there's more to defense than Douglas prancing in the face of whoever he defends. he does absolutely nothing else
Check this guy out. So desperate to put Lin down. How sad. Remember Charles Barkley? Yah that TV analyst on TNT, Hall of Famer, and used to play for Rockets at one point? Guess what? He said Lin is legit. Not to brag, BUT YOUR OPINION DON'T MEAN A DAMN THING!
You've been a poster since 2008 with 4000+ posts, so I respect your opinion as being your honest opinion. I do not think that you are a troll, and I can empathize that it must be difficult for you that there seems to be many people against you (unless you enjoy the attention). I do think that you are horribly wrong on this one, though. You, however, would not be the first one. All of the GMs and scouts passed on Lin, multiple times. Even those that had him on their rosters and in front of their noses (and that includes D'Antoni until he was forced to play Lin due to injuries and ineffectiveness). Remember when Kobe said that all of the GMs (or many of them) should have been fired for missing out on Lin. It is difficult for people to accept others that are different. Lin looks different from the basketball players that most of the American public has seen. He seems to act different. That is enough for most to dismiss him. About defense, the "reason" that Sampson gave for playing TD the entire OT, even though there were obvious OFFENSIVE possessions during dead balls that Sampson could have brought in Lin. The reality is that Lin is an elite defender. You can't measure his defensive effect on stats alone, even though his stats our outstanding (on top of his steals and charges drawn, he has even led the Rockets in blocks two out of the last three games, and has been outrebounding our starting PF). His help defense and ability to disrupt the opposing team's play is disregarded by most casual fans, who still judge defense by the way players "look." Unfortunately, even Sampson is guilty of this, and again, he is not alone. I'm sure that this is not new for Jeremy, as he has hinted that he has to be miles and miles outstanding to get noticed. For minorities (whatever the profession), it is nothing new. Being better is not good enough. Sometimes being alot better is still not good enough.
awesome. your defense for Sampson tonight and your continued Lin bashing everyday is getting tiresome. you can keep trying to backup your points with "you are a LOF" all you want but it doesn't hide the fact that you are a lonely LOH troll
There are actually a few other possibilities: 1) Les didn't want to shell out the $2 mil for new coaches. 2) Les mandated that the coaches must artificially inflate Harden's numbers for Les's All-Star Game. The coaches are not happy with this mandate and are lashing out with these stupid decisions and tirades against Lin whenever he does anything beside sitting in the corner and be a target for Harden "WTF Jeremy! Are you trying to get us fired!?! You heard what the Les said!!!" Seriously I am heavily leaning toward #2, because if that wasn't the case Les would probably have given Morey an angry phone call by now and told him to fire the coaches after this, $2 mil be damned.
OK, I'll agree that Harden's numbers are small sample size, I'm sure he'll end the year higher. Douglas, however, will most likely end the year less than 30%. Douglas was 23% last year 27/117. Lin was 32% last year 24/75. I'm perfectly fine arguing over views on a forum when they're based on reason. It's perfectly fine to criticize Lin if you think he isn't the superstar that others think he is. But it's clear from the tone of your posts that you're just trolling for reactions with baseless arguments. So in the ignore list it is.
The only thing more annoying than the LOFs on this board are the anti-LOFs. From what I've seen, they're a pretty sad group.
He might have, or he might not, but the offense would most likely have been FAR better. You realize the Rockets scored only 6 points that entire OT? And what does "essential" to the team's survival have to do with anything? Are you arguing that TD is essential to the team's survival? Or are you talking about winning games? Do you REALLY think that the Rockets would win as many games with TD playing the Point Guard position and Lin in the D-League? Tony Douglas was the starting PG for MANY games for the Knicks (Baron Davis AND Bibby were injured) before Lin appeared. And guess what, he became the Backup overnight... not just the backup, but D'Antoni played Lin 40+ minutes PER GAME for WEEKS. Against the Lakers he sat Lin for 6 minutes before he yanked TD. Against Dallas he didn't even suit TD up and had the SHOOTING GUARD play PG, and only did that for THREE minutes. Woodson wouldn't even suit TD up to play PG. His preference was Lin, Baron Davis, and then Mike Bibby... TD couldn't even crack the 4th PG spot, with EITHER coach. TD shot 0/3 and had ZERO assists during OT. The team shot 1/9 and got to the line 2x for Free Throws (Asik/Harden). BTW, as a point of reference regarding Lin's awful shooting... 2012/13 Lin .355 FG%, .267 3pt% Douglas .273 FG%, 250 3p% 2011/12 Lin .446 FG%, .320 3pt% Douglas .324 FG%, .231 3p% Interesting thing to note, as BAD as Lin's shooting has been, his FG% AND 3pt% are STILL better than Douglas' are this OR last year. So, you're giving up Lin's passing AND shooting for Defense that *might* be a Little better for the entirety of Overtime. Yah, don't think I'm buying what you're selling.
I doubt that playing Lin in OT would have made much difference on the offensive side, since the offense was going to go through Harden anyhow. Maybe he would have made a difference on defense, or maybe not. Regardless, it's a incredible vote of no-confidence for the starter PG to be benched in OT. I can't recall seeing anything like this. When Sampson made that comment that TD matched up better against Detroit's backup PG than Lin, I heard some very creative explanations about how Sampson was just bolstering TD's confidence and ppl were reading way too much into it. It's good to know Sampson cares so much about managing the confidence of our backup PG. I think the bigger mistake was the 4th quarter -- not playing Lin enough, and not letting Lin run the offense more, especially since he was doing a good job of it this game.
One of the things that is SO frustrating about this is that defense actually is pretty measurable nowadays... we have advanced metrics for this sort of analysis. Sure, they don't tell the whole story, but they do tell much of it. This sort of analysis is where the Rockets are supposed to be at the forefront of the league, for God's sake! Look at Synergy... or even just the advanced stats section on Lin's (and Douglas's) basketballreference profile! Lin is truly a good defender, and definitely better than Douglas. In this day and age, defensive statistics are comprehensive enough that saying Lin is a poor defender is just as silly as saying Asik is a bad rebounder or claiming that Harden doesn't score very much. Just look at the freaking numbers! How, on the Morey-managed Rockets, OF ALL TEAMS, can the coach be this dense??!!
Small sample size for Harden and Parsons. But for Lin, it proves he is a bust. Can we start Toney Douglas already? (sarcasm)
Because old people (with some exceptions) don't know how to use computers, send e-mails, or use technology. They like to rely on their eyes, which has been clouded by years of biases.
uhhh, they have a laundry list of injuries. Love, Rubio, Pek, Bud, Roy, Barea...and RA has them at 5-4. I wish he never left...
so maybe its time for Morey to Bench Sampson and play Finch? Dude is making some major headscratching calls, its still early but assistant coaches should be on a short leash. Lets see what the wundercoach Finch has to offer!
Lin's defense has always been his calling card, and his defense has always been miles ahead of his offense. His offense got the attention in Linsanity because he got hot and had teammates and a coach that trusted him. His weaknesses have always been ballhandling and shooting, not his defense. I hope you saw him D up Gallo, Wade, Lebron, and a scathing hot Batum just over the last few games, on top of all of his charges drawn and steals.
