This is good, but we are still middle of the pack in points allowed per possession, meaning we foul a lot and give up 3s. Our defense still has a lot of room for improvement.
I was being flippant, too. But really, given the impact of 3 pointers, rebounding, turnovers, and free throws, FG% alone is a pretty poor measurement of either defense or offense. It's really just a fairly meaningless blend of 2 pt and 3 pt shooting %. It's funny, though, that coaches (including McHale and Sampson) actually still refer to "FG% defense" frequently. Must drive Morey crazy. In any case, HOU is about average as a defensive team so far. They do an excellent job defending 2 pt shots and is good at not fouling. They are allowing way too many 3 pointers at a decent %. They are poor, however at defensive rebounding and forcing turnovers. So opponents tend to have more opportunities to put shots up as a result.
All this says is that the Rockets have great interior defense. Which means Dwight Howard is earning his paycheck and then some. We still suck horribly at transition defense and we suck at perimeter defense(giving up open 3s). Hopefully these can change. But teams aren't getting layups in the paint unless it's off the offensive rebound because Dwight has to challenge a shot.
Whats the points allowed per possession? But at the end of the day, its getting stops during crunch time that really matters.
I'd like to see the offensive and defensive stats for the 4th quarters. In most of the games lost this season, the team has blown 10+ point leads and struggles to score points and defend.
This has more to do with McHale favoring defensive line-ups in the 4th and Harden's hero ball. I think its a bad mistake to go defensive to try and protect a lead. We should be executing team ball that finds the open man and our best offensive players should be on the court.
It's really our TURNOVERS (1st in the league ughh) that's making us lose games. Last night our 3pt shooting redeemed us from our 21? TOs. What's infuriating to see are those lazy passes out on the perimeter and dribbling into a crowd of 2 or defenders. smh
turnovers, opponent turnover and... def. rebounds Actually there're two major problems with turnovers: Rockets are the worst team in league in turnovers (19.1 per game) and also the worst team in causing opponents turnovers (only 13.4 per game) Here's almost 6 more possesions for opponent team. Forcing opponnets to low FG% is one component of defence which is good... Causing turnovers is one component of defence which is bad. There's another component which is surpisingly not so good. Rockets get more defensive rebounds than any other team (36.0). So defensive reboudning can't be problem, correct? Not so sure... Because of quick pace, big number of turnovers and ... low opponent FG% - opponents have very large number of FG attempts, much more that with other teams. Opponnets also have 14.1 offensive rebounds. It's bad. Actually it's worst in NBA! And it means that Rockets succeed to get only 71.9% defensive rebounds, which is 27th in league... So Rockets fail to capitalize on causing low opponent FG%.
