All of us would like to see the team make the leap on offense to the same degree we have on defense. More and more, certain players are getting singled out (rightfully so) for this. Jalen Green leads the way. But lets look at the rest of the puzzle. Coaching matters, right? This what I want to take a closer look at. Ben Sullivan Ben Sullivan, 39, will lead the Rockets' Summer League team in Las Vegas this month, and he's perhaps the most interesting assistant on Udoka's new staff. He is renowned as one of the game's leading shooting coaches after stints in San Antonio, Atlanta, Milwaukee and Boston. In Houston, Sullivan will be tasked with overhauling the presently-shaky jumper of incoming lottery rookie Amen Thompson. No team shot a worse percentage from three last season than the Rockets, so even sneaking out of the bottom 10 this year would mark a major win for Sullivan and his new team. Royal Ivey Royal Ivey is no stranger to basketball fans in the Lone Star State. He was a star player for the Texas Longhorns from 2000-04, where he started a school record 126 games and earned All-Big 12 honors in 2003, the last season Texas reached a Final Four. Ivey then played a decade in the NBA before joining the coaching ranks, including a stint as an assistant alongside Udoka in Brooklyn. Ivey is also the head coach of the South Sudan national team, which qualified for the FIBA World Cup in February. Garrett Jackson Like both Ivey and Sullivan, you can trace Garrett Jackson and Udoka's relationship back to San Antonio. Jackson worked in the Spurs' video department in 2019 when Udoka was an assistant for the team, and two years later, the pair reunited in Boston when Jackson was added to the Celtics player enhancement staff. Jackson played college basketball at USC and Saint Mary’s and had international playing stints with five different clubs. Tiago Splitter NBA fans of the 2010s will likely remember Tiago Splitter, who had a pretty sizable rotation role in San Antonio from 2010-15. The Brazilian center was a rookie during Udoka's final season with the Spurs in 2010-11, and the two were reunited when Splitter joined the Nets as a scout before becoming a player development coach for the franchise in 2019-20. Splitter is also the first Brazilian-born player to win an NBA championship. Cam Hodges Houston is focusing heavily on shooting with its assistant hires, pairing Sullivan with Cam Hodges, who worked with celebrated Spurs' shooting coach Chip Engelland. Hodges, a 36-year-old assistant, joined Udoka during their stints in both San Antonio and Philadelphia, and Hodges most recently served as an associate coach role with the Clippers. Mike Moser The youngest addition to Udoka's staff, Mike Moser is all of 32 years old, having logged collegiate playing stints at UCLA, UNLV and Oregon. He later returned to the Ducks in 2021 and 2022 as an assistant coach for Oregon women's basketball team. Moser most recently spent the last season working on Joe Mazzula's staff in Boston. It seems Sullivan and Hodges are most directly connected to the offense. If our offense is to improve, no doubt, these two coaches will play a part in it. So tell me, looking at our offense, what is working and what isnt? What can these guys do to make things work better? Where it comes to offensive schemes, I think there are folks here much more versed on the subject than me. Some of you may have insight to what our offensive coaches have done before. Their strengths and weaknesses. So speak up! What do you think?
Very detailed information! I would say their goal of approaching an offensive scheme has been altered dramatically since the start of the season. Loosing KPJ hurts but I’m pretty sure they didn’t expect Jalen to struggle to score this much on offensively and we actually don’t have personnel (players) to take on a offensive role other than Jalen Green. So far Alpi has given us more than we expected, Jabari has increased his shooting percentage, and off season additions has been excellent thus netting us winning records. I honestly don’t have answer how we gonna up our offense other than trading for offensive player since Tari and Amen are both more of energy swing defensive minded guys and Cam is still too young to be consistent. I can only hope Jalen to suddenly snap out of funk and be a Jamal Murray type of player
Udoka said they would not run a complex playbook right until the younger players are ready for it. It is basically just the same old FVV- Sengün action and few other 2 man actions..... You pretty much also shave off Green's 25 points when he is not feeling it or he is being benched. Tari and any other bench guy should fill in for him.
