NBA FINALS: HEAT VS. NUGGETS

June 4, 2023

Rick Adelman

Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award

THE MODERATOR: I'd first like to introduce David Fogel, National Basketball Coaches Association Executive Director and General Counsel. Also joining us is Rick Carlisle, Indiana Pacers head coach and National Basketball Coaches Association president. I'll turn it over to David.

DAVID FOGEL: Thank you, Mark. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. We are excited to be in Denver for Game 2 of the NBA Finals, and to present the 2023 Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award.

On behalf of Coaches Association President, Coach Rick Carlisle, and all of our head and assistant coaches, I'd like to thank Commissioner Silver, Mark Tatum, Kathy Behrens, Mike Bass, Byron Spruell, John Hareas, Mike Levine, Mark Broussard and so many people at the NBA, and for all the league support and assistance in providing this tremendous platform for our great coaches.

We are especially proud of the Chuck Daly Lifetime Achievement Award, which honors the memory of Hall of Famer Chuck Daly, who over the years set the standard for integrity, competitive excellence and tireless promotion of NBA basketball.

Chuck was an incredible mentor to so many coaches and players in our league, including Coach Carlisle and Coach Adelman. With that, I'd like to turn it over to NBA Coaches Association President, Coach Rick Carlisle, and Coach Adelman. With that, I'd like to turn it over to Coach Carlisle.

RICK CARLISLE: Thanks, David. Adam, thank you. I see Byron Spruell in the back. Hi, Mark. Appreciate you guys. Also want to mention that Rick's daughter Kathy Adelman is here, and a lot of things are kind of coming together tonight. Rick's son David is one of the coaches for the Nuggets. Kathy, who is from Portland, went to the University of Portland concurrent with Erik Spoelstra, and they were both point guards on the men's and women's teams. They know each other well. So there's a lot going on here.

Before I announce our committee members that vote on this award -- one of them is Joe Dumars, who is here, appreciate you being here, Joe -- I want to also announce another award that we normally wait until Summer League but thought it was appropriate tonight, given the fact that his son is also coaching. So the Tex Winter Lifetime Impact Award for assistant coaches was voted on about 10 days ago and was awarded to Brendan Malone. Let's give him a hand. (Applause.)

This is a night that is a very special night. We're going to announce two awards, which we rarely do. Our committee, I mentioned that Joe Dumars is on it. Gregg Popovich, Pat Riley, who is in the building, Bernie Bickerstaff, Billy Cunningham, Donnie Walsh, Phil Jackson and Lenny Wilkins. Our past winners: Tom Heinsohn, Jack Ramsay, Tex Winter, Pat Riley, Bill Fitch, Bernie Bickerstaff, Dick Motta, K.C. Jones, Jerry Sloan, Al Attles, Hubie Brown, Doug Moe, Frank Layden, Del Harris, Larry Brown, last year of course was Mike Fratello.

Rick Adelman is a guy that guys in my generation watched very closely. When I became a first-time assistant coach in this league, I was out scouting a lot. Back in that era, there was a lot of play calling. You were constantly getting calls and writing things down and drawing diagrams.

When I watched Rick Adelman's teams play, there wasn't a lot of slowing down and stopping. There were a few calls here and there, but his teams played with amazing pace and amazing flow. He empowered his players to just play the game and just do what they do.

Consequently, he had amazing success: 23 years, 1,042 wins, three-time All-Star coach, two-time Western Conference champions. His years in Portland were amazing. They were right at the brink, and they ran into a hot Detroit team one year and they ran into Michael Jordan another year. Otherwise, they could well have been champions.

In Sacramento, to give you an idea that great coaching does make a difference, that franchise has been there 38 years, and they've made the Playoffs nine times. Eight times with Rick Adelman as coach, one time with Mike Brown as coach. It's pretty amazing if you think about it.

Then in Houston, had an amazing run of it, must have been about two months. They won 22 games in a row, which is the third-longest all-time winning streak.

Rick did accomplish some amazing things, and his low-key, understated personality belies the fact that he was a guy that was a great innovator of this game and in many ways shaped the way the game is played today. His teams in Sacramento had the bigs coming out, spread out the guards. There was movement, there was cutting. It was a beautiful game to watch. You see a lot of that stuff now. I mentioned his teams in Portland.

