You just can't answer the question: why as their major offense choice and PG, Dragic was not looking to attack and was unable to make the assists? Let me answer that question. From the start, Lin was playing very close defense on Dragic. Dragic was forced to quickly pass the ball all the time. That's why he wasn't able to do anything. He couldn't facilitate the offense, get no assist, and only was able to attempt one shot and missed it in the whole first Q. He was so un-effective that when Kendall Marshall subbed him, their coach let rookie Marshall stayed in and Dragic was on the bench for almost the whole 2nd Q (1:17 left on 2Q when he reentered). That explained why Dragic played only 29mins total despite he played the full 4Q. As a previous poster said, Dragic was 2/7 FG 0 assist 2steal 1 TO in 1 and 3 Quarter basically (since Dragic didn't play the 2Q except for last 1 min.) The 1Q and big part of 3Q was also when Lin was on the court. Do you think it's just an accident that Dragic was playing very poorly when Lin was defending him? Think again. This is Dragic who just posted 16 assists in his last game against the Kings and basically was playing very well the past few games. It's one thing to not like Lin fans, it's another to just dismiss Lin as a non-factor defender. Time and time again Bullard was commenting Lin is a solid defender and even defensive coach Sampson was saying Lin was not given enough credit for his defense. It's obvious to most who watches game after game to notice Lin is a pretty decent defender and in some games even very good defender (Last Jazz blow out game comes to mind.) You can say Lin's offensive games are not consistent or subpar, but saying he is a poor/bad defender is just ignorant.
It was a game the Rockets should have won. They made a lot of mistakes that they shouldn't make. There were times when guys didn't make the cuts they were expected to make, and we threw the ball away. There were times when we missed defensive rotations. There were times when we blew lay ups(which seems to have increased lately). I think a lot of it has to do having a completely different rotation and unfamiliar players since the trade.
Maybe I'm wrong but coasting in terms of basketball is used to describe a player who's sort of just going with the flow and not really giving much effort. You can definitely tell Dragic was looking to bring it 4th qtr. Also saying that it was more because of Dragic coasting rather than Lin playing hard nose defense isn't saying he's a turrible defender. As a user pointed out Harden was on Dragic as well and we know how much he is known for defense.
jeremy didnt play well last night but the night before he was a big part of this team winning...im a huge lin fan but he needs to be more consistant....Lots of guys didnt play well last night....its how it goes...thats why they play the game Lin isnt as good as some think and not nearly as bad as the idiot haters want to say....hes in the middle, hes a good player whith a big upside... hes a really good athelete whos very bright....he will get there if this team wins one game in the playoffs it was a really good year....everyone just frickin relax
Rockets aren't even close to playoff ready, even if we win at home Wednesday. Losses in PHO, DAL (twice) SAC, PHI, WAS, NO, MIN.. we lose to really bad teams. Playoff teams rarely lose to bad teams, they take care of business when they are the better team.
Did anybody notice that the Rockets actually scored 138 points against the Suns ... the pity is that 33 of those points were by ex-Rockets in the clutches of some mythical bird that rose from its own ashes.
I am glad you finally decide not to play word games any more. If you say coasting is just trying to go with the flow, then can we say Lin was simply coasting whenever he had games when he was not getting points and assists? Remind you, that's not just a few mins, that's 2 Qs without any assists and just few points for a major offensive ball-handle player. Unless a player is used purely as a defensive stopper/force, usually we call such no-point no-assts non-impact player a scrub don't we? (Not saying Dragic is a scrub at all.) Harden was on Dragic sometimes purely due to defensive rotation. That's just for a few seconds here and there. Every game we have defensive rotations. But in the game most time a player is assigned to his own man. Lin was on Dragic most of the time last night and he was doing a good job defending him, before the 4th Q. Dragic went off in the 4th Q, was it because Lin was too cautious due to his foul trouble or due to Lin's energy level dropped? We don't know. But saying Lin was not defending Dragic well in the 1Q and 3Q is just ignorant.
Nobody mentioned Lin was in foul trouble in the 4th quarter. He couldn't guard Dragic as well as he did in the first half. Dragic was scoreless in the first quarter.
Back to backs with significant travel are killers, but so are loses like this. A too familiar pattern of late season losses to lesser teams is a clear path to continued mediocrity. I sure hope this group can change direction or we will be right back where we have been for three consecutive seasons, nowhere.
Jeremy was actually hugging Markieff when he thought he was Marcus...Markieff didn't say anything cause he was enjoying it too much :grin:
While some people here are busy blaming individual players, I would like to point out something that I think is even more crucial to us making the playoffs. The major reason for all the close and lost games since the trade has been the fact that we have lost 28.3 points that PPat, Morris and Toney Douglas had been providing per game before the trade. Since then we have only been getting 18.2 per game in the last 6 games from their successors, a reduction of about 10.1 points per game. TRob has only played 6 games since he joined the Rockets. Last night in the Phoenix game, we lost by 2 points. The PFs (DMo and TRob) and the backup PG (Beverley) produced a total of 8 points. The GSW game, we won by 6. The trio produced 9 points. The Dallas game, we lost by 4. The trio produced 15 points. The Dallas game at home, we won by 33. The trio produced a total of 27 points.* The Orlando game, we won by 2. The trio produced a total of 32, of which only 2 points were by TRob. The Bucks game, the first game TRob played for the Rockets, we lost by 2. The trio produced 18 points, of which only 2 points were by TRob. Beverley has scored 0 points in the last three games, and TRob was also scoreless in the last two. I am happy about DMo's performance so far but it's still not enough to cover all the loss. While we are busy blaming individual players for lost games, should we be looking into the big offensive hole in front of us and think how we can fill it up quickly before we lose more games unnecessarily? Bear in mind that expecting Harden and Lin to make up for the reduced points like they did in the last game against the Thunder would be an unrealistic expectation, especially after 63 games into the season. Fatigue does add up and minor injuries do aggravate with multiple compacts.. Keeping both Harden and Lin, and every core player, healthy is a more pressing concern now than any time before for us to safely secure a playoff spot.
As a matter of fact, Dragic was held by Lin mostly to 5 points and one assist for the first three quarters until three minutes after the fourth quarter started.
It's only word games because you didn't understand the meaning of the word and put words in ppls mouth
