How many more players will have to break down crying for fans to start valuing players who play great defense? Seriously, fans don't even realize Harden's defense has been just as good, if not better than Ariza's (last season).
So did Harden really come out with a defensive purpose? Stat line says yes! Green needs to give us more of this
If we are doing a trade it’ll surely be a guy who can play the 3 and 4 spot. Someone like Green of Memphis or James Johnson of Miami. I don’t see us going after Bazemore .We need a PF to help Tucker out
Gerald Green is realistically our best SF with House gone. He really should be starting over Ennis. He actually has one of the highest net ratings on the team.
Really unexpected win, but Utah has trouble scoring so this could happen if we could just make some threes which we did. It's nice to finally see a game where some random player doesn't have his career game against us. Holding Mitchell to 26 points on 24 shots is excellent.
Rivers is finally is starting to shoot well. His playmaking is very important especially when Harden is being doubled and triple teamed. Faried shows he can clearly score more than with just dunks. EG didn't have a good game, but he drove well to the basket. It was encouraging to see that. Gerald was just great. A win against the Utah Jazz is always welcome.
The Rockets' next two games are against the Suns and the Kings. CP3 should be back vs. the Suns, which would give the coaching staff a chance to re-integrate him into the starting 5 against a weaker opponent. The Rockets shouldn't take this lightly, because we can't afford to keep having letdowns against bottom-feeding teams. The Kings might be tough, because Capela's not around to make Willie Cauley-Stein his b*tch but they're 21st in defensive efficiency (ironically, 4 spots higher than the Rockets right now) and Harden usually feasts on poor defensive teams. Being young and prone to reaching might also lead the Kings to accumulate lots of fouls quickly but they're a pretty scary team in transition. These two games should not only be wins, but also a chance to get CP3 up to speed. I'm of the opinion that Eric Gordon needs to rest that knee, but we'll see what the training staff decides.
Will be a tough task, but if anyone can will it into existence, it's this year's version of James Harden. If Capela is targeting the first game after all-star break as his return date, then we can expect him back by the 22nd. Still about 3 weeks away, so we need to hold on until then. I wonder what the trade deadline will bring?
I missed the game last and I'm watching the replay right now. but it's the Jazz broadcast. Good god are the Jazz announcers whiners, especially Matt Harpring. From opening tip they started talking about Harden's free throws and bemoaning our style. They get hyped whenever Jazz get in the bonus in the 2nd quarter with 8 minutes left but get all up in arms the other way when Rockets are drawing legitimate fouls. Can't wait to hear them whenever Rox blow this **** open.
The rockets were playing 5 against 4 because after Rubio got screened he was running around like chicken with head cutt off!!!! Ennis got free runs to the rim after a screen on Rubio. Twice! So did far"weed"! Rubio got benched after just 3 and half minutes into 1st quarter!