Consequently, last year in 2022 he was enshrined in the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Very deservedly so. So I'm going to turn it over to Rick for some comments, and then we'll do some questions and then we'll do a photo op. (Applause.)

RICK ADELMAN: I learned this from Joe Biden. He talked with cards out here, so I brought mine.

I was listening to Rick talk about the teams I had. I have this speech here, but I'm not going to really do it. It was amazing groups that I had. Anybody who coached in the NBA knows that you have a great chance of success when you have really good players. I mean, it's a players' league.

But I also learned that you have to have good players and good people, people that will listen to you and will do what you want. I'm just honored to have this award. I think back to a good friend of mine who is not here, Michael Goldberg, who was a very good friend of mine, and really miss him.

It is amazing that it's here in Denver. When the thing was going, I thought, well, we're going to have to fly to Boston. Then all of a sudden Miami wins. So now you've got my son David here as a first assistant. Ish Smith is on the team, who I coached. Daniel Shimensky is a trainer here, and my trainer was Mike Shimensky. Then Erik Spoelstra, of course, hung out at our house all the time and played basketball on our sport court and did all that stuff.

And then Kyle Lowry, Kevin Love. Robert Pimental is an equipment guy. Forgot about Robert, but it's just like, holy criminy, something happened right. And with (Brendan) Malone getting that award, I told David, you've got to win it. If you can't win it now with us two getting this award, I don't know how you're going to do it.

I think of Chuck, and it brings back bad memories seeing Joe here (laughter), because it was 1990 when we played Detroit in the Finals, my first year coaching. My third year, we got to play Chicago.

After that, I thought, this is easy. You get to the Finals every two or three years.

But we played Detroit, and one thing I admired about Chuck after that series was over is he played to his strengths of his players. I mean, we had to face those three guards they had, Joe, Isiah and then Vinnie Johnson, and they just killed us. They just killed us. I never thought anybody would beat that Portland team three games in a row in Portland, and they did it.

That's where I remember Chuck, how he used the strengths of his team, of his players, to get the best out of them.

I tried to do that. I think Rick said it best. When I had Portland, who had three of the best offensive rebounders in the league on that team, and they would throw it up there and just go get it back. There wasn't much we could do but just rebound the ball. Great team, great guys.

Then in Sacramento we had a totally different team. It was a team that passed the ball, cut, shot it well. But again, I got real smart because I put Vlade and Chris Webber at the elbows and let them be our point guard, and that worked. It really worked with that team.

Then, of course, when you go coach Yao, you don't screw around with Yao. You put him at the low post. You put him where he can be successful. What a great guy he was to coach. One of the worst things I had to me coaching in this league was when Yao got hurt. It just broke me up because he was such a great player. We had Yao get hurt, Tracy McGrady get hurt and that had just ruined that team. It was a great team, because as you said, 22 wins in a row. I forgot about that.

It's good I get back to these awards because it brings back memories of things. That's what happened with the Hall of Fame, too. It brought back so many memories. At the Hall of Fame, I had eight players come back. I had seven coaches, assistant coaches, come back. That really means something to you when you see all those people again. Here I am with Kevin and Kyle on the other team and a couple other players are here. It really means a lot to me when I think back on it.

It validates what you did.

I know I'm not supposed to do this, but when you're a head coach, and Rick will tell you this, you have people around you who help you. They're part of the reason you get there. I had an owner in Paul Allen who gave me my first job. Out of nowhere, he gave me a chance. I really appreciated that. We got to the Finals my first year.

I had assistant coaches that were just great. I'm going to name them, whether people like it or not. John Wetzel was with me for 14 years, I think. Elston Turner, T.R. Dunn, Pete Carril, Bubba Burrage, Terry Porter, Jack Sikma. Pretty good names on this list. Then my two sons, David and R.J., were assistant coaches with me, and Bill Bayno. Great group of guys. That's how you win. You have people around you.

