[ClutchFans] Podcast: Game 1 loss a wake-up call or death knell for Rockets?

Can't wait for PODCAST #2 boss

 

Looks like your title was a premonition Clutch....

 

Pretty clear that if the Rockets exist, that was a death knell, Clutch. Frankly, I haven't seen the Houston Rockets in over a week. Heck, longer than that. They've gone missing. The jokers wearing our uniforms are freakin' imposters. If anyone finds the Houston Rockets, let me know, OK?

 

That series spun out of controll fast. Kind of reminded me of the 95 series against the Mavs. Just the other way round. We go up 2-0 and folded.

We need to get toughness, the help of the referees, clutch play and luck back. Not particular in that order. Turn that thing around.

 

The numbers are clear... we are going to get stomped out of the first round.

 

They've been missing all of April.

 

the only thing the 95 mavericks was nailing was toni braxton

 

The momentum issue is real. The Rockets lost it several weeks ago. However, here is the bad news, then the good news. First, there are five games remaining, the Rockets have to win four of them. Second, the Mavs were in the same position against the Rockets (TMac and Yao, I think 2005 or 2007) and won the series, the last game by forty points.

 

We're done. Portland has already shown they'll resort to hack-a-Howard. I know that was Dwights motivation for the sizzling start. He was mad at himself. 1 more free throw and we win Game 1. Portland has been incredibly lucky to see Harden shoot sub 30% while Aldridge goes all 1995 playoffs Olajuwon on us.

It's alright though, new commish, new rules. Hack-a-Howard will be flagrant. "A foul called as a result of contact that is deemed excessive, intentional and/or unnecessary. The team that draws a flagrant foul is awarded two free throws and possession". Its intentional, its a foul, and its unnecessary. I'm mostly kidding, but it's ironic the definition of flagrant is concurs with fouling a player without the ball 90 feet from the basket. That's gotta go. We weren't going to win anything this year anyway, so maybe we lost some playoff experience. But Portland will be around with us in the West for a good while. Payback is a b****!

 

Went to bad mad, woke up sad. Wait 5 months for the playoffs just to lay an egg? Man...

 

This team has shown signs of this all season. The overall regular season record was great but you could just tell watching the games that this team is still a pretender and not a contender. They need better coaching too. The team (as built) needs better coaching to get better. They have a lot of talent and potential as a unit but not enough to overcome mediocre coaching.

 

The playoffs are mostly half-court grindfests. No way around it. That's where we showed cracks all season. You get this offensive unit in half-court sets and we got spacing problems. And defensively in half-court against teams playing 2 big boys down low...they consistently beat us all season.

The rest is smoke and mirrors. GIGO - garbage in, garbage out. Barkley said it last night talking about the Spurs. You gotta look at games against the better teams because half the games you play mean nothing against all those teams that are not playing to win games. That's why you have to cull that data to look at really where this team stands in regards to competing for a championship. We are what our record says we are, probably about the 6th to 8th best team in the league considering injuries. If Marc Gasol had not been dinged for most of the season we may have would up as low as 6 to 8 in the West.

This is why I've been hollering about making the TT work all season. We shouldn't have given up on it early. We should have double-downed on it. It was our only chance to compete against the true playoff and championship contenders. You can't have your 3rd best player playing 10-15 minutes a game and expect to go anywhere.

 

I agree about the twin towers approach. Granted Asik was "hurt" a good deal of the season, but they never developed this during the regular season when they had a chance and then tried to integrate it on the fly in the playoffs when they were on their heels.

 

I didn't think Game 1 was a death knell but it should've been the 'push the panic button' moment. McHale clearly did not have a sense of urgency about making adjustments in Game 2. I don't sense that he is going to do anything differently in game 3 except preach defense. All of his gambles earlier this year are not paying off: Failure to integrate Asik into the rotation in a meaningful way; failure to cultivate the pick and roll offense with Lin as the key playmaker to help Howard/Harden; failure to integrate 2-way players like Garcia and Casspi into the rotation; too much reliance on Beverley to be a shut down defensive PG in an offensive minded era.

McHale's strategy has already been discredited because Portland has already proven that it has the better starting 5. The only way to save this series is to utilize Lin, Casspi, Garcia, D-MO and Asik to help Howard and Harden.

 

I think there might only be 2 games remaining.

 

Yup, I said the the rockets were going in crawling and the blazers hit their stride just 2 weeks ago. Then meh comes in with his little stats of how many teams had to come in on a "gelling" before the playoffs. Stats that ignore context are killing this board.

 

Classic! LOL!