The Houston Rockets fired head coach Kevin McHale in November, 11 games into the season and less than six months after he led the team to its first Western Conference finals in 18 seasons.
The Rockets were 4-7 at the time, and have gone 37-34 under interim head coach J.B. Bickerstaff, which was good enough to get them the eighth seed in the Western Conference playoffs and a date in the first round with the Golden State Warriors. A date in which, after a 26-point loss on Saturday night, isn't going too well.
Earlier in the week, and five months after the firing, Rockets general manager Daryl Morey attempted to explain why McHale was prematurely let go, via a post in a Q&A website called Quora.
"...Kevin's long tenure with the Rockets by NBA standards was no exception," Morey wrote. "He was an amazing coach to work with who did a tremendous job. I believe he is the coach with the best winning percentage in Rockets history. Since owning the team, our owner has had fewer coaches than any team in the league except Utah. Bottom line, we have great coaches at the Rockets and they stay a long time."
McHale had a 193-130 record at the time of the firing (59.8% winning percentage), which is the highest winning percentage in franchise history, and the third most wins. This would have been his fifth consecutive season with Houston.
Morey continued:
"Obviously, given this history the decision to change coaches was not taken lightly. Our team was reeling at the time of the change -- in just our first 11 games we had lost multiple games to non playoff teams, including two at home, and none of the losses were close, most were double digit losses. In the West, you basically can't do that for any stretch of the season and still reach our goals for the season. The prior year, for example, we had only 2 losses at home to non-playoff teams the whole season - we had already done it in only 2+ weeks. I believed that if we waited until what would be considered a normal timetable to make a change that it would likely be too late. Our only focus is on winning and I felt a material change was necessary."
Of those first seven losses, three came against non-playoff teams (Denver twice and Brooklyn) by a total of 37 points. They also lost to Golden State, Miami, Dallas, and Boston. In the 2014-15 season, they got off to a hot start, winning nine of their first 10 games.
Morey cocluded:
"Was this decision fair? No. Was it correct? That is unknown as we don't know what coach McHale would have done if he had stayed. I am comfortable we made the best decision for the team with the information we had at the time. I know this, when Kevin coaches again a team is going to get one hell of a coach."
McHale was offered a spot on the Boston Celtics' coaching staff the day he was fired, according to the Boston Globe, but declined the offer. He has taken time off since the firing, and has appeared as an analyst in numerous TNT basketball broadcasts since.
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