We're a defensive team. On offense we play best when we're unselfish and move the ball around or when defense creates offense. Right now we're struggling when we don't trust our basic foundation of what our offense is: ball movement. Last game, Jalen and Alperen played a little more selfish and tried to score too much rather than take what the offense was giving them. They went to the bench. So a little more faith in the system is what we need. We've scored big point totals this year... when we trusted the system. Trust the system, play unselfishly, that is the fix. Forget individual numbers, team comes first.
I think we knew from day one that a team with a high volume shooting guard who can't shoot was going to struggle on offense. If you look at on-off splits among guys who have played more than 100 minutes, no player hurts the team by being on the court more than the guy with the highest usage on the team. That's quite a bit to overcome.
Running much of the offense through Alpi makes total sense. But for opposing teams, fronting and doubling Sengun is a part to why our offense sometimes struggles. We need to make teams pay for playing this way. We needs plays that counter this defensive approach vs Alpi.
The team simply doesn't have many players gifted at putting the ball in the basket, it's not complicated. FVV is a good shooter and floor general...but scoring wise doesn't really do anything else well. Jabari may be a significant offensive threat eventually, he isn't right now. Eason collects points in a myriad of ways, but almost all of them are out of system or spot up shooting not ball in hands offense creation. Brooks and Tate are effort/defense guys. Holiday and Jeff Green are solid rotation options, but not much more than that. Jalen Green and Sengun are the only guys I would say have offensive impact potential right, and Green completely vanishes quite frequently.
As opposing teams gain more insight on how our offense works, they imploy schemes to mess it up. Clogging up the paint and daring us to shoot is one I am seeing more and more of. In turn, our SYSTEM needs constant revision. While I agree with your points, in order to trust a system, the system has to be proven to work.
I get that, but we have what we have until the FO see fit to change things. My point is, how do we get more out of what we have now?
Green struggling to be efficient is obviously the biggest culprit. FVV creates offense but his scoring isnt much better than Jalen. Dillon and Jabari not being creators doesn’t help. The lack if an offensive horse of a 6th man is the 3rd factor. I am all about giving Jalen the season to see what happens. I am certainly less optimistic than I was. I want Cam getting 18 min a game.
Honestly, I haven't been able to watch as many games with my two teens playing football in tandem for two separate teams and now basketball season for their Jr. Highs under way. But I would like to possibly see more PnR opportunities with Alp being the on-ball creator and Bari being the screener, especially off the elbow or 3-point wings. Again, I'm not sure if this has been attempted but Bari and Tari as rollers and working off the baseline if their defender sags in the paint really worked during SL. Even if it's all 3 (Bari, Tari, Alpi) working as the screeners with FVV, which I'm sure has been done, we may be in better positions to catch defenders recovering or on their heels. Especially if Bari and Tari can become efficient enough on their pick and pop opportunities. I'm most definitely enjoying watching our offense more so this season than last year's iso heavy stagnant hero ball. Hopefully with time our guys find creative ways to punish defense while increasing open looks for one another. More importantly both Jalen and Alpi need to stay engaged, even when they're having off nights.
There is not much we can do with the offensive schemes to improve it. There are major things we lack, and honestly it is amazing we can win that many games with such an offense. 1) fvv - not a great scorer, cannot finish inside 2) Sengun - does not stretch the floor, poor 3pt shooting 3) Other than Sengun and fvv no playmaking, no decision making 4) overall weak shooters the whole team The only thing I can think of getting more cutters for Sengun, Bari being used more as spot up shooter. Green gets the spotlight because he is supposed to be the answer to shooting, getting to the rim and partly additional playmaking. For the first two the schemes won't help much, it is mostly mechanics, court vision and decision making. He needs time to improve if he will.
That’s an in game strategy to use against us when our shots aren’t falling. That doesn’t work against us in all situations, only when we’re cold from three. Either way, ball movement and taking what the defense gives us is our best offense. You’re overthinking this. Maybe you tweak with offensive rebounding when you’re doinking all of your shots but ball movement is still the base and our offense sucks when we play selfish ball.
