When we traded away Rafer, we didn't keep winning because Lowry was immediately a better replacement. Lowry put in decent minutes off the bench to be sure but he was no barnstormer. It was just a case of Brooks upping his level of play when given the opportunity combined with the fact that Rafer hadn't been helping us win nearly as much as we thought he was, aka his contributions were overrated and dampened by the fact that he was such a poor finisher at the basket and took such a high proportion of our team's shots. The same thing is happening now. We're not expecting Dragic and Thabeet to make up all the difference from losing Battier and Brooks. Far from it. Whatever they can give us is gravy. The point is that their contributions were overrated to begin with, and the emergence of guys that had been backups/on the bench given an increase in their minutes is going to be the key towards making up ground on and perhaps even surpassing the level of play they were able to give us. So far it's worked spectacularly. I love the idea of playing Lee or Bud at the three; now our 3-men are almost always smaller than their opponents, but they're also much quicker too. And Lee and Martin seem to have a great chemistry when they're on the court at the same time and neither has to do the lionshare of running the offense. Right now the team is clicking. We'll see how long it stays that way. And oh yeah, before I finish...Brooks sucks this year. Hard. 2-9 every game hard. Our offensive efficiency will easily move to top 5 in the league without his deadweight ass anchoring us down. Field goal% of 59 tonight. Hell yeah. Go take your weak sauce to Phoenix Brooks.
Morey has definitely made some mistakes and still gets praise in which he gladly accepted. But the only reason he's able to is because of Adelman. Our roster is the most talentless i the NBA, yet people say things like "in Morey we trust". It should "Adelman we trust" because he's the REAL reason we're anywhere near a 500. basketball team
Can we give credit to the guys on the court? Morey didn't make those trades for a playoff push. Instead of Morey pulling a fast one, maybe our players are just steeping up? Just a hunch.....
People weren't calling Brooks "our only closer" when he was here. In fact, people were pretty down on him. And you're cherry-picking one move from two years ago to make your point. The reality is that the team is at .500 and a longshot for the playoffs. They're playing well and it's exciting, but let's not get carried away.
I think that's why he's a good GM. Some people on the board say he values his players too much, but in general he's been pulling the trigger/trying to when he sees a good deal on the table.
Did anyone see the d they were running? I have never seen them play team D like that all year. They were playing a clog the paint d. Double team anyone that drives to the basket and double alrdridge as soon as he dribbles...they would let the trailblazers shoot and then all guys would box out. To prevent easy put backs... It looks exactly like the D the suns play...where you make them a jump shooting team and every time they miss you make them pay... Think dragic gave us some advice for our style of play?
I think its important to realize that alot of the issues with this team before the trades had to do with chemistry of the players. Someone wrote a thread mentioning Adleman's use of his "comfort foods." AB and Battier were definitely two of Adelman's main comfort foods that I think needed to be taken off of his plate. -First on Battier - Battier was the leader no doubt. He is vocal, he is a coach on the floor, and quarterbacks the defense. However Adelman's coaching philosophy with this team since Yao Ming went down the first time was "efficient offense leads to efficient defense." Meaning, If the offense is executed to perfection it puts you in the best position to get back in the half court to set up the defense and not give up easy transition points. Different than D'Antoni's 15 seconds or less offensive model that often has players taking bad shots and alot of threes that leads to alot of fast break points. Battier is an offensive liabilty as far as making back cuts and coming off screens for jump shots that Budinger can make. Adelman tried to make him effective in the offense but it just didnt work the way it does with Budinger. Also Lowry has great chemistry with Budinger and is great at putting him in better positions for easy buckets than Aaron Brooks was. Better efficiency on offense leading to better positioning on defense. -And on Aaron Brooks- I keep on thinking about Brad Lidge and Billy Wagner for the Astros when I think about Brooks. Its all mental and a change of scenery will do him wonders. He does have better chemistry with the starting group and that was a big issue with him coming off the bench. He needs to be shooting and scoring in rythym. He is not best suited for instant offense off of the bench like you would think. The move for a PG like Dragic, who is an upgrade defensively, will do wonders for the bench because he can be effective immediately slashing the defense and recreating a similar style of play that Lowry had when he was he PG off of the bench.
http://www.82games.com/1011/10HOU8.HTM#onoff And yet the Rockets were better offensively with Battier on the floor than they were without him-- part of it is he gets to play with Lowry/Martin/Scola rather than, say, Brooks, a lot more, but he also fits what that unit does with his passing and shooting. Battier was shooting a lot better than Budinger, particularly at the start of the season, when Budinger really struggled on both ends of the floor. Adelman made the correct decision to play Battier more minutes (30 or so) than Budinger (20 or so) based on their play.
