Thats a lot of words to make the standard argument of the MMM types: "3's only work when they go in. " touche, brother.
It would be nice if he would start acquiring guys like that again, instead of the crap he's been trotting out at the 4 the last few years.
The tactics of the Rockets offensive sets are not difficult to understand. Spacing. It is much more difficult to recover defensively to players at the tree point line when a defensive switch occurs. This is simply doe to the added distance the defender has to travel. A mid ranged shot is not much easier than a three point shot. From 8-15 feet the NBA players hit ~39% of their shots. Players hit ~35% of their shots from three point range. Those numbers make for an easy calculation of the average scoring per 100 shots. Three point shots ~105 points. Mid ranged shots ~78 points. The defense does have to guard the two point territory. Under difficult circumstances because on any dribble penetration the Rockets players will stop and take a wide open unguarded two point shot from 8 feet. With a dribble drive penetrator like Harden and only the center guarding a cutting Howard to the rim, defenses must quickly collapse. This invariably leads to wide open shooters behind the three point line. Entry passes become much easier to Howard if he only has the opposing center to worry about. Then of course the double quickly comes, leaving wide open shooters at the three point line. I could go on and on. Mid ranged shots are disappearing from the NBA. This is Morey's offense, and Morey has one of the best tactical minds in basketball. Plus he has all of those statistics to back him up. Do not expect the slightest change in how the Rockets play basketball. Morey even hired one of the most wide open offensive to coach RGV. The Rockets have played beautiful basketball this season. Enjoy it.
like others have stated, our fantastic 3-point shooting is predicated on having Dwight Howard being a huge threat in the paint.... it won't work very well without him.
pretty much, with dwight, the defense basically needs 3 people in the paint to stop harden drive + dwight, leaving someone open, somewhere. last night well, they didn't need to care about the roll man, so it was 2+2 leaving no one open
Remarkably the Rockets held in there pretty well until D-Mo got gassed. Asking a seven foot 270 pound player to jump from ~15 mpg to 30 mpg is asking to much. The Rockets then had the train wreck of Papa playing the center position. There is no possible good outcome there against Bogut.
And it was against the Warriors, who shamefully prevented themselves being on the receiving end of a record by purposely fouling all of our guys at the end of the game. I still think the Rockets should take that personally and strive to beat the hell out of Golden State every time they play, but it just doesn't to resonate with them.
I know there are probably plenty of advanced statistics that back up taking lots of threes, especially corner threes (of which we don't seem to take many), but it just seems like such a risky strategy to rely on. I'd love to see a map of how the average shooting percentage decreases as you get farther and farther away from the rim. I don't think many people argue that a shot just a few feet within the three-point line is a waste, but a shot halfway between the basket and the arc has GOT to be a much easier shot. Even if you have a team stacked with three-point shooters, they're still going to shoot 40% if they're awesome. The 3 out of 5 misses will often bounce far and lead to fast breaks unless we position ourselves correctly for the bounce (and we've doing a better job of that this year, I think). If one or two of your shooters is just having an off night, it ruins your strategy. It's just such a hard shot to make, and right now people know to either defend us close or far; that's it. When the far threat isn't doing its job, then we're dead in the water. Ugh, my gut just tells me this isn't an approach that can win four NBA Finals games.
I have posted hard stats on what % of shots fall in each zone. Just from memory (it will be approximate) 6-10 feet 39.8%. 10 feet - three point line 38.7% Beyond the three point line 35%. That is why the Rockets have a from beyond the arc, at the rim or from the free throw line is where scoring should take place philosophy. nba.com/stats will provide all of the detailed maps you could ever want.
I think people underestimte how much the Warriors adjusted on defence. after the half, They basically started playing us like the Trailblazers did in the playoffs, aggressive on the three point line, and when any pick and rolls come, the big man sags off completely, leaving the midrange wide open. Yet McHale didn't adjust the offense, and people kept shooting threes. Trevor and Harden took advantage of this only once, taking and making a couple of midrange shots, but the rest of the team didn't seem to see this.
The Rockets practice offensive sets that yield threes. They shoot threes in every game. Please read this slowly three times. http://bbs.clutchfans.net/showpost.php?p=9324253&postcount=64
The Rockets' philosophy towards the mid-range shot is a good heuristic, a good rule of thumb. But successful teams cannot be dogmatic about this stuff: they adapt to the circumstances, adapt to game situations and how they're being defended, and adapt within possessions. Not all threes are created equal. https://twitter.com/knarsu3/status/493143394248851456 More here: https://medium.com/the-cauldron/lost-art-the-mid-range-jumper-64b64fa0f081
those midrange shots don't help at all. Lets force up contested 3s, or force feed our excellent post presence...Dwight. I mean, Memphis isn't doing that right
Breh, our shots just aren't falling. That's it. We need a back up to the back up that doesn't play for unknown reasons. That should solve it.
I don't doubt that the 3 and the layup are the most efficient shots. But if our scheme is so superior, why are we ranked right at the middle (14th) of the league in eFG%? Something is telling me that defenses are figuring us out. If you can only do one or two things well, people will eventually find a way to stop you.
While it's true that rim and 3 baskets are the most efficient in terms of PPS, I feel like a mid-range game is still important to open up opportunities there. The Mavs and Blazers ran and continue to run offenses anchored by mid-range shooting, yet last year and this year they both run elite offenses. I don't think adhering to the 3's and layups model to this extent will prove beneficial in the long run.
Exactly, you guys are both spot on. In a perfect world where we can run our style of offense with other teams playing to the "script" we think they are supposed to be playing to...3s and layups is all we should do. The fact of the matter is that a versatile offense will set you up for situations like that. I don't understand why this fundamental point is so lost on some of the people in this thread.
