ClutchFans Game Thread: Lakers @ Rockets 11/14/2007

its time to let SF3 play, with Tmac out. With the percentage that rafer and mike are shooting now, i be happy with anyone that is willing to score.

 

im not impressed with adelman at all thus far into the season. i know that it takes a while for a team to adjust to his type of offense, but i would think close to 10 games into the season (plus training camp and preseason) we would start to see something. i just dont understand how an offensive minded coach can continue to put yao in positions where is fronted, and has a man on his back. where are the cutters? where is all of this 'movement'? the only difference between this years offense and last years offense is rafer will get the rebound from the defensive end, and run up the court acting as if he is capable of running a fast break, and then he pulls back and runs a half court set. i know it is early, but this is getting ugly. we have too many offensively challenged players trying to run a difficult offense (hayes, battier, alston, mutumbo, scola).. geez, 3/5ths of our starting lineup just flat out suck at the offensive end. i can live with hayes, because he brings toughness, but battier and alston are just lame ducks. does anybody else notice how rafer avoids contact? or how head will foul a jump shooter at least 1 time a game. or how bonzi misses at least 3 layups or put-backs per game? i know these things will be fixed, but... we are so flat, stagnant, uninspired, unconfident.. it is alittle disheartning

 

I agree with a lot of what you say, but just keep in mind that we're 6-3 with one of the toughest schedules thus far, and outside of T-Mac and Yao we're shooting 37% as a team with a 44.8 TS%. That is absolutely horrible, and there's no way these players are going to shoot this badly the rest of the way. In other words, we're on a 55-win pace and should expect players to shoot much better eventually. That's not too bad, actually.

 

good post. I think some people got cought up in the "offensive minded" adelman and expected something amazing. This team has some scorers but like you mentioned, a good chunk of their rotational players are not great scorers. You cant turn a bulldog into a greyhound.

 

i honestly think outside of mcgrady's injury the real turning point of the game was battier's bogus third foul where evans hit radmonavic. after that battier had to sit down and snyder came in. kobe went 5-5 over that stretch which let the lakers balloon their lead up to 18 in the second quarter. the one shot kobe missed was a long 3 i think that was a heat check.

so kobe scored at least 11 points (i think one of kobe's shots was a 3) on 5-6 shooting without battier on him...and this is just that stretch in the second quarter i distinctly remember. not accounting the times when james was guarding kobe in the 4th.

so thats 6-18 shooting for 19 points if we do not include at that period of the second quarter when battier guarded him.

battier is a good defender on kobe...kobe is just the best offensive player in the game he is going to get his..i watch the game with some hard core laker fans and they all said the same thing about battier, kobe always scores a lot on him but it takes him almost just as many shots to get the points.


if battier doesnt get that bogus third foul early in the second quarter the dynamics of the game change completely cuz thats when the lakers built their lead on kobe's hot streak. snyder kept letting him free out on the screens even JVG was saying that kobe had way too much space coming off the screens

 

This is getting ridiculous...are u telling me Kirk Snyder and Luther head deserve more minutes than Francis.....Whta the hell Adelman....i'm gettign a little tired of this...last year you guys b****ed about JVG putting Bonzi in his doghouse...so wahts the difference here with Adelman putting Francis in his doghouse....

 

I thought the turning point was when Rafer bricked that 3 after we tied the game at 71/72. That was when the Lakers closed the quarter out with 4 straight points.

 

I was expecting rafer to be good this season from the preseason reports of him emerging as the top gaurd.

But wtf. He hit some of those 3s last season, he's hitting none of them this season.

With that said, Rafer and James need to find their shooting touch again to make up for t-mac in this upcomming week.

Hopefully our spurs killer can show up again, and about the mavs and suns..well i just hope james and rafer can hit shots, and seeing some steve francis would be nice.

 

he has a good preseason every year...