before the trades.

You really think the FO are unhappy that he was giving Battier and Brooks minutes? Two of their best trade pieces who they were desperate to showcase? One the golden boy the other their best chip on this team to get a superstar.

Rumors of Les looking to replace Adelman has been there the last couple of years.

 

Yes, sorry, I misspoke. Second Round against LA.

 

Exactly... Going into last year without Yao and with an injured Tmac, the national media expected us to compete..... Compete for the worst record in the league that is. After surprising everyone and barely missing the playoffs with no all star players, the media gave some measure of respect this season on the thought that Yao might return and we could be in the running for a blockbuster trade, but we still weren't thought to be serious contenders. Then Yao went out again and realistic contention went with him, as did our strongest selling point for another super star. Especially when Brooks went from most improved, to worse than his rookie season which no one saw coming. Brooks injury, followed by poor play off the bench carried over to affect many of the other bench players who played so well with Lowry last year, and by the trade deadline our "assets" were looking about as bad as they ever had. It's not a coincidence that almost all of them have improved their play since Brooks departure.

Now some might say Brooks should have been traded, or benched earlier, but that is really hind sight talking. If he had been benched the forums would have just been flooded with free Brooks posts, and "How is he supposed to prove he is back if they don't play him?", and "The Rocket's hate Brooks" conspiracies, and the Adelman bashing would have been at least as pronounced, just for different reasons. We can already see how much of that there has been for T-Will this year and he isn't coming off a Most Improved Player season where he was starting for this team. I'm sure the Rockets were hoping Brooks could snap out of it, if for no other reason than to up his trade value.

At any rate, the Rocket's will be hard pressed to get a coach who is even on par with Adelman given the state of the team. What proven coach wants to coach a border line lottery team with no all stars? Especially when the owner is letting a hall of fame coach go under circumstances where I think most coaches would say Adelman has over achieved? That doesn't mean he hasn't made any mistakes, or is above critcism. It just means that any other coach the Rockets have a chance at replacing him with will likely be a step backwards.

 

How different is this claim that Lowry came into the season fat, lazy, and unmotivated? They look the same, smell the same.

 

Damn... give him the extension Les. That was painful to read (painful in the sense that it would be heartbreaking to lose such a good coach). IMO, he's gotta be in the COY running AGAIN.

 

If the guy was fake he wouldnt have been tryin to eat Alonzo Mourning's leg to back up his team .... His time may have run its course here in Houston but I still respect the guy.



I DO NOT want to see Adleman gone after this season - he's done a fantastic job with a piss poor hand. I really want to see what he can do when he is dealt good cards .....

 

Adelman is a top tier coach, the only way we could get better is getting PJ. Which isn't going to happen.

I'll take what a nearly 2 times NBA finals coach has to say about it than anyone else. He knows how to get the job done and he has done so much with so little season after season.

You would think a guy's head would explode with all the instability and keeping the team affloat , but he has been able to do it. I have had times I curse his rotations and what not but i have a very deep sense of respect for the man.

 

+100000
This is an excellent post, great points.

 

Battier is really the only one here, but keep in mind, Houston isn't the first team he's coached, he does seem to be talking about his career in general

 

If that is the case then question answered. But that's not what I got from reading it. Maybe I'm reading it wrong.

 

Adelman seems like a bit of an ******* whenever he talks to the media, and to be honest, this kind of reinforces that opinion for me... but I'll be damned if he isn't a pretty good coach. Most likely better than anything else that's available. Extend him, Les.

 

It's completely disrespectful that Les hasn't offered Rick a contract extension. Whatever’s going through his head about the team’s situation, Rick’s intentions, or anything else just needs to stop. Bottom line: we have an all-time great coach who’s done an incredible job here despite all the bad luck. If Rick still wants to leave, fine, but at least we didn’t look like complete fools like the Kings for not even trying.

The Blazers, with all their injuries, and the Nuggets, with their complete roster overhaul, could just as easily have said it’s not worth keeping a big-name coach. But they had the common sense to realize they’re lucky to have them and did what it took to retain them.

I hope Adelman leads this team to the playoffs and wins COY. Maybe that's what it's going to take to force Les to stop being an idiot and give the man his contract...

 

I can understand the debate and can actually see both sides.

Lets suppose its some miracle and we land Williams and Howard. Adelman isnt really the ideal coach for that. If we had Bosh, then yea, Adelmans system would be excellent.

So from managements perspective, I can see them hesistant to commit to Adelman because there is uncertainty as far as direction goes.

I would sign him anyway and eat the losses if you have to fire him later.

 

Leslie, get this man his extension! Before we have to settle for the likes of Mike Brown in the offseason.

 

We don't do extensions.

Signed
--Rockets' Management