Coaching It’s nothing new for fans to have a compulsion to assign blame following a loss, and coaches are the perfect scapegoat. But the amount of hate our coaching staff gets is just ridiculous. I personally find it difficult to evaluate coaching prowess in the NBA, perhaps due to how much individual players can impact the game and how volatile their performances can be from game to game. How good of a coach is Erik Spoelstra? Mike D’Antoni? Rick Carlisle was fired from the Pacers after a 35 win season in 2007, but won a title with the Mavs in 2011. How much of that title was related to good coaching? Perhaps a “Perfect Storm” of crap needed to happen that year for the Mavs to win, e.g. time to gel after acquiring veteran talent Marion/Kidd, or lebron collapsing in the finals. The very next year the Mavs had 36 wins (shortened season) and were swept 0-4 in the first round of the playoffs. It’s easy to blame McHale for the team’s woes, but keep in mind the Rockets are coached by a STAFF of competent coaches. As a professional coach, McHale has a win record of .45, which in my opinion is pretty damn good considering the complete lack of talent he’s had to work with (can you name the 3rd best player on the 2009 Wolves team?? Gomes? Foye?). Sampson was interviewed for the Rocket’s head coaching position and was cajoled by Morey to stay on after McHale won the gig. Chris Finch is the head coach of the Great Britain National team, and has had success with practically every team he’s coached prior to that (lead Sheffield Sharks, Euphony Bree, and Rio Grande Vipers to titles; led Dexia Mons-Hainaut to 1pt finals loss). JB Bickerstaff lives and breathes basketball, tutored by his father’s 40 years of NBA coaching experience and Dean Cooper adds 14 years of his own, including two as assistant coach under Rudy T. Let’s not forget the people coaching the Rockets behind the scenes such as Carroll Dawson, the man largely responsible for Houston’s long-term success at the center position. Coaching isn’t a one man job and it’s ridiculously unfair to blame this staff for the poor execution of the youngest team in the league. When appraise coaching talent, I try to evaluate whether or not the team is under- or overachieving, given the talent at hand. Before the 2011/12 season, we lost 3 of our best players in Aaron brooks, Shane Battier, and Chuck Hayes, and completely replaced Rick Adelman and his entire coaching staff. The media consensus (including many CFers) was that we were tanking and many people had us slated for 20-30 wins (before the lockout). We ended up with 42 equivalent wins (adjusted from the 66-game shortened season), which is only 1 win less than HOF coach Adelman had the previous year. We were completely over-achieving the entire season and had the playoffs in the bag until a monumental collapse in the final 10 days of the season. Over the course of a few months we went from no hope to hoping for the playoffs. To me, that’s a sign of competent coaching. **This is just my personal opinion, but I have never wanted to stab myself in the eye more times than during the 2010/11 season under Adelman. To me, it was more frustrating than JVG’s half-court snoozefest or the dark years before Stevie Franchise. Our offense was a magnificent symphony of poetic bball ballet, truly amazing given our lack of talent….but that season’s defense gave me high blood pressure and took 10 years off my life. The games were LITERALLY layup drills for the opposing team. No one boxed out. We finished the season with zero rebounds. Opponents got putbacks as if they were defended by cardboard cutouts. Adelman did not hold his players accountable whatsoever on the defensive end. That season Tom Thibodeau benched Carlos boozer for the entire 4th quarter of a close game because he wasn’t boxing out. The bulls ended up losing to the nets by 2, but Thib’s statement was made: I am holding you accountable on defense, and if you don’t box out, you don’t play. Adelman NEVER held his players accountable like this and perhaps if this lesson was taught to Martin or Scola early in the season, it would have paid dividends down the road.** I hear a lot of complaining about substitution patterns, which I understand since it annoys me too. However, I have ALWAYS complained about substitution patterns under EVERY rockets coach lol. Another coaching facet that I have always complained about is that we rarely double team opponents, which drives me mad. We have always let single opponents set career highs on us and lead their teams to victories, single-handedly. These feelings are not Rockets-specific….every fan complains about these things because they are the most transparent variable in a loss. Our players didn’t get it done?? Should have played the other players!! Get beat by an opponent?? Why did coach let that opponent beat us!! Anyways, coaching isn’t like playing chess, a well-planned strategy can be ripped to shreds by player execution. To be clear, I don’t think everything is peaches on the coaching front, I just think it’s really difficult to evaluate how good a coaching staff truly is, with there being so many variables in the game of basketball. Let me know if you disagree, I just hope we can all take a deep breath before we lynch the coaching staff after every loss. TL;DR Michael’s Secret Stuff actually contained trace amounts of methamphetamines.
What are you trying to say here exactly? And no, the amount of criticism McFail receives is not ridiculous by any stretch of the imagination. The only reason the team overachieved last season is because they were still running the Adelman offense.
actually adelmans offense requires skilled big men to run the offense through the high post, and we dropped that pretty quickly. maybe we overachieved cuz we finally added some friggin defense?
The defense was really, really good the first two years under Adelman, back when they still had Yao and Mutumbo patrolling the interior. Also we still had Scola, who was at his best in the Adelman offense, last season.
This season, to me, is about growing. The losses aren't as painful as they've been in the past, so long as I see some individual promise here and there. So, realistically, the only way the coaching staff has disappointed me this year is by not playing some of the more promising kids as much as I'd hoped by this point...mainly Motiejunas and Jones. But I don't see them in practice every day, so what do I know about whether or not they're ready for real minutes? Patterson's been solid, and he's got a pretty good work ethic...so it may just be about showing them how you earn your minutes in this league.
My main issue is with the rotations. I know youth isn't consistent, and strange rotations are okay in strange games (the last few 1st quarters have been brutal), but overall, the Rockets don't even have a regular rotation yet.
I do not think Mchale took any team to the playoffs as a head coach. That was simply a horrible mistake for Morey. Mchale has been doing his best and there is no reason we need to blame on him.
Um, didn't McHale thrive in a system established by the great Red Auerbach? He played in the system for years and when you hear him talk, you can tell he knows the game. Also, he wasn't just given the coaching position. He took it by blowing Morey away in the interview after Morey grilled him on situational awareness. We can't blame coaching this season. Even though we're not a bottom tier team, we're still rebuilding.
Honestly, some posters make the same argument every time a team has a terrible coach. They say it's the players and not the coach. Well, that isn't always the case. Look at how much better the Knicks were last season when they dumped D'Antoni and retained Woodson as their head coach as one example.
Coaches do have different strategies. Sampon likes to play M Morris, G Smith, and sometimes rookies. McHale still prefers C Aldrich, T Douglas, and never rookies.
Rudy T got a lot of criticism for not having enough discipline on his young players and not putting in enough structure, until he was let go, and they brought in Jeff Van Gundy. Later, everyone here criticized Van Gundy's rigid, predictable offense and dour demeanor until he got fired. They said Rudy T was much better! He inspired players! Then, everyone here criticized Adelman because his defense was poor and he wouldn't play rookies. They said Jeff Van Gundy was much better, we will never win without defense! Now everyone criticizes McHale because his offense is less fluid and his substitutions are not as consistent... One day he will move on and the story will repeat for the next coach...
