In order for the Rockets to have any chance of winning this series, I believe they will need to play Deke and Hayes a LOT less minutes. Sure they are defensive stalwarts, but they are so deficient on offense that it allows Utah to gang up on the other players on the floor and shut our offense down. The Rockets were most successful during the streak when Deke started and Landry was the primary backup where Hayes only got situational minutes. They need to go back to that....because playing defense is not enough....you have to be able to score the ball too..... I hope Adelman realizes that we need more offense on the floor.....to win. DD
Agreed completely. When Hayes went to the bench, we started winning. Unfortunately, we had a healthy Landry then too. Without a healthy Landry, we have to play Deke and Hayes. Could you imagine a game of one on one between Hayes and Deke? A game to 11 would take 2 hours to finish!
Landry looks healthy to me, he just hasn't been playing as much..... Time to throw him to the wolves........get those rookies some time..... Adelman should go to them and say...."your time is now"...... This team is not a real threat this year, so you need to use this time to teach your young guys what it is going to take. Remember a 19 year old Kobe shooting airballs against the Jazz? He learned well........time for our young guys to go to playoff school too. DD
Agree, I think for this team to have any chance in this series we need to see a heavy dose of Carl Landry. Let him fight through the defensive screw ups. He's still the rockets best finisher and probably best athlete.
Hayes should never be more than a situational player. Deke actuall played ok and when he went out, the game changed. Landry is ok, but he's predicated on people getting him looks. I like ur idea, why didn't we keep Gay?
i think you are right but i'm going to add to it if you don't mind. I think the rockets can get away with having defense only players, but only if they run. if the rockets are going to continually make it a half court game then they need more offense in the game. if they are going to play chuck/shane/deke together then they have to get easy buckets before the jazz can set up their defense.
Definately Hayes & Deke shouldn't be on the court together. Hayes can come in after Deke or Scola fouls out. The Jazz are able to play 1 on 1 defense on us without Yao and we need all the firepower we can get on the court.
It seems like carl landry is still injured or that he is schedule for a off season surgery or something as he is not himself after incident. What I want to think is that Landry is completely healed, but he is holding out for his contract extension. He has demonstrated enough to the rockets and to the NBA that he is worth alot of money. His agnet may advise him to hold off on the explosiveness to ransome a bigger better contract extension.
I agree, the defense is not what we are missing / what we were missing in game 1. It is offense, like like last year we can't score enough points but I'm sure it will change cause the offense is giving it to us. But I agree, we need to give less minutes for Hayes, Deke because they are just too weak offensivly and what we need it offensive power, especially inside. But now the problem might be rebouding. You saw what happend in game one, Utah was taking every rebound with Deke on the bench.
ya... the jazz are one of the top scoring teams in the league. no matter the defense the rockets put out there, houston will have a hard time outscoring this jazz team. no sense on making it harder on themselves by playing deke and hayes.
I can't believe we agree on this! I also like your idea of using Brooks to pressure Williams full court. Williams is the key to winning the series. We must shake that guy up.
The title of this thread should be "Too many Not Good Enough players". With us missing Yao, the Jazz are better, younger, faster, stronger, etc and there isn't much we can do about it. When they play well, the Jazz will beat us.
The Jazz are not all that great as far as athletes go.....they are good, but they are not particularly long.... Boozer is not that tall for a PF, Okur plays shorter than he is...and D Will is short too.. They are more aggressive...and play tougher.....for sure. DD
At this point I would want the young guys and guys that are going to be here next year getting a lot of playing time. It will take a minor miracle to win this series (I hope to God I am wrong), but Landry, Brooks, Novak, etc need to get more minutes.
If Mutombo is playing well I want him out there, but I agree about Hayes. As much as I respect Hayes for carving out a place in the NBA, you're in a whole lot of trouble if you're stuck playing him significant minutes in the playoffs.
You keep saying this, but it's not true. Don't you mean when Yao was playing and Deke and Hayes were not? I'd agree with that. Once Yao went down, Hayes started get rotational minutes again. The four games between Yao going down and the Dallas game where Landry got hurt, there were 2 games where Landry got more minutes than Hayes and 2 games where Hayes got more minutes. Then there were 5 wins after than when Landry didn't even play. Once Yao went down, Hayes returned to the rotation as the primary backup center, getting his usual minutes. you are confusing the time when Hayes lost nearly all his minutes, but that was when Yao was playing. Landry was the primary backup PF. I don't recall Landry ever playing C. Scola would do that, but primarily it was Deke and Hayes.
Compared to us (which is the only thing that matters), the Jazz are more athletic, better, longer, more skilled and tougher.
Hmmmm....let's look at this honestly in a position by position comparison. PG 6 foot 3 and 208 pounds Bobby Jackson 6 feet 1 and 185 Edge in height to Jazz, athleticism is about equal, Bjax is more explosive than Williams even at his advanced age. SG Ronnie Brewer 6' 7" and 223 pounds Tmac 6' 8" 223 pounds TMac is taller and a better athlete and basketball player than Brewer, though Brewer is quicker. SF Andre Kirlendo 6' 9" 223 pounds Shane Battier 6' 8" 223 pounds Kirlenko is certainly longer and the better Athlete, but Battier makes up for it with hustle and smarts. PF Carlos Boozer 6' 9" 266 pounds Luis Passion Assassin Scola 6' 9" 230 pounds Boozer is the better athlete and is bigger, but Scola is not too far behind as an overall player C Mehmet Okur 6' 11" 263 pounds Deke Mutombo 7' 2" 261 pounds So they are a bit better athletes overall but not all that long in general....in fact other than Kirlenko, they are a relatively short team. DD
Yep. Deron Williams - very quick, very strong, very athletic Andrei Kirilenko - quick, athletic, very long, very versatile Mehmet Okur - quick enough to put the ball on the floor against our bigs, has great body control for his size, and can of course hit the 3 Ronnie Brewer - good length, good speed and quickness, and maybe the most purely athletic player in the series Paul Millsap - strength in spades, mobile and athletic Carlos Boozer - agile and STRONG The only people I would highlight on the Rockets are Aaron Brooks for his quickness, and Carl Landry (when healthy) for his athleticism and strength. Maybe Tracy or Dikembe for their length only. That's all.
