No doubt our offense is rivaled by only Golden State. The only problem is on the defensive side of the ball. We have two elite defenders a their positions in Bev and Ariza, but team defense is a HUGE factor in determining opponent points per game. Using our current roster, what strategy/defensive schemes do you think would help put us in the top 3 defensive teams? Or do we go by the mantra: "The best defense is a great offense"?
Aren't we the best defensive team in the league during our winning streak? At the same time, since Beverley came back we have been in the top ten. We are not a bottom tier defensive team. Our team has been one of the best on both sides of the court recently.
According to https://www.teamrankings.com/nba/stat/opponent-points-per-game, we're ranked 20th. Agreed that this may not be accurate due to recent success, but I'd like to see our rank in the top 10. The reason I'm concerned is that defense tends to take on more weight in the playoffs.
Sorry, but you need to define our defensive woes, if you are going to claim it in a thread title like this Our team defense has been surprisingly good to great since Bev came back. We are locking in. A lot is high energy fockass mixed with elite to good individual defenders. Since Bev came back we are: 8th in the NBA in DRtg In last 13 games 4th in the NBA in Drtg All games 14th Stats or per nba.com
I think we have lapses during the game. Also, it is obvious there are some lineups where we are very good defensively. To me: Harrell, Dekker, Brewer, Gordon, Beverley has been our best defensive line up. That very undersized line up is proof that you requiere discipline and will to play defense, everything else can make you better, but you need the 2 fundamental aspects. Don´t have the numbers to back it up, purely eye test, I´m at my job and can´t really get into basketball reference
Seems a bit rhetorical don't you think? It was already determined going into the season that our offense would have to carry our defense. Honestly, I'm more than happy about our current level of defense. While a championship was never the goal for this season, our success has all of us fans believing it is possible. We are who we are and we're not going to be able to change many schemes now that we're deep in the season with so many back to backs. The best possible course at this point is to eliminate the stupid mistakes, stay healthy, and continue playing with enthusiasm. We'll see in the playoffs whether offense or defense wins games.
Rockets aren't world-beaters on the defensive end, but I don't think the defense has been so bad it deserves it's own thread. I think the Rockets have been playing pretty well defensively. After last year's debacle, I'm just excited they are actually trying to defend. PLUS the narrative the Rockets are a bad defensive team is getting tired. Just because Harden isn't the greatest, and MDA hasn't preached defense in the past, doesn't automatically make the Rockets a bad defensive team. Gordon has also been labeled a bad defender. Media told me he was supposed to be TERRIBLE, but to my surprise, he is really good. Dekker gets an honorable mention too. His lack of lateral quickness has been extremely overstated.
not sure what OP's been seeing but during this long stretch the Rockets have been quite solid defensively. Seem you're putting a little too much focus into opponents ppg without acknowledging other factors that go into it
Isn't that the stat you want to look at (recent ones)? You don't go from 28th to 20th without showing TONS of improvement. If first shot 3 out of 10 free throws, then made 17 out of the next 20, does that make u a bad free thrower?
We have been one of the best defensive teams in the league in December. Defensive efficiency is a far better accuracy as to how good a team is at defending, not ppg against. we are the 4th best defensive team this month http://stats.nba.com/teams/defense/... Season&DateFrom=12/01/2016&DateTo=12/31/2016
How do we fix defensive woes? Keep putting the ball in the basket so our defense can get set instead of defending in transition.
Likethe others I agree that defense hasn't been as bad. That said,I really think we could benefit from another defensive wing to play behind Ariza. Remember when we had 48 minutes of Artest/Battier? Admittedly that is a bit of a pipe dream.
Our defense is passable now. Our rotations are on point and we chase guys off the 3pt line for the most part. Two weaknesses continue to show: post players kill us inside on isos and we have trouble grabbing defensive rebounds at times. Also, careless turnovers hurt us on transition defense, but that's just part of our offense and there's nothing to be done about that. Maybe we can trade for a defensive center or Capela can gain another ten pounds and take lessons from Deke.
You should make a new one, we haven't had one in awhile. In fact, there isn't a single Dmo thread on the first page now. Time to make more Dmo threads baby!
WOES. We ain't got woes. Woes is a great word though. We've been average since Bev came back (i.e. playing very good defense at a non-difficult stretch of the schedule). I think we will finish between 10th and 15th best defense which is a HUGE credit to the coaching staff and players. Looking just at personnel we should be one of the 10 worst defenses in the league. As for our "woes", we fix it in the summer. For now we focus on our strength. How do we go from being the #2 offense to being the #1 offense? Would Philly really say no to Nene + Harrell + our 2017 first rounder for Noel? Maybe re-route Harrell somewhere else for a vet that Philly can use? Capela/Noel would push us into the top 10 defensive category with Ariza and Bev hounding the perimeter guys. Woof.
