The Matt Thomas Show with Ross - The Mike D'Antoni Show 2-11-20

Episode Date: February 11, 2020

Rockets Head Coach Mike D'Antoni joins Matt each week to talk Houston Rockets Basketball

A straightaway three, it is up. And it's good. The Rockets are rolling now. Do a better, harder, longer. Rejected. The beard is cooking. And they play together. They play hard.

He set. He fired. And he had the three. Now, exclusive insight and the latest on your Houston Rockets. You've got to be a champion. To be the champion. Presented by Billiard Factory. Rockets head coach Mike Dan Tony joins the Matt Thomas show on Sports Talk 790.

home of the Rockets. And we are very excited to spend a half hour with our favorite NBA head coach, Mike D'Antony. Rockets and Celtics tonight at 830. Coach, how goes it? How you going? No complaints, no complaints at all. Quick question. And when unfortunately, we've had a couple of these this year where the buzzer has beaten the rockets.

You've had a lot of them in your life where the buzzer has helped the Rockets or any team you've coached. Does it make you, do you sleep the same either way? Do you lie and bet it going, man, that was so much fun to watch, or that was totally agony when it happens on the downside? Well, it's definitely total agony. You know, you try to approach it the same way, whether we, if law would have gone in, going out, we have problems. We've got to cure and we've got to work on.

We've got to get better and got to move forward. That'd be nice and worth of win, but you persevere, you just push it forward. On the frustration level, because look, you've said this, multiple times after the game last of the other night. I was thinking the same thing driving home. I mean, that was a 12-round knockout fight. There was great shooting on both sides. You got two huge baskets from Covington and Tucker.

You know, they struck last, obviously. But where do you size that one up in terms of, do you spend time looking at specific plays maybe earlier in the game that might have been a difference maker that it doesn't come down to a final second? Or do you just go, you know what? That night was just meant to be that somebody maybe with the ball last would have won the basketball game.

Well, I thought it was playing at a high level, maybe playoff level for both tapes. Like you said, both made big shots. But the way we try to look at is that, you know, we're up 10 a couple of times, and we just couldn't get over the hump. And, you know, what is it that we're not, we've got to be a little bit more consistent when we get up to him. We're going to take better shots. You could miss them anyway, so be it.

But, you know, make sure they're good shots. And then I thought that our man-to-man defense just right on man, you know, man on man, just right in front of them. We had a hard time staying in front of Connolly and Clarkson. And, you know, Eric Gordon coming back will help a little bit of that, obviously, because he's a good one-on-one defender. But at the same time, we have to do a better job. Rocket take coach, Mike D'Antony here on the Matt Thomas show.

And coach, I know you talked about it a little bit after the game, but Rudy Gobert being the primary defender on Russell Westonelie. I thought that was interesting. And this whole small ball lineup that you guys are going with, it's making for a lot of interesting wrinkles. What do you think about that one? Russell seemed to get the better of them more often than not. Well, I mean, Russell's playing a very high level right now.

And that's kind of what's our purpose of going small. We're trying to open the floor up for him, and we don't think there's anybody like him in the league, so we're trying to maximize what he can do. And at the same time, it will help James get to the rim. He still does these other things. It makes us better offensive, more efficient, and much better not turn the ball over and all that.

And so far, we really haven't been hurt on the boards or second chance points or things of that sort. The games that we have lost one in Phoenix, we just didn't play well and we didn't have energy. And the last one, one, they played well, give credit. And two, we have to, we have to man up and guard. You know, we got a guard against front of us. So you're going to get better, moving forward, and see if it, you know, continue to work.

But I'm still very optimistic, and I think we can get this thing done. Mike Dan, Tony, with us on Sports Talk 7-90. We have to be with us to the bottom of the hour here on the program, getting ready for tonight's game with the Celtics. You know, we didn't get to see Russ during his MVP season every single night. We do get to see him now? Do you guys talk about where his energy level is a whole lot? I mean, obviously the back-to-backs he doesn't play in,

and I don't know if it's because he want to prepare himself with a playoff run, or he thinks little steps here and there gives him better bursts of energy. But every time I see him play now, it feels like for a better part of two or three months now, Coach, his zero to 60 continues to just be at a high performance level. He's finishing better at the rim. Those little bank shots are coming in and a better percentage. Everything about him in the last two months is not even close to what we saw

in the first couple of months of the season. Yeah, he's got a nice comfort. level going right now. I'm very confident. He's energy level. That's kind of his trademark. That's what he has based his whole career on how he comes and he's just relentless in attack. And he kind of

drags the whole team with him a little bit on trying to get down the floor and we're trying to keep up with it. But that's what he does. And he's doing extremely well. I think the last two months I'm not mistaken, it's maybe the best in his career. If not, it's right there with

the best of his career. So He's playing a very high level. We hope that well. My first to survive. It has to continue that way. He certainly has. His free throw percentage has gotten a lot better. He's not taking merely as many threes.

