Nate McMillan takes over as the coach of the Indiana Pacers.
The Indiana Pacers have a new coach, and his name is Nate McMillan.
The 8 Points, 9 Seconds crew gathers to talk about the promotion of Nate McMillan, whether Larry Bird makes any sense anymore, and what is in the future for the Indiana Pacers.
Nate McMillan is the next coach of the Indiana Pacers.
Your reaction was .
Will Furr: Nonplussed. I was hoping Larry Bird fired Frank Vogel with a big score in mind, but Nate McMillan is a retreat. He could be better than Vogel, but a “new voice”? Not at all
Jeremy Comstock: $#<&#=^%÷^:=*>”/÷!!!!!!!!
Tim Donahue: Meh. Nate McMillan has had a relatively successful and relatively well-regarded NBA career. There’s no reason to believe he’ll be a bad coach. There’s also not much reason to believe he will make the Pacers much, if any, better.
Ryan Eggers: Surprised, a little confused, and not very thrilled. McMillan matches many of the coaching flaws Bird criticized Vogel for, and McMillan certainly isn’t a “new voice” in the locker room like Bird wanted. Also, why would Bird need to wait a week to hire a guy he’s known for 3 years? If McMillan was his guy, why didn’t he know that from the second he fired Vogel? Unfortunately, we all probably know the answers to those questions
Justin Ochoa:
Next: But Larry Bird said...
Considering all of what Larry Bird said about Frank Vogel, does this make sense to you?
Furr: No. McMillan is a voice the locker room has heard for 3+ years. If they’ve tuned Vogel out, it stands to reason that they’ve tuned Nate out too. McMillan’s offenses have been slow, and his defenses have been average.
More from 8 Points, 9 Seconds
- Pacers’ Daniel Theis dominated Team USA in Germany’s semifinal win
- 3 Players who could beat out Tyrese Haliburton for 2024 USA Olympics
- Pacers’ Tyrese Haliburton takes step back in Team USA loss to Germany
- Pacers fans get angry at Tyrese Haliburton’s NBA 2K24 rating reveal
- Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton unveils lofty goal with Team USA
Comstock: Make sense: Not really, but I don’t really expect Larry to make sense. But firing a successful coach while giving only 3 reasons (change, points, locker room) and then hiring someone who seems to contradict all these reasons (been there, historically slow offenses, been there) is especially baffling.
Donahue: Yes, but that’s because I think Bird fired Vogel, because he was tired of him. Bird wanted something different. While I’m sure he probably thinks that will equate to something to better, ultimately, I don’t think it was particularly important to him. Vogel’s flaws had become too tiresome for him, regardless of Vogel’s strengths, and now he’s ready for somebody else’s flaws.
Eggers: It doesn’t make a French Lick of sense. Bird publicly held a relatively small checklist in things he wanted from a new coach, and McMillan doesn’t come close to meeting those requirements. Fast-paced offense, new voice, and an overall revitalizing change in the team. Nope, nope, and nope. The only sense anyone can make out of it is that Bird’s ideal candidate didn’t fall through, or perhaps more likely he just didn’t know what he was doing.
Ochoa: From my interpretation of the press conference in which we found out Vogel was no longer Head Coach, it sounded like Larry Legend wanted: 1) A fresh voice in the locker room 2) An offensive mastermind. To me, Nate McMillan is neither of those things. I don’t think he’s a bad coach, but he’s been with the Pacers for 2 seasons now so he’s not a fresh voice and his teams are not historically great at offense. No, this does not make sense to me. And, no, the fact that it doesn’t make sense to most Pacers fans is not surprising.
Next: The Pros and Cons of McMillan
McMillan had slow but average to above average offenses with the Portland Trail Blazers. Do you think we will have a better offense than Vogel? Will the defense take a step back?
Furr: I expect the offense to gain some natural improvement. Myles Turner will improve, the Pacers will likely sign/draft an offensive player, and Nate McMillan’s teams have typically been efficient. The defense will likely regress ,though. Vogel has been a consistently excellent defensive coach, and McMillan has not.
More from Pacers News
- Pacers’ Daniel Theis dominated Team USA in Germany’s semifinal win
- 3 Players who could beat out Tyrese Haliburton for 2024 USA Olympics
- Pacers’ Tyrese Haliburton takes step back in Team USA loss to Germany
- Pacers fans get angry at Tyrese Haliburton’s NBA 2K24 rating reveal
- Pacers star Tyrese Haliburton unveils lofty goal with Team USA
Comstock: Offense/Defense: Honestly, if they don’t have a better offense in year one, McMillan should be gone. I expect they will, but it may not equal more points. As for the defense, that depends on Dan Burke. If he stays, and he’s really been the mastermind of the defense, they should be fine.
Donahue: The offense will get better because both Bird and McMillan will shift the team’s emphasis from defense to offense. Nate is being hired to do what he’s told, and be tough about it. He will be told to make the offense better, and that will define the team’s focus. Theoretically, the offensive Xs and Os will get better, but the offensive flaw of Vogel’s teams were the lack of discipline combined with a lack of offensive talent.
Defensively, the team will get worse. McMillan has absolutely no history of putting anything better than average defensive team on the floor. In his 12 seasons as head coach, his teams have allowed 1.6 points per 100 possessions more than the league average . For reference, Jim O’Brien’s Pacers allowed 0.1 points per 100 FEWER than the league average, while Frank Vogel’s Pacers allowed 4.1 points per 100 fewer.
