Why is Dwight Howard scoring so much less this year?

Isn't Darren Yuvan the poster Dreamshake here who got pissy a lot, so quit posting like 10 years ago, and starting a blog to spite cfnet?

Quoting him is like referencing someone's thread posted here. No one ever does that, but why not. There are a plethora of takes here worth repeating. We don't need to repost a blog entry from someone who left cfnet because he couldn't hang and get along.

Further, the theme of his posts are aimed at issues being discussed here that he's reading as a lurker. Why not just post them here?

 

My problem with this is we're paying him 20M PER and Dwight is considered to be the best center in the league because of his amazing defense/rebounding and decent offense. Dwight's post game has regressed however he's still remained a deadly PNR scorer. Considering the lack of big men in today's NBA if Dwight takes less than 10 possessions a night I always feel like we're not maximizing his abilities.

 

Rockets are 7-7 when Dwight plays.

In the 7 wins, Dwight averages 14 points, 14 boards basically

In the 7 losses, Dwight averages 11 points, 11 boards basically


When Dwight scores 14 or more points, our record this season is 5-1.
When Dwight scores 13 or less points, our record is 2-6.

When Dwight's points+boards is equal to or greater than 24, our record is 5-2.
When Dwight's points+boards is equal to or less than 23, our record is 2-5.

In our 7 wins with Dwight playing, Dwight averages 7.42 FTA's per game.
In our 7 losses with Dwight playing, he averages 3.7 FTA's per game.


When Dwight shoots 5 or more FTs per game, we are 7-3.
When Dwight shoots 4 or less FTs per game, we are 0-4.



Guys these numbers hold up for all of Dwight's games played here. The more touches he gets down there, the more our winning percentage goes up. Complain about his terrible post-ups all you want. But the man needs to have the ball. Look, he's shooting 55% from the FT line this year and 57% from the field. By any offensive metric you look at, Dwight is at worst our 4th most efficient offensive player that has played on the active roster this season.

Trevor and all the other perimeter players except for Harden and Thornton have been so abysmal offensively that throwing the ball to Dwight in the post is better than any of them using any possessions at all.

So, keep griping about Dwight. Gripe about how terrible his post-ups are. And ignore the absolutely horrible shooting and playmaking we've been getting from our perimeter guys all you want. And we can continue to lose games and float around .500.

And frankly, our perimeter guys are responsible for about half of Dwight's turnovers as well, waiting too late to try to get him the ball, ignoring him, until they are desperate and then throwing trash passes at him when he's smothered on the interior, throwing the ball at his ankles and expecting him to catch it, throwing bullet passes in traffic from 10 feet away, throwing lobs at him at the rim when he's double-covered with the shot-clock running down and Harden is standing 30 feet from the basket.....

We have some of the worst perimeter to interior passers in the league on this team to go along with some of the worst distance shooters. And that further deteriorates Dwight's efficiency.

I totally agree that if Lawson were handling the ball, Dwight's efficiency and his usage would increase...both a great thing for this lousy shooting, turnover machine of an offense.

 

He practices threes relentlessly in warmups. He needs to start spotting up in games and drain them.

 

The fact is that Howards postups have been horrible this year. There's very little that any player on the team does that has been less efficient than Dwight's postups.

We have 4 players with 10 or more postups this season and Howard is currently the worst of the 4.

Postup Stats

Capela
10 Possessions, 7.1% Postup Frequency, 1.0 Points-per-possession, 66.7FG%,20% FT Frequency, 0% And-1 Frequency

Harden
35 possessions, 6.1% Postup Frequency, 0.94 Points-per-possession,
42.3 FG%, 22.9% FT Frequency, 14.3% And-1 Frequency

Jones
16 possessions, 9.9% Postup Frequency, 0.81 Points-per-possession,
38.5 FG%, 18.8% FT Frequency, 6.3% And-1 Frequency

Howard
61 Possessions, 31.6% Postup Frequency, 0.67 Points-per-possession,
37.5 FG%, 18% FT Frequency, 3.3% And-1 Frequency.

Those are horrifically inefficient number for any type of shot. In comparision, the only spotup shooter with a lower ppp this season is Brewer at 0.58. After Brewer, the next worst spotup shooter is Thorton at 0.85 ppp.
Add in the fact that Howard is turning the ball over on 19.7% of his postups.

I don't think increasing the frequency of anything that inefficient is going to help make us better.

 

Hey, but wait for "playoff dwight"!!! He's so much better!

 

No one knowledgeable about basketball considers Dwight the best center in the game.