The training staff -- it's just something you think about when you get an award like this. In fact, I see in the back, I think I see -- is LJ back there and Lennan? I got two grandkids here, LJ Adelman and Lennan Adelman, and their mother, David's wife Jenny.

It's good to see them here.

Anyway, I also think the thing you have to do when you're in this league, and anybody who coaches in this league and has been married, you know that your family is so important. Your family is everything to you. They're the ones who stand by you. They're there when you get home. It's long seasons.

I had a great family. I have 12 grandkids now. Good thing about them is you can spoil them and send them back home.

But the thing I had, too, is I had a rock in our family, my wife Mary Kay, who couldn't be here today, but she was a big reason why you get an award like this. "Lifetime achievement" means you have someone special with you.

That's about all I have to say. I'll throw away these cards, and we'll go from there.

Q. These awards, the neat thing to me is they inspire reflection from other people. Coach Spoelstra was just up here talking about the idea that he may not have coached if not for some of your inspiration. As time marches on, whether it's Spo or your son, Kevin, Kyle, what does it mean to you to have the long-term impact on all these different journeys?

RICK ADELMAN: You know, it means a lot. Seeing people that you really care about succeed. I brought my son David in as a developmental coach. I wasn't sure that was really a smart thing for me to do, to get him involved. But he's worked his way all the way up to first assistant, and he's done it on his own. So it's really a pleasure to see that for me. For a father and a coach, it means a lot.

Watching Erik, the way he's grown. Pat took a great chance to give him the job, and he's proven himself, too. You see the ex-players that you've had, that means a lot. When you see guys like Kyle and Kevin, you just think back to all the good times you've had.

I think that's probably the biggest part these awards do, is they give you a chance to see everything. Hall of Fame, my whole family got to go there. I owe all those people. So that's special.

Q. Maybe everybody here doesn't recall that you were a player in this league, as well, and I'm curious --

RICK ADELMAN: That's a very loose statement.

Q. What sort of lessons did you learn as a player about this game and about coaching that you maybe took with you into the coaching career?

RICK ADELMAN: I learned a lot because I was fortunate, I had my first coach was Jack McMahon, who's no longer with us. He gave me a chance. Pat says I made the team in Portland when he was there because they liked me better, and I said, well, that's probably true.

But I think you learn from -- I had Jack McMahon, I had Dick Motta, Phil Johnson was one of my coaches. I had a lot of coaches who were -- Butch van Breda Kolff was one of my coaches. I was around a lot, and I learned from them. I learned what to do. I started the first couple years. I came off the bench after that, and I just learned what you had to do to be an important part of the team, whether you played or whether you didn't.

I learned that -- then I had six years of junior college at Chemeketa Community College in Salem. It's a hard word to pronounce. It took me a while. But we had great success there.

Little did I know that Jack Ramsay was actually following my team at Chemeketa, and when Jimmy Lynam left he called me and asked me if I wanted to interview. I did, and he gave me my first break as assistant coach.

Jack was a unique individual and a great coach.

Q. You mentioned you were reluctant to bring David with you to Minnesota. Why were you reluctant, and then what did you see in him that let you know that he could do it at this level?

RICK ADELMAN: Well, I watched him coach in high school. He had great success in high school, and his teams were fun to watch play. He had a really good feel of how to coach guys. I watched him work guys out in high school, and the reason I hesitated is because I didn't know how long I was going to be in Minnesota. I really didn't know. I didn't want to pull him all the way from Portland to Minnesota and not have a chance to stay there.

But to his credit, after I left, he stayed with Flip Saunders and he stayed with Sam Mitchell and he worked his way into it and worked his way up.

But you never know. It's not like the coaching ranks are really solid right now. Few guys have gotten fired who have been pretty good. You just never know. You've got to get lucky.

I was very lucky. I was 13 years in Portland as an assistant and head coach and I was eight years in Sacramento, four years in Houston. It doesn't happen very often that you get to stay in one place.

That's why I was hesitant. But I just thought he had all the knack and the wherewithal to do the job.

Q. Erik Spoelstra was just in here talking about how you gave Kyle Lowry the confidence to take the next jump in his career, Kevin Love the next jump in his career. With those two guys, who do you think you did for them in helping them become who they are now?

