Rockets were 2nd best team in league after timeout

Aren't the Rockets starting essential the same lineup as last season, sans one player who left in free agency...and was replaced by a strikingly similar player?

 

Yep.

It's easy to have continuity when you have all stars and super role players. We have our all stars, now we are going after the super role guys. You don't keep guys you believe can't be what you want for the sake of continuity.

 

IIRC, Harden called switch right before the play started, creating some confusion. And Jones's positioning was terrible. Not sure if it was coaching or execution. But that was one awful defensive possession after a TO. It should have been an easy defensive play with less than a second left on the clock.

 

They key to it all was Chadler's inexplicable shading Lillard underneath which allowed him a dead run to the ball unimpeded. Parsons acknowledged as much after the game.

Still even with that, it was one helluva shot.
As much as I want to completely fault the defense, part of me has to acknowledge that amazing shot (and it was a shot not a heave) by Lillard.

Putting Parsons on Lillard to defend a last second, desperation shot was a good call. Parsons just played it wrong, apparently in anticipation of a screen that never came.

 

Even with all the Switching if Jones had just turned around Lillard wouldnt have been so wide open.

Still puzzles me why Jones was Guarding the Inbounder, Basically made 5 on 4 situation 4 on 4

 

He was guarding the inbounder to challenge the lob underneath which was the play most people expected.
I'm not sure what you mean about Jones turning around given wasn't really close to Lillard when he caught the ball. There was nothing Jones could have done there.

 

Did you not see them visibly confused on the floor just before the play started? They had no clue how they wanted to play it.

And WTF was Jones doing? Sure, our players mostly suck defensively, but if a good defensive coach was in charge, our defense on that possession would have been tighter than a nun's *******.

 

Trust I've seen that play more times than I care to recall and it sickens me no less each time.
However, contrary to the popular mythology around here, the failure of that play was not a failure due to coaching. It ultimately came down to a bad guess by Parsons.

Like I said, you can blame the coach if that helps you cope, but the facts, player comments, and personal observation don't support that position.

 

1. Most people expected a Lillard 3. They were down by 2 and would win the game with a 3.
2. Why would they want a lob play when the Rockets had the best shot blocker guarding the rim?
3. If the Rockets were so worried about the lob, why didn't they pull Jones back to double down low? Guarding the inbounder with .9s left is just dumb. In fact, Jones wasn't even crowding the inbounder to bother the inbound pass. He stayed in a no-man space being totally useless.

 

If that's your opinion, fine, but I have no idea what you're seeing out there. I saw a confused as hell team.

McHale has one more year to not underachieve.

 

go watch the play again - Jones was not guarding the inbounder at all - he was way off of him the inbounder would have had a free look whether if it was a lob or the pass to the top -- he didnt crowd Batum (i think it was Batum inbounding) at all. If he was in Batum's face like 98% of inbound plays that entire play could have been different - Batum would have to float the pass over Jones which could have given Parsons the 1/2 second he may have needed to catch up to Lillard and really contest the shot.

So much went wrong on that last play not just the switch and the late clock starting.

 

McHale is practicing calling more time outs right now.

 

Yes only one change in the starting lineup, but % of total minutes played from last season was my original point. Only 4 or 5(if Garcia returns) guys back who played more than 984 minutes(25% of total regulation minutes). Parsons, Lin, Asik, Casspi and Brooks played 7804 minutes total which was 39% of the total Rockets minutes. You don't expect that much turnover on a 54 win team.

If any of the starting 5 miss extended time because of injuries we will be relying on guys who haven't played many minutes together. Harden, Lin, Parsons and to a lesser extent Asik played a lot of minutes together over the last 2 seasons. I wouldn't be surprised if the team gets off to a slow start just because of the time need to adjust to the new guys.

 

1) They were down by only 2 points.
They were up in the series.
They were playing at home. (The age old axiom is that you go for the tie at home, the win on the road.)
2) They have one of the best bigs in the league who was having a great game and a phenomenal series.
A layup is a higher percentage shot than a desperation 3.
Even Parsons himself expected them to run something going toward the basket.
3) To challenge the inbounder to make a more difficult pass, hopefully resulting in a more difficult shot.

Of course we have the advantage of hindsight now and we know Lillard hit an incredible shot, but the Rockets had a solid defensive plan.

 

geez,you'd think after almost 10 years we would learn to spell morüay's name correctly

now if only coach could call time outs in needed situations,after all he is the coach.

 

While I agree that certain Houston fans are bad, we do have to acknowledge that the bad defense was not 100% on the players. As acoach when you see bad communication habbits and bad match ups you have to fix those issues quickly. Not to beat a dead horse about the Portland series, but Asik should have started game 2 at the latest. Also our last play of the season was a communication issue, but in my opinion as a coach that should have been addressed to death after the Steve Blake shot back in November.

 

That really depends. If the players followed the instructions to a tee, then it's on the coaches. We won't really know what happened in the huddle unless somebody has a transcript.