 

Because he is done as an elite player

Eye test said he's slower and have less lift. That combine with his TO prone POST plays = less PPG and POST opportunities for him.

 

One factor has to be less "hack-a"

2 reasons for that...
Improved FTs
We haven't had many leads

Edit: his FTs haven't improved much

 

TOUCHES, aelliot, TOUCHES!!!

Throwing the ball to Dwight in the post doesn't mean posting up. It means throwing him the ball and letting him finish. You want to isolate supposed post-ups where he dribbles and attempts to finish. I'm talking about his touches in the low post where he catches the ball and shoots it, whether that be a post-up or simply turning and finishing or simply jumping up, catching the lob and throwing it down in one fell swoop! All Dwight's shots come at the rim!! He's shooting 57% on top of getting fouled and going to the line and knocking down 55% of them. The only offensive players we have that are getting more juice out of their offensive touches (FGA's+.44*FTA's+TO's) are Harden, Capela, and Harrell. And Harrell's defense is so terrible we simply can't afford to keep him in there very long.

Put up with some of his crappy post-ups and turnovers in order for him to get the ball enough to finish and get to the foul line. Because overall his results exceed everybody else's used possessions besides Harden and Capela's. Feeding Dwight in the post doesn't mean Dwight dribbling around on a post-up.

 

He's not sitting out anymore.

And why would anyone ever want Dwight to get more post touches? Have you guys ever watched Dwight in the post?

Why does anyone want to see more Dwight free throws? Jesus, teams foul him ON PURPOSE because THEY WANT HIM TO SHOOT FREE THROWS. Strategy 101, if your opponent wants it, you probably shouldn't want it either.

I'd rather have Dwight focus on what he's good at- rebounds, blocks.

I would also like to see more of that Harden-has-the-ball-in-the-post-pick-and-roll-with-Howard thing they had going a couple games ago... against the Knicks? They ran it at least 3 times to great effect.

 

anyone thats watching the games cant say for certain he's done

it comes down to just two things. he doesnt have a great touch around the rim so he needs to get into rhythm. but he cant do that cuz he's in and out of the lineup and the team is horribly inconsistent at passing him the ball.

they need to keep passing him the ball and dwight needs to get healthy

 

Wake up and welcome to the 2015-16 season where Dwight is shooting 56% at the line and is a more efficient possession for us than any other possessions except a Dwight Howard shot, a Clint Capela shot, a Jason Terry 2-point shot, and a Montrezl Harrell shot. They're not fouling him on purpose. They're letting our guys shoot because we're absolutely terrible so far! Besides 55-56% is very, very acceptable for us for an offensive possession with Dwight because it also yields up an opponent foul that puts them deeper into foul trouble and us closer to the bonus.

So far this season, a pair of Dwight FTA's is one of our most efficient possessions, Rip Van Winkle. Wake up. It's 2015-16.

Yeah, the Harden in the post pick-and-roll works......and the high pick-and-roll where Dwight comes out to the 3-point line works as well. As a matter of fact, the pick-and-roll with Harden and Howard.....simply works!!!!

 

You mean, Rockets are 7-7 when both Dwight and Capela play.

 

No, I mean Rockets are 7-7 when Dwight plays.

 

So, Capela doesn't play when Dwight does? We don't have an advantage by having both playing vs only Capela?

 

If Howard catches the ball with his back to the basket and he's within 15 feet of the hoop then that counts as a postup. It doesn't matter if he dribbles or not.

I was replying to your statement that Dwight post touches were better than anything anyone other than Harden or Thornton does. That isn't true as these numbers show. When Howard gets the ball in the post it is very inefficient. Those are the stats I quoted. That's also the same as you just described other than pick and roll or lobs. Howard in the post should be the last thing we do. Right now if you throw it to him in the post its about a 1 in 5 chance that it will be a turnover and if he doesn't turn it over its less than a 40% chance that he puts the ball in the basket.

 

He is using most of his effort on the defensive end and on the glass.
It's probably best for the team. I am okay with 15/12 and solid defense from Dwight. We can find other ways to score especially when Dmo comes back and Harden, Brewer, and Ariza get their averages back up.

 

When Dwight has a clear roll to the rim he should be getting lobs, and get the ball when he has his man pinned deep, those are high percentage plays that create points and put the Rockets closer to the bonus.

I think it's fair to distinguish those touches from "post ups."

 

Because they told him they don't need him for his offense. They only need him for rebounding and protecting the rim. Dang must be nice to get 20 mil a year to play only defense and rebound.

Gotta love the way the Rockets Organization conducts business.