I am in need of answers im not going to lie. It didnt seam like it to me at first, but the more I think about it. I think we had to tank. Mchale couldnt be that bad when it comes to his rotation. Our team couldnt of played that bad with what we had on the line. I have seen more intensity in a shoot around then I have seen the last six games. DID WE TANK! OR DID WE TRY!
And one other thing. Do you see Dragic / Lee wanting to come back to this team in the off season. I dont see gogi coming back. He could play for a better team and make more money same with lee. Whos going to want to come to a previous no playoff team
Thanks for this thread! It seems this team really showed their true colours when the pressure was on when good, gritty, tough teams come to play and the boys go hide in the corner and cry. Unfortunately we are that scared little kid. We let other teams dictate how they played and when shots didn't fall the effort was gone. They didn't force any teams out of their comfort zone, defense weakened and it all went downhill. They did try in some games or at least for stretches but I've never seen anything like this. The lack of emotion and urgency was so obvious, you'd almost think the players were tanking. Coach as well, McHale didn't seem bothered with any of these last 6 losses. Even Adelman showed more emotion! McHale's rotation meaning including Kyle at all cost, not using a big guy in the 4th come to mind and is suspect to say the least. I wouldn't be suprised if McHale is trying to tank since maybe the 2 losses against Utah & Phoenix. The referees didn't help, they were downright awful but the championship teams did something about it. Maxwell would get T'd up, Olajuwon at times, Thorpe, Elie, Cassell and coach Rudy T would've been livid with some of those calls. McHale seemed to be fine with most of it. Players as well. To me, when you're involved in a game and in a do or die mode, emotions flow over and you don't just accept horrible calls like the Rockets did. This tells me the Rockets accepted the referees trying to make them lose which means they didn't care enough about winning in the first place. The one thing that also really bothers me is what Lee said which is that coaches told them they culd win 4-1 or go 3-2 and still get in. That's not the kind of mindset they should be in. Take it one game at a time! This doesn't inspire guys to do well, although we haven't won any MUST WINS either. The do-or-die mentality has not been there and that upsets me deeply. At least go out with a bang, not like this. That's why I couldn't care less who comes back except for Camby. That guy is the true definition of a warrior! The guy is 38, playing with a bad back, hand all messed up and still manages over 15 rebounds, diving on the floor and just all out hustle throughout all these games. Can't say the same for others.
The Rockets wanted to win. They haven't taken a night off since the first game of the season. The last 6 teams matched the Rockets intensity and won. The Rockets have to go above and beyond to win games, and this team can't do that.
I see both Dragic and Lee coming back. This will be their team to start of next season. Once though we will have to wait till draft and see what changes Morey has in mind. Who knows maybe the GM side of McHale took over and decided on tanking the rest of season.
The whole thing is this unit was going above and beyond all season. McHale got them to play at a better level than what they are. It all consumated about 3 weeks ago after the trade deadline acquisition of Camby and him having a week or so to get in a practice and get familiar with his new mates. Once they threw him in the starting lineup, they went on a run. But during that run, Parsons was playing over his head, Dragic was playing top-notch ball, Lee was draining shots and playing great D, they were all playing their best at the same time. That lasted for a good couple weeks and then in crunch time, it all came crashing down. I'm not really upset about it. It was a prelude to what a playoff run would have been. We would have been punked out in 4 games by whoever we played because once the opponents stepped up their intensity level to playoff intensity, which we had been playing at for much of the season trying to get back in this thing and make a run, then we just got annihilated. I said back in January that I had seen enough of this group. That was while Lowry, Martin, and Bud were being run out there as the starting perimeter unit along with Dally and Scola. I knew that group wasn't going anywhere and they weren't as good as last year. Then Lowry and Martin got hurt and McHale moved out Bud for Parsons and things got a little interesting again for me, just to see what other players had. And I think it was a good thing. We discovered that Goran has legit game. (He