Well, this just goes to show you that there isn't a single, solitary thing that is acceptable about the Houston Rockets to the ClutchFans bbs. I wonder if the Kings and Twolves fans criticize their own team so much? I mean, this is bordering on self-loathing. Yeesh. Oh well. I still dig the Rockets. Dudes are from Houston.
If 80-90 points is enough to win most of the time, that's fine to me. That is JVG's style with Knicks, although we are more talent than those Knicks. We have 2 players still in injury list. I hope they can score 90+ points when those 2 players are back. With the defense we have and if we can score 90+ average, we will win a lot of games.
I was wondering the same thing. We have great defense, but what we really need to work on is our offense. For example, we held Memphis to, I think, to the 70s, but we still lost. Defense will, at best, keep us from losing the game, and, at worst, keep us in the game, but we really need to maximize all our offensive talent to make sure that we win games against great teams and win easily against not-so-great teams. Don't get me wrong. I love Van Gundy's defensive strategy, but it's half court ball. And the Rockets, in nature, are a running team. They have the speed and talent to be as fast and as powerful as, let's say,the Mavericks (last season's Maverick's roster). But if you run like the Mavericks, you're not going to be able to get back and play half-court, Van-Gundy-Eastern-Conference-Style defense. Defense is extremely valuable, but scoring is something we should not be too willing to sacrifice. I hope JVG will eventually work out a compromise between his defensive strategy and playing a run-and-gun game. With our guards, and with the great passing of Yao and JJ and up and coming shooters like Boki and Pike and A Griffen, we could have a very lethal offense running game. So somewhere in the future, if Van Gundy wants to take the Rockets to the next level (where they will finally peak and take their place along the Championship contender elite), he's going to have to work out a way to combine those two aspects of defense and offense.
If the opponent is only scoring 19 points a game, I would have no problem with the Rockets scoring only 20 a game. Even if Moochie got more than 10 minutes off the bench.
Say what? That's a totally different thread...why bring it up here? But, since you did, what 4 teams(You stated not good enough for #4, so I'll assume that we would have taken #5) do you think are good enough to defeat that team? I'll give you the Lakers. That's it.
That's a common misconception of the Rockets. People see the Rockets with two talented playmaking guards and think that we're a running team, but we have been one of the worst teams in the league at scoring fast break points since Mobley and Francis have been together. This lack of a running game can be directly attributed to Francis and his inabiltity to push the ball and find the open man. Francis is in no way a lost cause because he certainly has the ability to run this team, and what JVG needs to do is run fast break drills until Francis is blue in the face and it becomes second nature to him.
Defensive game is fine with me. I like our current 2nd seed in the Western Conference with Minnesota, San Antonio and Phoenix at the bottom. As we start playoff today, we are playing Utah in the first round, Seattle or LA Clipper in the second round, LA Laker and Dallas in the Conference final. Haha.
I think our offense is fairly ok. Besides, even with the best offensive players, we're not going to score like the Mavs simply because Van Gundy's our coach. I just like the fact that we have the best points-differential among all teams. Who cares how many they score? Just as long as they score more than the other team.
The rockets are not going to make ESPN highlight reel Ally-Opps anymore nor consistently score 100 points. This is a defensive team now so get use to 80/90 point games.
Our defense so far are tested by the bottom dwellers in the NBA, except the Nets(without starting pf) and the Mavs(scored 97). We'll have to keep it up against the better teams. No doubt it's better than last season, and I think both defense and offense will improve as the season unfolds.
I won't get used to 80/90 points NEVER. Yesterday 74!!!! What's that??? Are you happy when you go home scoring 70 points???? Oh yeah... is really funny to see this game... but oh! we have played defense. Defense is very well and that's what makes you win games, but don't forget this is an offensive game!! We have the talent to make 100 points and we are scoring 74. I hope with Mo-T back this will be improved. Maybe now, without Taylor, Pike and the Griffins we don't have that talent I say. Ok.... I will wait to see what happens with Mo, and later with Mo, Pike and the Griffins. But don't you say that this deoesn't matter! 74 points in 48 minutes is UGLY. Here in spain, my team has scored 90 points in 40 minutes. And that's not a ****ty league, is the 2nd better basketball league of the world. 74 points would be 61 in 40 minutes. And with the Jazz, Nuggets, Heat or Magic... well, these teams have 1-3 good players. But there are no excuses on the Rockets.
Whocares if we cant make points as long as we keep the other team under 80-90 points we will win the game & thats wat matters most.
calm down jodete. There are quite a few reasons for our low scoring output. We have NO fast break. I honestly don't remember any post 1990 team having one(well...Drexler was good). You don't win in the playoffs with the fast break. We purposely slow the pace of the game down. That's the same thing we did with Olajuwan and Thorpe. You call it ugly basketball.....I call it winning. Please don't compare the basketball league in Spain with the NBA. All of your truly good players live in the U.S. and play for teams with U.S. addresses. I'm pretty sure the Rockets would average over 100 points in your league....
yes, i am happy if we win. i would rather clamp down on the other team and control the game rather than get in a free-for-all and score points. i don't care how many points we score. are you the kinda guy that watches baseball for the homeruns, do you like the dh rule? i bet you really hate soccer since they don't score much. i agree that some styles of play are more aesthetically pleasing than others, but we are playing good ball- and winning. you might as well get used to it because until you are named head coach things ain't gonna change.
"Are you happy when you go home scoring 70 points????" After playing four games in five days, one of which was a double overtime loss the day before, I don't mind coming home with a win regardless of the score.
thegary, I don't believe you have to play one way, at the expense of the other (defense or offense). While we may get suckered into playing ONLY defense, that will hurt us come play-off time. We need to play both offense and defense. Sure, we can pat ourselves on the back (our record) by playing just good D. But what does it matter when a team like the Spurs or Lakers can play both? Dallas is trying to just outscore the league. We'll see how well that works. Again, the last few games we've just been hamperd by BAD shooting. We're open, but we're not hitting. I'd don't remember the last time I saw Yao miss so many jump-hooks. Everyone, not just Yao. What the frick!?
I love it when people say "good defense" after a game like the one against the Sixers. Yeah, you don't need any offense to win...that's why the top nine scoring teams in the league all have winning records and only two teams in the bottom 10 in scoring have winning records. I'm not saying that you shouldn't play defense, but if you can't score it will catch up to you. The Rockets offense is medicore at best. If they don't improve, they're headed for lotteryville part 5, that's a guarantee...