I mean, everything that we thought he could be, he has come as advertised. About Robert Covington. We saw him literally hours before the first game against the Lakers. You just said throw him out there, see what he can do. I don't even really count the Phoenix game, but he came up with some big shots for you in that Sunday game. having been around him a few days. What does it like to coach him and get to a while you think you can get it from him between now and the end of the season?

Well, you know, I had him also assistant coach in Philadelphia when he was there for six months. And I got to know Robert and, you know, really like him as a person. And also as a player, he just fits us perfectly in the sense of he's a catching three shooter. He can't put it on the floor. He doesn't do that abundantly, but he can attack close. out and get to the rim. He rebounds for his size very good. And he's

a good defender. So I expect, you know, that he will continue along his path and maybe one or some other things that we can use him in different areas. But he's definitely going to be a key for us going forward. And I thought he's played well, especially in the two games. Like I said the Phoenix game we kind of

throw out. He's played well. And I expect that to continue. And, you know, to be honest with, we've had a lot of guys, McNamore, Daniel Hiles had played really well and I play. And that's going to bode well as we go forward. How did you convince James he couldn't jump center anymore? That was probably the biggest shock of their night.

Well, I was kind of a shock, too, that he didn't. But I thought he, I guess he saw Covington go up and get a couple of rebounds. So he thought we might have a better chance with Covington. I was going to say, James thinks he can do everything well on the floor. Why not? He's actually won a couple of jumps over the course of the years. So it wasn't the strangest thing. It's just, I would have liked to have seen 6-5 versus 7-2, but you know what?

Covington held his own. Yeah, I mean, a lot of the jump ball is, you know, depending on how the referees throw it, plus you can steal it. Plus, if you're strong, you can get a little bump in before you go up. There's all kinds of, no other ways you might be able to steal it. But like I said, I don't, you know, the jump ball's not that big of a deal because they get it twice. We get it twice. Yeah. It's when you have to have it.

Yeah, overtime is a big deal. Jump ball is a big deal. But so we'll just, we'll be okay. We'll survive the jump ball. I think so, too. So looking at stats, and again, it's in the eye on the beholder. The rebounding numbers of all favor the opposing team since this move, and that's going to probably not be a huge. Okay.

Now, the ambition when you hit rebounding numbers, that you're qualifying that. Close on qualifying. Go ahead. Okay, I just put the offensive rebound. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I was going to say, what I was going to say. So your listeners know that just don't look at just total rebounds, going to have nothing to do it anything. It's just the offensive rebound.

And how many points do they get off the offensive rebound? That's it. Yeah, I'm a big, I'm way more of concern about a second-chance point category than I would be about rebounding. Yeah, well, that's the only thing about it. They can't get 58 offensive rebounds. They can't put it back in the basket. It doesn't really matter.

Well, one of the things you and I talked about, I think he was on the show, is, you know, Clint, before he left, the heel injuries, he wasn't finishing as nearly as proficiently as he was before. He was grabbing his own rebounds. But so that was, again, my point is that rebounding number to me, is the most overblown stat of it all because if you're making shots, you don't have to worry about rebounds. And conversely, the other team is making a whole lot of shots.

Who cares when the rebound, in fact, if you lose the game because their team's making shots. The one number that I had been in. Well, also a big thing is turn hours because if they have, you know, like 15 turn, we got that. We haven't seen more shots we get. So you don't miss half on my least. So that's another opportunity for them to get rebound.

So there's all kinds of, there's some things that don't mean a lot. It means a little bit. Obviously, we want to rebound the basketball, but we do. not want to get beat in that category, the second chance points. And it's been pretty close. We've been beaten, but not close enough that it causes concern right now. Because even with the tall lineup, we were 24th in the league, I think, or 8th and second chance point.

So we weren't winning with the tall line of a lot. So that's kind of, you know, hasn't got worse, has got better. We hope it will get better. That's why you and I are besties, because I was going to brag about the turnover count in this smaller lineup, even pre-clint, has gone. automatically. If you're under 10 turnovers in an NBA game and it feels like it's been that way for the last month or so, you're going to win

a lot more often than you're going to lose because you're not giving any other team extra possessions. Well, that's especially going in the playoffs. That's a huge stat. And you've got to get up more shots than the other team. You've got make sure you get good shots. And that's what we're working on. We want to make sure that each one of us has a chance.

