The Rockets and Kings are Coachless and Uncoachable

If this was on fire, it would represent the Rockets and Kings

As it happens every NBA season around this time, coaches are being fired and hired. It always goes on during the playoffs and, more often than not, it's usually smaller named coaches taking jobs. Guys like Kenny Atkinson taking the Nets job or Earl Watson taking the Suns job. See, not that big of names. Sure, Thibodeau took the Timberwolves job and, to a much lesser extent, Scott Brooks took the Wizards job, but that's about as splashy as it gets this time of year. And yeah, Luke Walton took the Lakers job, which is a potential disaster worse than taking the Knicks job, but most teams wait until after the playoffs, or during the finals to really get into their head coaching search.

Two such teams currently searching for a coach that I want to talk about today are the Rockets and the Kings. Let's tackle the Rockets first. This team is an absolute dumpster fire. This team has absolutely no chemistry. James Harden is becoming a world class prima donna. Dwight Howard needs to leave that team as fast as possible, and, he's not really that good anymore. The other starters, guys like Terrence Ross, Corey Brewer, Patrick Beverly and Donatas Montejunas need to try their best and get out of there because Harden is no fun to play basketball with. Also, Daryl Morey needs to be let go. He put this team together through analytics nonsense and they are a complete mess because of him. Morey was the one that figured pairing Howard and Harden was a good idea. This was the guy, and I totally agreed with him at the time, that thought bringing in Ty Lawson was a good idea. This is the guy who trades away picks and young players with the "win now" attitude and it has not worked out. Sure, they miraculously made the Western Finals last year, after the Clippers epic collapse, but they got outworked, outplayed and outclassed by the Warriors. And the true James Harden showed up. The guy that shrinks the bigger the moment gets. The Rockets are a total mess. Even their interim coach, JB Bickerstaff said he'd rather be an assistant than the head coach of this team. Bickerstaff has been with this team for a long time, got his chance to be the head coach after they fired Kevin McHale 11 games into the season, and he looked and acted like he hated every single second of it. I would too if I were him. The coach of the Rockets is basically just a figure head that has to deal with players that aren't as good as they may think. Nowhere is it truer than the NBA where the coach, for all intents and purposes, doesn't matter. The only coaches that demand the respect and attention of their players are Gregg Poppovich and Steve Kerr, other than that, none of you guys really matter. If I were a coach at any level, be it high school, college or the pros, I would not touch that Rockets job with a ten foot pole. They are going to lose a lot of players, mainly Dwight Howard, and the new coach will have to deal with all the nonsense that comes with James Harden. Harden is uncoachable and that team is going to get blown up. The Rockets will be a rebuilding project, and an established coach will not touch that job. The Rockets may have to dip into the college ranks and we all saw how well that worked out for Fred Hoiberg and Billy Donovan. Sure, Donovan won 55 games, but he has Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant at his disposal and his "coaching" didn't really play any part in their success. And Hoiberg, the Bulls, with all the talent in the world, didn't even make the playoffs in the East. So, good luck to whichever low end NBA assistant or college coach that takes that Rockets job, it's going to be tough.

