Rotation was too short, D'Antoni overreacted to NeNe's injury and ran his 7 guys into the ground. Can't play fast, small and long and expect to execute at the end of games. Harden was terrible at the end but the gameplan adjustments from one game to the next were idiotic at best. Combine the two and Rox lose Game 5.
That's the knock on D'Antoni since his Suns days. He shortens the bench far too much during the playoffs. It's an old school mentality of winning and/or losing with your top gladiators. Which is tough when you are a fast paced team trying to wear down your opposition. In theory the exhausted starter is better than the fresh back up or second stringer. What the Warriors did in 2014 was put egos aside and had former starters also on the second team. Iguladala, David Lee, Livingston and others were recent starters in the past. Spurs were tired at the end of regulation; But they had fresher bodies than Houston did at the end of regulation and OT of game 5 (among other games). It's a game of attrition as much as talent nowadays. I would like to surround Harden with competent players much like LeBron does in Cleveland............plus a payroll exceeding well beyond the hard cap level.
I somehow disagree on this. The 7-man rotation has affected us during the last few minutes of the regulation. James already started to ball hog at the last couple of plays. The shooters started to miss the open shots. Even it is enough for us to win the regulation in game 5. What about game 6 and a potential 7? Will we have enough gas left? We can even forget about next series. I don't think this is the right rotation for a championship run. Unless our goal is just advance to the WCF. Our coach should definitely work on his rotation if he wants more success from our team.
At least McHale had the balls to sit Harden when he has no energy, MDA refuses to change his ways of running his starters into the ground.
Is this guy for real?. Harden looked dead in OT. Ariza looked like a 50 year old man. No one could run.
Harden took the entire third quarter off. He shouldn't have been tired. It wasn't the 7 man rotation that did him in. Harden did Harden in. And that's the sad part because had he not deferred, they would have extended the lead, and he could rest down the stretch. Instead we got Gordon trying taking over the offense and the role players taking all the shots... the lead vanished.
What he's failing to acknowledge is the Spurs had 18 more bench minutes than the Rockets. That's an addition 1-2 players missing from the rotation.
It's not just about one game or series even. MDA is coming off like he thinks he can ride a 7 man rotation all the way to a title. If he's doing it now, why would he change it up when the stakes only get higher? Delusional. McHale gave the rookie Capela major minutes in the playoffs after he barely played all year.
Bobby Brown produced, but MDA trusts Eric as a back up PG and Mbah though I've yet to see the latter initiate the offense lest a few rare ones. So we won't see Bobby, Demetrius, Zhou and Troy at all unless it's a blowout. Black is still situational I'm guessing. Thoughts? One more interesting bit: These are statistically our top 5 defensive players or is this opinion?
Other than friend's with JH, I don't know why they signed him. I'd rather have a young player with upside
