I thought this deserves its own thread since oakdogg and others make some good points in the Mario Elie interview thread. Hope you don't mind oakdogg I am using some of your quotes since you are very adamant about the premise of giving the ball to your best player and system being very comparable: I get the point about iso's and Rudy T's offense in comparison to Harden and the current Rockets, but are some of the key differences in my opinion: - Rudy T turned a team focused very much on the perimeter game and pick and roll / pick and pop with both Dream & Thorpe to a Dream focused offense, meaning get the ball to Dream first and work from there. Not so much with Harden and the current Rockets. - While it may seem like a iso heavy offense, it wasn't. Dream relied very much on players giving him the ball, knocking down shots, be in the right spots, cut to the basket. Also to get Dream in position they would have plenty of different ways to get him open. Harden usually gets the ball off of one simple screen on the side at the top of the key or waits for it, if he's not bringing up the ball himself of course. - Olajuwon used to be selfish and didn't trust his teammates enough. Rudy T forced Dream to trust his teammates and be more of a team player. Rudy T used the 3pt shot and the rules to the advantage of the team in an era when threes were not that staple for winning teams. The importance of our 3pt shot to our offensive strategy was bigger than most teams. - Olajuwon working in the post was not as much in isolation of his teammates as Harden dribbling for seconds on end. Dream made quick moves and passed it back plenty of times when he got double-teamed for a shot or re-post. This is not a knock on Harden, since you need players around him to make plays once he passes it or just knock down that simple 3pt shot. However, I do not see how this Harden iso offense is anywhere near as strategic or team oriented as Rudy T's offense focused on Dream. I seriously doubt that McHale and company put as much work and thought into our offense as Rudy T did. Our offense was not give it to Dream and that's that whereas now it's all up to Harden to figure it out on the fly, so it seems. In a way, that's a heavier burden than Olajuwon had to bear, just to be fair to Harden. Giving Harden the ball is not the problem, the way he receives it, the game plan behind him receiving it in a certain spot, the spots where his teammates are supposed to be and what they are supposed to do, how they can help and contribute the best way possible, a system or lack thereof IS. Remember, the players of those Rudy T teams were not the best 3pt shooters, but we had a lot of good enough shooters who wanted and COULD shoot them. Rudy T took advantage of players tendencies and skills, but also trusted them and built an offense players bought into. During the McHale / Harden era, I didn't see any adaptation of our offense when it was clear we lacked 3pt shooters for our 3pt heavy offense to thrive. This is where not just the coach or players are at fault, but our GM as well. Leslie too, but I hope we can just understand this is bigger than just a coach or a player and not get into finger pointing. What do you guys think?
That is sooooo wrong it is unbelievable, we did not win until Hakeem started passing the ball - he went out with an orbital fracture, the team won like 14-15 in a row, he came back and realized the team could do more with him passing the ball and they took off from there. People were complaining about ISO because it was not working - especially in the playoffs, once Dream started trusting his teamates....Mario Elie Kiss of death, Sam Cassel shot in NY, Kenny Smith against Orlando, the birth of Big shot Bob in San Antonio.....that is when they became a team.... DD
It's much more difficult to play against double teams today due to the rule changes. Back in the 90's, when a guy would double team Hakeem, the defender who left his man to double team leaves his guy wide open. That doesn't happen today because players can hang out in space to deter kicking it to the open man. A help defender now hangs out in space and guards two guys in a mini zone. It makes it much harder to kick it to the open man and swing the ball for an open shot. Because players can hang out in space and guard a zone on the floor rather than a specific man, it makes isolation plays much more difficult.
This is 100% truth. The Rockets ran zero plays, the only difference between Moreyball & Rudy was Hakeem. Once Hakeem went to Toronto I remember Francis & Mobley ISO ball being hard too watch. Rudy's offense was no better than Morey's
Good point! Would you agree though that Rudy T's offense was not that 'iso' heavy / reliant as our current one? We may have to define iso as it's not as clear cut as it may seem.
