take it easy, some of us knew we gotta lose the game, novak is just on his road, its just the beginning, he must know a lot after this game.
I like Novak as much as the next guy... but not at the expense of Chuck...playing I was expecting Novak to... take more minutes away from Jho and Padget... and not start...thats big big shoes to have to fill for a young rookie... one thing to come in as a sub to take needed 3 point shots... another thing to start a game...and play big minutes
Yeah, completely surprised about this..why start a person who hasn't played much ..man van gundy what r u smoking?? There's one thing playing small ball but novak wont get the rebounds and he hasn't even played much. Why play him in a big game ?? Yes this was a big game..because it's against the suns..we always wanna play well against the good teams
Really??? I guess JVG looked into his crystal ball and knew that Chuck was going to have foul problems, so he just went ahead and started Novak.
The Suns did not have any wing player that could size up with Novak, although every wing player the Suns had could prolly out hustle Novak. I'm guessing JVG was hoping that Novak would simply shoot over anybody the Suns assigned to him. Furthermore, JVG prolly expected Yao and Shane to be able to compensate for Chuck's absence considering we're in a unique situation vs. the Suns' frontcourt compared to other teams that struggle with finesse players like Amare and Matrix - we have a 7'6 center that is also finesse.
There's a difference. If we had started the game with Chuck and put our stamp on the game, the refs would have been less lenient on foul calls. Reason being, in grind-it-out tough games, referees are reluctant to blow the whistle. However, JVG surrendered to D'Antoni like a bondage slave and decided he wants to try to outscore Phoenix, as if this team is so unbelievably loaded that we can put the Phoenix Suns on the court one night and the San Antonio Spurs another. We are the Rockets, we have an identity. You start Chuck. You immediately make it clear that you're out there to play a slow, tough game, and you don't plan on being soft. You grab rebounds, which Chuck does. You go to the basket repeatedly and get to th FT line (they had almost double the number of FTA than we did), and you definitely don't jack up twice as many 3's as the freakin Suns. IF ANYTHING he should have inserted Spanoulis or Head into the line-up in place of Rafer. I'm a huge Rafer supporter, but both those guys would have brought us a betetr advantage against the Suns. You put Spanoulis in with Battier and Hayes, you have the toughest mother****ers in the league on the court. You put Head in and T-Mac becomes PG, his length bothers Nash and T-Mac tends to drive more when he's PG because that's how he gets his assists. Poor judgement by JVG. Doesn't mean he's a horrible coach. But he made a boo-boo- He'll learn. It doesn't happen often, and hopefully it won't happen again.
Ok, mods, please edit out that word from my post, I got a bit emotional there and din't realize. Sorry.
This is the funniest thread ever. It starts with the announcement that Novak is starting. Woo hoo!!! "Greatest coach ever!!" Yeah!!!! Go Team!!! Fight!!!! It starts to moderate a bit. It ends with, "what was he thinking???" horrible decision!!! what are you thinking???
Didn't matter he fouled out in the 4th quarter where we needed him the most.. Hayes got the majority of minutes over Novak anyways.
Funniest thread? Not really. Those who hailed JVG's initial decision for playing Novak as a starter are not the same ones who lashed out at the move.
I would like to see Novak on the court for some run, but starting, that is a bit much IMHO. At least JVG took a gamble.... DD
I don't see the humor. If anything, this thread just demonstrates the board is divided as always. It's only funny when posters quickly contradict themselves on the same topic, which is not the case here.
He took away Deke and Padgett's minutes. Padgett really sucked the last game, so he wasn't going to get minutes. Juwan was injured, so he was not going to get minutes. With Juwan injured and Deke not getting minutes because of the matchup, It was up to Hayes to backup Yao.
there have been no less than three very solid posts ni this thread that accurately explained WHY he used him. did you even bother reading the thread before responding? Im guessing no. It was a calculated gamble based on matchups Jho = out Deek = too slow Chuck was needed to backup Yao AND if Novak would have come out hot, he would have opened up the floor so the SUns could not double and triple Yao constantly (like they did all game long) come on man..use some damn common sense...or at least read the posts of those that do.
