Isaiah Hartenstein - Rockets second round pick (43rd overall)

That's what surprised me too. The aggressiveness was great to see.

He needs to watch video of Jokic on defense to see what someone with his body type can do.

Early in the season, the Rockets had serious rebounding woes creating their losses. With Faried, that's likely some help, but it reminded the value of a rebound inhaler, even in a D'Antoni system.

 

I'll sound like a whiner but he should have played for us more this year .

Now , with farried in the fold ... there probably isn't room for him . I think he can be better than nene , but Nene is gonna get his 6 mpg and MDA will play small the rest of the way .

His trouble in the NBA has been finishing and not fouling . The fouling ... I think he is getting screwed a bit , losing every 50/50 call. I'm glad to see he's working on being aggressive finishing in the G-league , but part of what makes the NBA finishing so much harder is that you are going vs bigger and more athletic guys ..... in other words there is still an adjustment

I don't think his 40/20 proves that he's gonna be a great NBA player right now .... but it does prove that the g league is no longer a challenge .

How many more games of this would you need to see before you call him up and make him some PT?

Also I don't like how he is hunched over lol . He needs a full offseason of strength and athletic work to help mitigate injury risk .

 

It probably would have sped things up but to be fair at no point in this season could we really afford to try something like assimilating a new center to our game plan.

Whatever though, seeing he’s not coveted by the rest of the league he won’t be traded and will be our backup starting next year seeing this is definitely last year of us leaning on Nene

 

You never know hahaha .... Morey is salivating over his 40/20 game and hoping he can do that so his value increases .

He's on a great contract . A lot of NBA teams would like to take a gamble on a 20 year old 7 footer who puts up 40/20 in the g-league and can shoot it a bit .

The crazy thing is that I thought he won the backup job out of camp .... he got a little PT earlier in the season and got the nickname "hustlestein" ... he wasn't consistent but he made good plays here and there . MDA made the choice to phase him out and go small , and then made the inexplicable decision to try Chriss at center .

I feel the opposite that we didn't have the opportunity to assimilate a young player ... we had a crazy start .. it should have been every man on deck gets a chance to step up!!

 

Congrats to Hartenstein for playing his ass off to earn a rotation spot, but MDA playing him more up to now would have been insane. We've been fighting to regain our footing since the beginning of the year and Isaiah frankly hasn't been very good in NBA action. "Better than Marquese Chriss" is hardly enough to earn a place in the rotation. Looks like he's figuring things out now, so it'll be interesting to see how he does next time we bring him up.

 

I'm with you fwiw.

 

I don't know if his back injury history has something to do with his hunched posture.

 

Thanks , and I know that I'm nitpicking at this point .

What back injury ? Did he have one the year we drafted him ?

 

https://hoopshabit.com/2017/06/27/houston-rockets-5-reasons-isaiah-hartenstein-good-pick/3/

 

Great confidence builders for very young player. Few more similar games in G League is great resume and establishes consistent elite production.

Creates confidence for Rockets too. Good for MDA to see for call up purposes, good for Morey to use as asset piece.

 

It’s not all that uncommon for kids who grow tall at a young age to have back posture..... a lot of times it’s a way of trying not to standout.... as unbelievable as it may sound not everyone enjoys being a whole foot taller than their friends.....especially kids.... if you notice a lot of taller women slouch over like that.... being tall is really tough on girls especially if they’re not introduced to sports at an early enough age to build that confidence......

Growing up short and hitting my growth spurt late was agonizing for me...(really thought I’d be short forever) I would’ve given anything to be tall at a young age but I guess I could see the awkwardness of literally looking down at all you friends and even some of your teachers......

 

Let's hope Hart will overcome this "habit" of his.

 

Morey: "Maybe we can show off Hartenstein tearing it up in the G-League to boost him as a trade asset.".......

 

I'm happy he's making a big impact in the G league but he still has some things he needs to work on before he can be a rotation guy in the nba on a contender. I didn't like the way he seemed to shy away from contact instead of going through guys. In the nba players will be quick enough to be in position close to the rim, he'll have to use his size and strength more. He was agressive when there was no one in position but contorted his body for layups and went for little floaters like a guard when defenders were nearby. His defense also still looked lacking. He needs to learn how to effectively use his size to take up space.

 

Hartenstink is balling.

DD

 

Not a big scoring night but a good box-score in other respects .

19/18/7/6

With the last two being assists and blocks .

I'll admit i didn't watch the game . But I think Isaiah is a good defender when he doesn't get called for fouls . I have no idea how to fix that at the NBA level ... perhaps he just needs to gain some respect .

Either way , I hope he keeps it up .

At some point I want to try him out over nene. The fact that Ne can only play like 10 minutes kills us .

 

Decent to good low post defender but he’s on skates when he has to defend on perimeter and especially when switched on a guard. Problem is that is lack of lateral agility is compounded by an average wingspan (7-1) so unable to recover when beat.

Even Bruno and Qi were better on perimeter because their ridiculous wingspans (7-6 plus) allowed them to get blocks even when trailing.

 

but people on Clutchfans told me he was a scrub...

 

I bet Chriss was a mgt decision to trump up his value too bad he turned out to be useless lol

 

Good to see him dunking the ball instead of playing under the rim. Even one-handed a lob? That's a real good sign IMO.

Hartenstein, Clark and House should be mopping up minutes on this injury report of a roster...