[ClutchFans] Podcast: What in the world is wrong with the Houston Rockets?

It would take a change of GM & ownership for that to happen. Morey & Alexander wouldn't be among his favorite GM-owner pairings in the league.

 

You're right. It's not.

Remember, James himself acknowledged after our loss to the Warriors that he needed help with ball handling. That was before Lawson and with Bev in there. So add that factoid to your other points about Bev being atrocious on both ends (which is correct) and to the facts that Clutch/MK brought up about Bev being hurt constantly and not a great 3-point shooter anyways.

Bev:
1. Is hurt all the time
2. Is not a great 3-point shooter when he's in there
3. Has looked bad for over a year now on defense when he's been playing.
4. Was the primary PG when Harden was complaining about needing help with ball handling.

Some of us already know (but we don't want to state it because once again it's too painful) that Bev is not the answer at the point for us. We have not seen the monster Beverley since the 2014-15 pre-season when he chomped up Jrue in a couple games. He was dinged most of last year. More likely Bev's role on a championship contending team is just what we heard wafting out of the Rockets organization towards the end of last season and throughout the summer of 2015. That being Bev is a good 3rd guard, an off-the-bench guy, to have on a championship contender. So, Bev is a 6th man at best. He shouldn't be starting for a championship contender. And you're going to continue to see this when he comes back and he's ineffective defensively.....which is the primary reason he got $18 million this summer. I'm afraid the 2013-14 monster Beverley is dead. He's been replaced by a player who is 50-70% of what he once was defensively and basically the same offensive player...which isn't nearly good enough.

 

It's part fit and loss of form. Lawson's has been declining the last several years. Some posters think he still has the same ability he had when he peaked early in his his career because of stats and numbers on a bad team.

It's kind of funny how Morey used to talk about the importance of free throw shooting and he's assembled a team full on bad FT shooters. Another point he's brought up a few times back then was about undersized PGs and their longevity in the league. Ty is an undersized PG who peaked early and is nearing the dreaded 3-0. Historicaly, that age is instant death for players in his situation.

 

I disagree with MK on one point. Ty CAN fit into any system to various levels of success. Implementation is key. He needs the ball in hishands more when Harden is on the court. Ball dominate balls can success toghter. Wade/ Lebron, Manu/ Parker, Westbrook/ Durant all are examples.

 

explain when Ty is off the bench and Harden is on the bench then? Anyone have those numbers from this season so far?

 

They need a new offensive system no more iso ball.

 

I actually think that's why he'd be such a great fit. I think that part of the reason why we've started so bad was because we never took preseason seriously and didn't work hard in training camp. We didn't even do two-a-days this year.

The players obviously don't work hard enough in the offseason, so bring in someone who busts their butts in the regular season.

 

exactly, system/coaching/player vs father time = father time wins.

 

I've been warning people that last season's WCF appearance should not have been a gauge of our strength. While a lot of people here were crying how lucky GS was, I was saying that the Rockets were the team that was lucky in reaching the WCF.

We did that by a miracle comeback that happens about once every 1000 tries. And we got HCA over the Clippers because of a dumb division champ rule AND an unexpected Spurs loss at the end of the season.

Yet, we got cocky and thought we were actually that good. We were not. Harden, as the franchised player who was supposed to carry the team, was bailed out in the playoffs more than once. Yet he was heralded as "the guy who got robbed of the MVP" and what's worse was that he believed that himself and got complacent and arrogant.

 

yup. just hope more cf's have realized the truth now.

sometimes i wonder what if it wasnt curry but harden who actually won the mvp award last season. what couldve happened?

 

To be fair to Harden, he was probably exhausted by the time we faced the Clips.

To bash Harden, he tried to quit (and took the team down with him a couple games) when he lost the MVP. And we have yet to see what kind of Second Star actually fits with Harden and who's the coach to do it, because until now he's been given free rein to do what he wants.

 

We would have won the New York game, Brooklyn, and the Dallas game, if we had more height! New York had 19 offensive rebounds, six by Pozingis in the
4th quarter alone. McHale said himself, that no shorter guy could out duel him, and that he would punish a shorter guy. Jones is 6-8, and Harrell is 6-7, and other than Howard who is smaller than most centers, and Capella who is 6-10 and 230 pounds, we are just too small, and during the course of game, our smaller guys are just getting worn down. Size does matter, and Morey should know that by now! Houston has to play a near perfect game just to win, and our guards can't release because they have help on the boards which wears them down also. We will win consistently when we get bigger!

 

bev's defense has been so disappointing the past ~11months i was actually happy to see JB try out KJ mcdaniels on opposing point guards late in the game at memphis. maybe with a full month of healthy play bev might somehow get back to his level of two seasons ago, but even then his ceiling and the ceiling for our team on the whole with him starting are not championship level anyways. giving him that contract with 3yrs guaranteed is looking like a mistake.

i really want JB to find a way for lawson and harden to play off of each other. on offense lawson's woes have come primarily from his inability to drain shots (and poor spacing when he drives in). a coach's job is to find ways to get his players going, starting with easy buckets. maybe we should be running more screens and opening up lanes for him to get his confidence up. we waited so long to get a top 15 point guard on the roster, at the least we owe it to ourselves to put him in the right position to succeed now.

