ClutchFans Game Thread: Rockets @ Pistons 1/31/2015

That got me thinking, how did Houston even survive with Tarik Black as the starter during a 8-4 record, especially against Memphis?

 

Tarik Black works Hard and is a good Rebounder. Rockets played like straight garbage tonight, but if they had someone who could rebound in Traffic against big players they would have won tonight.

 

Dmo isnt a very strong rebounder
Tarik black would've helped a lot w/ Howard out

 

Tough loss. Detroit couldn't miss. plus we miss Dwight alot around the rim. but Harden basically didnt play that whole second quarter, if he does I think the we a run , and the score is closer at halftime. No 21 pt deficit to deal with later. the guys were prob thinking they just lost there leader in that second quarter.
I wish we got this game , but its nothig alarming.
yall gotta calm down, this team isnt perfect , but it is good.

 

We are not contenders until we get a decent coach

 

Ain't that the truth. Mchale is the worst coach in the western conference that is for sure.

 

Live game notes from the cold and dreary Midwest:

• This was my second Rockets road game of my life; so far I haven't been at all lucky for the team. The last time I went I was living in Indiana and attended a clobbering by the Pacers. This was a pretty sad one as well. Oh well, I sat by a nice guy who was also rooting for the Rockets and was quite knowledgeable about the team. We didn't have much to celebrate, but hey. We talked about D-Mo's breakout last night.
• The fans weren't too fond of Josh Smith, but his teammates seemed to be pretty cool with him. He spent about half of warmups hobnobbing with several of them at center court. Even SVG managed a genuine looking greeting and fairly enthusiastic shoulder pat.
• Bill Worrell is such a cool guy. He had lots of broadcast stuff to do before the game, but he still took the time to meet and greet with several Rockets fans in courtside seats. I was about 15 rows up and I kind of wanted to run down there and get in on the action, but I figured I should be considerate.
• In pregame introductions, D-Mo was announced as "Doan-tanus Motijunas!" to his great chagrin. The look on his face was great, and I think the Pistons PA mangled it once or twice more throughout the game.
• Josh looked like the fans were definitely getting to him - either working too hard to do something, or alternately getting rid of the ball right away. He never quite found his groove in the hostile environment.
• During a Pistons spurt after Harden left, McHale turned to look down his bench, saw all he had sitting there as backup was Canaan/Pap/D-Mo/Dorsey/Terry, and just got the saddest hangdog look on his face. It actually almost made me laugh out loud.
• Harden looked a step slow live, not a surprise with the injuries he has been playing through and the load on his back to carry the team. Of course, being THE BEARD, after a slow start he still had a monster second half and the Pistons fans atmosphere was very nervous early in the fourth.
• I went ahead and put this in the game thread instead of making a "look at my game pictures" thread because I wasn't that close and my phone's camera isn't that great. Here's a few:

Spoiler

I made a 4 hour roundtrip for this disappointing loss, but better that than to miss out seeing the Rockets live entirely for the year!

And of course I was repping the boys in red!

Spoiler

 

Props to you for representing in cold Detroit.

At least the Rockets gave us good moments in the 4th quarter. Going small seemed to wake up the team, so the coaches have that option to fall back to again when we're battling taller guys.

Your heart must have stopped when you saw Harden on the floor for several minutes. How did that look to you?

DET broadcast crew also mispronounced Montiejunas the whole night and worse was Papanikaleyo. My God, do they need glasses or what?

 

You may be on to something there ^^^

It was not just Tarik who helped us when Dwight was first out but Papa's BBIQ. Now that some of his shots are going in, we should find a way to include him in the rotation in the 1st half.

 

We need a SCORER at PG to compliment Harden and make our backcourt a 2 headed monster (Dragic or Lawson).

Nothing on Rubio's resume says 'scorer'. None of the attributes you listed will help us at PG.
So he can pass. But who's he gonna pass it to?
Ariza for a brick? Papa for a brick? Smith for a brick?

Lately we've put up enough bricks to build our own pyramid.

Please find someone who can break down the defender and slash or also shoot.

