I've been calling out for a winning streak of greater than 5 games since Dream was still shaking in Houston. We're close now, but I don't feel like we really are. We haven't really put any teams away. Any lead we take into the 4th quarter we blow with some nasty streak where we can't put the ball in the hole. Basically, it looks to me as the Rockets are content with not losing instead of winning. Anyone else get that feeling? I don't blame the offensive design, I blame 4th quarter execution. Do we need another series like the old Phoenix series when we turned from choke to clutch? What can we do to start blowing out teams and putting them away early ... and once we have them down, keep them down?
Here's my observation: In the 4th quarter, our Rockets put so much effort into defense that their offense struggles. After a while, when defense becomes a way of life rather than a duty, this will get better. Ming, Mobley, Francis, Posey, Griffin. We don't have any shortage of scorers of any kind from anywhere. Our bench features MoT and Moochie who can score too. I'd rather have this rather than the usual not being able to make a defensive stops.
It's called winning with defense, and slowly building offensive consistency. I generally expect a 4th Q lull with the Rockets this year, but if you notice, the other team is having one, too. btw: are the Spurs blowing out teams and going without 4th Q lulls...I don't know, but I'm curious to know. GO DEFENSE!!! GO ROCKETS!!!
I don't know. I still call it not winning. It's not just our shooting percentage that seems to take a nose dive in the 4th. I didn't crunch any statistics, but it seems our turnovers increase (or perhaps that's just my observation because everything seems so much more important when it's crunch time and the game's on the line). Very rarely have I felt that momentum was with us towards the end of the games. You're right, our defense is winning the games for us, but I really feel we're winning in spite of our execution rather than we're winning because of our solid defense.
I've said this since the beginning of the season. The rockets are focused on defense this season. Mobley's quote before the first regular season home game in the tunnel. "Lets play D, the offense will take care of itself" or something like that. If you look at all our good wins, we played excellent defense. In all our crappy losses, we played terrible defense. We shot lights out against the Jazz and we still lost because our defense sucked that game. Offense puts fans in the seats and on this board, defense wins championships.
The last 3 games, the Rockets have beaten 3 playoff level teams. The key will be whether or not they can keep this up on a consistent basis for the rest of the season. The last 3 games, Francis's Ast to TO ratio, the team's Ast to TO ratio and the FG% against have improved DRAMATICALLY. Those are three areas I tend to watch very closely for this team as they indicate a lot about what is going on. I will be interested to see if they can keep this up or if they lull back into the ways of old. Francis Ast to TO ratio: Steve Francis has averaged 9.33 APG over the last 3 contests in relation to his 4 TO per game; that translates into a 2.33 to 1 Ast to TO ratio. This is a HUGE improvement over his 1.5 to 1 he had for the season before this stretch. I would like to see him get to the 2.5 to 1 range and consistently remain there. If he can do this and upgrade his defense some, Francis would become the best all around guard in the league imo. The fact that he is shooting 46% from 3 pt range to along with 44% from the field is amazing. Team wide Ast to TO ratio: The team has averaged 22 APG and 13 TO per game over the last 3 games. This is the type of numbers this team needs in these categories to win consistently imo. That translates into a 1.69 Ast to TO ratio which is right near the top 5 in the league and a HUGE improvement over the 1.25 they average for the season which is bottom 5. This improvement has a lot to do with Francis's improvement the last 3 games imo. Its important for Steve to set the tone that the team will pass the ball and get everyone involved. Steve's improvement in this area is reflected by the team's improvement. FG% against: This area is probably the largest improvement of all. The Rockets have averaged 40% FG against the last 3 games which is unreal. They have moved into the top 3 in the league in this category, and defense has become their calling card. The reasons for this imo have been Yao's excellent shotblocking, James Posey's move into the SL and surprisingly Cuttino's solid play on the defensive end. James Posey's MPG have increased a LOT since Rice's injury, and the effect he has on the defense as a whole is amazing. James is a VERY good team defender and does a good job of moving around the floor and helping out. In addition, Posey is a very good man defender. Cuttino's SPG have increased a lot this month and that has helped as well. These are the areas I have seen the improvement from the Rockets the last few games. They have shown signs of brilliance in the past but then lulled back into bad habits. Going into every game, I hope for them to hit targets of a 2.5 Ast to TO ratio for Francis, a team wide Ast to TO ratio of 1.6 to 1.7 and FG% against under 43%. If they can meet these targets consistently, they should continue to win. Hopefully, they wont lull back into the old bad habits.