The Pacers have better defensive talent than McMillan’s previous teams – or had, depending on what happens with Ian Mahinmi and Solomon Hill – and Dan Burke will do a good job of maintaining the structure. However, the focus of both Nate McMillan and the team will be getting better offensively, and that will reduce the defensive discipline. That’s a power struggle Dan Burke will not win. The Pacers will probably make Nate a better defensive coach, but Nate will make the Pacers a worse defensive team.
Eggers: Bird obviously thinks he’s a better offensive mind, so I’ll give him a shot. I think almost any coach would be better with rotations and late-game play scenarios than Vogel was last season, so just for that I think McMillan can lead the team to an improved offense. However, if he runs his preferred tempo, that might not result in Bird’s ideal PPG quota. If McMillan runs a faster paced offense like Bird wants, then the answer to this question gets a little more ambiguous. As for defense, the team will inevitably take a step back. There’s no indication that Dan Burke can uphold the kind of defensive culture that Vogel created in his tenure (while adjusting to Bird’s offensive wishes the entire time) and McMillan certainly isn’t the defensive genius Vogel was. However, I doubt Bird really cares. The goal with firing Vogel was to find a better offensive coach. Everyone knew that they wouldn’t find a better defensive mind.
Ochoa: I honestly don’t think we will see a huge difference in style of play right off the bat. On either side of the floor, our schemes and sets may look new and different, but I don’t think Nate’s style is drastically different than Vogel to the point where we’ll say, “Wow, this looks like a completely different Pacers team!”
Next: Who would you have hired?
Were there any other coaches you wish the Pacers would have hired?
Furr: I would’ve cheered for Messina or Mike D’antoni, but some of that is a general “grass is always greener” sentiment. Messina is an unknown, and has international and Spurs experience. D’antoni modeled small ball and had significant success with the 7 seconds or less Suns. They were exciting options.
Soaring Down South
Comstock: Other coaches: Yes, many. I think Bird’s 3-year philosophy is asinine. I would have preferred long-term organizational stability with Vogel at the helm, but with Frank gone, I was hoping for a “next level” type of candidate. McMillan is the opposite— a competent, replacement-level coach with absolutely no chance for greatness.
Donahue: Frank Vogel. Coaching was a problem that neither Larry Bird nor the Pacers needed to solve — at least not at this point. Once Vogel was fired, everything became an unknown. There are coaches out there that would have been more interesting — Messina, D’Antoni, maybe one of the assistants like Stephen Silas — but that’s mostly just the optics.
Eggers: I still remain in the camp of people that believe Vogel should never have even been in consideration for the chopping block. That being said, the prospect of having a big change like this was interesting, and McMillan doesn’t bring it. Someone like Mike D’Antoni would’ve brought that change on the offensive end. Someone like Ettore Messina would’ve brought that change in the excitement of a new coach (a member of the Popovich brain trust, mind you) and seeing what he could do. Either of those coaches would’ve been preferable over this hire. McMillan isn’t a bad coach by any regards, but if Bird was going to get rid of Vogel, I wanted to see a hire that justified it. An assistant coach doesn’t justify it by any means.
Ochoa: Realistically, I didn’t see many “free agent” coaches out there that would have been an upgrade from Vogel. Vogel was a really solid coach and if you’re going to fire him, you have to have a better plan for a replacement. Of all the rumored candidates I heard, I think Brian Shaw or Mike D’Antoni would’ve made the most sense, but not even sure if those guys would have been much of a major upgrade either. Basically what Bird did was the equivalent of a twenty-something fresh out of college quitting his first real job because he didn’t like it, but didn’t have a new job lined up so now he has to move back in with mommy and daddy until he figures out how to be an adult in the real world.
Next: Will the team be better in 2016-17
True or False: The Indiana Pacers will be a better team in 2016-17.
Furr: False. The Pacers overachieved to get 40+ wins under Vogel this season. It’s certainly possible the Pacers will sign someone with offensive firepower and improve, but I would be surprised to see next year’s Pacers exceed this year’s win total.
Comstock: False, but I don’t think the transition from Frank to Nate will be the root of the decline. I think Bird will aggressively try to improve the roster but will have little luck doing so through the FA market. If he swings and misses on a George Hill trade, PG and Myles Turner are only good enough to carry this team to 35 or so wins.
Donahue: I don’t know. More depends on the roster moves than this coaching hire, but my belief is that moving from Vogel to McMillan is at best lateral, and more likely a downgrade. If Bird can add talent — specifically shooting – through the draft and free agency, they’ll be better. If he picks up ill-fitting scraps, then the countdown starts to the Paul George trade demands.
Eggers: The Pacers performance next year will likely have less to do with coaching and more to do with the roster that Bird puts out, although any and all consequences from a bad year will be put on McMillan’s shoulders. If we can hit on one of the free agents that the Pacers fandom have been discussing for the latter half of the year and draft a nice complimentary piece in June, then the team will be better. If not, then either Paul George needs to become a consistently top 3 player or Myles Turner needs to make a huge jump in his game for the Pacers to finish better than they did last year. That likely doesn’t happen, though, and the team will probably regress without roster improvement.
Next: Myles Turner Joins USA Basketball Select Team
Ochoa: True. I think PG will continue to play at God levels and Myles Turner is going to have a great summer. Pending some roster changes here and there, I think the Pacers can go out and win another 40+ games and make the playoffs as a 6-8 seed. Coaching is super important, I get that, but let’s not forget how important it is to have good players. We have enough good players to keep treading water, at the very least.