don't give dwight the ball

*clueless and INCAPABLE of making proper adjustments...

 

Alot of time, people think Hack-a-Dwight is not an issue as long as Dwight hit 50% of the FTs. But they don't think about the impacts to the other Rocket players. Our players will get disinterested and the offense would be 1 dimensional. And once Dwight got the ball inside, he rarely throw it out.

In the first game, the Blazers deployed Hack-a-Dwight and it totally messed up our offensive rhythms.

So what adjustment did McHale did in the 2nd game? He deployed Hack-a-Dwight on his own team by force feeding to Dwight on almost all possessions in the first half, totally messed up our offensive rhythms.

Nice job!

 

I've been thinking the same thing. Add Millsap and Dalembert (as Asik's backup) plus a better backup wing would have been better use of the money in retrospect, but hindsight is 20/20.

 

this team isn't the same style of team as last year. i find that last year's 3 pt shooting was better. but upon checking the stats, it was 35% shoooting this year, and 36% shooting last year. one thing to note is that we shot less 3's this year (probably due to dwight).
needs to be balance for team

 

totally this....whilst it was great for Dwight, none of the other rockets even got a shot or much of a touch til half of first quarter had gone...and guess what, no one played any D apart from Dwight and Pat during that first quarter....when one player dominates the ball the others will end up standing still and watch......it's just how it goes....

I got the feeling that Terry Stott wasn't even that concerned about Dwight going off.lopez wasn't getting blasted for letting dwight dunking all over him, infact some of this defence was almost a bit like bait.....

....Portland's focus in soley on stopping Harden by going at him on offense and shutting down Parsons. They don't need to game for Lin, as Lin didn't even see much time in Game 2....

Houston won't win a game by going to Dwight, they need the three point shooting, fast breaking, layup/dunks from the rest of the team, punctuated by howard's D and rebounding...

 

I totally disagree. Dwight was making shots, it doesn't matter if they were dunks, it is irrelevant. He was dominating Lopez! You continue to feed him the ball. Ok, our style dictates we run...but Portland is making everything and getting back in transition. Thus, they are preventing us from running our typical offense. Giving the ball to Howard, in a sense, was an adjustment, and frankly, there was nothing wrong with it other than everyone standing around and not slashing!

The Iso plays and the fast breaks that worked in the regular season does not translate over well into the playoffs. Our team is going to have to learn to work its @$$ off on both sides of the floor. Create your own opportunities and take what the defense gives you.

Also, we just flat out need LMA to miss some shots and not play quite as efficient has he did the last game. While he seemed unstoppable, it has still needed to have 2 career games in order to beat us, despite JH playing so poorly.

 

Wow people think Hard shots off was Dwights' fault?!

 

I play PG, and I always like to feed the hot hand.....but come on Dwight shot every ball for up to like 8 possessions in a row in the first quarter!! That's too much...and it had an impact on the rest of the team...also Dwight went cold in the second half, despite keep on shooting....he also refused to pass the ball out for shots then, as he felt he could make them....which is fair enough because he made so many in the first quarter...

Agree on iso plays, that defo won't work in the playoffs well not every possession......you don't think an post up with dwight on Lopez is an iso play?

 

god, i dont like dwight at all (van gundy stuff and how he made fun of ömer earlier) but at least he tried to took responsibility LİKE A MAN.

No top of the key pull ups 20 sec remaining on clock, no driving on defenders just to get fouled, no eurostep bull****. No defensive lapses. Superstars had to take responsibility and howard shoved up and tried his best. He is our best player among the competitors.

 

definitely he came to ball that last game, shame harden didn't turn up.....

 

I agree that the Dwight post-up can be considered an iso play; however, the issue shouldn't be with that, it should be with our player standing around watching him instead of cutting and moving to the empty spots. They started doubling DH for crying out loud, that is when we should have taken advantage. What i'm getting at is that it was only a problem because our players dind't move for Dwight to kick the ball out. Instead, they went cold by standing around watching. Had they cut, DH would have passed the ball out, as he did when he was doubled and he kicked it to Bev, and they would have gotten' looks.

By your logic, your saying that Portland should have been cold bc they gave the ball to LMA too much.

JH still shot the ball in the first qrter, and he still missed. DH shooting 10 times in the first isnt' what caused James to be cold. The lack of movement did and aggression, imo.

