But all that said, they've gotta stop with the Harden being the PG bs. I swear if Harden dribbles more than 4-5 times on a possession, it usually ends up being a bad possesion. If they are not going to have Lin as the main handler, they should just play hot potato with it and everyone moving around and looking for open shots. I hate those Harden iso's.
Lin has not done anything outside of a 12 game or so stretch of his career that would say he is an above average pg. He did that when he was coached by mike freakin d'antoni. Those that expect him to ever replicate any of that again are delirious. He is not suppose to be the second best player on your team, he should be your 4th on a team with an athletic big and a spot 3pt shooter and a wing that can play both sides of the court. In other words Lin is highly overrated and will never be what many of you hope he can become. He doesn't have a smooth shooting stroke, he can only finish at the rim with one hand and has yet to learn how to play off the ball on offense.
Well I do like his honesty and I don't believe he has any sort of agenda against Lin. A bit incompetent? Yes. But maybe we need to give them a bit more time to figure things out as well, the impact of Mchale's absence might be bigger than we think.
Actually I think it was more due to lack of time. Remember, they're also trying to integrate Harden and develop Asik simultaneously. Many of the plays added were picks for Harden, and plays off Asik to get him to the rim. There's only so many days a week to add them. Lin's PnR's was on the list of stuff to get done, he just wasn't at the top of the list. Give them time... the Rockets are still essentially in training camp.
This is actually incorrect. He was essentially playing Elite calibre under D'Antoni, and doing borderline All Star production under Woodson. Those comprise his total of 25 games. And this season he's dealing with a team full of talented, but essentially very raw players, 13 of whom haven't really played together before where the majority are Rookies and Sophomores. Young and inexperienced players that are STILL learning basic defense and offensive playsets. It's really alot harder than you think to go from an established roster of talented veterans to a roster of talented Rookie/sophomores and still maintain good production, Especially playing the PG position -- the most playset/personnel/chemistry dependent position on the roster. 8 games in is WAY too early to judge anyone on this team, Lin especially.
Yes know I love his honesty too. I don't think he has an agenda against him either. Morey has always been high on Lin so it makes no sense to me why Morey or any of the Rockets wouldn't want him to succeed considering the investment they made in him. I am starting to think that he is very incompetent though. I seriously think that after Harden's first two MVP performances they literally decided to make Harden the primary playmaker & did nothing for Lin. The fact that bigs aren't comfortable setting picks/screens for him is telling. Like the bigs literally look lost when he was handling the ball vs when harden was & it was never like that before. Yes I agree I never really had a problem with McHale. The fact that Sampson for the second night in a row brought Asik out to end the game is craziness. He said he learned from his mistake after the previous game but he did it again. Ugh if we had lost that game he would have looked dumb.
Meniscus surgery with an expected recovery time of 6 weeks is not major. It's been 32 weeks since his surgery. How long can Royce keep using his anxiety as an excu....oops I mean, how long can people keep using Lin's knee surgery as an excuse?
For $8mil, the Rockets were looking for an above average PG. Do you have no fundamental concept of what NBA salaries are like?
They gotta realise that Harden is not as good as Lin when it comes to creating for others, it's not a knock on Harden nor saying Harden is not a good playmaker at his position. But harden is not a PG nor should he handle the PG duty full time while looking for his own shot, people are asking too much. What frustrates me the most is last game they sit Asik in the 4 qt which lead to the meltdown, Lebron was getting into the lane at will and nobody was there to protect the paint. Why? It simply does not make any sense.
Give this guy some time to develop. Keep in mind he is still a very young player who has been starting on an NBA team for less than year. Technically, he's a "seasoned rookie" still learning the game....I like my boi Lin. He'll improve...give it some time. I mean come on, the guy went to Harvard...his basketball IQ has potential to reach approximately 9834981341.03
Harden's more versatile than Lin right now, meaning that Harden can play both SG and PG, whereas Lin is only comfortable at PG. Maybe Harden can squeeze out a few more PPG and APG by playing a scoring PG role, but then you relegate Jeremy Lin to almost nothing on the offensive end. Wouldn't it make more sense to make Harden sacrifice his game a bit to accommodate Lin's obvious talents as a PG? The aggregate result is much better for the Rockets.
1)Harden now does most of the playmaking/ball handling, and he should, so the other players have to spread out to give Harden room to drive to the lane and make plays. The problem is Lin is not a great 3pt shooter to take advantage of that. I expect him to gain more confidence on his shots with more work. 2) Lin is best at attacking the basket and pick and rolls, but the Rockets currently lack a 3pt shooter outside of Harden that teams are afraid to leave open and a big who can finish inside. Neither Asik or Patterson is particularly good at finishing inside, and Asik have a lot of problems catching the ball. The other teams have really caught on to this after the first 2 games and made it much harder for the ball handler to attack the basket. During the 3 game loosing streak the other teams have really taken advantage of this and both Lin and Harden's production came down drastically after the first 2 games. Harden being a much better player have adjusted to it over the past 2 games, Lin on the other hand have not. Things are looking up tho, Douglas, Morris, and Delfino have started hitting their 3's, Terrance Jones and Motejunas gets up to speed defensively will provide a decent big to run the pick and roll. And Lin is still young enough where he could still improve his 3pt shooting by putting in hard work. One of the main reasons he was so successful during Linsanity was that he was still a unknown to most teams, teams have since then adjusted accordingly so it's now up to Lin to up his game to get around that.
You need to know more about recovery. It's not just the wounds or the part of his knee being repaired. It's about regaining his strength and getting rid of the mental block, and yes, it takes longer than you think.
Yes I have said this before. I personally don't think Harden is as good when it comes to creating for others. Guys are getting the ball to late in the shot clock with regards to Harden. He really shouldn't be handling the PG duties as much as he is right now. And yes the Asik thing is baffling considering the part that the heat have historically shot poorly against Omer. Even in Omer's bulls days as a back up the Heat never shot well when he was defending the paint. Sampson made the same mistake again bringing Omer out tonight if we had lost that game would have been awful.
