Theory: Defense was so bad last season specifically b/c of Dwight and his impact on others.

Uh, watch the games.

Lack of prep, strategy, and overall effort. Dwight was okay at best, Harden deserves the blame here.

 

part of the defensive problems was definitely the coaching staff's insistence on our bigs rushing the perimeter on switches, which left our interior hollow possession after possession, game after game, month after month

 

Sorry, but this makes no sense...

T_Man

 

Then give him touches... Oops too late now.

 

I'm sorry but James Harden showed a lot less effort with Matador defense. He set the bad example for the perimeter players considering he was supposed to be the leader of team. Dwight was frustrated yes and defensively he was not getting blown past on the perimeter repeatedly. He always had to leave the man he was guarding to help on defense when ariza and Harden couldn't keep up with their guys. You guys will see just how bad it will be this upcoming season without him attempting to block every shot around the paint

 

I can see where Dwights lack of interest on the court rubbed off on the team. Bottom line Howard is mentally soft.

 

Dwight was absolutely a negative, he admitted that so there's not even a reason to doubt that.

But honestly James was also utter **** in the first two months, i mean, really really bad.

 

When players are already at the rim before Dwight has a chance to react...it screams that these "perimeter" defenders are NOT doing their job. And when Howard did go to challenge shots, a simple weakside rotation couldve made a difference. The Rockets were terrible at it.

Dwight had his issues and yes...he isnt the same defensive beast. But the Rockets as a whole stunk on defense. Players like Ariza and Bev are thought to be "defensive" stoppers. They had poor seasons defending.

The Rockets wasted Dwight during the time he here. They failed to integrate him into the offense and relied too much on chucking shots from distance...especially by POOR 3 point shooters. Wish Dwight the best...I too expect a decent season for Dwight in Atlanta.

 

I'm not s Dwight fan, and no doubt he mailed it in for most of last year. I'm glad he's gone. But folks are not seeing the full picture if they think we aren't gonna sorely miss his rim protection, defense and rebounding. Capela has some upside and I'm excited to see if he can take a big step forward this year with a lot of opportunity, but we are definitely worse off without the presence of Dwight in front of the rim. We need to replace that production, and it cant just be by getting more scoring. Well maybe it can? We'll see what happens with the Pringles experiment. I'm skeptical that you can contend, or even be one of the top teams without defending. This Bezdek guy isn't a miracle worker.

If folks contend that dwights lack of effort and frustration caused the team to suck defensively, I'd say maybe it negatively impacted the team, but seems like a convenient scapegoat

 

If the Rockets do better defensively this season than last, would it change MDA's rep for being offense only?

 

So many factors contributed to a weak D last year. The most overlooked though was the fact that this team couldn't hit a basket. I could not count how many times a Rocket would clank a shot off the rim that would lead to a fast break layup! For the love of God having some shooters (Rhyno, Gordon) is going to do wonders for this team defensively.

 

Yes I did...and I argued..that the wings regressed mightly. The defensive scheme was $hit(we switched incessantly whether it was needed or not), failed to block out, AND rotations were ALWAYS late.

Dwight didnt have a great season...BUT that includes every other guy on the team...

 

I think the reality is that James didn't care at the beginning of the season, that led other players to not care.

Pretty much when James started to play better, Dwight started to have his problems and quitted on the team leading others players to not care.

 

its been said a million times, the whole team fkd up. they came into the season in a funk and never got out of it. even if dwight gave his all, they wouldnt be much better. he'd be out of position most of the time having to help so daam much, just like ariza.

unbelievable after all this time rockets fans still blame dwight the most.

 

It was a nightmare! I'm going to say part of it was defensive coaching. Other times I feel like we didint have enough players that could create their own shot or make a basket. I feel like that sort of sucked the wind out of the players.

I think Howard noticed that and tried to take matters in to his own hands by requesting more touches, it's just that when he tried it looked bad. Over all I don't blame Howard for the problem.