I don't think is fare although is natural to look for a scapegoat to drop the blame for the woes of the team. Is better to find the problems as a team, and to give and opinion on how we think it can be fix, but we know is easier to blame someone as the only reason of the problems. ---------------- Problems ----------------------------------------------------- The little thing are the thing getting us hurt, not one player. Lack of 3 point were every Rockets have the blame. The lack of defense as the team is to blame for all the Rockets. Problems on the perimeter are one of the Big issues but the lack of size and shot blocker on the middle other that Yao is to blame too. Turn over on lazy passes, giving back easy point and momentum back. Finishing the game is maybe the biggest problem, because I don't know if we have the player(s) to do so. ------------------- My remedies --------------------------------------- Most of this can be fixed. Defense is a matter of full team commitment and Coach have to make this the first priority. We need player getting back on defense, hustling, closing on shooter, battling for rebounds, etc. doing the little things. This is all about effort don't require a great level of skills. You maybe have a bad shooting game but, there is no reason not to play hard on D. And a short rotation with a constant rotation cycle will help. This 10, 11 deep and changing the rotation every game don't help. Good thing RA play Hill, he can help inside. The 3 pointers will come Cbud, Battier, AB ect. are good 3 point shooter it will come. Perimeter problems. We are getting too relax defending the perimeter and maybe focus to hard on trying to stop the superstar and helping on their superstar to much, that we living wide open scrubs that are capable of making wide open shoots or layups. Superstar will get their number just don't let the Smith, Shannon Brown, Affalos of the world to beat you. Play some zone, trap, stay in front and contest the shoots, just mixed it up. Don't overplay, If we get beat by superstars ok, but not by scrubs. Turnover. This will come down as we play more together and with a smaller rotations, but there is no reason for this careless turnovers. Late game giveaways problems. Midway the 3 quarter seen to be the movement where we give the game back. Starting every 4th quarter from behind after been up for most of the game is not a recipe for wining. A finisher is something that we haven found and I see no solution so far. KM so have make a few key 3 pointer and Scola have been the best we got but not even close to someone who can create for himself or for others. Yes this was long but maybe in this thread we can find problems and solution as a whole instead of blaming everything on one player.
At the moment all we can do is Lose. Every game during Clutch Time someone goes Hot on us. EVERY SINGLE GAME.
Yes we can't make stops. The problem I can't find a group of player to trust to be clutch or a go to guy to create for himself or other. Kobe, Billups, CP3 they know what to do. We don't know who is that guy. Kmart don't look as he want to be that guy. Scola maybe want but he won't get the ball. Usually teams have a two player game at the end of the game or a o to guy to close it out. We need a AB-Scola, Kmart-Scola, I don't know. Who is it?
I doubt AB ever learnt a word called "teamwork" Too many times I watched him playing his 20 sec solo.
a nice heat-check is a nice, hard personal foul. i don't give a s*** if the player was shooting 3s. if he's hot, foul the mofo, and let him earn it on the line. bet he won't be hot the next few shots.
Stop blaming ONE person Finding scapegoats don't help the team win. Everybody's in on these losses, everybody on the team has to assume responsibility. Right now we do have an identity problem, we do have trouble closing out games, but first and foremost, it's an attitude problem... Starting Budinger over Battier won't solve our problems. Calling off our veteran leaders as "scrubs" won't solve our problems. Benching Brooks and starting Lowry (who's still held back by back issues) won't give us an automatic win. Having Yao come off the bench will have an impact on the game, but we need him to gel with the starters too (with the amount of dumb mistakes we're making right now on a nightly basis, it's still not going to win a game for us). Trades are long shots, and new players would need even more time to adjust. Our back court may be fragile defensively, but adhering to the game plan, making smart decisions, rotating, trusting teammates, and increasing on court activity and intensity will help more than any adjustment in personnel. Firing our coach sure AS HELL wouldn't be an ideal solution. Playing all of our young players 30+ minutes might help them develop, but sure isn't going to win us many more games. Many fans on this board attribute the reason of our losses to ONE player. This is completely untrue - we don't have one player who exerts so much influence on the game to the extent that he's able to wreck us single-handedly. It's a group effort, and a positive attitude will help fans and players alike more than anything else. Have faith in this team, trust this team, like we always have before, and quit simplifying the problem, when the simplification of the problem is the biggest problem itself. Finger pointing causes trouble, it doesn't solve it. The Mavs started 0-4 and went on to win 67 games. Our own Rockets loss 6 disheartening losses in a row before going on to win 22 straight. We all know the potential of this team currently assembled to succeed, and this is why, perhaps, we're so disappointed by its performance. However, there's reason to believe that the coaching staff and all of the players are hungry for a win, are frustrated at these losses, and are doing all they can to replace that zero in the win column. And I think we should believe in them.
Agreed. It's a team game. If it was one player, the coach would see that and bench him. Some people have a simplistic view of the game, though. Rep for you.
Nicely spoken, basically there are a lot of problems that we have been talking about. 1. Chemistry 2. Identity 3. Rotations 4. Scheme 5. Intensity of players It is not a simple one guy fix, though lots of folks on here seem to want to blame one guy.... Nice post. DD
Ooh, didn't realize there was an existing thread out there... Nice merge. I think the problems that we have right now are partially due to: Miller are Lowry are still significantly hampered by injuries (Chase too, albeit to a lesser extent). Lack of practice time, and room to gel. Instability of the rotation, esp. with Yao's situation. The attitude of a couple players (I would argue that's more of a temporary dissatisfaction rather than anything else - if you were Aaron, wouldn't you be pissed that you're not getting an extension?) Basically, with Yao's situation, our players have to learn two different game plans instead of just one. Combined with our new additions, the sheer number of capable players that we have, and lack of practice time, I don't think it's unreasonable that they would need longer to mesh. When on-court chemistry was still under development, I think we all expected the intensity and mental focus of last season to carry over and notch us a couple of rough wins. That didn't happen. This is where we desperately need to step up, but once the guys get it going, I think we'll be quite successful.
the team right now lacks a fundmental defense concept, team help defense, making opponents a jump shooting team, and don't give an easy shot to opponents. those blocks and steals are exciting things to watch. they are good for defense but not belonged to fundamental defense. they are like ice cream on the cake.
good non-knee jerk post i think they jst need time 2 gel, some1 noted in anothr thread that guys are overcompensatin on D and winding up out of position, mentally every1 KNOWS they gotta play defence but actually playing TEAM defence takes time and trust in your teamates, u hav 2 know where every1 is gonna b at all times etc
BTW - As a fan, I have personally seen enough of the "lose as a team" concept, I hereby request much more of the "Win as a team" result. That is all ! DD
While I agree that the team is not as bad as their record, its not a great feat to put up a lot of points/rebounds/assists if you're playing at the pace we are.
