Melo and how his offense can make the Rockets defense better.

The fact that so many people in this thread have to bend over backwards to justify assertions should speak enough of their validity.

 

We have two examples of both Harden and Melo playing some of their best basketball alongside other ball dominant guys.

I am surprised to hear you, of all people, are against Melo, considering you dogged on our effort guy (Battier) non stop in favor of more offensively oriented guys back in 07-08

 

AMEN brotha

 

I'm not against the Rockets getting Melo... I'm actually for the Rockets to get Melo for Asik and Lin. I think the Rockets will be the most interesting drama filled team of the west and that's exciting to watch unlike the championship caliber Spurs.

 

he's better than parsons scrub ass who can't even shoot a jump shot with proper form

 

I don't think boozer and defense should be mentioned in the same sentence. ever.

 

I put on 2k14 game with this starting lineup
C howard /monti
PF Carmelo/ covington
SF Parsons/ covington ( i guess our 2014 first rd pick is here)
SG harden/ daniels
PG beverly/ canan

This team played againsts cavs
I turned off controler and watched
The rockets won 139-136
Melo hit a 3 with 17 seconds to go
Box score
Howard 16 pts 20 rebs 2 blks
Melo 35 pts 9 rebs 2 stls 8 ast
Parsons 15 pts 4 ast
Harden 33 pts 11 ast 4 reb
Beverly 12 pts 5 ast
Key bench: canan 15 pts.
What i tend to see was bench was awful lineup was amazing. What tend to work well is harden and melo pass back and forth in peremter and look for open shot. Harden and melo during fast break was great to watch. Harden set a pick and roll with melo and melo missed in paint howard came to rescue and slammed it in. What i saw was if they got the isolation out of the way in kept to the flow of game with out egos. This team is unstopable on offense they can shoot 60-70% on many nights. Defensivley they couldnt stop kyrie everytime kyrie had ball he could do anything dwight could stop him but he. Couldnt stop kyrie like he couldnt stop lillard in portland series. Only dwight and beverly playing defense will get us to 2nd rd maybe conference finals. A team like thunder/spurs still have an up on us

 

Lolwut.

 

Definitely think Melo's low TO rate is due to him taking more shots than being a more secure ball handler. Didn't watch many NYK games this season because they were so bad, but did remember it seemed like he took a lot of turnaround and transition jumpers. He took 29.3 FGA per 100 poss this season and 32.1 in 2012-2013. He missed 16.1 and 17.7 shots per 100 poss in those two seasons. Harden on the other hand tries to drive to the basket to score/ draw fouls or dish the ball off for dunks.

 

I don't think you're wrong, but it's not really fair to characterize Morey as not caring about coaching. Does RC Buford have in depth discussions about coaching strategies? Is there even a consensus on how much impact coaching has? There are no ways to quantify coaching performance. As a casual basketball fan, I don't can only see the results, I can't explain them.

For instance, I look over at Charlotte and see Al Jefferson and Josh McRoberts anchoring a great defense and am dumbfounded. Jefferson's been a huge defensive liability his whole career. Does Steve Clifford get all the credit for that? And if so, how did he do it? If there's a way to analyze that, I'm sure Morey's on top of it.

 

I'd like to bring up a point I haven't often seen when talking about Carmelo's defense.

He's better than T Jones offensively AND defensively.

He is a galaxy better offensively, a better passer, the perfect stretch 4 (and will instantly be our best 3pt shooter besides daniels), a decent help defender, good rebounder, has elite low turnovers for a top scorer and is better than Jones as an overall defensive player.

Look at RPM or game film he's better than Jones and a huge upgrade overall. I'm not a cap expert so I don't know if we also could keep Parsons or Jones if Chandler or Melo takes less money as a free agent.

We still need a defensive big for match-ups and 3&D PG or wing player if we lose Asik or Lin, but think about how much we upgrade at the 4 position.

 

I agree.

We still need a backup 3&D wing, PG, and a defensive center to backup Dwight.

However, the elephant in the room isn't Melo to Houston, it's still McFail. This is the thing that needs to change--his position or actually come into the season as a coach with some X's, some O's, and some defensive philosophy.

 

I played NBA Jam the other day. I played as the Rockets with Hakeem/Maxwell most of the game and took Horry off the bench when necessary. They faced the Knicks so it was Ewing/Starks most of the game.

I pushed Starks down every time they touched the ball. Got on fire real quick and Olajuwon rained threes on them.

Rockets win 137-26. We beat them that year in the finals so it makes sense.

 

Harden's lack of effort will doom all hope of defensive improvement no matter the scheme and no matter what player you add. Unless Harden makes an improvement on D, the team won't be good enough defensively. You can't have a "star" ****ing around like that if you want to be a contender.

 

Neither Bird nor Magic were great individual defenders. Small PGs constantly burned Magic like he was stuck in mud. And practically every PF in the league could toast Bird with their athleticism and power. It was the game within the game that Bird and Magic won with their opponents so well. They could push their man into the teeth of the D. They could bait their opponent into a battle of wills and whup them with better offense.

The bottom line is if we put a superstar hall-of-fame player in their prime at the 4 spot alongside Dwight and Harden and Bev and Parsons we will be championship contenders. The rest is just minutia.

 

I'm definitely with you there. I've brought up examples in other threads how a coach can completely change the defensive culture with the same players people wrote off defensively.

I try to stay objective though, McHale's lack of experience at the assistant level puts him behind the curve, but he does learn and eventually make adjustments, albeit slowly perhaps due to lack of mentoring from a great coach paying dues.

The team likes him, we've improve (regular season) every year and we kept a smooth locker room drama free for the most part.

That being said, this is his Kubiak year imo.

This is the last year of his contract and he has to improve our playoff defense, adjustments, improve play-calling and experiment with combinations for post season defensive adjustments (and less foul calls).

 

cant help imagine the scenario that on a Dreb both of them dash to front court leaving only 3 guys on the reb and even they r lucky to get it those 2 start fighting for the ball once it get passed to them

 

I don't know why Clutch hasn't featured this on the front page yet.

 

or bend over backwards to just make them look like idiots when it end up first round exit as ppl told them earlier of the season
just watch their games, those small things that lead to win, they never do it, that's how I ID real winner and fool's gold--stat/highlight chasers. putting 2 fool's gold in a team? u better pray they suddenly started to hustle when it matters but what happened to one of them last season explain it all. they spend a whole career to develop those bad habits you cant just expect them correct it over several miracle months, especially under the soft coach Milk Hair.
one is enuf headache for him now the 2nd? Melo not gonna change nothing or even make it worse.

 

If Melo comes here it'll help Harden because I don't think he's a natural 1st option. Melo will be our 1st option and Harden will get better looks off double teams. I still think we need Rondo running the show