 

I would also like to make a point about Howard's scoring. The discussion in this podcast was about Dwight's scoring no longer being important. I don't know if Clutch or MK really believe that or not. But they did discuss it in regards to Dwight's role going forward being as a defensive/rebounding savant.

While I do agree that Dwight's identity comes from his true greatness on the defensive end (and he is still great down there, the best in the business and the best big we've seen in the Association for many years on the defensive end), I do not agree that we don't need Dwight's scoring down low.

I'm not going to argue the point of Dwight's post-ups. Those have proven to be mostly ineffective. But I am going to argue for Dwight touching the ball OFTEN down low...mostly on PnR's and also because the perimeter guys actually make him a focal point and look for him when he's loose down there so they either throw him the ball for the dunk or they shoot it while he's in position to clean up the mess.

There was a moment in either the Portland or Memphis game where Dwight had low position and he screamed, "SHOOT THE BALL!!!". Somebody on the perimeter (maybe Trevor or Brewer) was dribbling around with it and Dwight had leveraged perfect position to either jump up for the lob or the put back. IMO, that is a reflection of our offense. Dwight wasn't complaining about not getting the ball on the post. He was grinding down low. All he wanted was for the perimeter guy to get the ball shot up so he could clean it up if necessary. And the perimeter guys weren't even paying attention. That is totally ridiculous. More than ridiculous it's plumb sad that our primary big is begging the perimeter guys to shoot the ball so he can have a chance at picking up scraps....when they're shooting so absolutely atrocious out there. They're not even looking for him down there. And they're not even running PnR with him. And that's not right.

You can't win without your primary bigs touching the ball.....often. You've got to leverage the great physical presence and hands of Dwight down low. You've got to get him the ball where he can just go up and hammer it down. And those opportunities are plentiful in our games with as many 3-point shots as we take. They've got to run the PnR's through with Howard and not abort them...and they've got to actually throw the ball to Howard in the pocket when he gets his defender pinned down there....which is multiple times a game. We're not talking about running the offense through Howard in the post and him catching on the post and fooling around with the basketball. We're talking about simply throwing it to him when he's wide open at the rim, folks! We're talking about actually running the PnR through with him.


Just a little bit of anecdotal evidence that indicates this team is better off when Dwight is scoring the basketball:

Since Dwight has been here for the start of the 2013-14 season our record with him in the lineup is 82-40. That translates to a winning percentage of .672. Interesting enough our overall record since Dwight has been here including games he's missed is 115-63 for a winning percentage of .646. That means without him we've gone 33-23 for a winning percentage of .589.



When Dwight plays and scores 12 or less points, our record is 19-16 (.543).

When Dwight scores 18 or more points, our record is 41-12 (.773).

I picked 12 and 18 out of the air arbitrarily. But I did check other reference points and the trend holds as long as there are sufficient games for the evaluation.


It's just this simple. Dwight is our second best player. And he's a big man. He defends and rebounds his butt off. And he's one of the best finishers in the league. When you come down on the offensive end, it makes no sense not to get him the basketball in a position to finish the play and get his numbers. Especially when we are shooting so atrociously from the outside. And especially when we're wanting to "get the ball to Terrence so he can finish". Whuuuuuuuuut!?!?!?!

WHAT ABOUT GETTING DWIGHT THE BALL SO HE CAN FINISH WITH IT?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!


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Which leads me to my final point about Harden. Clutch/MK kept referring to a disconnect between Harden and McHale. In my opinion, the true disconnect is between Harden and Howard. Harden can zing those beautiful passes to the corners. He can find Clint above the rim. He can bounce pass to Terrence in traffic. But he can't find Dwight Howard in positions to score????????

Does anybody here really think Harden and Howard are spending extra practice time together to build their on-court chemistry??? We're talking about pick-and-roll here. And they've been together for 3 preseasons, 2 regular seasons, and now the start of the third regular season. How much effort do you have to put into having a conversation about how the big likes to receive the pick-and-roll and the nuances the guard wants from the big in the picks????? I mean come on, now. Let's be honest. We either see dysfunctional, aborted pick-and-roll action from these two....or....they skip it altogether and we don't even get the basic pick-and-roll from them. Does that make any sense??? Does anybody thing that McHale was coaching these two guys away from the pick-and-roll????

I'm speculating the problem is between Harden and Howard....and the McHale firing was a consequence of their problems and apparently Harden's unwillingness to make it work.

 

while morey chases and then watches kd sign with the wiz. dwight's going to quietly sign with the mavs. you just know that's going to happen. it's the morey way.

 

Aaaaaaaand now I'm sad again...

Great podcast as usual. Too bad the content isn't on the brighter side of things...

 

Clutch,

Since you opened the can,


What in your opinion is Terrence's trade value?


Just to give you something to work off of, in my opinion, Terrence is only worth a late second rounder in terms of draft picks. If you include him as a throw in with another player (Brewer/Bev/McDaniels/Dekker) then he might add some slight trade value to even out a trade for a team that wants to take a flier on him for the last half of the season. Or if it's a straight up player to player trade, I suspect Terrence may be able to get you a minimum salaried vet, say somebody like Bargnani, Brandon Bass, Randy Foye, etc.

 

We're looking at a rebuild if this season gets any worse.

 

well we're ranked 28th on NBA.com . . . right ahead of the Lakers and Sixers.

http://www.nba.com/2015/news/powerrankings/11/23/week4/index.html

 

Mavericks #7???

Just shoot me.