Hard to say what factors are most attributable to the Rockets resurgence lately. But one thought stands out in my mind, although several others come into it also. That is, that the Rockets always seem to blast off when everyone has written them off. After the trade deadline, the most common evaluation was that the Rockets didnt get better in the now, and were orienting themselves for the future. The underdog mentality has always served them well it seems.
Battier is a great guy, but he's a planet that needs to revolve around a star....something we don't have. I love him to death, but we'll be okay without him in the short term. I've got fingers crossed that we'll get him back in the offseason - his locker room presence shouldn't be discounted. Dropping Brooks HAD to happen. When we were scraping around for any scoring last year, having a one-dimensional waterbug scorer was fine. But we simply couldn't drag him around with horrid sub-35% shooting (sub 29% from deep). Not when he couldn't bring anything else to the table except griping. The Rockets clearly weren't happy about the trades, so maybe part of it is getting a chip on their shoulder. But I think to a small degree they also got a bit of an enema. I think the units flow a little better now.
the rockets just played one of their best offensive and defensive games against a team that would normally give them fits with size and athleticism. and we still get the "look at the 82 game stats for battier" posts. unbelievable
Morey's plan of getting a star did not work true but its not because he wasnt trying. It takes two to make a trade its not like a video game where you can override deals or magically make a player like Josh Smith come to the Rockets for Shane Battier. Stars are rarely traded as it is and Denver made it clear that they werent going to trade within the western conference and if you think the Rockets could have had a better deal for Williams than what the Nets gave then thats just absurd. 4-5 years that seems a bit of a stretch to say when they could make it this year. This team may not be contending for a title in the next 4-5 years but to say that they wont make the playoffs I dont believe that at all considering even in their worst years recently I dont believe they even went through a stretch of 5 years of missing the playoffs. (I believe they went 4 during the steve francis era though they were close to making it Yao's rookie year) and I do believe Morey is a good enough GM to not allow this team to go that long without playing in the post season. so here is a simple 'money where your mouth is' bet for you Every Year the Rockets make it to the playoffs the next 5 years you donate to the tipjar 1 dollar for every victory that the Rockets had (So if the team goes 49-33 you donate 49 dollars to the tip jar) For every year in the next 5 years the Rockets do NOT make the playoffs I'll donate a dollar for every Loss that the Rockets had (so like last year when they went 42-40 and missed I would have put in 40 dollars) We can start from this season or next season up to you I still think they can make it to the playoffs this season. Sound simple enough for you to do?
We'll be fine if Budinger and Lee will keep their play up. Historically they have not had that many stretches with this kind of efficiency. I rather be overcautious with the praise than take the Carroll Dawson with Kelvin Cato and Moochie Norris attitude.
I think the reasons we are playing better are pretty simple. 1. More minutes for Chase and Courtney and they both have been better (more efficient?) players than what Battier has been for this team when you take into account their contributions on BOTH ends of the court. 2. End of games. Instead of trying to end games with Lowry, Brooks, Martin (which is a defensive matchup nightmare for the Rockets), we are ending with Lowry, Martin, Lee which has given us more size and better defenders playing. Combine the fact that Martin gets the ball more at the end of games now with not having Brooks, and Lee gets to spot up from 3 more often (shooting over 40% from 3) means we have been much much better on offense down the stretch of games. 3. For whatever reason, the defense has been much better. They are rotating better, dribble penetration is not as bad as it has been for most of the year, just more fundamentally sound. I can't really figure this one out. Either Shane was overrated defensively (which is quite possible), or Martin and Budinger are not quite as bad defensively as some of us have thought (or they are getting better). Not having Brooks on the court has also helped a lot in this regard. These are the main differences I see. Granted it has been a small sample size, but the Rockets are playing as well as they have all year, and against playoff caliber teams at that. I hope it continues.
