During a 30-minute introductory news conference on Wednesday, Nuggets coach David Adelman outlined several of his philosophies as he takes over the job. Here are five key topics that came up during his presser, and how he tackled each of them.
Defense: Schematic variety
Adelman operated as Denver’s offensive coordinator on Michael Malone’s staff. When he took over as interim head coach, he took a more involved role in the defensive scheme as well. Nikola Jokic played drop coverage in a crucial win rather than his usual up-the-floor positioning, and the Nuggets went to a zone throughout their second-round playoff series to thwart the Thunder. Expect them to continue trying an assortment of strategies.
“I think we have to be much more creative throughout the season. … I think it gets guys through the year healthier,” Adelman said. “You can demand a very aggressive man defense, but I think you can change things up. I think we have high-IQ players. That allows you to (have) more variety defensively.”
Denver’s base defense against the pick-and-roll typically deploys Jokic at the level of the screen, a more aggressive arrangement than playing him closer to the basket. The idea is to provide a buffer for the defender tasked with navigating the screen, and to ultimately deter the ball-handler into a reset. The consequence is that if the ball-handler can thread a pass to the roller in the middle of the floor, Denver is stuck defending 3-on-4, chasing their tails to close out on shooters. The rotations demand intense effort. When it doesn’t work, opponents drill open 3s. When it does work, it’s exhausting.
The Nuggets regressed from eighth in defensive rating to 21st in the league last season.
Offense: Half-court precision
At their championship heights, the Nuggets were notorious for walking you down and patiently pummeling you in their half-court sets. With Jokic pulling the puppet strings, they always generated an open shot.
They still ranked fourth in offensive rating last season, but rather notably via an uptick in tempo. Denver was the eighth-fastest team in the NBA, one year after ranking 26th.
Adelman wants to get back to the team’s roots.
“Our transition game was very impactful throughout the season, but some of that does not translate to the playoffs,” he said. “So that’s a major goal for us. We have to get back to being an execution-based team. If that takes away some of our PACE numbers or whatever the analytics want to say, I think that’s OK if that wins you a game in May, as opposed to playing a game in December. It’s a very different style of basketball. And we have to think that way throughout the whole season, so when we get to that point, we can morph into that team.”
Adelman made sure to marvel at the appropriately named Pacers and their anomaly of a playoff run this year — emphasis on run.
“But I think most of the time, the vast majority of the time,” he said, “if you want to win big, you’ve gotta play slow. You’ve gotta be efficient. You’ve gotta be clean.”
Player development
When Josh Kroenke posited last week that “a lot of our answers are internal right now” as a roster, the subtext seemed directed at Adelman, who’s taking over a largely underdeveloped depth chart loaded with late first-round picks and early second-rounders.
If changes to the roster are indeed minimal this summer, then finding enough bodies to complete a deeper playoff rotation will be a heavy burden. Adelman seems ready to embrace that, understanding he’ll need to give young players more in-game experience during the regular season — but also preaching that “to grow into a role, you have to earn a role.”
“We have people in this building that are more than capable of creating the depth that we need. It’s also me creating a different kind of relationship with these players,” he said. “Being the head coach as opposed to lead assistant is a lot different. Those expectations have to be defined for them. I need to be active and go see players, make sure they understand what they can do to have an impact on this team next year. … All these guys have people they work out with away from this building. We have great people in this building. But we have to unify those relationships.”
He’ll be trying to mend a disconnect that has developed in some of those relationships. Players’ offseason workout preferences became a point of contention between Malone and former general manager Calvin Booth.
Ego management
Part of being an NBA head coach, of course, is managing the fallout of your own lineup decisions. Professional athletes are prideful. They want to play. When they don’t, it inherently bruises the ego.
Adelman seemed to display a deft hand at navigating locker-room politics during his interim tenure. He attempted to pull off a pure meritocracy. There were nights when starting small forward Michael Porter Jr. was excluded from the closing lineup. Porter was still among the players to endorse Adelman for the full-time job.
So, how will Adelman navigate those situations over the course of a season?
“The last two years, we’ve lost Game 7 in the second round of the playoffs,” he said. “So when we get to December, January, February, and there’s small fires to be put out and all those things, and guys aren’t feeling it or whatever, I will remind them of that. We have to understand that if we want to have our ultimate goal, our professionalism has to be (consistent) throughout the whole season. … If guys can’t understand that, that’s an issue, and I’ll make sure they remember that.”
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Adelman has the opportunity to build his own coaching staff this summer. “Those are conversations we’re gonna have going forward,” he said. “… I do think we’ll have to take a long look at everything with the (current) staff, just like you do with your roster, your players. Because every year, you want to get better.”
In all likelihood, Adelman’s eventual staff will feature a mix of individuals retained from last season, and a handful of newcomers. He was also asked if he plans to hire an offensive coordinator for the role he previously occupied.
“I have to be willing to listen to outside opinions,” he said. “It’s different for me. It was my opinion (as an assistant) before, being given to someone else. So I think delegation will come as the staff is formed. And there are different ways to do it. What we’ve done here has been successful, with the offensive and defensive coordinators, with the head coach. But there’s other people doing it a different way across the league.”
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