And he has yet to pass a single playoff series? So you call that tremendous in every playoff game? Such a ...
WTF? The guy's a YOF for his statement??? The Jazz didn't seem to have any issues with the "depth perception" when shooting their FTs. So we're going to start blaming the fans now? Haha...what a joke! The players are all multi-millionaires...let's take some personal responsibility. This is inexcusable -- they should get their asses to practice a few hours early and shoot from the charity stripe.
Novak's playing time was weird. Most coaches would put Novak in either the end of 1st quarter or early 2nd quarter. If Novak played well, he stayed in the game longer. But Novak came in at the end of 3rd quarter and stayed almost the whole 4th quarter. Although Novak was hot in 3rd quarter (4/4, 10 points), Adelman should know better about Novak's defense. So, it ended up Novak didnt take a shot in 4th qtr and the Rockets gave away a 37 pts 4th quarter. This kind of rotations are very suspicious and not reliable on Adelman's part. You just dont gamble on an important game in 4th quarter with a rookie who plays his 1st major minutes in NBA. Although the result might still be a loss, the rotations really left some doubts out there.
The reason that Rafter stepped up during T-Mac's absence may be due to the fact that he was needed more. Now with T-Mac back, T-Mac was handling the ball most of the time when the ball is in front court. With T-Mac out, it was mostly Rafter's responsibility. Kind of like last year, when Yao was out, it was Howard and Motombo's responsibility to step up to make up the weakened front court, and they did.
Look, I'm not saying that defense wasn't a problem. But the Rockets displayed a whole range of problems tonight. One of those, undoubtably, was poor shot selection. T-Mac didn't hit anything at the three point line in the fourth quarter. The Rockets would have been better off if those shots had gone to Novak, without a doubt. But the real problem was T-Mac playing the ball too much. When guys are standing around doing nothing on the offensive end they have a tendancy to stand around and do nothing on the defensive end. Here's another question: was Novak a problem on the defensive end? If he was, why was he in the game? Win or lose, not getting the ball to Novak is STUPID BASKETBALL. It demonstrates a complete lack of basketball IQ by the Rockets, and I'd be saying the same thing if they won. If as a player you know that Novak is a liability on defense but has range, and that additionally he's having a hot shooting night, then the onus is on you to create opportunities for him and get him the ball. As it was, what happened? The Rockets got zero offense and zero defense from him. Adelman played Novak in the fourth for a reason. The Rockets should have followed their coach's lead and tried to utilize him.
If we take out Yao. we are the wrost free throw shooting team in the league. T mac need to learn how to shoot free throw.
did u see novak's D in the 4th? he didn't know who he was guarding haha. that's why even if novak hit a gazillion shots, JVG would still not play him
Adelman, thinking to himself: "Novak's got the hot hands tonight. Yes, he's got some defensive issues but his outside shooting pretty much got us back into in the third. It's a gamble, but I'm going to throw him out their in the fourth". Rockets, in the fourth: "Look, Novak's on the floor! It must be because he's a defensive monster. Let him shoot the three? Why? There's no reason to get him the ball. Wheeeeeee."
Kover will hit that no matter who you put on him Novak can improve his D, it's his offense that we need... Imagine him in there with Yao down low.........drooling......double yao, burned by novak........ 1 on 1 D is overated anyway.....
what i love is when i watch the rundown, the national scene hates teh rockets so much they showed no rockets highlights just straight jazz hilights, and then on every other game review they show mixxed team highlights F**K all those rocket tv haters, we loose we loose its life
but adelman should have seen our offense was fine without novak. novak gave us a lift to end the 3rd. but after 1-2 mins to start the 4th, adelman should have seen we got our rhythm offensively and therefore needed to yank novak. he didn't know where he was AT ALL. yes our offense sputtered in the first half, primarily b/c tmac didn't knock down ANY of his shots: zero, nada, nilch. when he got his rhythm, our offense was rolling to a 54pt half, as he scored 19 pts. adelman likes to stick with what is good. novak was good offensively. but he should know a clueless defensive player like novak should not be out there for long stretches--the same way a clueless offensive player like hayes should not be out there for long stretches. but it really shouldn't have come down to that. had we make our fts, make our layups, we would have won this game. free throws is a huge concern right now. tmac has GOT to do something about his fts. if you're going to blame tmac, you blame him there.
You guys act like Jerry Sloan and the Jazz just sat there and not react to Novak shooting 4/4. Unlike the 3rd, the Jazz stopped leaving Novak wide open/double teaming Tracy, which in turned gave Tracy more room to operate in the 4th. I think Rick left Novak out there just for that very reason, spreading the floor. I think it was fairly effective except for the fact that their defense was do porous! 30 points in a quarter for the Rockets is solid offense, too bad we gave up 37 points!
Nope. The team should have realized that their coach was playing Novak for a reason and they should have followed their coach's lead. There is no way that T-Mac should be taking 30% of the Rockets FGA in a balanced offense. Does that sound very balanced to you?
tmac took 4 shots in the last 2 mins when the lead was 9 so he jacked up a gazillion 3s for a prayer. so in essence he really took 20, which is normal. i don't get how u can blame the offense. WE GAVE UP 37 POINTS. WE SCORED 30 PTS. if we passed to novak like u wanted to, u think we would scored 40 instead or something? defense still gave up 37 POINTS. and that's due to novak doesn't know what the hell he was doing out there. he had 5 secs to go to ak47 under the basket (as he was UNDER THE BASKET) and he didn't do jack. that kind of stupidity on defense killed us.
Agreed! I guess that is because of last game. Since we won with 3 rookies in the 4th quarter, Adelman might expect same result with Navok on the court. BTW, are you doublehh...?
Who knows? The Rockets might have been able to score 38 points in the fourth. It's obviously possible to score 37. Obviously it's not possible to prove that in some alternate universe Novak got the ball and went on a tear. But it should be obvious that not getting him the ball is stupid basketball, regardless of whether or not you win or lose. Who cares if Novak sucks on D? Hayes sucks on offense. With any player you gain something and you give up something when you play them. Adelman obviously made the decision that he was going to give up something on defense to try and get something on offense. Or maybe he pulled his number out of a hat? At that point the Rockets on the floor have to realize what Novak is there for and try and get him the ball. They didn't--that shows low basketball IQ. One more thing: do you think the Jazz are sobbing back in their locker room and saying "We gave up 30 points, we suck?" No, they're saying "We gave up 30 points, which is horrible defensively. But we scored enough on the offensive end to make up for it." Sometimes offense can make up for crappy defense. That was obviously what Adelman had in mind. Too bad the Rockets were just too brain dead to follow their coach's lead.
