2001 Mercury 30ELO shifting problems

[FireBob462]

I have been plugging away at little things on my new to me used 14 ft livingston with a 2001 mercury 30elo each time I hit the water, most issues have been due to user error accompanied by some small issues that seemed big to me because i have never had a boat before. My current issue happened when I dropped her in yesterday. All was going well until I I went to put it in reverse at the dock and all it did was go forward. It made it very difficult to get out on the lake but after running over my pvc pilons on the trailer I finally got someone to push me out. As soon as i got out there it wouldn't go back into neutral. After shifting back in forth on the the control box with the engine running of course, i finally got it to go to neutral. I then remembered that i zip tied the throttle and shift cables loosely to the transom in order to clean things up back there keeping in mind not to create new bends. I cut it loose and continued to to shift back and fourth on the control box i finally got R F N back but the spots on the control box where they engage is off and it makes a grinding noise when going from gear to gear even when shifted quickly. Its also allot harder to shift and Reverse sometimes will bogg down the engine until I give it a little gas. How do you adjust these cables? What is the best way to see if it will shift at the engine by myself? What are the common signs of the clutch dog going bad? Any other pro tips you guys may have?