Dwight Howard Not Happy With The Effort in Houston [NBA.COM]

Howard leads alright. Typically, when we are down by 5 or 6, DH would demand the ball on the block, insisting to take it to the basket. The problem is it rarely works and often leads to a fastbreak on the other end. Then he would demand one or two more times until we are down by 10+ points. It's not his leadership in question. On the court, the leadership comes down to by example, and so far he has been short of that.

 

Best leaders lead by example. That's why his criticism tonight doesn't hold much weight.

 

So the 20 min meeting took place without Harden? That's concerning.

Of the games I've seen (all but the Philadelphia one), I don't think the Rockets have lost a single game this season due to being outplayed (well, maybe the second Clippers game), pretty much every loss has been due to taking things for granted and showing poor effort, either as a team or key individual players. The ceiling for this team is high, but it's very rarely approaching that ceiling.

Good that the Rockets are not in the East, or their tendency to give terrible effort against poor teams may cause them to miss the playoffs.

 

It always seems like ever since I watched the Rockets play (Yao/Mobley/Francis to Yao/Tmac - Lowry/Lee/Budinger/Scola) our teams have always lacked in contesting every shot. We're not as disciplined as the Spurs are with rebounds and ball movement. Then again the season is still very young and our young team is still going through some growing pains. Dwight needs to stfu and make more free throws then we would win more games.

 

We were not outplayed by the Suns tonight? We were pretty much down by double digits most of the game. We are crying for Parsons and Lin to come back, but a team with supposedly the best 2 guard and center ... just embarrassing.

 

Yea they're all saying the ball needs to move, they need to try harder, there' only 1 guy not there to say it....so i wonder who they're talking about.

 

To be fair, he's making more FT's this year than he has in over 2 years.

2010-11 - 59.6%
2011-12 - 49.1%
2012-13 - 49.2%
2013-14 - 54.8%

http://espn.go.com/nba/player/stats/_/id/2384/dwight-howard

Not great, but getting better.

 

these people are grasping at straws! I thought I saw a post or 2 about Beverley cutting the lead down to 7 with a minute to play like it was some sort of accomplishment.

 

Jason Friedman had some quotes from James Harden after tonight's game on his article on the Rockets website. I guess he didn't stay to meet with the rest of the media. James was pretty much saying the same thing as everyone else. Actions are going to go much farther than words at this point. They need to start putting this words into actions on the court.

 

Good. He is supposed to be the leader of this team and has called the team out for not bringing effort against the lesser teams. He understand and Mchale understands that these games are going to be the difference between being in the middle of the playoff race are at the top of it.

I would be more concerned if he was okay with what has happened over the last 2 games. The media is going to spin any story into some bigger than it is to get hits and draw ratings. We are just over a month into the season and none of the positive press conferences praising the team talking about unity and hardwork are spoken about.

Skip Bayless and SAS are playing CHARACTERS. Skip will say he told everyone so, Smith will defend him, and be more rational.

Plus Smith knows if he his nice about Dwight, he is more likely to get exclusives etc.

Let's just hope they are addressing this at practice and behind closed doors.

 

Need to put the ball back to a point guard

 

Yeah, he is doing much better. At one point in the season he was something like 60% on the road and 40% at home.

 

Damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.

 

just saw Howard's interview, he looked really pissed.

 

Well said!

I have no issue with Dwight saying this, but he has to show the effort he demands from others first.

That he doesn't get many shots is a team problem, not specifically a Dwight problem, but his effort, defense and rebounding must be better if he wants his words to carry weight.

And I don't say the above to deflect blame from Harden, because he is the main culprit, IMO.

 

this.

 

Is the main problem effort? I saw Harden get frustrated and try too hard on the offensive end. All the coaches can say is make a quicker move. So he shoots all these early 3s and drives into the lane wildly.

It's unfair to lump all the blame on Harden. When the team is held captive by its simplistic offense. When no one else including Howard can make a damn shot. On nights when it's not working, coaches have to have other ploys and schemes.

 

I didn't watch the game, but 18 boards (8 offensive) don't scream lackadaisical to me. Especially since had will to crash the boards after seeing the great effort from his other superstar teammate.

 

If anyone has a video, please share a link! I would like to see it too.