 

I take nothing from Dwight, who was pretty much the lone bright spot last game. But I agree that there needs to be a lot more offensive variety -- and for God's sake, when it becomes crystal clear that the "hot hand" has gone cold, STOP FEEDING HIM. I agree with those who said posting him up continuously really lead to the rest of the team being disengaged. As soon as we kept going to him (and especially once the crowd started roaring every time he touched the ball), Harden appeared to check out.

And I'm definitely not giving Harden or anyone else a pass or making excuses -- it's playoff basketball, and yeah, you should be fully engaged for the full 48 minutes. But I also don't play basketball, so I don't know how difficult it is to stay truly engaged under those circumstances. We've noted the same thing w/ Dwight throughout the season... if he isn't involved offensively, he tends to check out. Get him involved and his effort everywhere else goes through the roof. So maybe there's something to be said for that theory. IMO, posting him up needs to be more the exception than the rule. That just isn't how we won during regular season.

Also agree that finding good, open shots is more likely to come from Harden's penetration than Dwight passing out of a double team. He frequently has the ball stolen or loses it out of bounds when he's doubled, so.... yeah. We were rolling along pretty well this season when Harden was assist-heavy, and it would be nice to get back to that.

 

good counter point on LMA.....and it tells you a lot about team unity....

portland players are fine with LMA taking shots, Houston not so much with Dwight or Harden...

It's about accepting your role....Pat accepts it, Asik knows his role.

Lin tries to but he like to score, Parsons doesn't and harden isn't willing to compromise his role....there's no sacrificing for each other...

 

it isn't hard to stay engaged if you accept your role.

In the past I have played with guys that were much better than me, and I knew i wasn't going to get the ball much, I accept my role is to play defense and rebound and to let the star shoot, but if I am disgruntled or think I should shoot more - maybe I think I have an advantage over my defender and my star team mate still won't pass, then my effort on boards and defense automatically goes down....and this is quite common no matter which level you play at...

Example, i played with this Euro league guy on my team, it was just a recreational run.....so lots of freedom....he was beasting and no one on my team took a shot...he took all of them, even when someone was open they would pass the ball back to him automatically...after winning a few games in a row, a better team comes on...they start doubling him, he starts missing.....I finally get a pass from him, took a wide open 2 point shot and missed it....

I am a good shooter and he knows I am a good shooter and he's staggered i missed an open shot and starts hollering at me....my response, dude I haven't taken a shot in the last 30 minutes during all our games, none of our team mates have....

i just think unless you're like Derek Fisher/Rob Horry/Sam Cassell, where you aren't given a chance to do much during the game and then all of a sudden you're given one shot right at the end of the game....it's awfully difficult to make it...

so in answer to your question...yeah I think it's very difficult to stay engaged all 48 minutes to hit a last minute shot, when you're not being allowed to do anything during the game....

 

That's ridiculous. The idea is once Dwight gets going, he will bring a double team which will open up things for drives and kicks. However, with Harden, Parsons, and Lin all playing like complete hot garbage, Dwight HAS to force things. You're basically punishing him for being the only one to actually show up this series.

 

My point was not to stop feeding Dwight, because it doesn't involve other teammates. That's what we did with Hakeem, and I was fine with that. But Dwight isn't Hakeem. He's not Yao. Hell, he's not even Mo Taylor - I mean that, Mo was good in the post. Dwight in the post is a bad option. He was lucky he could get dunks in the first quarter. As soon as he was denied dunks, what happened? The man has no shooting touch! He can't make a basket if the ball is 2 feet from the rim! Why do we want Dwight to draw a double team?! He's a terrible passer out of the double team - turnover city!

I was proud that Dwight took it upon himself to up his game for the victory, but his fascination with and the organization's enabling of this dream of being a dominant post player will take this team down.

Now, say what you want about Harden, but he is proven. We can and we have won with an offense based around Harden. Go with that. Just tell him to take it to the basket more - a lot more.

 

Only on Clutchfans do people say "go away from the hot hand" and "don't exploit a mismatch".

 

Folks it is just stupid to not go to Howard. F' MOREYBALL. Play Rockets ball the way we always have. The bigman gets the ball first and the rest of our boys need to step up and be men.

 

Force feeding Dwight for endless possessions isn't the way we've always played, though. At all.

 

Did Daryl read my post?