If there is no movement then even 3 vs. 4 static spacing becomes defensible with peel switches and defense jumping passing lanes or sagging off non shooters like Russ or even a cold EGo.
See that's what Im saying here if Russ wasnt so trash at shooting, he would actually have the funtional space required like actual 5 out spacing, same with EG...I honestly dont even expect him to continue trash shooting into next year, its Russ that Im worried about.
Lack of variety is problematic when teams have time to game plan for you and just you specifically. They have checks, they always have checks, where is the balance? One of the oldest is adages in all of sport is take what the defense gives you. If the fielders shift to cover a pull hitter, go oppo. If they stay with 2 deep safeties but are content to give short passes up, you dink and dunk until they are forced to change. It’s not even like the initial Harden double is brand new... but the rockets take it so far that the lakers compensated by abandoning certain players and shots because the rockets literally won’t do anything different. They judo’d us. They made us think our punch was going to land right before we got hip-tossed. Over and over because we literally wouldn’t post Harden up for 3 possessions to keep them honest. Dishonest defense. You pulled it right into the switch anyway. You threw that bomb right into double coverage anyway. They judo’d us using our own system against us. Sports analogies! No roll-man, no shooters, bad rotations, gimmick offense against a guy trying to be the goat. I mean, just work on making 3s from the logo have the other defenders just stay put, no need to waste energy. Shoot wherever you get doubled. You laugh until you realize that’s exactly what Westbrook does...his move isn’t launching a 3 over the defense from half court, it’s running headlong into with no plan. Yeah it’s great when it works, Harden probably makes 30% from the logo too. Jesus H. Christ this team is a mess.
You can argue whatever you want about Rockets' needs and player weaknesses, but at the end of the day it's pretty simple: You need movement off the ball and activity on the weak side to play HQ basketball and speak about an elite offense in the playoffs. And that's it. The article is OK, Lakers D was OK, but it was about our rachitic offense. D'Antoni's bet in the long run plain out failed. He thought he was outsmarting people simplifying things to the extreme, and at the end of the day he was just exposed. His atypical offense turned out to be too easy to guard and gameplan against on a long playoffs series for an organized team. Period. So before speaking about players needs, we just need a normal dynamic offense. Then the quality of the sets and the quality, IQ and complementarity of our players will make it elite or not. But firstly we need a regular offense able to exploit our strenghts and adapt to defensive changes. And of course for starters, this "detail" could probably help...
Show me any offense that could win with Westbrook's production offensively and defensively? O ur offense was never garbage when Harden actually had a true second option next to him. Westbrook killed the way our offense was run....same with Rivers to an extent.
Not a fan of Westbrook, but we weren't elite offense with Paul neither...Look at the playoff numbers.
What "Playoff" numbers are you referring to? Do you realize that team's who play good defenses are going to have their offensive rating go down, you dont just evaluate playoff offenses without context. GIve me a break, its the same old spiel. "You have to do X to win, this is the way way basketball SHOULD be played." Whatever man.......
Lakers are going to sweep Heat. They likely would sweep any East team. They almost swept Portland and Denver too. Only team that gave Lakers and their fans a scare were the Rockets. Blazers and Nugs were deeper and more talented but 1st three games of Lakers vs. Rockets could have gone either way. Except for 1st game, Rockets blew the Lakers out of the water. Rockets did all this not with a regular offense. A regular offense (traditional 5) would have barely made the playoffs.
Great medical term but poor use in this context. Rockets offense is many things but "sickly, weak, feeble or rickety" it is not.
First, there was no scare of us after Game 2. Second, if any team gave the Lakers real scare, it was the Nuggets, not the Rockets. Two of the Denver losses could have gone the other way if not the combination of late game heroic by AD and some officiating help. Their best player was in foul trouble in 4 of the 5 games they played. Denver was clearly the better team in the playoffs than us because they had multiple weapons instead of just one trick. Their offense was much more efficient than ours against the Lakers even when they had to sit Jokic a lot because of foul trouble. MDA should take some blame on not adjusting. But we didn't have the personnel to do much of variation even if he wanted to. The article is spot on about our lack of reliable shooters, lack of smart decision makers and lack of player and ball movements.
Look up LA media and national media, Denver was not a threat AT ANY TIME in the series. Very different media commentary when Lakers played Rockets.
You should watch game 3 again then. After game 3, our guys were gassed, it was a miracle we came back and made that game 4 close. Our guys were done after game 4, completely spent. Our offense had more to do with Westbrook being garbage than anything else.
Not sure if that true or not. I don't care much about what the media say anyway. They are driven by narratives. Harden and Westbrook are bigger stories than Jokic and Murray. Many casual fans don't even know half of the Nuggets starters. Stats show that the Denver series was closer than the Houston series.
Rockets should consider bringing in Will Voight (defense - peel switches) and Jim Crutchfield (offense - motion and transition) as assistant coaches.
