Either start Lin, or bring in a new starting PG, Bev ain't cuttin' it.

F'real. Without Lin (and Asik, but, you know...) our bench is terrible.

I'd be a much bigger proponent of starting Lin if we had an actual backup SG who could get buckets, which we might get sometime between now and February.

 

Completely agree with what you are implying by first sentence. On Brooks being able to hold things down without Harden or Lin, I completely disagree.Playing without Lin and Harden gets him into situations where he runs too many isolations. An Aaron Brooks Isolation is probably neck and neck with Asik post ups as the worst offensive plays run by the Rockets. On the flip side, Brooks has turned himself into a very good catch and shoot player when he has someone be the play creator.

 

Look at starters stats. If you want to use a small sample size, at least use one that supports your argument. The Rockets played one of the deeper benches and still won with dominant starter play.

 

I think the thing about Lin playing off the bench is overplayed.

With say 3 starters getting 36 min (Parsons, Harden and Howard) and 2 starters getting 32 min (Lin and Jones), you have these five players getting 72% of the 240 minutes per game.

Tell me you can't rotate players so that you have 2-3 of them on at any one time.

I don't know which basketball team or games you guys have watched, but we've pretty much played an 8 man rotation all season, with 9 in some circumstances. You'll have 2-3 starters playing with 2-3 players on the bench at all times (except the first 6 minutes of each halves).

There is no Jeremy Lin leading the 4 other members of the bench to improve his efficiency. That's a myth.

And could McHale stagger Lin and Harden's minutes effectively so that one of them is on the court at all times, and they still play together around 20 minutes of the game while they both start? You wouldn't think McHale could do the maths judging from last year, but he just happened to have gotten smarter and could do it for Howard/Asik this season when he wanted to try it (except they play together more like 12-14 minutes).

It can be done. It makes a lot of sense. But somehow many posters here refuse to think of it as a possibility.

 

The comedy is that McHale was more than willing to try it for a tandem (TT) that was obviously not going to work. But he has stubbornly refused to do it for a tandem that has shown many signs of potency when put together for some time. This could also go in the Official Fire McHale Thread, but I'll just keep it here.

 

Edit: his efficiency or the bench's efficiency

 

And the other thing is, would Beverley's supposed better defense be quite needed on the bench if a lot of his minutes will be played when Lin is off the court, ie if staggering Lin and Harden then Harden would be on court, plus our best defensive player Dwight would more likely be off court, and the bench mob of Garcia, Cassipi and Greg Smith/DMo could really do with more defensive help than the starting line-up.

It just beffudles me how Beverley's defense is so important for the starting unit that has arguably much better defenders in Dwight and Parsons than their replacements in Greg Smith/DMo and Garcia/Cassipi, and Harden plays around 40 minutes anyway.

 

yeah I probably went lil too far with the brooks thing but I did say a few mins lol, but I don't get the whole Lin needs to come bench when harden can help the team when non starters are on the floor also. He plays 38-40mins a game so unless casspi, Garcia only play 8 min she's going to be out there too.

it's easy to stagger mins as a coach once you see the importance of having at least one of you 2 playmakers out there.

 

Calvin Murphy's pre-game statement:
"JLin and JHarden playing together: Harden should let JLin be the point guard. He should not bring up and shoot the ball. JLin should be the PG that he is and not force his shots. If both play their positions, they will beat the Spurs."

- Lin starting or coming off the bench is good for the team if he playing at least 30-32 mins, but I still would rather him start and stagger their mins for reasons I stated previously, people will have their opinion that's cool & I will have mines.

 

Calvin Murphy's pre-game Statements
"Harden should let JLin be the point guard. He should not bring up and shoot the ball. JLin should be the PG that he is and not force his shots. If both play their positions, they will beat the Spurs."

- Lin starting or coming off the bench is good for the team if he playing at least 30-32 mins, but I still would rather him start and stagger their mins for reasons I stated previously, people will have their opinion that's cool & I will have mines.

 

I will say that the Rockets have played very well with Beverley on the floor with the starters. The starters have played better with Lin in limited minutes so far this season. I don't really care who starts between Lin or Beverley too much as long as Lin is on the court when Harden rests. I have not seen Beverley play much with Asik when Asik was healthy and not in TT. With Beverley struggling with his shot, Beverley may be starting as it may be the easiest way to get him minutes with Harden and without the backup center.

I think it is only a matter of time (late this season, early next) before Canaan fights his way into rotation unless Beverley steps up his game. When that happens, the Beverley-Lin arguments will end and Lin will be the starter with Canaan as backup. Granted, the Lin-Canaan arguments will probably start as well as the Canaan-Beverley arguments to a lesser extent provided Beverley isn't traded.

 

The Rockets won last night because T Jones had 21pts and 14 Rebs without that it's an L and had nothing to do with Harden, Lin, Parsons, or D12. Why because those 4 will always get buckets, it's the X factors like Jones who put us over the top. Also, please remember the Rockets have already beat the Spurs in SA with Pbev starting.

Can we please stop this racial hate and just wish the best for anyone in a Rockets jersey and save the hate for the Mavs.

 

Did Murph ever think of coaching?

 

I agree with trying to keep the racist hate down, but the Rockets got good to great games out of all 5 starters. Usually, at least 1 or 2 starters have an off game. Harden and Parsons were a combined 8 of 12 for 3pters. Howard pulled down 20 boards. Lin had an 8:1 Assist:TO game with good stats all around.

 

Calvin Murphy is not political welcomed in this forum.

 

Agreed. Normally I dog Harden, but he repeatedly stuck daggers in the Spurs comeback hopes in the 4th Q. Everyone played a solid game.

I wish the Rockets would get up like that for the mediocre teams.

 

Harden post game
“I was getting a feel the first two quarters,” Harden said. “I knew who was playing well coming into the game. I wanted to keep them involved, keep them going a little bit, and tried to get mine toward the end. It played out well"

-I like Lin & harden starting because harden doesn't have to carry a big load to start the game and other players can get the ball moving and get in rhythm early at a fast pace. harden is the best SG in the league and I want him to be healthy and save a lot of energy for our playoffs run, this will help the team. & he understands that's also from the comment above. When you have harden leading in points, Howard rebounds, Lin assist, & parsons somewhere right under them all that's great team basketball and everyone playing their ROLE

-I predicted early in this thread that if Lin finishes his contract in Houston he will be back starting at some point, probably if he's not traded by the deadline in feb. Bev did good as a starter with the team, that's what morey wanted to see before he could make other business moves, but at the same time Lin has his chance to prove the team needs him now.

 

^^^ forgot about jones, pretty much the same thing I said about parsons applies to him.

 

He is a very knowlegable commentator. A hall of famer backcourt great. He knows what he istalking about.

 

I don't buy this argument. If Harden's energy and health are what you are worried about, Beverley should be starting as it is a lot less tasking on Harden to play with Beverley (as long as Beverley isn't hitting his threes) in starting lineup than to have to carry a unit with Beverley and the backup center for extended minutes in second quarter, late third, or early fourth.

If you are for Lin starting, the argument that makes sense to me is that you want to blow the other team out early so the Rockets are so far ahead that even if the bench is a dud, like last night, it doesn't matter. Good lineup rotations can be used to try to minimize stress on starters, but probably not as well as just having Beverley start. Blow outs can also get Harden on the bench more.

I myself am for starting Lin as I think beating the opposing teams starters is more important than beating their bench players as the starters play more minutes. Harden expending more energy with backups is mitigated by more blowouts leading to more time on the bench. I think the Rockets could handle the drop in performance from the bench. Asik will also help bench a lot when he comes back before he is traded.