Rockets' GM Daryl Morey stands by small ball team despite loss to Knicks | NBA | FIRST THINGS FIRST

Still 20 some games left in the regular season. Let’s just sit back and observe. I will say this — this is a copy cat league, and we looked out of sorts when the bigs were relentless attacking us last night.

 

Wait, people here actually think it's even worth discussing whether that loss was because of small ball? That loss had little to do with the size of our players, and much to do with the Rockets' habit not getting up for crap teams. Esp in the first half.

I think it's now like 10 or 11 of our 21 losses have come to sub-500 teams?

I know, it's frustrating as hell to watch as a fan... you sit down with a beer for what you think will be a fun, relaxing evening of watching Harden go for 40 and the Rockets win by 20, and then they not only keep things WAY too interesting, but ultimately lose in an excruciating way. But it doesn't mean we don't have a winning formula. I think it means we have veterans who finally are learning to save it for the playoffs.

 

You ARE crazy if you think MDA is/was the problem. Especially after a loss that was due to listless play and effort on part of players.

Agree with everything else though.

 

And that's really okay.

In fact, I greatly prefer it that way.

I am more partial to winning than thinking i am right.

 

Morley looking svelte, did he not study his spreadsheets, “only lost to the Bucks by one” ?

 

Well 31 rebounds behind had nothing to do with us being short?

DD

 

Imagine instead of the junky big men the Knicks were owning us with it was Anthony Davis and his tall Laker teammates. It’s a fun gimmick during regular season when opponents haven’t overtly gameplanned for it, but it will take its toll in the postseason. Miss the days of Harden alley ooping to Capela....

 

Small ball only works if they try on defense. They did not last night.

 

If last night's game is the wake up call the team needed to understand they can't just show up and expect to win, then it was worth it. There are plenty of games left where they can continue their ascent to the 2 seed....it's just that their margin of error is zero now. I'm still going to trust my eyes and my gut on this and say that the Rockets have the look and feel of a team that can go on an epic Finals run. There has to be a concerted and collective team effort to defend and rebound, and we need our shots to fall with a little more consistency. If that happens, the Rockets are the most dangerous team in the West.

 

SAS: "Now teams can look at this game and see how to beat the small ball Rockets."

SAS figured us out, guys! Just get more rebounds than us and Rockets lose! Easy peasy!

 

Giving up 20 offensive rebounds doesnt come down to height it comes down to heart. This lineup will be fine.

 

Lol bruh...it only 1 loss. Ofcourse everyone would start overreacting due to our controversial lineup and strategy.

 

You're right, it certainly played a role. I was struggling with the best way to word that post. The point is that wasn't the primary factor, and even if it was, it's not enough evidence to even be worth discussing. Every team has a weakness, and size is one of ours (though of course, that small size is also closely correlated with several of our strengths). Sometimes our lack of size is going to hurt... and while it may have hurt last night, anyone who reasonable who watched that game shouldn't have seen nearly enough to believe our formula can't work.

We were down 21 on the road against a team that, while not very good overall, has strengths that dig elbows almost perfectly into our weaknesses, and that couldn't miss from deep. And we still nearly won, and probably would have if not for what appeared to me to be a clear lack of focus and interest in the first half.

 

Randall and Gibson are not "junky" big men. Our intensity wasn't there last night. It's hard to win any games when the rebounding differential is 31. Knicks are the best offensive rebounding team. They punished us down low and we couldn't turn them over. If other teams can do that, sure, we will be in a world of trouble. The thing is though show me teams in the west that can do that to us. AD may be, but the lakers don't have another big that can do this. Jazz - their bigs don't scare us down low and we have an advantage over them offensively. I would not want to play Mavs of all teams in the first round. All in all in the West, the clippers possibly can crash us on the board and overwhelm us offsensively, but more or less play similarly to us. The Lakers - if LeBron starts posting up against us like Randall, it will be tough, but we may not even see them in the playoffs. I would like to play Jazz in the first round, Denver in the second, and clippers in the 3rd. There is a path.

With CC, I don't think we had a path.

 

I just think that most of the league is not really adjusting right now because it is the regular season and we are the only team playing this way, but once you hit the playoffs, teams will game plan around us.....and if they rebound like the Knicks did we are not going to win many games.

This is 100% why I wanted a BIG that can shoot the 3ball ala Mehmet Okur so you could still have the versatility to put a big guy in to rebound if necessary.

We are all in on a gimmick, IMHO.

DD

 

I think the higher seed will go to the NBA Championship Game. The #2 Seed is vital, that's why that game last night was so important. They are evenly matched.

There are going to be more games where the Rockets shoot below average in the playoffs, than above average. The game slows down and opponents can key in on what you do best....WE NEED BRUNO MORE TO STOP THE OPPONENTS FROM HAVING A FREE LANE TO THE BASKET AND NOT GET OUT REBOUNDED BY LARGE MARGINS

 

It's certainly possible, but again, last night just didn't prove anything one way or another. They would have helped, but we didn't need those rebounds to win. And no matter how small we are, getting outrebounded by 31 is an anomaly in this league, not to mention all the other abnormal things that went NYC's way. Also, rebounds are the box score stat with the weakest correlation to winning. Ultimately, the Knicks exploited our weaknesses while we failed to exploit theirs the way we normally do.

I believe most of the strengths we have will remain intact in the playoffs. Remember how we exposed Gobert in a few games even in last year's playoffs? That was well before we officially went small (but while Capela was sick for much of the series and playing like garbage), and Utah had to start cutting his minutes because he was a complete non-factor.

This Rockets team is that x10. The spacing and speed this team brings is a problem in either the regular season or playoffs. There's only so much you can do to adjust if you want to keep low mobility big guys out there. The main thing that worries me in the playoffs right now is the same thing that worries me every year: officiating changes. Especially the NBA's hitman, Scott Foster.

I mean I get the concern. This strategy is pretty out there, and I wasn't sold on it at first... but I believe it is/was our best change at the trade deadline.

 

How is this supposed to prove the Rockets can't go small when the guy who got 16 rebounds on the Knicks(Randle) was 6'8" and Taj Gibson(10 reb) is also only 6'9"? That only proves a lack of effort - not a problem with an extreme disadvantage with size. Most of the Knicks' guards had good rebounding games too - Robinson was the only true "big" who played meaningful minutes. I'm sure hitting the boards was a point of emphasis for the Knicks and it sorta worked for them but Houston slept through an entire half and spotted the Knicks 20+ points before finally turning it on and nearly winning anyway. In short, I don't think there is much of a blueprint here aside from "if you are a losing team, Houston is likely to sleep through half the game so you have a shot".


FWIW, I think the rebounding thing is a red herring for the real advantage of small ball which is more capable 3pt shooters on the floor at once. If another team wants to pound you on the boards with their biggest guys, I think Houston would prefer that because those players generally speaking are not 3pt shooters and Morey would love to trade 3s for 2s as long those 2s aren't super high percentage dunks/layups.

 

Yep, we just couldn't make an open three to save our lives most of the night... In theory, if we make literally one more three, we win that game. Not to mention the other abnormalities that went NYC's way.

There's a handful of guys in slumps or quasi slumps that I expect to pick it up soon (although I also expect McLemore to come back down to earth a bit).

 

If you're pinning your playoff hopes on Bruno... prepare to be disappointed. That guy still hasn't learned how to play basketball yet.