We have a 'Warriors weaknesses' thread, but what good is looking at the other team's weaknesses when you can't even fix your own weaknesses? What do you think the Rockets need to avoid to put themselves in a good position to win this series? Here are a couple of negative stats about the Rockets from today: <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">The Rockets are scoring the most points of any team in the postseason- averaging over 111 per game.</p>— Jenny Dial Creech (@jennydialcreech) <a href="https://twitter.com/jennydialcreech/status/600696677599727617">May 19, 2015</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">BUT, the Rockets are also averaging more turnovers than any other playoff team with 15.3 per outing.</p>— Jenny Dial Creech (@jennydialcreech) <a href="https://twitter.com/jennydialcreech/status/600696782260076544">May 19, 2015</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Here is another. Rockets No. 1 in playoffs in free throw attempts with 38.3 BUT last in FT percentage with .654.</p>— Jenny Dial Creech (@jennydialcreech) <a href="https://twitter.com/jennydialcreech/status/600697298293813248">May 19, 2015</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> It's not crazy to think that Hack-A-Howard/Capela/Smith may come into play at some point. Work on free throws and limit turnovers comes to mind for me about this team. McHale possibly learned his lesson from hacking a player while his team has good momentum? What do the Rockets need to avoid?
inconsistency on defense. also turnovers, many of which were easily avoidable (aka those 'cute', behind-the-back, and 'home-run' passes).
The Rockets have played the the other top 3 offenses in the playoffs so far and now will go up against the 2nd best in GSW. Their defensive numbers are skewed because of that.
I don't like the turnover numbers because those are also a function of pace. Regardless, the Warriors have roughly the same pace we do, and they do take better care of the ball better than we do.
Same thing as the last series. Own the glass, limit turnovers and get back on defense to limit transition points. Of course, closing out hard on three-point shooters is a given. Do those little things and the Rockets win this series.
Rockets weaknesses? Hmm...... McHale is a terrible coach, all he does is collect a paycheck and scream "play harder." Dwight Howard is a turnover and free throw missing machine. He is too nice and doesn't care about basketball. James Harden is a thirsty and fat out of shape joke that doesn't defend or pass the ball to Lin. Trevor Ariza is a terrible shooter and can't dribble. Corey Brewer is inefficient and stupid. Prigioni is old and suxxxxx Terry can't stay in front of his own shadow, let alone defend. Jones is lazy. I think that basically covers it all..........oh I forgot. Morey is stupid and fat and eats at Sonic.
The Clippers, statistically worse than Rockets (by one place; they were 28th and were 27th) in FT% this season employed the hack strategy against us with effectiveness. The Warriors were 9th in FT% this season and are full of good shooters. There is no doubt whatsoever that they will hack our bigs. This series, we HAVE to make those shots, and take that away from them. Jenny's right about turnovers, too. However, there are different types of turnovers. The Rockets make an incredible number of stupid, stupid, stupid passes, and Harden, God love him, is one of the main generators of them trying to force bounce passes to the bigs through needle holes in the defense. Smith and Prigioni can pull those passes off...sometimes...but Harden needs to just eliminate them and instead take the ball to the hole. The long, safety valve pass to the corner three-shooter once you gone nearly all the way to the basket is another one of those risky, turnover-prone passes. Just take it in, draw the foul, make the basket, get blocked, but don't put the ball straight in the opponent's hands with a bad pass. We've been eaten alive plenty already on points off of our turnovers, and that's because Rockets turnovers make for ideal fast breaks for the other team. They need to stop being so tricksy, unless they're sure they can get the ball to someone in a better position. Remove the stupid turnovers and gain a huge advantage. Also, speaking of turnovers, get back down the damn court on transition D. Speaking of defense... The defense is something that shouldn't come up, because they know they can play it now. They played powerful shutdown defense while Smith handled all the offense in the amazing Game 6 comeback. Now, I'm not saying they won't lapse in D, but I'm just praying they realize that their defense is what got them to this round and have the drive and confidence to turn it on and keep it on throughout every game. The one factor I hope doesn't come into play is Harden's emotions about losing the MVP to Curry. The Rockets beat the Clippers as a team. James needs to be fired up for sure, as do all of them, but if he tries to out-MVP Curry, the Warriors are going to outplay the Rockets. It's business; go out and do your job properly if you want a promotion to the Finals. I think the Clippers series taught them a lot, but I hope they've retained it, so they come out firing on all cylinders from the first second of this series.
i doubt they will hack our bigs (maybe w/ a few exceptions here and there). it's just not kerr's cup of tea imo.
I would say inconsistency in half court offense. When we don't push the ball as much, our offense really suffers because we don't really have any go to plays and play makers other than Harden. Too many possessions where 4 other players all touch the ball and do nothing with it and then dump it to Harden with 8 seconds left and prays for a miracle Also defense inconsistencies, we don't know when to switch or not, lot of scrambling leading to wide open shots
Kerr's cup of tea is winning. He'll do it if the game or series goes bad. In close games he won't because he doesn't want to disrupt the flow of his team and he has confidence in his team, as he should.