RICK ADELMAN: Well, I think what you have to do is when you're a coach, you have to probably put guys in position where they can succeed, and I tried to do that with both of those guys. Kyle, he was a tough little sucker, I'll tell you what, but we got him. I had Aaron Brooks at the time, too.

But Kyle just kept growing and growing. One thing I remember about Kyle, we played them in exhibition when -- I forgot who he was with. Memphis, that's right. He got a triple-double against us in preseason.

So when they brought in -- maybe we should go after him. I said, go for it, that's great. But he worked his tail off, and he was very -- to me, he was very receptive.

Kevin, it was just a no-brainer. I mean, he was a great rebounder, a great three-point shooter. He could post up. I took advantage of his three-point shot because he could do that and he could spread the floor. We had another guy [Nikola] Pekovic who was our center, who was strong and physical, and Kevin was a perfect fit for him, and Kevin could pass.

I had watched Kevin in high school. He played with my other son in high school. So I saw what kind of talent he was.

One thing I learned, too, that I didn't coach then, but I watched a high school team, and their coach wanted me to come in and put our corner offense in. So I did it, but after practice I said, this is not a -- this is stupid. You've got Kevin Love, you need to post him up. You don't want him at the elbow area.

But when I got to Minnesota, it seemed smart to post him up and put him there, and he did it all. He had all the talent in the world. Both those guys, you put them in a situation, see if they succeed, and then you go for it.

Usually guys don't disappoint you.

Q. You mentioned the way you used the bigs in Sacramento and some of your up-tempo teams. As the years have gone by and you've watched the way the game has gone, have you allowed yourself to reflect on the fact that you are one of the coaches that have impacted the evolution of the game?

RICK ADELMAN: I see it. I see it, especially because I watched every Denver game, and Jokic is Jokic. He is so good. You watched him play, and it's fun to watch that type of game be played.

I have a brother who coaches in junior college, and he tried to tell me one night that I can't watch the NBA because it's just one-on-one and three-point shooting, and I said, well, that's because you had no talent when you were in junior -- if you had Jamal Murray, I think you might give him the ball. (Laughter).

You see it evolving, but I think the three-point shooting has changed the game completely, but when you have -- if you have good post-up people, you're going to go to them. Now the difference is someone like Jokic, you want to double him? Go ahead, because you're going to leave somebody wide open, and he's going to find him.

I see it evolving, and I think it's great for the game. I love watching Denver play, and I love some of the things other people, too. Miami does a lot of the same stuff, move the ball. It's a fun way to play.

Q. You've mentioned and other people have mentioned the incredible ball movement and player movement that your Sacramento teams had, and I know you had Coach Carril in there for a long time and he brought some of the Princeton stuff in, I'm sure. How much of that was your own sensibility about how the game should be played and how much all five guys should be involved in the offense in a given possession?

RICK ADELMAN: Yeah, you know, it's funny because I tell the story all the time that when we started the first training camp and we were playing, and Chris Webber would go to the left elbow all the time, whether or not -- I don't care what we were running, he would run to the left elbow. Vlade would go to the right elbow. I told the coaches, maybe we should just put them there and use them at those spots. They both were good post-up players, but we thought, let's just use them, and they loved it. They loved it. Chris just loved going to the elbow, not all the way down, unless the play was for him.

And Vlade, he was just a natural. We kind of just used those guys, and then we had Doug Christie, Peja [Stojakovic] who was just a great, great shooter, and Mike Bibby who could just flat out shoot it. But they all were willing to cut, they all were willing to do something to set it up for somebody else, and that's what I love about Denver's game. They make the right cut, they set it up for somebody else to get the shot. People don't always see that, but that's why that seem was so much fun to coach, because they were willing.

I've told the story before that people say we didn't defend in Sacramento, and during the regular season we didn't defend a lot because we outscored everybody, but in the Playoffs, that team was so intelligent that we put a game plan in and the other team had a hard time scoring on us because they were all together as a unit.

That team was really special, and it was -- Portland and that team were two that I was very fortunate coaching both of them.