Then, there is the Kings vacant head coaching job. They have reached out to some big name guys. Guys like Kevin McHale, Mark Jackson and Stan Van Gundy, but they all seem to be turning the job down, and they all seem to turn it down for one reason. That one reason is Boogie Cousins. First of all, I love Boogie Cousins the player. I think he is a wonderfully skilled big man. He can play in the low post and run the floor with equal success. He is definitely a once in a lifetime good to great low post player, but he clearly has a very bad attitude problem and he is un coachable. Not one single coach that he has had in the NBA seems to last longer than one and a half season. Hell, if he had stayed at Kentucky more than one year, I bet he and Calipari would have ended up having problems. Calipari may be the one guy that can coach him, but he isn't leaving Kentucky for a NBA rebuilding job, so those rumors need to stop. I love love love Boogie Cousins, but I totally understand why all these coaches are turning down the job. I mean, George Karl, who made it work with strong personalities like Shawn Kemp and Gary Payton, couldn't reach Cousins. From the start, Cousins did not like Karl. Before they even met, he was down on Karl for some past accusations. It was a broken marriage from the jump. There have been other head coaches, but the only one that seemed to work, Mike Malone, was inexplicably fired after one season and 11 games into his second season. Malone was making it work, but Cousins went down with an injury and the Kings lost a couple of games in a row. That was enough, according to the front office, to fire him. It was a joke that Malone got fired so quickly when it seemed he was turning that team around. But, that's another problem with this franchise. The front office thinks that the team is better than it actually is. Vivek, the new owner, is an idiot. He is the one pulling the trigger so quick on coaches. He is the one that keeps drafting players that play the same position over and over again. One year he takes Ben McLemore, the next year he takes Nick Stauskas. One year he drafts Boogie Cousins. A couple of years later, he takes Willie Cauley-Stein. Vivek also said, on live national television, he wanted his team to play five on four so they could get quick fast break points because that's what his fifth grade daughters team did, and they were good. He compared an NBA team to a fifth grade basketball team. That's insane. No coach worth their mustard should touch this job with a ten foot pole as well. The Kings are a mess akin with the Rockets. The only selling point in the Kings favor is the fact that they will get a decent draft pick, but who really cares, that's just more rebuilding.

These two jobs are not good jobs. I don't think anyone with any sense is wiling to take either one of these jobs because these jobs are a stomping ground. There is no success to be had at either spot. Yes, the Rockets have James Harden, but he plays no defense, he is a ball hog, he holds the ball for 20 of the 24 second shot clock and he is a prima donna. The Rockets won't have much else going into next season. And yeah, the Kings have Boogie and Rondo, but what coach in their right mind really wants to deal with those two headaches. As I said, I love Cousins, but I would not want to deal with Rondo at all. He is past his prime and he may be a crazy person and he is too big a headache.

While other teams will fill their vacancies with relative ease, I think the Rockets and the Kings will have a long, tiring and troubling time trying to fill their head coaching jobs. Both teams are dumpster fires and no coach with a good head on their shoulders will give those jobs a second chance. Those jobs will be filled by lower level assistants, college coaches, or more likely, a crazy person.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. He coaches pre K basketball and is ready to be called up by the Kings or Rockets. He fully expects to be fired in less than a year, like any other big time NBA coach would be. Follow Ty on twitter @tykulik.

Dwight Howard Deserves Better Than the Rockets

Where does it say these numbers will win an NBA title?

With the NBA trade deadline this Thursday, one name is being thrown around and it's a forgone conclusion that Dwight Howard is going to be traded from Houston to any number of teams. Boston, Atlanta and Toronto have all been brought up as potential landing spots. If you watch ESPN or Fox Sports News or any number of sports media outlets, they are all saying the same thing about Dwight Howard. He's a malcontent, he complains too much, he can't coexist with another star, he's too much of a diva, he's lost his dominant form from five years ago, basically he is the problem they all say. This was the case when he left Orlando in free agency. He didn't like Stan Van Gundy and he quit playing mid way through his last season. He then signed with the Lakers and his one season there was an absolute train wreck. He didn't like playing with Kobe Bryant, coaching was sub par at best and he looked genuinely unhappy that whole season.

Then the big blockbuster deal when he joined the Rockets. He was the missing piece that this team needed, or so it was thought. His first year there, they did okay, but they bowed out of the first round of the playoffs to a Thunder team that didn't have Russell Westbrook. Then, he missed the majority of the first half of last season due to many injuries. The Rockets played surprisingly well in his absence, with James Harden coming on very strong, heavily involved in the MVP race. In fact, Harden was the players choice for MVP last year. But, when they needed Dwight Howard the most, he came up pretty big for the team. He was a key cog in their run to the Western Conference Finals last year. In their three game win streak to complete their comeback against the Clippers, it was Howard, not Harden, that made the difference. He was a force on defense. He was rebounding at an extremely high rate and he was getting whatever he wanted in the post. He made DeAndre Jordan look like a rookie at times during that series. He seemed to be regaining his dominating form.

