Positivity vs. Coach Nate

First a little disclosure. I am not nor have I ever been on an organized sports team since little league. I'm not sure what's considered the norm in coaching. My assumption based on my own observations is that there's a whole range of how head coaches motivate a team, and Coach McMillan falls somewhere towards the mean (average) as far as coaching style.

That said, there've been a number of comments he's made lately that strike me as harsh. I do get the feeling that he always makes an effort to answer questions from the media candidly, and he tries to be realistic in his analysis. But even when one tries to be realistic it's impossible to keep your subjective viewpoint from getting in the mix, and it seems to me that Nate's glass is half-empty.

I'll give a few examples. My Internet is slow tonight (satellite) so please forgive me but I'm not going to get the exact quotes, instead I'm paraphrasing most of these:

• From the BE homepage:

  The 3 most memorable moments...

  "It's not 3 moments. We had an unbelievable comeback in the Rose Garden. Our first playoff game. Our first road game. The first game we lost to the Lakers, I'll never forget that, what our guys were looking like during that time. There were a lot of great moments."

   So his one moment he specifically remembered is a loss.
• After losing game 4 in Houston, when asked about our chances in the series, he said he didn't know how much fight his team had left.
• Tonight on his conversation with The Game's "Courtside" show with Mike, Mike and Wheels, he was asked about Oden's decision to go to Ohio for the summer to continue his college education. Nate said 1) The players are free to go where they want for the summer, the organization can't force them anywhere. 2) He strongly encourages the players to spend as much time in PDX as possible with the assistant coaches. He will have some coaching staff in Ohio with Greg. 3) He recognizes that college education is important to Greg, but he has stressed in their conversations that Greg has a career now and the career comes first. "He needs to have priorities."
From a P.R. standpoint alone, not to mention his relations with Greg, I would have expected a statement more along the lines of "We're very supportive of our players' pursuing their college educations. It's good for their personal development and it sets a good example for aspiring athletes."
• Brandon Roy has publicly made it his goal to win the championship next year. Roy said it's important to set goals because that prepares your mind and body to achieve the goals. Asked about this, Nate says that of course we are now reaching for the championship because once a team reaches the playoffs, the championship is the next goal. However, he's quick to add that next year he has no idea how far we'll go. Could get knocked out in the first round again. Probably won't make the brass ring.

I don't suppose that Jackson or Riley are a ball of laughs. But isn't there something to be said for believing in your guys, and making them believe that you believe? Positive reinforcement? I'm not coming to any conclusions here. Just taking the opportunity to see if I'm off base.  

I do wonder if this style doesn't also effect the game-day decisions. It seems like Nate's philosophy is that there are a lot of dues to pay before you can achieve a major goal. There are no easy wins. So it seems to me he approaches each decision with the idea that you have to do things the right way, and that often means the hard way.  I think the team's growth attests to the benefits of this philosophy. But I also think that to get the ring you need a coach who has a bag of tricks and doesn't hesitate to change things up because it feels like the right thing to do.