I know JVG is a good coach. His record is an example of that. But the one thing that makes him a good coach, keeps him from being a great coach. He is stubborn! He will live and die with a guy’s hustle instead of putting a better talent on the floor and getting the most out of them. I thought great coaches get the most out of their players. Only good coaches get players to get the most out of their system. It wasn’t as evident as it was last night. With NO big or low post threat, we still ran plays that posted up players in the lane and clogged it up with no room to penetrate. Then he wasted six quality minutes on a player that he knows he will take out, and puts his team in a whole every time. With Yao, I can understand playing Bowen, but without Yao, you need as many scores on the floor as possible. And this is where his stubbornness comes in. If you know you are down to your bench players for extended minutes. Why not keep things simple, where guys just have to react and play ball. Maybe push the ball and get in a fast break game, or some type of early offense. What I saw last night was a coach trying to adapt players to his system, instead of adapting a system to his players. You want to know why you didn’t see the “old T-Mac last night”, because the old T-Mac didn’t have someone clogging the lane, the old T-Mac wasn’t basically playing point guard for this team, and the old T-Mac had players that ran up and down the court with him to get easy baskets. He didn’t have guys walking the ball up the court, or athletes on the bench, because the coach didn’t want to adapt to the type of players he has left to play with. Graham, Swift, T-Mac, Head, Moochie, Howard, even Bowen, all these guys can run, but if you put them in a half-court game 90% of the time. Last night is what you are going to get. Ok.. I’m done! Pile On!!
excellent point. JVG is not changing his system to fit our rotation right now. i don't blame him though. maybe we can win an extra game or two but we won't have another 5 game winning steak just because JVG decides to let them run. this is a terrible season for the rockets. it's no ones fault. injuries are the worst part of sports but you have to deal with them. losing games right now doesn't even bother me because what can i actually expect with the rotation we have out there? i expect to lose these games. yes i hate that the season has turned to sh*t. yes i hate that we wasted another year of tmac and yao, but there is no one to blame. we just have to wait it out. if we miss the playoffs because of it, then so be it. we will get a good pick, healthy players, and make a huge run next year.
It's easier said than done. We just simply have no talent to do anything at this point to win in the NBA. Other than T-Mac, we have a bunch of CBA-level players out there.
it has been very frustrating watching the rockets this year esp with such high hopes and expectations. it is difficult watching all these players go down one by one. along with the lack of chem, due to all the injuries, we just dont look like the rockets team that finished off the season last yr (before our horrible game 7). i hope that these guys would hurry and get better and while that is happening, the guys out there can just hold the fort. we still have time...but honestly time is starting to run out when we look at how long these guys are going to be out.
If it was that easy to run teams would do it all the time. It's not that simple. You don't run just because you want to. Professional teams get back on defense, they don't let you run because you feel like running. but to run more we need a point guard who can push the ball which we don't have right now. Mcgrady has the ball in his hands because we don't have anyone else healthy who can break down a defense. Mcgrady is our only playmaker right now. We need a guard, whether its from the inactive list or through trade, who can break down defenses and get Mcgrady better looks. Sura was perfect last year in that role. He sucked defenses in with his drives to the basket and created a lot of shots for teammates and took a lot of pressure off TMac. Look I think all of this is solved if we can get a few of our guards back healthy. You can fantasize all you want and see Bowen and Graham and Moochie and Swift fastbreaking in your dreams but in reality Bowen is Bowen, Graham is Graham, Moochie is Moochie, and Swift is Swift. They are who they are they're not superheroes who can fastbreak and score at will. None of them are above average basketball talents. They're just going to have to defend their asses off and have a lot of luck on their side. It sure is cool to use my imagination and see them running and dunking like the showtime lakers though.
It's much easier to run when you take more risks on defense and force more turnovers. The Rockets are second to last in the league in forcing turnovers. Van Gundy has always preferred a more conservative defense that stresses being in the right position rather than forcing turnovers. As long as he prefers this conservative approach on defense, the Rockets will not be able to run even if they wanted to.
I do understand the difference in talent, but do also understand getting the most out of your players and making things simple, to get the most out of the players you have. None of the guys left really didn’t play a huge role in last year, so not only are they learning how to play through fatigue in getting more minutes, they are also still on a learning curve in understanding JVG playbook. Look all I’m saying is instead of trying to run all of you sets, pick 3 or 4 that you run good, and stick with that. All these guys have played basketball before, I’m sure they understand basic sets. I’m not expecting “Showtime”, but what I saw last night, in person, was all on JVG. Period.
I'm not blaming JVG. With the current active players, not much can be done whether you're Pill Jackson or Brown or Pope. You can't expect Tmac + 4 college players(our 2nd best player right now is Head, a rookie) to win consistently in NBA. That's the same thing when Tmac was out. We should be glad we have Tmac and Yao, these defeats really showed they are true stars.