Must be sarcastic, because Rudy T running zero plays is just not true. Just like McHale never running a play is not true.
It may have been but it was easier to isolate defenders back then and easier to exploit double teams. Back then they were able to clear out an entire side of the floor to go 1-on-1 and the defenders had to follow the offensive players to the other side of the floor. Players had much more space to work with and it made isolation plays much more effective for superstar players. Isolation is much more difficult now and not as effective as it was in the past.
I remember Barkley calling for the illegal defense with his hand gesture , while he backed down his opponent from the 3 pt line to the low block. "He is backing up , backing him up, backing him up that's illegal defense" Bill Worrell screaming!
Bottom line is, it's easier to double team and recover on a perimeter player like Harden than it is to double team and recover on a post player. When a defense has to run out of the post to pick up a perimeter player he can be more of a triple threat player (shoot, drive, pass). There is usally less ground to cover when coming off a double team of a perimeter player. Not as much spacing can occur. Another problem we had was we didnt have very consistent shooters and nor were they capable ball handlers to drive and either score or make a good pass. They were one dimensional (average) spot up shooters. That was the biggest issue to me. Not enough playmakers on the floor. Last year when J Smith was playing well you saw what it looks like to have multiple playmakers on the floor. The spacing and ball movement looked very good and we scored in multiple ways and got high percentage shots.
Fair enough, in that sense yes it might have been more 1-on-1 than I thought. Still something just irks me about Harden dribbling for a few seconds until he goes for a step back jumper as opposed to Dream backing down a few seconds and going for a fade away shot. Both go-to moves and both very effective.
I think Harden is a better offensive player than Dream. The rockets offense isn't that bad. Except they have bad 3 point shooters and they shoot a lot of 3s. Its just defensively the dream was a god and and made the entire team defense great.
So anyone can react to my points about Rudy T's offensive system vs. McHale's? Am I wrong in thinking he helped turn Olajuwon into a more selfless player and create a system based on his personnel, while relying more on him and creating maybe more 'iso' situations? Did McHale do something similar with Harden and was it just the lack of good players around him? I'm also thinking that people who have a negative view of Harden's iso ball is not so much iso's themselves, since star players thrive on going to work with the ball and it's usually why they have the advantage over teams like the Hawks who have a good team full of passing and unselfishness, but lack the all-stars to give the ball and just take over a game, but the perception or hint at selfishness in the term 'iso'.
Dream would still be effective under the current rules. His handle was too good, especially in his later years, to keep him from getting into position. I think what'd you see if he played now is a lot of baseline picks to free him to get a pass 15 feet from the basket. Then he'd dribble his way in to a layup or dunk like Blake Griffin does, but with 100x better moves. The post game is dead because most current big men aren't skilled enough to take more than one dribble. In the 80s you didn't have to know how to dribble because you could reliably get good post position from an entry pass.
The year Bill Cartwright elbowed Hakeem and knocked him out a month was in 1990-1991. That's when we realed off the 13-15 wins in March. Houston actually missed the playoffs in 1991-1992. 1992-1993 was when Hakeem really turned into a monster after almost being traded in the offseason.
No, dream involved his players better, was more consistent on offense, took a whole team on his back, and inspired his team offensively. Dream can play like a guard. Harden doesn't have a post game.
Actually, the current offense with Harden reminds me more of the sandlot basketball we played under Rudy T when we had Francis and Mobley, which I hated and was embarrassing. Iso, dribble, dribble dribble, drive to hoop, or dribble, dribble, dribble shoot a three. Very little ball movement. Same thing, only Harden is better than Francis/Mobley. I see NO similarities between this offense and the dream years!
Offensive Ratings: 2010-2011 - 111.3 2013-2014 - 111 1994-1995 - 109.7 2012-2013 - 109.7 2015-2016 - 108.3 2014-2015 - 107.0 1993-1994 - 105.9