But if you get up more shots in the other team, then, you know, theoretically you should win. And there's ways to do it on second chance points. There's a way to do it on turnoff. You know, that's the way you create them, and we're trying to do that. If we win that category, we've got a good chance to win. All right, Mike Dan Tony, another segment coming up with the coach here on Sports Talk 790.

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What a pass. Got it. To get Rockets insight, you need to go inside. Hey, look who's here. Rockets head coach, Mike Dan Tony on the Matt Thomas show. Presented by Billiard Factory. 216, final segment with the coach here on Sports Talk 790. Marwin Gonzalez spoke to the folks in Florida with the Minnesota Twins.

We'll let you hear what he had to say about the Astros scandal coming up in about 15 minutes from now. Coach, Major League Baseball is proposing in a couple of years where the top seeds in baseball get to pick who they want to play in the playoffs among eligible playoff teams if they expanded. Would you like to be able to, let's say that the Rockets see to finish first? first or second. Hopefully it happens. But, you know, get a chance to choose who you'd like to play in the first run, or do you like it the way it is where one plays eight, two play seven? Well, I haven't really thought of it. You know, probably like it to where it is. I would say after 82 games, usually the eighth place team is probably the eighth place team. So I don't know if it would be that be that many changes, be honest with you. It might be something

where the eight gets hot and you want to go with the seventh. So, I mean, it could happen. It's interesting, but I haven't heard any talk that we would do that. What about, I know, it's funny, all these commissioners are trying to change things up. Is it because they're afraid they're losing an audience, trying to freshen things up? How often do you guys, as a collective league, get into, you know, like this mid-season tournament, rephrasing things? I mean, is that brought up much among their coaching fraternity? Do you leave that to, like, the general managers and the owners?

Well, you know, really haven't been brought, the meetings I've been in, have been brought up to the coaches. So I think it's more, you know, it has to start with the players union and the league. Then it would probably filter down to our opinion, maybe. But, you know, right now it's the league and players. That's probably worse than you're the ones that have to play. And it's interesting. You know, they're trying, I think every league's trying to spruce up a little bit. You got to change some, maybe keep up at the times and keep up with different entertainment stuff out there that you want to keep fresh.

And maybe it changes warrant. but it will be done with a lot of thought into it because they don't want to mess up something pretty good also. Yeah, the audience that listens this show knows, I do love instant replay. I feel like your league could even do some more of it, and we've seen some examples, most notably the Portland, Utah game of a couple nights ago.

Does it frustrate you that a whistle has to come in order for something to be changed? I mean, do you feel like that's something that could be discussed the league meetings this summer that you don't necessarily have to wait for an official to call something in order for it to be overturned? Yeah, I do think they could do something there because I think everybody on the floor just want to get it right, whatever that is. And if that means using more instant replay and maybe have an official at the table watching the instant replay that is quicker. You know, one thing is they just don't want to make it longer, make it boring and all that, but you do want to get it right.

so, you know, maybe, you know, through signals or whatever, you can have a replay immediately and then, you know, especially the stuff that's obvious. You know, and I know there's always going to be 50-50 calls. Always going to be calls that breaks in the game. But the egregious ones, you want to get right. What goes into the decision-making process when deciding to go for a challenge you? How much do you listen to the player who fouled or didn't or your assistance or looking at the replay? What makes you say, you know what, I'm going to go ahead and challenge this?

Well, we want to try to get something that's closer to, you know, it's never full proof. And you can't be 100% sure because a lot of, you know, and I understand the referee's viewpoint that in a normal situation, they wouldn't have called the foul. But since they did call it, yeah, there was a little contact. And so technically, you know, it's as if you make contact, it's a foul. And everybody knows it wasn't a foul if you ever played basketball, but they don't want to return. So you have to kind of guess and hope that it's clear. And the biggest thing that we try to do, no matter when in the game, you take points off the board. And obviously, if you take three points and four points off the board, that's the max you can do.

But you want to be, you know, if you take it off in the second quarter, if you take off fourth quarter, taking points off, you know, technically is the same. But we just want to be sure when we do it, we're taking points off. The thing frustrates me, Mike, is the fact that you might be. Mike, there's a call in the second quarter that you want absolutely a challenge. And you get it and you win that challenge and you feel pretty good. And then there's something that's screwy that happens in the fourth quarter and you get one per game. My belief would be, and you're worried about timing.

