We all know these playoffs are a series of adjustments and counter-adjustments. With that in mind, and knowing we have successfully countered the starting lineup of Portland with Asik replacing Jones, what would you do if you were Terry Stotts to try to get Aldridge off early again and what other strategic or lineup adjustments would you make push back against what we did to the Blazers in Game 3? Aside: Personally, I still think that McHale has to make more adjustments than Stotts. As nice as that win was last night, it came down to a wild scramble on a loose ball that if we had lost the possession would have probably ended our season. Our small-ball lineup did NOT play very well against Portland's small-bal lineup. So, I personally think McHale still needs to adjust his rotations and defense in the small-ball lineup. However, for the purposes of this thread, we all know Stotts is going to counter the Twin Towers. Why don't we discuss what he is going to possibly counter with to jump ahead a little bit and figure out how to best counter his counter? I'd like to read your thoughts on it.
They need to write a bigger cheque to the refs. Obviously it was enough to win game 1 and game 2 but not game 3.
What would you do defensively to counter that tight pick-and-roll we ran for practically every possession we had when the TT were in there that was very successful and efficient?
Defensively, I'm not sure playing Harden, Lin and Daniels will ever work. We had that line up going for a while and Batum had his way on whoever was matched up on him.
Fortunately they have played their asses off, played great defense and have made virtually every open three pointer. They can't adjust. That is not to say they can't win if they can keep shooting incredibly, but that doesn't usually happen.
More importantly for the Rockets is that James Harden NEEDS to get Superstar mode for this series. He needs to become the player he is for them to win game 4. If he returns as the player we all love then this series goes to 6 games and Rockets win the series. Whatever Blazers adjustments be, they won't stand a chance against James Harden's ability.
Despite the impact of Lopez this season for LMA, the Blazers are a uptempo 3 point shooting team similar to the Rockets. I'd say he looks for ways to go smaller and get more ball movement. The Rockets were pretty much doubling LMA with Asik and Dwight last night. Someone had to be open for 3 in that case. I think he tries harder to exploit the attention they are giving him. They even started doing that anyways in the 4th last night and it was working, and a big reason Batum was getting a large number of 3's.
Clear the paint, whoever harden is on should do a blow-by as soon as they touch the ball. If Dwight helps, feed it to a shooter or LMA. Simple yet effective
only adjustments I see them making is more exaggerated head snapping, louder yells driving to the basket, and quicker fall downs after shots
The template for dealing with twin towers was laid out early in the regular season. Asik's man, presumably Lopez, needs to play aggressive help defense on Dwight and clog up the paint on the penetrators. As we saw last night, leaving Asik open near the basket isn't a huge risk. He has to handle the pass out of the double team, and then convert the bucket, and so far that has been a low percentage play for him. Getting a free extra defender in Lopez on every Rockets possession will likely be enough to stagnate the Rockets offense.
I think they will go small ball more. They kill us when they have LMA at center. He pulls Howard out to the perimeter, and our rotations are horrible and our players can't handle Lillard driving on whoever guards him.
I'm wondering if the thread starter and his hatred for jones will acknowledge the so called Twin Tower really didn't work. The rockets won the game,which they should've done game 1 had they secured 1 rebound. Mchale doubled lma with howard vs letting the lma stopper play him 1 v 1. As a result,portland got good looks at the 3pt line and lopez was killing the offensive glass. If I were stotts,what would I do? Batum-lopez pnr or Lilliard-lopez pnr in middle of floor.This occupies D12 away from the play,lopez rolls to the basket,and u can always ball reversal and get lma mid range shots before the double. Even if he shoots and misses. Lopez is under the rim for offensive rebounds. I will say howard played lma as well anyone has this series and that's comforting. He was engaged,active,and out to prove he could guard LMA and he did a great job without a double.
