Houston Rockets should hire Tom Thibodeau immediately

Tom Thibodeau is the answer for the struggling Houston Rockets

News of the Houston Rockets firing head coach Kevin McHale after a 4-7 start to the 2015-16 NBA season broke early Wednesday morning, per Yahoo! Sports Adrian Wojnarowski.

From playing the Golden State Warriors in the 2015 Western Conference Finals to out of a job in a matter of months tells the world the state of the 2015-16 Houston Rockets. Many expected Houston to contend for an NBA championship in 2016. With superstars like shooting guard James Harden and center Dwight Howard, and after last year’s deep playoff run, the notion didn’t seem all that farfetched.

However, chemistry issues seem to have disrupted this team that doesn’t play a lick of defense (109.0 defensive rating, 28th in the NBA). It’s easiest to fire the head coach, but that is more of a reactionary solution to the myriad of problems presently existing within the Houston Rockets organization.

While James Harden did earn Western Conference Player of the Month honors for an abbreviated October, he is building a reputation of being difficult to coach and lacks the defensive tenacity to become an all-time great player. Dwight Howard isn’t exactly placid either, having acrimonious exits from both the Orlando Magic and Los Angeles Lakers in his past.

Bringing in skilled but troubled point guard Ty Lawson seems to have added more fuel to the already combustible Rockets. The voice of sanity on the team, veteran point guard Jason Terry, is getting drowned out in all the madness. It also doesn’t help that general manager Daryl Morey views all of his roster pieces as tradable assets.

However, this team is too talented to not make the playoffs. Would bringing in a new head coach mid-season do the trick in turning this 4-7 team around? For the Rockets to take off in the second half, the organization should consider bringing in former Chicago Bulls head coach Tom Thibodeau as its new head coach.

Thibodeau is one of the greatest defensive gurus that professional basketball has ever seen. He has his roots in the Jeff Van Gundy coaching tree and was the supreme defensive strategist on the 2008 NBA Champion Boston Celtics under another Van Gundy disciple, Doc Rivers.

He left Boston after the 2009-10 NBA Season to become the head coach of the Chicago Bulls, a franchise that hadn’t been relevant since the Michael Jordan/Scottie Pippen/Dennis Rodman days. From there, he turned a young Bulls team into a defensive juggernaut and went 255-139 in his five years with Chicago, making the Eastern Conference Playoffs each season.

His Bulls teams from 2010-11 to 2013-14 finished in the top six in team defensive rating, including number one overall in 2010-11 (100.3) and number two overall twice in 2011-12 and 2013-14 (98.3 and 100.5, respectively).

The 2015-16 Houston Rockets have a -7.7 point differential (100.8 points per game versus 108.5 points allowed per game) and two disgruntled superstars. Dwight Howard is a great defensive player and played his best for another fiery head coach in Stan Van Gundy when they were together in Orlando. The Howard/Van Gundy years in Orlando were great while they lasted. Harden has never played for a fiery NBA head coach, considering Scott Brooks and Kevin McHale weren’t exactly the frustrated, defensive aficionados like the aforementioned Stan Van.

What the Rockets need is a head coach that will push/aggravate them to get the most out of the players. Sure, Thibodeau will play his stars 48 minutes per game, much to the chagrin of the NBA front-runner in the analytics movement, Morey, but the Rockets would have the passion to challenge Golden State, San Antonio, or whomever when deep in the postseason.

While the analytics conundrum may prevent a Thibodeau/Morey Rockets marriage from coming to fruition, it would definitely anger Southwest Division rival New Orleans, who are currently 1-10 under their new head coach Alvin Gentry. The Pelicans picked Gentry over Thibodeau as their new head coach entering 2015-16.

Thibodeau is two years younger and a more proven defensive-minded head coach. New Orleans was a top ten offense under Monty Williams. Beating the Pelicans with Thibodeau as the new Rockets head coach would accentuate the wrong hire of the New Orleans Pelicans.

Bringing in an intense coach to a volatile situation doesn’t normally bode well, but Thibodeau could become the championship-caliber individual Houston needs to get over the top. It can’t get any worse in Houston than it already is, so not considering Thibodeau as an option to coach this team would seem counter-intuitive – even if Morey would likely need to be less stringent with his analytics. The Rockets need a defensive identity and Thibodeau, for better or worse, can certainly provide that to a lost team.