[USA Today] Three key stats on the defensive turnaround by the Rockets

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Ben DuBose email
2 hours ago

Just one week ago, Houston Rockets head coach Mike D’Antoni blasted his team as “soft” after an embarrassing loss at Miami in which they trailed 59-18 after only 16 game minutes.

At the time, the 3-3 Rockets had a net defensive rating of 116.2 — ranking second-worst in the entire NBA on the new 2019-20 season.

Since then? They’ve now won three straight games to improve to 6-3, and the defensive rating over that stretch is 97.5, which ranks third-best in the league among each team’s last three games. Houston’s total net rating over that same period is 15.0, good for No. 2 overall.

The offensive rating of 112.4 during the same stretch is only slightly higher than the 111.5 rating of the first six. Thus, the vast majority of the team’s growth has come on the defensive end. In two of the last three games, opponents have been held to 100 or fewer points.

The schedule has played a role, but it’s not everything. Yes, the Memphis Grizzlies, Golden State Warriors, and Chicago Bulls — the three teams Houston has beaten in its current three-game winning streak, as of Sunday — have a combined 7-22 (.241) record.

But it’s not as if everyone Houston played over the first six games was a juggernaut. The Washington Wizards are 2-6 (.250) and put up 158 points. The New Orleans Pelicans are 2-7 (.222) and scored 123 points. So be it actual defensive improvement, bad shooting luck evening out, or a combination of the two, something has changed.

Here’s a look at three telling numbers on the turnaround:

35.4 versus 26.3

That jump represents an enormous increase in the minutes per game of starting center Clint Capela.

In Wednesday’s win over the Warriors, Capela had 19 points, 16 rebounds and a career-high-tying six blocks. In Saturday’s rout of the Bulls in Chicago, Capela posted season highs in rebounds (20) and minutes played (42), and he also had 16 points and four blocked shots.

In the first six games, Capela averaged 13.2 points, 8.0 rebounds, and 1.7 blocks in 26.3 minutes per game. In the last three, those numbers jumped to 15.0 points, 16.3 rebounds, and 3.3 blocks in 35.4 minutes per game. Even his free-throw percentage improved significantly in that stretch, rising to 60.0% from 47.4%.

As for reasons why and where it all began, it’s a bit of a “chicken or the egg” conundrum. Is Capela playing more because D’Antoni made a conscious choice to put more trust in his 6-foot-10 center? Or was D’Antoni’s choice a result of Capela’s superior play forcing his hand?

To some degree, it could be both. And it might also be an improvement in Capela’s health, with the 25-year-old admitting after Wednesday’s game that he had suffered a shoulder injury in offseason play with the Switzerland men’s basetball national team.

Regardless, the result is a net positive for the Rockets. The reality is that outside of Capela, the team’s frontcourt options are either undersized, older, or both. Even if Houston’s perimeter defense is adequate, extensive doses of lineups with a 6-foot-5 P.J. Tucker at center probably aren’t going to have sufficient rebounding, length, or rim protection to survive in today’s increasingly athletic NBA.

There’s also the matter of whether Tucker, now 34 years old himself, could remain fresh over the grind of 82 regular-season games if asked to regularly play center against significantly larger players.

Besides Tucker and going by D’Antoni’s current rotations, the next options at the power forward and center spots are 19-year NBA veteran Tyson Chandler, now 37 years old; and 35-year-old Thabo Sefolosha, who is just 6-foot-6 and has spent most of his career as a swingman. Neither is a strong candidate for extended minutes.

To put it simply, for the Rockets to put forth a lineup with sufficient athleticism and length to guard most modern NBA teams, Capela is essential given the current roster composition. Whatever the reason, his minutes are up, and so is Houston’s overall defensive productivity.

“We did play better defense,” D’Antoni said after Saturday’s win in Chicago. “Clint, I thought that was his best game of the year. He dominated the rebounding and the defense. He was great.”

22.2% versus 43.3%

That’s the three-point shooting by opponents in Houston’s last three games (3-0), as compared to its first six games (3-3).

Yes, the schedule hasn’t been great with the Grizzlies, Warriors, and Bulls. But four of the first six opponents were teams that entered Sunday with .500 records or worse, and two of them (Wizards, Pelicans) had winning percentages of .250 or worse! The Rockets actually gave up an average of 140.5 points in those two games.

Be it defensive improvement on the perimeter, bad shooting luck evening out, or a combination of the two, the numbers show the problem is getting better. It could also be the team getting into better shape, which D’Antoni had cited as an issue.

“If you’re going to win in this league, you’ve got to defend,” guard Russell Westbrook said after Saturday’s game. There’s no nights off. We’ve got to play every single night.”

With Westbrook, the Rockets began the season in those first six games by leading the entire NBA in pace at 109.2 possessions per game. That was a dramatic increase for a team that ranked fourth-to-last in pace a season ago.

Over the last three games, they’ve slowed the pace slightly to 104.7 (No. 8 overall), which might be helping the veteran-laden team conserve more of their legs for defense and perimeter closeouts.

“We’ve done an unbelievable job,” added James Harden, when asked about the defensive improvement over the last three games. “That’s what we’ve talked about. Before that, we ranked close to last in defense. We’re much better than that, and we’ll continue to show it.”

63.1% versus 36.8%

That’s the proportion of Houston’s overall team minutes played by Eric Gordon in the first six games, as compared to the last three. The dramatic decrease is in part because he missed one game with a hamstring injury, and played just 21 minutes in his return Saturday.

To put it simply, Gordon has been a problem for the Rockets on both ends of the court. He’s shooting 28.3% overall and 25.4% on three-pointers with a Player Efficiency Rating (PER) of just 1.8, with a negative net rating of -8.7.

Lineups with Gordon have graded out poorly on defense as well, which may be in part because having a 6-foot-3 guard at small forward makes the Rockets much smaller than most opponents.

To D’Antoni’s credit, he adjusted by moving 6-foot-6 forward Danuel House Jr. into the starting lineup and keeping him there, even after Gordon’s return. That starting lineup of Westbrook, Harden, House, Tucker, and Capela has graded out extremely well.

ut it’s not just a matter of Gordon versus House. Going by net rating, the Rockets have also fared better with 6-foot-3 reserve guard Ben McLemore in the lineup, as compared to Gordon.

The Rockets can’t simply give up on Gordon. He was a dynamic two-way force as recently as last postseason, and he’s an essential part of the Rockets ultimately hitting their ceiling as an NBA championship contender. There’s a reason they gave him an additional $54.5 million in guaranteed money with his contract extension in September.

Breaking Gordon out of his current slump is certainly a priority, and he might also be one of the guys D’Antoni referred to as needing to get in better shape. He probably needs playing time to help accomplish both of those goals, or at least to expedite the process.

Nonetheless, D’Antoni has to balance that with the reality that to this point, Gordon’s presence has clearly been a net negative for the Rockets. And the schedule will stiffen in the near future, with the 6-3 Los Angeles Clippers (who may have Paul George back) coming to Houston on Wednesday.

Given the small sample size and the end goal of a title, it would be extremely premature and reckless to remove Gordon from the rotation entirely. However, there’s also a middle ground between removal and the 30.3 minutes per game that Gordon averaged over the first six games, when Houston got off to its poor start defensively.

If D’Antoni can limit Gordon to the 20-to-25 minute range until his performance improves, that might be the optimal way to let Gordon work through his slump while also giving the Rockets a better chance to win games in the interim.