The Rockets need to use unconventional lineups to win in the playoffs

The article makes a lot of sense and I would hope coach would consider experimenting with the lineups in the last 4 games of the regular season. That is not a lot of time but it would be better than trying such changes once the playoffs begin.

 

I agree with this and have been feeling that Brewer should be at the point with the starters because of his defensive ability. Our best perimeter defenders are Ariza and Brewer. They need to be checking the opponent's best offensive perimeter players. That means Brewer has to start and match up with guys like Parker, Paul, Westbrook, etc.

The other position where we have to get greater vairance with the starters is at power forward. (Once again, like last year, we're talking about the 1 and 4. Bosh killed us.)

Since we can't run DMo out there any longer and knowing that we're going to be small and short of big bodies at the 4/5 (unless Morey goes and gets somebody else), then I'm wondering if the move at the 4 with the starters shouldn't be to go small with Kostas moving into the lineup.

The advantage of starting Brewer/Kostas/Harden/Dwight/Ariza is you then can bring in Smith/Jones as a tandem against teams backup bigs. Splice in Jet and Pablo with those guys and let JET and Pablo play against backup perimeter players where they can use their veteran moxy against lesser talented perimeter players and there's your 9-man rotation. Smith and Jones look much, much better playing against opponent's backups where they can both defend more effectively and both guys can run the ball up, thereby allowing the guards to runout and spot up early for the 3 or get ahead of the pack for the layups.


What I am convinced of is if we run the old standard lineup out there with JET at the 1 and Terrence at the 4 that we will get smoked at some point in the playoffs. That won't work. Opposing starting point guards are going to gallop right past JET and Terrence can't hold bigger bigs nor can he create space offensively.

What I am not convincd of is would a smaller non-conventional lineup actually work any better than what we are doing now. But I think they've got to try it and see how Kostas and Brewer look with our big 3.

 

I like it. 0% chance Mchale tries it.

 

I LOVE this idea! but like the other poster mentioned Mchale is waaaay to rigid to think out of the box like this.....it's so sad that a poster on clutch fans can have more sense then a HOFamer like McHale

 

Although a Rookie, Johnson should have been guarding Parker. Yes he is a liability being a rookie however, Dorsey is a liability from the FT line and he still gets time for obvious reasons. Even if Johnson ONLY plays selected minutes and selected games when Terry and Prig are getting torched, so be it. How many times this year have we gone with the same lineup, only to have one player torch us and torch us and torch us because no adjustment is made.

 

Pretty unfair McHale criticism considering he started Delfino at the 4 two years ago to pull Ibaka out of the lane, and Asik at the 4 to attempt to mitigate Aldridge last year.

 

I guess he didn't start Delfino at the 4, but moved Parsons there and started Cisco. He went small though, which was brilliant and almost won him the series

 

It took him a loooong minute to make the Asik adjustment...I felt like he should have put Parsons at the 4 at times as well to make Aldridge chase him around the perimeter. A major reason we couldn't slow down Aldridge is because he guarded no one the entire series neither did Lillard.

 

Aldridge would have just backed down Parsons and gotten anything he wanted. And if they switched Dwight onto him, Rolo would've grabbed every board. I agree though, they should've started the series with Omer. How could they not know TJones was too small for him right off the bat?

 

think coach has a clutchfans account so he can at least give it thought

 

Just posted this yesterday in a different thread ...



Haven't seen it mentioned yet, but since Bev was lost, I've become more and more convinced of something ...
In the playoffs Harden needs to play true 'PG' a whole lot more

That way McHale can have Ariza & Brewer on the floor together a lot more to guard other team's PG, and we don't have Terry/Prig trying to check 2's (Ellis/Green/Afflalo) or even 3's (Parsons/Kawhi/Batum), or overburden Harden by having him guard the opponents' best wing scorer all night

This would mean KJ McDaniels would now become a key rotation piece at the 2/3 so Brew & Ariza don't have to play 40+ every night, and he could be a secret weapon as a beast to smother guys like Parker when they are lighting us up

Jet/Prig could still split 12-16 mins off the bench when Harden sits, or against opponents' backup PG here and there

Plus we know McHale likes to go small, and I could see us fielding a big, long, quick perimeter-D lineup for stretches with 1 Big, Harden at point on offense, plus Ariza/Brew/KJ swarming the perimeter and seamlessly switching on picks

Not like we haven't seen sudden rotation shakeups in the playoffs from McHale before ...
- Bev steals Lin's starting job during 1st-rd vs Thunder after being here about 3 months
- Asik takes TJ's starting job at PF after missing most of the season last year
- Troy Daniels takes Garcia's backup minutes in the wing rotation after being a reg-season afterthought last year

There are 144 game minutes to distribute among the 1,2,3 positions
This is how I'd like to see McHale allocate them in the playoffs against a team with a star PG:
Harden - 38
Ariza - 34
Brewer - 34
KJ McDaniels - 22
Terry - 8
Prig - 8

 

Coach is too smart to do this.

 

To be honest were prob top five deepest team in the league. Was prob almost as deep as the warriors before D-mo an Bev went down. I think if we had a coach who Could tinker with line ups against different teams in the playoffs we'd be unbeatable. Mchale should start a three gaurd line up of the beard , brewer, and ariza against the Spurs next game to try and catch momentum early.

 

But he does have a point with the unconventional lineup..if someone can correct me if Im wrong please but didnt we have Bev and Harden switching at forward spot in the OKC series I remember it being useful for a stretch there and almost damn near pulled it off. It's something Pop probably is prepared for, but who knows it can work! Gonna be interesting what coach does tonight and this point forward.

 

Hmm, a lineup of Brewer, Harden, Ariza, Smith, and Dwight? Please. One of my recent posts suggested that exact lineup. We already have a non traditional style of play where our 1 is our 2 and our 2 is our 1. Just put the best players out there to start and fire a cannon instead of a slingshot at teams.

 

a lot of imulating the Warrios lineup..he's basically saying we should have hired Steve Kerr the past summer

 

Your right that Aldridge would have done that but how in the world could he have guarded Parsons on the other end?? remember as a rocket Parsons was the most active player in the NBA in terms of movement..there was a stat that came out last year I remember that showed that...on top of that for us Parsons was a near 40% 3 pt. shooter so that would force Aldridge out of the lane completely destroying Portland's strategy of stopping Harden. If u remember the old Golden State teams were devastating with this line-up. They would put the 6'9 Al Harrington on Yao and start the 6'8 Stephen Jackson at the 4. No one could stop them until they ran into an equally unorthodox team in the Utah Jazz.

 

i like the idea of starting brewer at the 1, with harden running point on offense and brewer defending the 1. i think that would have its benefits, but it would also cause weaker bench production.

i'd also cut prigs and dorsey from the 9 man rotation in favor of nick and papa. minutes could look like:

dwight (36)
jones (28) - smith (32)
ariza (36) - papa (20)
harden (36) - johnson (12)
brewer (28) - terry (12)


brewer and johnson are our best chance at defending the 1. papa needs minutes to help create offense with his driving and passing skills off the bench. terry for clutch shooting. prigs doesn't give anything we don't already have so he's out, dorsey's out to avoid hack-a-joey. KJ could replace terry if we need D more than O.

 

These are all very good ideas but they need to be implemented immediately like.....tonight...do you have any faith in McHale thinking out of the box?