Reed could not have been worse than the atrocity of Green/FVV. This was like having Derek Harper and John Starks taking all the minutes when Rolando Blackman was sitting on the bench.
I don't disagree. But it's worth considering how shook and scared Reed looked most of this year. If you throw him out here and he gets shell-shocked that obviously can be damaging mentally for his development. It's a tough call, mostly because we refused to develop him at all for the large part of this season. So at this point I'm more comfortable with letting Holiday take Fred's minutes if he continues to be ass rather than throw Reed to the wolves to try to win a mostly meaningless series.
If its meaningless then by all means have Reed know what that feels like. Most of us knew this was going to be a "playing with house money" playoff run so go all in and get all the guys some run so they know what that intensity feels like. Yesterday was Matt Schaub throwing his millionth pick 6 in a row from our backcourt.
Here comes the inevitable "but if the 10th guy on the bench was playing..." Monday morning quarterbacking fan takes. I like Reed, and I really like Cam's talent, but you are out of your mind if you think either of those guys are doing anything that gets you a win in a game where Steph Curry is throwing up heaves from halfcourt like they are layups, and Jimmy Butler is doing his thing where he goes on another level defensively in the playoffs against your best players.
Reed played great against the Lakers and Clippers when he finally got starting minutes. You know he's great at passing too, and isn't a selfish player. I think Jabari would have scored more with Reed feeding him, and he would have fed Cam as well coming in for Jalen. Amen can't shoot 3's and is a worse free throw shooter than Sengun, which limits his options, but if Jabari, Reed, and Cam were more of a scoring threat from the outside I think it would open up more room for Amen to get inside and make the shots he's better at. But, if they hack him his free throw shooting hurts. That's something he has to improve.
If you swap out FVV minutes for Sheppard and Jalen minutes for Cam, the Rockets likely win. Sticking with the worst players on the court is what put the game out of reach.
I'm gonna raise the BS flag there. It's not like Fred played much better against the Warriors April 6th, when he shot 12.5% FG%, 20% 3PT, with 3 points in 36 minutes. In March he had 5 really crappy games out of his 12 games played. Lakers 14.3% FG, 14.3% 3PT%, 7 points in 40 min Utah 10.0% FG, 14.3% 3PT, and 4 points in 34 min DEN 16.7 FG, 12.5% 3PT, and 7 points in 27 min PHI 16.7% FG, 20% 3PT, and 3 points in 38 min SAC 12.5% FG, 14.3% 3PT, and 3 points in 35 min As bad as he was in those 5 games IME still kept him in for an ave of 34.8 minutes.
Ime played Marcus Smart over Pritchard and lost to GS because they didn't have enough scoring. The Celts then traded Smart, play Pritchard and are more balanced and won the ring.... Ime needs to start balancing his roster, he has 2 shooters in Reed and Cam that should have been playing all year as backups and therefore ready when we struggle scoring, but instead he wasted them by playing Tate and Holiday over them. The Rockets NEED SHOOTERS - we have em, Ime just doesn't value shooting as much as defense and until he does, we aren't winning crap. BALANCE WINS RINGS ! DD
In retrospect we should've sacrificed wins to develop Reed and Cam. Correct. We've already lost home court so all if ot was for doo-doo.
Where (a developed) Reed would help this team is that GSW is overhelping on any drives to the rim. They're forcing Jalen left, giving him space and the best help defender in the league is cutting off his drives which turns Jalen into a decision maker. Which is a death sentence for the Rockets. Reed changes that dynamic. You can't camp the paint because he will pull up from whatever you give him. If you decide to press to get the ball out of his hands you have two cutters in Sengun/Amen or a kickout to Dillon or Jabari. Even shooting 33% from 3 or whatever teams were afraid of his shot. The Warriors couldnt care less about Jalen or Fred pulling up from 3. And Ime benched our next best 3 point threat in favor of Amen who statistically doesn't work with Jalen Green *at all*.
Playing Ree Sheppar in a playoff game would be the dumbest move in the history of playoff basketball.
You think Reed Sheppard as a rookie is overall for sure going to be more productive than the current Rockets core rotation? I get the case that FVV has been so bad that you have to try different looks, but that doesn't seem to be the case you are making here. I agree that Reed and Cam should have played more this season, but I would make the case it probably would have hurt our standing in the West potentially and we might have been a play-in team vs the 2nd seed. THAT BEING SAID, you could EASILY make the case that in the longrun the team would be better off, AND the end result (likely 1st round exit) is the same in the short term. If that's your take I actually agree with that. I personally would have sacrificed a few regular season wins to play my high upside your prospects regularly this season, started reducing FVV's role, and I might have even shopped Dillon Brooks in order to make room in the rotation for Cam, Tari, and Amen to own those minutes. But it seems obvious that the mandate Ime had was sacrificing development for getting the best playoff seed possible, and that meant ALOT of FVV, Brooks, etc. and deference to Jalen & Sengun to give them run at being stars.
He very likely would have been better than FVV or Jalen last night and if he had a coach that ran competent rotations all season long, he's likely the runaway favorite for ROY. The only reason it's even a question as to of he'd have helped out the Rockets is due to Ime's mismanagement. He'd have provided spacing if nothing else.
Right because it would have been impossible to do better than the backcourt that shot 20% from the field and 2/17 from 3. I’d much rather have Reed jacking up 13 3s than FVV.
No, I was talking about games like last night, and all the other games where Fred wasn't scoring much, and shooting horribly. I think Reed should have played the second half in games like that, and not just 12 minutes or less. There were plenty of opportunities for more developmental minutes for both Reed and Cam when Fred and others simply weren't playing very good. You saw how much better Reed looked when he had starting minutes recently. If he had gotten more minutes throughout the season when Fred was bricking shots I think he would have helped us more in the playoffs and in the future. Last night he definitely should have come in for Fred by the second half, and Cam should have come in as well. Our guys were bricking shots and free throws left and right. Flexibility beats being stubborn and just blowing games and stifling development.
I find it hard to believe Reed would have looked worst than FVV/Jalen last night. Just competent backcourt play would have made the difference. It sucks that we are resorting to wondering if a rookie can come in and make some type of difference but FVV/Jalen were a disaster and the sad point is a lot of us aren't that surprise the starting backcourt wasn't only bad but a disaster for game 1.
