What is the biggest weakness in the Rockets Defense?

After watching what Grundy did to rafer Hayes and guys like Bowen...I am convinced defensive players are made not born.

Someone needs to teach these guys to play d. Their d could be much much better. While it may not be in their nature mindset, they have the athletic requirements to all be good defenders.

I think they need the right coaching. Timmy could make them into defensive players.

 

Does anybody know what our defensive system is, what scheme are we supposed to be running out there? I can't tell.

During the Hakeem era, our defense pushed the offense to the middle of the floor away from the baselines. That was by design to funnel the opponent into low percentage shots contested by Hakeem.

During the Van Gundy era, it was mano e mano, man on man, contest everything, contest every pass, contest every shot. And if you didn't dig and contest, then you sat. Didn't matter how good a scorer you were, you sat.

During the Adelman era, we still had some Van Gundy principle to our defense, especially with Shane and Chuck around. The defense slipped a bit because we were bringing in offense (Martin), but would probably have been very good like the Van Gundy era if Yao had remained healthy.

Now, Shane is gone, Chuck is gone, Yao is gone, Deke is gone. All that Van Gundy era is gone.

And I cannot tell what our defensive scheme is anymore.

 

Hayes has always been a great defensive player since his college days. Ask Hayesfan. Bowen was just a hustle guy.

The main reasons why JVG was such as great defensive coach were:

1. He's willing to sacrifice offense for defense in a heartbeat.

2. He had a clear defensive system and spent a lot of time implementing it. This in part made some mediocre defensive players look decent. But he could never make Kevin Martin a good defensive player. He'd probably beg the GM to trade that kind of player away. And he needed some smart defensive guys like Battier and Hayes on the floor to be the cornerstones of his system.

 

Exactly, need some players like under JVG, for example: Hayes

 

Coach and players

 

Whenever McFail trots out the "small-ball" lineup I cringe...

 

Through 8 games...

1st in Strength of Schedule
6 out of 8 games against top 8 teams in Offensive Efficiency

I agree the roster is a big problem, but this schedule has been brutal.