Then, this past offseason happened. James Harden decided partying and dating a Kardashian was more important than staying in playing shape. Dwight Howard seemed disinterested in even playing basketball. The Rockets traded for Ty Lawson, a deal I still very much liked at the time, but he was coming off multiple DWI and DUI offenses. Basically, this team was in the news for all the wrong reasons. The season started and they limped out of the gate. The Rockets started 4-7 and fired Kevin McHale, a move I still disagree with. Sure, it's up to the coach to come up with a good game plan and the Rockets had little to no interest in playing defense, but the players also have to be invested in getting better and staying in shape. It was clear that Harden and Howard had not done their job. But, instead of taking it on themselves, Harden and Howard blamed coaching, thus the firing of Kevin McHale happened. But, JB Bickerstaff is not the answer at head coach, and to his credit, he was put in a terrible situation. He said it himself, and I couldn't agree more, he is coaching a "broken team".

So now, sitting at 27-28 coming out of the All Star break, the Rockets are looking to make deals, although I think it's a moot point. This team, if they make the playoffs, will be out in the first round. There were reports last week saying that both Harden and Howard met late into the night with GM Daryl Morey, but I believe Harden was the only player present at that meeting. I truly believe he told Morey that it was him or Howard, that one of them has to go.

Now we get to the part where I actually defend Dwight Howard, something I never thought I would say. Sure, Howard is whiny and arrogant and self righteous, but he can still be dominant if put in the right situation. The way the Rockets run their offense is terrible for a big man like Howard. They give the ball to Harden at the top of the key, he dribbles for 15-20 seconds, then he either jacks up a contested three, or he tries to drive to the basket to draw a foul. I don't see how anyone, with Harden being the exception, would like playing in that type of offense. The Rockets are boring and they are predictable. And when you are a big man, you need touches to stay motivated. I don't care if it's just an easy dump pass to him in the high post and he kicks it back out, at least he got his hands on the ball during that possession. It's asking an awful lot, to tell your big man, hey we need you to play hovering defense, rebound at a very high rate and hustle down on offense, but there's only a 25 percent chance you will touch the ball. Any big man would laugh in the coaches face if they asked them to do that. I don't think that Howard is the real problem and I don't think getting rid of him will solve all their problems.

In my opinion, the two main problems on the Rockets are Harden and, way more importantly, Daryl Morey. Harden has been a diva since his last year in OKC. He didn't show up in the finals and when they didn't offer him a max contract, he said he felt disrespected and left in a huff. The Thunder, when healthy, are a much better team without Harden, no matter what Bill Simmons says (he does seem to have had a change of heart). And the fact that he wanted to make his "brand" bigger this offseason, that that was more important than staying in shape, tells me a lot about James Harden the player and person. He really screwed this team this offseason and he's screwing them over during the season.

Forget about the players, Daryl Morey and his analytic nonsense have been the main culprit that has caused this mess in Houston. He thought pairing a three point shooting, ball dominant two guard and a ball dominant, really good rebounding center would work because the numbers told him so. Numbers were wrong. He took a chance on Ty Lawson, even though they already have Patrick Beverly, because the numbers said having two point guards would make them more explosive. Numbers were wrong. He thought firing McHale would solve problems because McHale wasn't taking his analytics serious and that JB Bickerstaff, according to the numbers, would turn this team around. Numbers were wrong. This whole craze of analytics and numbers is about as useful as "moneyball" was in baseball. Sure, you will have a decent regular season, making the playoffs regularly, but, how many World Series have the Oakland A's won since Billy Beane took over as GM? Zero, that's how many. In fact, I don't even think they've made an ALCS in his time. The way to build a team is through developing draft picks and pairing veterans that know how to play the game. This numbers nonsense needs to go. The Warriors and Spurs don't use analytics, they just develop players and win titles.

So yes, if the Rockets do trade Dwight Howard, I hope it comes back to haunt them. I hope he gets on a team that feeds him the ball and I hope he dunks it all over James Harden and Daryl Morey and I hope he laughs while he's doing it. I cannot believe that I defended Dwight Howard, but all the problems with the Rockets don't solely lie on him. James Harden and Daryl Morey deserve the majority of the blame.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man podcast. The numbers tell him that it is time to stop watching the Rockets. Ty is on twitter, go follow him @tykulik.