As a leader, he has to get everyone to believe in him and his system. You can't abandon your system in times of chaos. Either you change the system for good, or you stay the course. I'm not arguing that his system is championship-caliber, I'm speaking in general terms. If this is what he has for the long-haul (past this season, onto the next) then yes, please, change the system. Changing the system now would do more harm than good.
Uhm......I disagree on all counts! Its one game with a bunch of scrubs....LOL #1 When T-Mac was with Orlando and getting scoring titles he did not have quality players around him and that is why he was required to score so much. #2 When T-Mac was with Orlando and getting scoring titles he also did not have to deal with zone defenses as they were not allowed until two years ago. #3 Who is JVG going to play? Here is the Rockets current roster and their status: Rafer Alston G - Injured leg Derek Anderson G - Injured leg 20 Jon Barry G - Injured calf 35 Lonny Baxter - played last night 40 Ryan Bowen F - played last night 9 Stephen Graham G - played last night (new to roster) 2 Luther Head G - played last night (rookie playing his tail off) 5 Juwan Howard F - played last night 1 Tracy McGrady F - played last night 55 Dikembe Mutombo C - Injured finger 25 Moochie Norris G - played last nigth 3 Bob Sura G - Injured knee 4 Stromile Swift F - played last night 7 David Wesley G - played last night 11 Yao Ming C - Injured big toe So we have (6) injured players; (3) of which are starters and the other (3) are vital bench players. Of the remaining players available only T-Mac, Moochie and Luther Head are capable of driving the lane to the basket. Luther is a rookie and Moochie is .....well Moochie so that really just leaves T-Mac. And if you were watching the same game I was last night he had double digit assists and should have had above 20 if our guys could hit a jump shot. He was also double teamed on EVERY play that he had the ball. Now having said all that it was an ugly game...lol and if Yao is not coming back to two months we will have to incorporate some new plays to run cuz that aint going to work against the better teams in the league. But to say it is entirely JVG's fault is a bit to easy.
Geeze, who is going to run the point if you want to play Phoenix style? You don't think coaches in Toronto, Atlanta etc. want to do that as well with all these young guns? They don't have the point guards to run that. Only the Nets and the Suns can do that efficiently with Kidd and Nash. By the way, T-mac does not want to be the T-mac on the Magic to jack up shots. Rox should just let T-mac rest, tank the season, trade away the expring contract and try to get a better pick. The lesson learned this season is that our role players are too fragile. T-mac and Yao are not ready to contend yet.
being able to run and having a willingness to run is completely different. i'd argue that even t-mac is a half-court player before a full on fast break player, even though he can play that way. van gundy is always pushing his team to get going and push the ball to get easy baskets. i think it's assinine to blame this on van gundy. the players we're missing could probably beat the team we have out on the court right now.
We just won 7 of our last 9 games, 5 of them being on the road. We lose Yao, Deke, DA on top of Sura, Alston, and JB, and it's all JVG's fault? The truth is that we are the most depleted team in the league right now and it shows. Guys like Mooch, Baxter, Graham all played significant minutes lastnight and they have played little to none this entire season. I'm not sure what some of you guys are looking for. Ya'll want us to run but who do we have to run along w/ TMac? The answer is no one.
One thing I was shocked at was the fact that Van Gundy didn't use pressure this game. In my humble opinion, we should have pressed from endline to endline and turned the game into a helter skelter up and down the court game. Take a bunch of chances, yes, and give up some easy buckets, but in return free up our guys that are still somewhat healthy to get some easy baskets and get the pressure off McGrady so he can get heated up in transition. The only thing I can figure out is JVG must have felt he didn't have enough bodies to run up and down. But they expend so much energy on defense anyways I don't see the difference in playing an up and down game. TMac, Graham, Bowen, Head, Moochie, Stromile and even DWes are all runners that can move up and down the floor easily. The only plodders we got playing are Baxter and Howard.
Look, I’m going to say this for the last time. “I don’t expect this team to be the Suns”, but I don’t expect this team to walk the ball up the court on every possestion either. Take the ball out, and get to the other end of the court at least on a uptempo jog, damn is that much to ask. Even when we had most of our players, and T-Mac was out. You hardly ever see the Rockets hurrying the ball past half court. I’m not saying this is going to solve everything, because we are without most of our players. But have you noticed how many teams press and trap us full court. When I played ball you did this to teams that you knew were not going to push the ball up the court, because if you did, most likely you would get burned. But teams that walk the ball up the court and don’t hurry, you pressure them, because they are not use to playing at an uptempo game. Look at them when they play, as long as Wesley is bring the ball up the court instead of Head, who usually has to start the game on the bench, the ball is damn near walked up the court. But if you allow slow Wesley to go down the court and let Head be your primary ball handler you will have a drive, shoot, kick threat along with T-Mac. I know most of you are saying, “he is only a rookie”, but ask yourself this is Wesley a better ball handler than Head? Wesley is a catch and shoot player. Let him do what he does best and get the ball out of his hands. Let Head and T-Mac drive, shoot, and kick
