Durant has these stretches where everyone sort of stands around expecting him to do his thing to carry the team offensively. In truth, this group actually needs him to play this role because we remain in the lower half of the NBA at making uncontested shots and layups. It's mind blowing to me how many easy shots we miss. We might as well have a perennial all-time scorer taking shots. But the pressing issue is overall energy level. Jabari and Amen appear at their best when they are running, out on the break, and crashing the glass. But we can't sustain that intensity for very long. Their teammates can't keep it going. Our engine seems to burn out and then the next game we have little energy to work with. If we come out and give less than our full attention to an average Kings team, they'll run ahead of us because we lack energy, shooting, and average perimeter scoring. I think this would be true even if FVV were lacing them up every night because he wasn't exactly making shots when he was playing. And he always walked the ball up. Our perimeter guys--Okogie, Sheppard, and Holiday--are doing admirably but two of them are undersized on the wing and Okogie is really a short forward and not a guard. He's almost always a step slow. As these three log more and more minutes, I'm worried that we'll slow down as we did for half the game against the Kings and that our shooting will continue to slump. There are no easy fixes until we get more players healthy. It's the grind. Those wanting more plays for Sheppard need to realize he'll burn out if he's asked to take on any larger role. My suggestion is that we probably need to see a steady diet of JD Davison coming in for 5 minutes at the end of the first half to absorb a few backcourt minutes from Sheppard and Holiday. Capela is filling this kind of role in the frontcourt, preserving Adams and Sengun. I'd love to see Ime have that sort of trust in 3rd string Davison because he's more than capable of filling that role.
This really deserves its own thread. Because it’s not a theory … this is Durant’s career story. It amazes me how he never gets called out for it by the media or fans, except a few fans of the team he’s currently on. and lack of ball moment … ball stopper … ur turn / my turn … is never his fault. It’s always someone else. He spoken of as a guy who can fit in to any team … i mean, in theory yeah, sure why not … high efficiency ball stoppers are great It’s just amazing
Great example, the starting 4 for the least probable championship team (6th seed) in NBA history. It's not impossible You're spot on. I mentioned in an earlier post that I haven't seen a scuffle all season. Jabari has a black eye, Amen has stitches and Adams gets knocked to the ground by Brooks and there is nothing. Last season Udoka got a lot of the credit for the team's identity, when it was Dillon all along. Brooks is a culture setter that brings massive intrinsic value. I did make a mistake; there has been one scuffle. Tari and Adams. Next game is a perfect opportunity to stand up to Brooks, hopefully someone does.
A few fans......I guess yeah there are thousands of non KD fans that know he is a Beta......at least a passive person.
If someone does some Rocket totally dirty, I imagine there will be repercussions. Maybe not during that game, if it's close or something, but the next time. Baseball-style. You just reminded me of a time at Little Woodrows on Alabama, years ago, our buddy is hustling pool and starts to talk some ****...the other guys weren't too fond of it, so I ask my buddy who's chilling at the table with me drinking beers "you keeping an eye on our boy?" he say's "oh yeah, all I have to do is stand up" Dude was about 7'1" 300. "I can stop a fight real fast"
Is it just me or did they have more off ball movement and cuts this game? It seemed to me as if they worked on it and put an effort on doing that.
Well said. I do think if we can get both Tari and DFS healthy, we'll be able to play all of the roleplayers fewer minutes and they can really give 110% most of the time they're out there (second night of B2Bs notwithstanding, always our nemesis). I think, for all the crap our front office takes, they did have a plan for this season and where our edge would come from, and a lot of that is defensive intensity and offensive rebounding, and for that style of play you need a lot of forward/center depth, which we do have, in theory. Just need to get everybody healthy.
Ya think Durant was extra motivated b/c Westbrook was on the other team? Not sure if it was brought up.. lol
So mad that pass behind Sengun’s head didn’t count because they called a foul. I used to hoop with an older dude at Gregory Gym in Austin, he was like 38 and a history professor or doctoral student and he had a crazy old man game. He’d throw these passes where he’d look like he was shooting then use the other hand to pass it. Looked so funky and kind of unnecessary but anytime an old person does something crazy people went crazy lol
Our halfcourt offense was already an issue last year. It was great when our defense would create offense, our young players looked amazing in transition. And we even kept up that intensity for the entire regular season for the most part. But when the games slowed down, like in the playoffs, the halfcourt struggles were never really solved. These stretches are exactly what KD was brought in for. Like you said, we need him to play this role. Even in GS, where they had arguably the best ball movement in the league, KD would do his isos in the midrange and essentially freeze out Curry for stretches. It's not pretty basketball, but it's leaps better than what we had last year. We're 2nd in the league in offensive rating despite being one of the slowest teams in the league. And to KD's credit he seems to be deferring to Sengun quite a bit.
The coaches recognized before the game that the Kings would have no interior defense. Their game plan was to relentlessly attach the paint. It was the right thing to do, the Rockets would have blown out the Kings starting in the first half if they, especially Amen, would start making their bunnies. I think Ime is basing his starting unit on the matchups and that’s ok, but he really does not adjust his rotations or call timeouts when he needs to. Hopefully, it is adjusting to new personnel and he figures it out before the playoffs. With health and the development of more synergy, I’m pretty sure we will be the 2nd seed again. We have the horses, whether we have the coach is yet to be determined.
I was at the game yesterday and I remember at one point looking up at the big ass jumbotron and seeing that the Rockets were something like 4-15 from 3 while the Kings were around 10-30. This has been a common occurrence this season where they're usually efficient from downtown(although not last night), but they don't overly rely on the 3-pointer for their offense. I like this approach. It means they won't have an 0-27 debacle in the postseason like in 2018 because they've got guys who can reliably score in the paint and from midrange.
