MDA: "Most of time adjustments are overblown. You just say 'Play Harder'"

still love that gif. still don't hate McHale.

 

I've concluded that Howard cost McHale his job. McHale was trying to placate Howard a little, and Harden wanted none of it.

 

He had a lot of context beyond just play harder. That the coaches were drilling in what was meant to be going on, so the players knew it anyway. The problem most had with Mchale was there didn't seem to be any semblance of strategy for "do it better" to make sense.

 

Howard, Brewer, Khloe, Thornton, Terry

 

Isn't it funny how quickly people's opinions can change?

Pretty much everyone during the offseason (myself included) criticized the MDA hiring. I thought we needed a defensive coach and that MDA was a washed up and a has been coach and that the game had moved on from his once revolutionary system. Why not? He had failed pretty badly at his last two stops in LA and NY. Now people in this thread are talking about how great of a tactician and strategist he is. Looking back on it now, it's easy to see how many more parallels our team has to those Phoenix teams than to the LA or NY teams. Harden, while capable of scoring like Kobe or Carmelo, is able to move and pass and stimulate offense in a more similar way to Nash.

Very few coaches are able to successfully change the way their teams run and find success no matter what players they have. Maybe guys like Belichik, Popovich and Saban? Maybe? Those teams seem to always be good no matter who is injured or what players they lose in free agency. But obviously MDA needs the right players to fit for his system. And having ball stopping chuckers like Kobe and Carmelo obviously didn't work. Credit to the Rockets organization for seeing Harden's potential to take this role and for finding the other right players to work in this system.

 

Ty Lawson

 

I don't think MDA has done anything miraculous. Would this team look much different if JVG was the coach? They both would have instilled confidence in the players and let them play - at this level a guy like Harden doesn't need a whole lot of set plays - basic concepts like spacing is something most good coaches preach.

What MDA did with making Harden the focal point even more so - making him point guard - and bringing Gordon off the bench - was probably his best tactical moves. Other than that I just think these guys want to win and rebound from last season, and have shown that it was last season that was the fluke, and not the year before.

McHale had to go because he no longer was able to control the team - as someone said "he lost the locker room" - for whatever reasons. McHale had to go.

I am more surprised by Harden's leadership than anything else truth be told. But yes, I give MDA credit, I did not realize coupling him with a defensive assistant would work (it did not work in NY) but perhaps MDA know defense has to be a priority. Shocking him to see him call timeouts after defensive lapses.

 

I know everyone pretends that Harden is just out there running iso with shooters, but it's not true. There is an actual system with actual plays going on. We went from being a joke on plays out of a timeout to be great at it. Other team's commentators have mentioned how we "always" score now coming out of timeouts. There is actual motion going on out there on the floor to create that space and intentionally get Harden matched up with the center for the other team.

Yes we are still running the same "shoot 3s with no regrets" system and still rely on "layups, three and free throws" but the way we are creating them is actually different. There's a good article on clutchfans home page that lays out some of the offensive sets that are being run. We are setting picks at specific points on the floor to create mismatches, etc. If we had JVG we would NOT be running the same offense because he doesn't believe in that TYPE of offense. Assuming we had the same roster, we'd probably see more Nene and Ryno post ups. I can't say it would be worse but it WOULD be different.

MDA is an offensive genius. He just is. There is a reason why players have great stats under him (percentage stats, not volume stats). He puts players in positions to get easy shots when he has the right facilitator. Everytime he's had a willing partner it has worked. Nash in PHX and the short run of Lin in NY and now Harden in Houston. He has failed when he had players who simply weren't going to run his offense (Kobe, Melo.)

 

So much for MDA not caring about defense. He gets as mad as Sampson used to

 

Well according to Ariza they don't run set plays and they just let Harden create. I think he has general principles and tactics, but generally just lets the players play with confidence. From what I can gather in comments by the players and what I see on the court - they are free to create but are given general tactics and things to practice - certain screens, cuts, and hand-offs in different types of situations but the overall flow is determined by the players themselves. It makes sense, you instill confidence by instilling trust in the players to do their jobs. Less control means more trust, more freedom, and happier players who feel they can act on instinct versus trying to follow too much structure.

 

He can say that, but film proves otherwise. It may not be as rigid as "Pick set, harden crashes and then x happens" but they certainly run plays. Where the freedom comes in is that they clearly have options based on what the defense does and they are free to figure that out on the court.

 

ya. i guess an automatic bucket out of timeouts is just luck......stop being humble MDA

 

its like when aaron rodgers rolls out and it looks like he just improvises all those td's. he may be partly improvising, but they practice the hell out of that play...

 

Got MDA fired too, fortunately it was in L.A. (Los Asses)

 

It's fine to say play harder if the effort level is the only or primary issue with performance.

If your team is lost on defense, and every player on offense is just playing with their balls, you don't get to keep yelling "play harder" and expect it not to chip away at your credibility.

MDA is right, the team was doing the right thing lazily. There was movement off the ball on offense, the defense was rotating but too slow. There was no tactical issue.

 

There is a reason why coaches watch a lot of game tapes so they know what other teams do in offense and device a plan to minimize the effectiveness of those plays - just like what MDA said. These coaches has seen these plays throughout their careers and should not be a surprise to them. To say that Mchale and his coaching staff does not have a clue on how to provide a game plan to stop these plays after being in the league for 30 years blows my mind.

To me, unless we are in the locker room or huddle to hear the specific instructions, how do we really know he was not providing guidance or direction?

 

Sometimes the hatred of McHale is too strong to take this kind of thing rationally.

Every coach knows that playing hard is the most basic factor in a team's success. Everything else won't work unless the players are willing to put it all on the floor. This is especially true for the NBA when EVERY team has the talent to beat any team in a given night.

1. McHale actually had some pretty good inbound plays. I think heypartner showed them at one time with videos. Is McHale a good coach? I don't think so. But his problem was not in strategy. It's in his lack of leadership.

2. D'Antoni is not known for his in game adjustment. That's has been the criticism of his coaching. He has one system and he sticks to it. That is fine when he has the players to execute. Why was he failed in LA and in NY? Because he could not adjust his system to fit the personnel. One reason I didn't like his hiring was because he was known to blame the players for not being able to execute his system rather than blaming himself for the inability to utilize his players.

 

Play harder is OK when the team does need to play harder. Last night was clearly the case. It is not OK when the team clearly needs Xs and Os for directions.

 

Players need to play hard, but sadly, they also need coaches who they want to play hard for. Players need to buy-in. MDA is better with X's and O's for sure and he probably has better assistants, especially post-Sampson.

That said, we have better shooters, and players usually try harder when shots are falling. Harden sabotaged McHale in the end, but Harden also "made him" before that.