Shane did allow Tracy to concentrate on offense but hopefully he won't have to conserve his energy with the addition of Artest. There was no excuse for it while Yao was fit,but after he was gone only Tracy,Scola, Landry and to a certain extent Rafer could be relied upon to score regularly.
PG defense is important but overrated. A PG must be able to distribute and counterattack his opposite man so he gets overworked. This is what we are lacking. Rafer and the backup PG's will have to step up on a regular basis.
If anyone watched every single game the last couple of years since Battier got here would know that a few times he was called upon to hold the bigger PG(BD, D Will etc..). Which he is very capable. He doesn't have the quickness but gets in very good defensive position. So with that said I do think that a defensive lineup of TMac/Artest/Battier/Hayes/Deke can be done. You can also substitute Deke and bring in Scola if we are playing bigs(C, PF) that likes to shoot jumpers or 3's, ie...Utah. If we are playing Nash, Parker, CP3 etc... we should have in Rafer. He is not a great defensive player but he is very capable to give those guys a little trouble(not make it easy). I know alot of you would disagree, but I wouldn't mind seeing Brooks in to hold these guys. He has the quickness, plays full court D and can be a pest/bug-a-boo.
I think we have a solid shot at being #1 in defense again this year. Not because of the addition of Artest necessarily, but because the team is so flexible now. With the exception of Brooks and Yao, everyone can play more than 1 position. We can guard big line-ups, small line ups, fast and athletic line ups. Our only weakness is a team with two solid low post threats like Phoenix because we don't have a guy that can defend big 4-5s really well. But only a few teams fall into that category.
thats a really, really big exception. and a really small one too. (pun intended ) speaking frankly, the rockets' team d wont go from great to elite with Yao in the middle because he is not mobile or athletic. this is a problem mostly because of the below average d at the PG spot. Yao is a very good post defender because of his size and strength, and because he does not need to jump to challenge his man's shot. these same strengths become weaknesses if opposing guards get in the lane, because weakside defense and rim defense require athleticism he does not have. His relatively slow rotations and slow recovery time usually put him in position late, making it impossible for him to effectively challenge the shot. This is also how Yao picks up alot of his cheap fouls (much like Shaq). like i said in the earlier post, the combination of below average defensive play at the 1 plus a slow rotating center is why PnR teams can exploit the rockets d so easily. they force the rockets two worst defenders to defend the PnR (which is a very tough play to defend even with great defensive players at the 1/5). our two headed monster of shane/ron doesnt come into play at all if opposing teams run the play right. so i guess what i'm saying is that we need to keep in mind that the offense dictates the action, while the defense only dictates the reaction. if the offense is able to isolate our 1/5, we're cooked regardless of how flexible the rest of the team is. unless Yao gets twice as athletic or Rafer has a growth spurt, i dont see that changing anytime soon.
I would be shocked if we did'nt finish #1 or #2 this year in both PPG defense and FG% defense. Just too many monsters.
HowsMyDriving, isn't 2nd in the league elite? Or are you talking about all-time defenses? Personally, I think that the defense will be improved a bit because of more versatility, but the offense will improve significantly because we finally got that 3rd guy. We're not going to be the Phoenix Suns (of yesteryear), but we're not going to have those long ass droughts that have plagued us for years. No more will I have to hear Doug Collins wheeze out the following line: "Oh, this is what I was watching for. The Rockets have a tendency to go on long scoring droughts and let their opponent back in the game."
yeah the question was about all time great aka elite defense. thats what i was trying to address. while the rockets d will be very, very good, even great from a season to season perspective, it still has a couple of glaring weaknesses that I think prevent it from being considered elite. but this is all in theory at this point. lets allow the season to play out and then we can talk about it based on facts instead of prognostication
let's just say we're gonna break a lot of records. we could challenge the JVG's knicks of holding teams under 90 pts for consecutive games (50 or something like that). we'll be ridiculous defensively.
i want to disagree a bit with your statement that rafer is a below average defender. from watching him defend, he seems above average and sometimes even a very good defender.
rafer on his own is decent, but we are talking about the personnel at the position, so that would be rafer + brooks + barry in spot duty + an athletically limited francis. overall a below average defensive PG corps, no?
Defense of a PG is irrelevant? That's r****ded. Yea man on man D and help D is irrelevant. Stop hating on rafer and find another team to root for. And if you're going to hate, at least suggest attainable replacements.
