I agree that without Tracy this season we should be able to defeat teams but I don't know about on a consistent level. Face it with T-mac out we lean on Artest more and he is far from consistent. The man struggles every time he has to create for himself. I did like how we posted him up more in the 1st half but in the 2nd half we couldn't even get him the ball when he posted up and when he did he wasn't effective. I'm not going to argue with you about us needing T-mac or not because the play on the court proves we need T-mac out there.
its justified...coz we're not beating teams we're supposed to beat...we're in a period of adjustment..
That makes 3 games lost this year in the last minute....Portland, San Antonio and now Indiana. Inexcusable. DD
we're talking about winning.. regularly.. against teams like the Pacers.. and Oklahoma city.. you know.. the game we lost without Rafer..? let's focus on this first.. before we start talking about the playoffs.. surely you see the futility of dealing with the possibilities of the future.. when you can't address the issues of the present..? you run out Wafer off the bench.. distribute PG duties between Tracy and Barry.. you know what Tracy would do.. when he sees Yao unable to gain position against Troy.. Artest's persistent struggles to actually look like he knows what he's doing on the drive..? that's right.. he'd jack up a shot 20ft out.. not exactly what consitutes "making a play" is it..? we do.. we just for some inexplicable reason.. use them with any semblance of stability.. Scola, Tracy, Artest are all more than capable low post threats.. who are interchangeable.. depending on which one you stick in the post.. and you lose nothing in the substitutions.. as you have shooters like Barry, Brooks, Wafer, Battier... and you have backdoor cutters like Hayes and Landry.. Alston, Tracy's absence or presence.. is going to have zero effect.. on your shooters percentages.. which is what killed us in this game.. 34% shooting.. 25% from three..
Im giving the team a pass till January to get their act together before I start second guessing rotations and calling for trades. I really think Chuck could have helped on Granger and Murphy, But coach thought other wise so Im going to respect that. I also think Aaron should have been in the game at crunch time he has had a nack for hitting big shots or finding others. Rafer's inability to he point blank layups and his bad decision making is pissing me off to know end right now. But Like I said I want to give the team till January to develop a solid rotation and find out where we stand with tmac.
not against the Pacers.. not against OKC.. and not against the majority of the teams we're going to face at this upcoming schedule.. if you actually believe otherwise... then you are simply using irrational justification..
We should of beat the Pacers tonight based off the simple fact that we had a 10 pt. lead with 5 minutes left. I blame a lot of this loss on coaching, but I'm not as confident in this team without T-mac or Yao as you are.
The two things that we were "needing" down the stretch of this game was a wing player who could expose their small lineup in the post and a guy who could make plays off the dribble. Ron Artest has poor handles and lacks the court vision to hit Yao off the dribble. He also failed at backing down Jack to get closer to the rim, he decided to face up and drive on the catch. Tracy Mcgrady is one of our best playmakers so i think he would have done a better job of getting Yao the ball. He also seems to be a better post scorer than Ron. I think he would have helped us win this game and if the problems of this game persist him playing is a necessity imo.
nothing could've been done with the mess the players were putting out there in the 4th.. nothing.. their shots just weren't falling.. as a result.. Alston was behaving the exact same way as he has been the past few games.. with Tracy in the line-up.. acting like a T-mac(when he iso'ed) mini me.. who can't finish he drives.. or hesistates on his shot.. stammering the team as what to expect or do.. Yao was getting fronted by Troy as soon as he hit the low block.. taken out and kept out.. instantaneously.. if we had Tracy.. he would've been left to jack it up as he saw fit.. because for the past several games.. the Tracy that's been out on the court.. the Tracy.. Tracy himself doesn't want to see himself playing like for the rest of the season.. prompting his sit out.. has been unable to drive it in beyond 2ft from the top of the key.. to feign a threat.. which has left him with two options.. pass it out to the open shooter.. or to rotate around the perimeter for the repost into Yao.. or jack it up.. guess what..? no one was hitting there shots in this game.. and I've already explained Yao.. Tracy wouldn't have done anything to've helped that situation beyond physically removing Troy off of Yao..
But the law of averages says that this is going to happen. Three things are at work here: 1. We're going to have losses like this. Losses where our team plays uncharacteristically and we lose a game we should win. Should we hate on the Rockets because of this? IMO no, because by definition its an uncharacteristic loss, which means it isn't the norm. It would be like getting mad that an saying Earth sucks because Hurricanes happen. Yea, they happen, but its not the norm. 2. People take games like this and like to extrapolate that we will suck in the playoffs because of w/e reason. Rockets fans should know more than anything that regular season means ****. Its November guys. 3. We have the power to make it better. Its not like we are in a situation where we are beyond our means. Take the Mavs for example, as good as they think they can be, their lack of a post presence will kill them in the playoffs and there is nothing we can do about it. But at least we have the tools to succeed, good 2 way players, specialists, outside threats, inside threats, guys that can share the ball. Its all a matter of figuring out how to do it. Finally, this time last season we were a below .500 team and didn't get over .500 until January, and ended the season 2 games away from winning the west, and a Yao away from perhaps the WCF. Cmon guys, isn't it a little too early to be calling the season over?
T-mac may have not been scoring lately but he always gets Scola and Landry easy shots. Most of their points today came from mid range jumper,offensive rebounds, or just Scola posting up. Speaking of Scola I thought we should of posted him up more in the 4th qt. We really stopped going to him down low as the game progressed.
I started this thread to ridicule the haters (you know who you are) but due to its timing and the manner of our loss it's become one of many parallel post-game threads. Inevitable, I suppose.. Look, all I want to say is: Vent your frustrations after losses, be pessimistic, be nitpicky, criticise and argue all you want.. but at the end of the day you are a Rockets supporter, are you not? The obsessive prejudice and outright malice exhibited by some posters here as a running theme is extremely distasteful
Irrational. In a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately sports town, it would almost seem justified. But on a game-to-game basis? 90% of the posts on here right after any given game, win or lose, are just plain overboard, knee jerk, shortsighted nonsense - this ain't the BCS, it's an 82 game season. Irrational.
irrational. i'm sorry we lost to an "weak team". I guess when the media suggest our 22 win streak was due to an easy schedule they were right. we suck. we should never lose to a "weaker team". this is the NBA after all. rox are pathetic. we should really think about rebuilding our team. god the rockets suck.
Well, i think alot of posters here hate the rockets irrationally, but thats simply because people choose to post in the heat of the moment. Once you clear your head a little and take a deep breath, i'm sure many of you regret plaguing 'Yao ming is worthless trash' and 'Mclady is a lil b****' threads all over these forums.
this is our problem. I chuckled when I read Tmac wasnt playing because we had an easy team. Outside of OKC Thunder, there are no gimme teams in the NBA
We are certaintly not playing a high enough level of Basketball to content for a Championship. However the problems with the team can only be fixed with time. And the season is long enough where we shouldn't be reacting as if there is not enough time to get better. Look at today's game. T-Mac got some rest, Battier had his first game back, but we lost to the Pacers by a point after a 3 game road trip where we were 3 and 0. I would be interested to see where the Spurs were in the Standings at this point of each season they won there Championships.
