Rockets fire coach after poor start to season
Rockets owner Leslie Alexander, seeking a “new voice and someone to turn the team around,” fires coach Kevin McHale, just 11 games into a season that began with championship aspirations.
You can kill the coach before a six-month season has even blinked.
You can coldly kick Kevin McHale out of Toyota Center and tell everyone in the NBA that one of the most-respected names in the league had lost touch with these supposed-superstar Rockets after just 11 games.
Leslie Alexander owns the right. Daryl Morey has been brilliant enough to roll hard on another franchise-changing risk.
But who can wake up this sorry, lazy, selfish team?
Who can make James “Too Cool” Harden care?
Who can do what no one in the NBA has ever done: Get the most out of Dwight Howard for an entire year?
And what man can balance the Rockets’ suddenly sinking world while reigniting one of the game’s most-loaded rosters, soothing two oversized Hollywood egos at once and making it feel like playing defense isn’t a personal insult to all of mankind?
J.B. Bickerstaff ? Good luck with that, coach.
The Rockets almost let their new interim man down Wednesday night, just like they suckerpunched McHale since opening night.
Harden’s gang gave enough for just 61 points and 29-percent shooting through three quarters at home against a rebuilding Portland team that entered the evening losers of six straight.
Then the Rockets finally rediscovered part of their heart. They tied the contest at 99 on Corey Brewer’s desperation 3-point heave. They won 108-103 in overtime, perhaps restarting their previously dead season at the same time. Blend of young and old
Bickerstaff is young in NBA years (36), bright, energetic and modern. He’s also old school. And he possesses the pulse and brain necessary to break through to today’s overly pampered, hard-to-reach athletes in the Association.
But Bickerstaff is going to have to be the greatest Rockets coach since Rudy T to make firing McHale worth it.
These Rockets were a no-show since the 20-point embarrassments began. Anyone who watched the nightly horror knew that. Alexander most of all.
“I know I’m going to lose before the game starts,” said Alexander, referring to McHale’s first 11 and the Rockets’ 4-7 plunge just five months after almost tasting the NBA Finals.
But can Bickerstaff get Harden to believe that real MVPs actually play defense?
“That’s probably one of the reasons why the (team) energy has been so low,” Harden said. “Making shots or missing shots, I’ve got to bring my game.”
That’s one answer. Now, more questions.
Can the new coaching solution figure out how to turn Howard into a legitimate low-post threat again?
Will the Rockets start swinging the ball, playing on a Spurs- and Warriors-like string, instead of quietly camping out while Harden sucks down the shot clock?
Maybe Tom Thibodeau could. Scott Brooks. Jeff Van Gundy. Some new, young, brilliant name that gives Morey the next Gregg Popovich.
But nothing in 2015-16 is changing and no one is reaching these Rockets unless Harden starts caring more about a gold trophy than himself.
“Harden will pick up his defense. … He’s been told just that,” Alexander said.
Bickerstaff got his first answer right Wednesday. He issued the same words as his boss, acknowledging the asset Harden has been allergic to must return to the Toyota Center starting now.
“There’s no doubt about it. … As a superstar player, there’s a bigger burden on you to be the guy on both ends of the floor,” said Bickerstaff, who was the Rockets’ defensive specialist under McHale.
These Rockets have only been committed to themselves since training camp began. A silly assertion
Harden insisted he was better than NBA champ Steph Curry — whose Warriors are now 12-0 — then showed up for a new year out of shape.
Ty Lawson has everything to prove. He hasn’t shown anything, playing frightened and tight.
The Rockets started coasting before they even broke a sweat, believing that falling 4-1 to Golden State a series before the Finals became an EZ Pass through the next 82.
“We are responsible. … It’s got to be a wake-up call,” said Brewer, who insisted the Rockets let down McHale and stressed that the ex-coach hadn’t lost the locker room.
This is Harden’s career arc already ringing.
Reality TV, billboards, flashy commercials, a $200 million shoe deal and worldwide branding or elite NBA defense, trying and caring for all 82?
“Just be a player that everyone knows I can be on both ends of the floor,” said Harden, whose renewed defensive intensity was praised postgame by Bickerstaff and was his classic self with the ball in hand: game-high 45 points, 11 assists, eight rebounds, 19-of-20 free throws.
This again unfairly falls on Howard’s huge shoulders. He lost his magic in Orlando, Stan Van Gundy went poof and D12 — who still can’t play full back-to-backs — will have to live through more post-Lakers drama without a ring on his finger.
But you can’t fire Harden and you don’t bring Howard to Houston just to be 10th in the West after Wednesday night.
NBA life. Players’ league. Power always wins.
“Something had to change,” Harden said. “I feel like for me, I had to change.”
Someone has to wake up this team. Maybe it’s Bickerstaff. Maybe he’s the next fall guy and another answer awaits.
But until caring and trying become cool at Toyota Center every night, not even Rudy T could fix this mess.