Progress ?

The team seems to be playing harder these last 2 games , and this is a huge step in the right direction. No one is saying we have reversed the trend , but the effort seems to be better. There is too much going wrong with this team to single out one cause for the poor play. I know it seems like its all falling apart. We cannot shoot. We don't have great individual defenders. The Refs seem to really be taking it to us this year.

The issue with the team goes beyond even all of this. We just don't play smart basketball, and we never have even when things go well. Also I question our mental toughness, granted its a lot easier to get up for a fight when you only have to do so once every few games. Right now the Rockets have to fight for everything to even be in the game.

I know everyone wants to crap on the team both for their effort and for their execution. Frankly fans deserve to do that. However, a few more three's fall , a couple of calls go the other way and we are right in this last game. This early in the season you dont look at the results you look at how we play. We played poorly enough to get the coach fired after 11 games. Right now we are still playing stupid, but the effort is coming back which has to happen.

Yes, we have structural and scheme issues. Yes we play idiotic basketball with far too high a frequency. But the pieces are there, our confidence and chemistry are not. Players have to play better, coaches have to teach better. The first step is self reflection and motivation.

For those of you who are results oriented we have gone from being blown out by 30 to winning in OT against crappy teams , and from being blown-out by 30 to only losing by 12 to good teams . All i see on here is threads saying that this is the problem , that is the problem etc.... there is no one problem. One problem that is turning around is the effort level and this is the base upon which you have to solve all other issues. I'm trying to look on the brightside while remaining as skeptical as possible. We can't shoot this poorly all season long and if we do it will be a statistical aberration for the ages.

 

Hey it's easy to give up , say everything is wrong in hindsight . It's much harder to think that maybe our GM is right , that we are talented , and that our players care about winning . Feeling frustrated is to be expected . If we as fans turned out back on the team now then it would be a lot like the behavior we scrutinize our players for . It's easy to play hard when you are winning . Staying focused and giving 110% is hard when the tables are turned and everything seems to be going wrong . I can feel our guys get deflated when they get a bad call or a 3 doesn't drop . They are trying hard . We expect these guys to blindly fight through negative events as if they didn't happen and have a short memory . In truth there is a large grey area for how aware you want your athletes to be . It's always darkest right before dawn .

 

Yeah , it's gonna take Lawson to get back to his old self and Dmo to come back to his old self to have any progress on that front . like it or not , we aren't too far removed from playing at last year's level . Sure our defense has been worse ... But if we could just shoot threes acceptably then we might have 1 or 2 more wins . Dwight just can't score at this point and when the shots aren't falling the ONLY semblance of offense is James . James could drive all game and put up 50 willing us to win , but that's not smart either . I'd rather take a healthy James and losses than a worn down one and wins or closer losses . We know that James alone won't be enough in the playoffs and we have to find something else as a team otherwise we aren't going far .

I can't fault James effort on defense as it looks like he actually has been trying these last two games and is basically our whole offense . The shooting has to turn around . If it doesn't fire the damn shooting coach . Confidence is also key and it's so obvious at this point ours is completely shaken . We need cupcake games and wins to get some confidence rolling , with it could come our shooting and with that our season .

Make no mistake we are in a dire position , if we can't get our confidence rolling soon then every loss will dig us deeper and our confidence will fall . Also it will be harder and harder to maintain focus and effort . It's a steep slope . The good news is that it's just as steep on the way up and a little irrational confidence can go a long ways . The win the other night was important and to be in the game in the fourth quarter against a good team on the road with questionable calls is a small moral victory; especially if viewed in light of previous games this season .

I hope that the progress regarding effort is here to stay . All we need is a little bit of shooting regression and some breaks here and there and we can be right back to playing decently . Playing well will come later and is partially dependent on health . Beverley and Dmo are huge for this squad and have experience playing with harden Howard and Ariza , our three best players . It's a glimmer of hope , but it's more tangible now than it was two games ago ... Hence the progress .