I know the league is. But if Mike Dan Tony or any coach gets a call right in the second, he shouldn't be punished, he should be able to continue to call challenges until you lose a challenge and then you stop it. But why should you have to then? Because I can see your brain moving here. Do I do it now or do I wait for the fourth quarter? one-point game, it doesn't seem fair, especially when you're getting them right. Yeah, I think that's something they might talk about or they might go away from the challenge

altogether. I don't know right yet what the league wants to do with that. But also, a big one, a big one is that even if I challenge early, and I haven't called, you have one mandatory timeout at a quarter. And so even if you haven't called your banditory, you challenge, you lose your time out anyway. because, and I might not have wanted to call it time out there, but I had a challenge. So, you know, even though I won the challenge, I lose my time out. And that's got to change. To me, that's the worst.

At least get your time out back, and I can use my mandatory a little bit later on when it's mandatory or when I want to use it, not because the referees made a mistake. So there's a couple things they've got to tweak if they want to, and, you know, it's not for sure it's from the stage. So we'll see. Give us an update. I know Eric Gordon, you ruled. out for tonight's game against Boston. It's just time going to heal his

soreness? What do you know about where he's going to be right now? Yeah, it's just time. It's all the tests for negative. So whenever he feels like he's able to play, he'll play. And I would imagine, as soon as we come back to the All-Star break, unless something goes wrong, but I would imagine he's ready to go after that. PJ's minutes have dropped a little bit, which I think has always been a goal of yours. Is that a concerned effort? Is that a little bit of foul trouble, a little bit of both? Where do you see his minutes now with Covington adding another longer wing player out there for you

that can play some four and five if you need him to? Yeah, I think we can cut PJ's minutes, and that's something we want and have to do. But he's important, and sometimes his minutes have to go up because, you know, we need a guy to take charges and use his board to be able to keep people off the board. So he has come down, and whenever we can, we will cut them. But, you know, again, he's just an integral part. And some guys, he just can't. If you want to win, you've got to play him.

So we'll see what happens. Rocket Tech coach, Mike DeAntona here on the Matt Thomas show. And coach, I just noticed, especially talking about back to the Thursday game against the Lakers where they were doubling James on seemingly every possession, it seems like your guys are getting a lot better at playing downhill with the four-on-three situations. Are you happy with the way that's been progressing? Yeah, I mean, you know, a lot of things are good. In office, since we've gone with a spread over, everybody's spread out that, you know,

we're our numbers away above what we were trending before. So offensively, we're much better. And the whole thing is going to come down. Can we stop them one-on-one? Can we keep them away from the basket? Because we don't have a lot of shot blocking back there. And can we limit the second-chance points? We do that, keep our turnovers down.

We're going to win a bunch of games. And that's the whole little battle. That's our test. That's what we've got to come ready for every night, and we've got to get better at it. Give us an early preview of tonight's game. This Celtic team coming in is what, one seven straight games, I think, is where the number is?

Well, they're good. They're really good. And, you know, they play five out also. They're big shoes three, so they have a wide open offense. And a lot of them are going to come down. You know, there are guys going one-on-one with our guys, Kimball Walker and Company will go out of us.

and then we'll have James and Wilson company go at them, and if whoever can stop, whoever, because everybody's going to be awake for the rim, and you're going to have to guard your man and keep your body in front of it. And I think they're also very good and not turn the ball over, so that may be one of the keys tonight is not giving any way extra possessions. So after tonight, All-Star break, will you turn the television off, turn your cell phone off,

stay away from basketball? How do you normally decompress with a pretty decent break here between games now? No, just normal. You know, I'll take a couple of days and go someplace and then come back and get ready again. But, you know, there's no basketball. I'll watch basketball until Thursday. And then I probably watch the festivities over the weekend except when our guys are playing. And then get ready and mentally get ready and go next Thursday night.

How is the team mentally? I know buzzer-beaters are always tough to stomach. But it's been a few games since the lineups been changed and the trades happened. And this is who we are. Can you assess just a general culture in that locker room right now? Well, I was frustrating after the loss. I left the mark on everybody. But, you know, we're full of, we think that to go deep and play it,

it's all in that room and the film room among us. It's among us that if we can get our problems solved, and that means, you know, stay in front of guys, now understanding how we're playing, and then offensively just really, really hone in on good shots instead of just, our great shot, said it's just good job. If we can do that,

and if we can play with a necessary speed and energy, then, you know, we're going to be really good. And I think everybody believes that down the last man. And now it's just a matter of, you know, let's do it. And it starts tonight. If it doesn't start tonight, it'll start right. We come back to all over. We've got to make a start to get on a run here and get ready to go.

All right, we'll leave it at that. Coach, thanks for the visit, as always. We'll see you tonight. Bye, sounds good. You got. Thanks, Coach. Mike Dantonie with us here. Brought to you by The Billiard Factory on Sports Talk 798.