 

I posted this the other night in the game thread, I think it's relevant for tonight as well:

It has become a ridiculous joke the last few games. I am shocked, angry & disgusted at the officiating…especially against Harden.

League mandate or not, if the guy gets hacked…call the foul!!!

Our best player had to sit out a third of the game, because officials made it clear to Detroit that no matter how rough they played Harden there would be no call.

I thank God that he wasn't seriously injured on that play.

McHale is from the 80's…send out a goon (Dorsey) to Rambis an opposition player when they start with the no calls on our team.

Start growing some brass ones and stand up for ourselves.

I give credit to Detroit for shooting lights out, but 8 on 5 wears you down…DMo gets two early fouls for barley grazing Drummond & Monroe, but Drummond cracks Harden in the restricted area, when he came back in the second half, with not even a glance from the officials!!!

Then they miss an obvious over and back when we were down 6 or 3 from memory…I'm usually good at recalling these things BUT TONIGHT I AM LIVID!

We need Capela to be called up, if for nothing more than his shot blocking…a 6'7" Center isn't going to get it done against a monster front court like this.

He might be regarded as one of the best defenders in Europe, but he's playing against Gasols, Drummond, Ibaka, Aldridge, Brooks, Jordan…not Sanchez, Raul, Slobodan, Luigi & Mario.

And our schedule the last few weeks has us flying across every time zone…back & Forth, Back & forth…not the biggest issue, but come on!

I'm off to cool down…might go kick a wombat or stone the crows.

 

Completely agree about the bear hugging. Was there a rule change I don't know about because it's looked like Derek Harper and the Knicks since the Dallas game and the refs could give 2 ****s about the amount of contact you put on Harden.

Now if they want to up the contact to pre '00 levels then I'm all for it, but if not then blow the whistle and clean it up.

 

Terrible effort, This team has too much talent even without Dwight to be losing games like this.

So frustrating that McHale just cannot get this team to play hard, with no Dwight we actually have to be sharp on our rotations or else no rim protection kills us.

Not enough rebounding from our big guys, DMo's got to get more than 4 rebounds, and with Drummond and Monroe down there we have to gang rebound, that wasn't happening tonight, smh.

Just a terrible effort, like so many other games this season, sigh.

At least Harden is okay. Something's off with this team, hope they figure it out.

 

I've always been a Bev fan... If he's not playing D though, what good is he?

We need a legit PG.

 

4 games in 5 mights. They won four of them and they are without Dwight.

 

I'm having a hard time understanding what exactly McHale brings to this team. The only set play we ever run is that little screen play where Ariza floats to the corner and harden skips it to him. That's all. If Harden isn't creating, we don't score. There's no movement, and McHale just sits there... I just don't get it!

 

This is a problem I have with McHale. Adjust, do something different.

Too bad that Harden will be on fumes by the time we reach the playoffs. So will a lot of the team. Should really open up that bench Mchale, some guys can get more rest in certain games. Shouldn't take desperation to throw Canaan and Kostas out there. They have fresh legs off a b2b, see what they can do.

We play a playoff rotation (8 guys) in the regular season. It feels like so many other teams use as many players as possible. It's not such a bad thing to throw out Shved, Canaan, Kostas in a game like this earlier. They are guys who have had good nights in the NBA before, maybe tonight is that night? (as it was for Kostas...) so if you are seeing guys not giving effort...

Maybe it's not lack of effort, maybe it is just fatigue? IF you were forced to run 4 miles without pacing yourself (because they do not pace themselves. They play hard more games than not), on that last mile no matter what, no matter how hard you push your body just can't get into that gear. The result is a team that looks slow, sluggish, and one step behind.

 

Everyone gets a bad night now and then.

 

His whole year has been bad defensively. Big step back on that end of the court. His FG% has also dropped below 40% although granted a lot of that is because 70% of his shots are three pointers.

 

Y'all not getting it, Pat is doing what we need him to do cause he do it well. If Pat shot more james would cry like a b!tch.. Y'all wanted him out the game Canaan gave it up like virgin on prom nite, it's be real fellas what we have is gem