There was always this bad loss to sub .500 team to stop our 2 or 3 game winning streak, otherwsie Rox could already register a 7 win streak this season. As much as I like Rox to beat tough teams like LA, Kings, Spurs, and pacers, the Rox gotta win the easy ones, and there is no excuse for that, it is costly we lose to such teams. The Jazz team can always clutch against bad teams, this is why they are still in the play off picture.
Excellent post, but I'm not gonna waste server space by copying it. I agree with you on the team defense, particularly shooting percentage against us. People talk about the defensive prowess Posey has brought with him to the team, but you touched on what I've noticed as well -- Mobley's defense has become very strong. Mobley (& Rice) did a good job containing Tracy McGrady earlier this season, and Mobley played VERY solid defense against Kobe Bryant last Friday. Still, come the 4th quarter, I simply don't feel any confidence in this team to close it out and just ride the victory train. Every game seems like it has to come down to the last possession. Say what you will about that building character or whatever, it's gonna equate to a long season if every game comes down to the wire. And that means guys are gonna slow down at the end of the season. I'm not knocking the way we've played these last few games, though I think we let Denver hang in there for way too long. Just like feishen said, we need to really put the mediocre teams away, and save our tough battles for the playoff-calibre teams. That's the way I see it anyway.
The hardest thing for a developing team to learn is to excute your offense down the stretch. We've seen the growing pains this year. That's why even though we win, it seems more like "surviving" then winning. Example, Sacramento. They are awesome and have been for 2 years. But they have not executed down the stretch against the Lakers for 2 years, and have paid for it dearly. That's why great teams have dominant players that have go to moves/plays that are easy to execute . . . Shaq in the low block, Kobe in iso, Jordan in iso, dream in the low block. The contenders are those teams that have put together everything else (like playing consistent defense), and are working on execution down the stretch. We're not consistent defensively yet, and we're still growing in execution. However, consider this . . . we're on pace to win 48-49 games. I don't know whether our record will reflect it, but I think our performance will improve in the 2nd half.
4th quarter. Stevie and Cat have been on the court, playing full out, for most of the 1st 36 mins. Rudy, I believe, needs to reduce their mins earlier in game without killing the flow. Therein is the Moochie thing. When he used to do his thing well enough to get his contract the minutes could be spaced better. Hawk, for one, would be a great antidote to the '1's and '2's who get hot. Let Hawk cool the hot shooter for a few minutes, bring back Stevie or Cat and win. JPo and Cat could initiate 'O' with Stevie recharging. Also, a few minutes of Cato on a Malone or other '4' when they get hot would be a nice bucket of cold water on the opponent and more legs left in the 4th for the Rox.
In addition to what has already been mentioned, how about free throw shooting? We could easily tack on another 2-3 games in the W column if our guys could hit their 'throws throughout the game and in crunch time.
Right...I think our best quarter when we are trailing at halftime is the 3rd quarter. We are good somehow. Maybe it's only against Atlanta. Yeah...we aren't blowing teams away but we are winning. I would like the Rockets to take every single free throw seriously and try to make each one. Keep up the good defense!
I agree. Like that one game against the Clippers where Moochie and Steve missed about 5 free throws between them in the fourth quarter. We lost by 2 points I believe. We have to practice our free throws more.