All I know is Ime's Offensive guy when he was with the celtics is now the Utah head coach. People will say that the Rockets don't have enough gifted players to run a good offense. I think that's a lie. feels like Ime takes it real slow and trusts who he trusts to win games (Sengun, FVV, Unc, and DB). bari, tari, segun, tate on the block, holiday's shooting (and jalen despite his struggles) should be a competent offense if Ime utilized all their strengths. when DB is ducking in for multiple post ups a game instead of bari somebody bumped their head.
23rd in the NBA in team shooting % and 19th in 3pt% speaks for itself. If we arent shooting 30 foot 3's or attempting circus shots to beat the clock this is what our offense tends to look like: It would be nice to use our youth and athleticism in transition every now and again. Our pace sucks.
So the topic is offense, but I like to pull back a bit and look at both offense and defense, since they are connected and relates to our styles of play (identity). On point differential, At home, Rockets can keep teams usually under ~105 pts. This is impressive, and thus is one of the reasons we're #2 in the league for DEF RTG (107.8 as of Dec 15th). On offense, we usually score just enough above the opponent to win games. Currently 22nd in offense (111.7). At home, we can beat good and bad teams. But when facing the bad teams (Grizz, Spurs), I really don't expect blowouts because of Rocket's offense is below-mid. I'm OK with this trade-off as it's getting us about slightly above 50% wins. On the road, the calls can easily favor their home team. So refs can easily nullify our aggressive defense should they choose. Putting some of this on a third party. We know zebras can sway games, but if a team is elite on offense, they can score enough to overcome any few questionable calls. Defense really depends on the accuracy of those call, so if the margin is not in our favor, we lose. Per scoring opportunity matters more when both teams are low scoring.I watch postgame interviews of opposing coaches when they lose to us. They tend to always say: we lost but it wasn't by that much. Except on some of those games, it was a Rockets convincing win. The runs they can have on other teams, they are less likely to have against our Rocket's defense.On speed of the game, Our slow pace is deliberate, as it's part of the defensive identity. Opponents is sometimes lull to sleep, which plays into our favor. On offense itself. FVV, Sengun Senhub Plays with Jalen Sprinkled in plays for Dillon and Jabari The bench #1 and #2 - It's still bread and butter. But recent opponents have honed in, and seems less effective. Doesn't mean we stop running it, just that we need to diversify. Can't go to the well too often. #3 - For all the benching Jalen threads, Jalen being with the starting unit has value. At least in first half, see if he's hot. Also keep collecting data while against different opponent's defense and players. Start of year, there were games with they had Jalen running with the 2nd unit; results have been mixed. FVV, Sengun + selective 2nd unit players Jalen, Jabari + selective 2nd unit players #5 Bench - Start of the year, fans were criticizing the performance of the bench / staggered lineup. Think the coaches have gotten better on the lineups and minutes allocation. 2nd unit palyers have played well enough offensively, where that narrative shifted. In recent games, it's almost as if, I hope our starters can just keep pace with other team's starters, then let our 2nd unit get us the lead over their 2nd units. As far as offensive identity; given where the guys are right now, the current style of PnR, dribble handoffs, cuts, is correct to do. There is no elite iso player here, so moving the ball around is optimum. Better free throws. (not much to say there). Final encouraging words: We were 27th in offensive rating last season, we're 22nd right now. Even though the jump is not as massive as the defense (29th to 2nd), it's still an improvement. We are a middle of the pack team. If folks wonder what happens if a coach take a young team and go completely opposite: mid record,super turbo offense (#1) but terrible defense (28th), it's the Pacers. As far building for playoffs and long-term sustainability, I rather we go with the current route with defense first.
If the other team can defend Alpi on single coverage, we are doomed, if not, we have a chance. That's the deep dive. No one else has the skills or the personality to be on this conversation yet.
This will all get figured out in time. Players will get better or they will be replaced with more capable ones. This is a process. 1st step was to change the culture of the team (check), 2nd step get them playing defense consistently (check), 3rd step move the ball on offense (check), 4th step score more consistently (in-progress), 5th step, be contenders (in-progress)