should be our starting PG if we can't sign DWill.) Goran, single-handedly drove this team to a good run. He played his a.. off on both ends of the court. That guy is a gamer. Love his attitude, spunk, not to mention his skill set. Then Camby came in and in the midst of Goran coming to the forefront, we all of a sudden got a significant upgrade in the paint. (If only Dally was a great teammate and could accept being the 2nd unit guy and come out with the 2nd unit and play his a.. off. BUt he can't. He's a pouter. He needs to go.) The reality is, this was our playoffs and we bombed. If we had made the playoffs as the 8th, 7th, 6th, or 5th seed, we would have gotten blasted just like we did the last week. The advantage is at least we have a 0.6% shot at Anthony Davis. (Very aggravating, since we could have shut it down in January and had a much better chance at him.) We did not tank! We played our a... off all season. We were in playoff mode from the get go. The bottom line is we are not good enough as currently constructed. We need SIGNIFICANT UPGRADES in the front court and we need marked improvement in the perimeter in either Parsons becoming a true two-way player and learning to shoot or a definite more efficient scoring presence at the 2 guard to go along with defense at least as good as Lee's. Basically we need to convert our one-way players to more two-way players. We need to find a way to combine the talents of Martin and Lee. We need to find a way to combine the talents of Parsons and Bud/Morris. And we simply have to acquire some top-notch front court talent.
You never know what would've happened had we made the playoffs. With Martin back, two bigs to throw out there though McHale like 99% of coaches don't like to use them at the same time and Dragic emergence we could've given teams a nice challenge.
The Rockets played their best. Unfortunately, this team just isn't good enough to compete. Proud of tge effort this year, but changes have to be made.
mctalky just wasn't a true leader when the bullets started flying. he made it a great point of emphasis that if didn't who you were, if you weren't contributing you would be sitting next to him...then ppat happened. Yeah, he was still out there being the kentucky tornado. I'm hoping he will get better by next year.
jopatmc - The one thing I don't get about the losing streak is the atrocious shooting percentages. How did we fall so far in that area? I also think there were some bizarre rotation issues that came up near the end. It almost seemed like McHale decided to change offensive strategies towards the end. Maybe that was a desperate reaction to what was going on.
I personally think there is more to it then just being a bad team we let go on all fronts, from playing hard to coaching decisions.. we got a bit lucky winning the games against chicago and LA, probably not planned but why so late? I don't understand it
Look at the playoffs. Shooting percentages always dip in the playoffs because ..... it's the playoffs. Everybody in the playoffs is scrambling on D and they are the better defensive teams anyway. The last week or so has been the playoffs. Every game we have played has been with playoff intensity D by the opponent. And our shooting percentages declined as a result. To compound the problem, you've got too many jump shooters like Lee and Patterson chucking up jumpers instead of getting the ball to the rim and getting on the foul line. The worst, most inefficient shot in basketball is the 20 footer and we probably shot more of those in the last week than any team in the league. Reason being injuries depleted us of more aggressive drivers and on top of that, we are undersized severely on the interior and it is much easier to step out and fire up the 20 footer than to get pounded into the floor by other teams 7-footers blocking our shots over and over.
We choked as bad as LeBron does in the 4th quarter on the Finals...... At least we have our rings......
Not having a true center play in the 4th quarter while sticking to Patterson when he's playing like ****, still boggles my mind.
True, I had a feeling that we tanked these last few games but I see no logic in that. If the tank job began at the start of the season or right after the All-Star beak, then fine. This may only improve our draft position from the 15th/14th pick to the 12th (so not worth it). So unless Notetaker thinks we can get a good pick and the 12th and maybe trade up, we may have just simply run out of gas.
Mchale can't be that stupid. Which is why i sense conspiracy between morey and mchale. Les doesn't want us to tank, but obv morey does so he can get us the best picks possible. Mchale and morey both probably realized we won't make the playoffs after the phx loss, so we are at full tank mode, but during the last 5 games of the season -__-
