ClutchFans Game Thread: Rockets @ Spurs 12/25/2013

Nah. I think Jones is just benefiting from starting next to Dwight. Alot of his defensive mistakes is covered up by Dwight's massive body inside the paint. When he plays by himself without an elite defensive big, you can see alot of rotation mistakes. But his play style when next to Dwight suits the Rockets. He and Dwight are great weak side blockers which leads to fastbreaks. He can shoot a three somewhat reliably(left wide open) and he is a good slasher. Need to work on his decision making as seen when he has the ball when the shot clock is going down.

 

I don't think it's a wash but I don't think that it's as vast of a rift as many people make it out to be. But on offense I think it's a much bigger difference.

The offense flows better with Lin at PG and Harden at SG. And it's not just because Lin is a better shooter and better at driving to the lane. It's b/c he makes the defense react to him much more than Bev does. That frees up Parsons, Harden and other guys to get better looks and better spacing on the floor to do more. Defenses have figured out that Bev can't shoot very much and many are just daring him to beat us. That means all of our other players have more defense focused on them. If Bev hits his shots, as he does every couple of games, then we usually do fine. But usually he is not really good and it forces Harden to carry the load and try to take shots with guys in his face or having to beat multiple guys to get to the basket.

Also, with Lin and Harden together, your looking at approx 12-15 assists between them easily. With Bev, your looking at about 8 assists between the two of them. That hurts our offense. Guys are standing around, taking tougher shots and ultimately, it leads to Harden forcing it more b/c he feels like he has to. It's better to get the other guys more involved in the game offensively b/c if Harden or Lin aren't hitting their shots, at least they have the ability to make good passes and put other players in good position to make shots. Bev's assist numbers speak for themselves.

Anyways, that's my thinking on the subject. I totally agree with you Clutch- everyone will have their opinions but I think it will become pretty clear how this unit plays out in the next few weeks. Glad I have tickets to a couple of games in January b/c it looks to be a fun and exciting ride if tonight is any indication of the games to come.

 

Well said. This also saves energy for Harden to actually play some D throughout the game.

1. Better flow of offense throughout the game (less ISOs by Harden), gets all players involved. If a few Rockets get hot, they are unstoppable
2. More PnR ran by Harden or Lin with D12 (Asik had butter fingers, sorry Asik lovers, although i like his defensive and rebounding game, his butterfingers just ruins the PnR).
3. Parsons can slash, hit 3s, do his thing, rather than trying to be the PG alternative to Harden (when Bev is in the lineup)
4. D12 gets enough touches from PnR and feeds from Lin/Harden at the block and dominate throughout the game.
5. Jones or who ever plays the 4 enjoys the least defensive attention and can get easy buckets
6. Bev can be the defensive spark off the bench that is needed from time to time as the starters get tired or lazy.
7. As for rest of the bench, usually there are still a few starters on the court game at all times. You just hope that the offensive is flowing well enough that they feed off of that
8. Harden still gets his points and has energy to play solid D. When Harden plays great offense and crap D, usually the opposing team capitalizes on that and makes a run. If Lin and Harden plays decent D. The rockets are true contenders.
9. Lastly the lineup of Harden, Lin, Chandler, Jones, D12 gives the highest potential to get a large lead at the start of the game.

 

who cares, they have 15 roster spots, 12 on the active roster and if players contribute and play as a team then the results will take care of themselves, i'm more worried about team play than individual play

 

only saw the highlights but looked like everybody on the team did a great job!!

 

of course i was talking about the benching lineup..

 

Parsons was our best player in the first half and Harden just went berserk for 14 last quarter points in the final 8 minutes.Those two were instrumental in the overall win.Others chipped in variety of different ways.Lin good defense very fluid decision making, Howard rebounding and so on.

 

That drive and dunk was huge considering we were only up by 3, and spurs being spurs

 

I think Lin was OK tonight. He played very focused and didn't drive in to walls inside. That's why there are shooters outside. You can kick the ball when there is nowhere to go. It also shows from Lin's assist numbers. If he keeps playing like this, the Rockets will look really good.

 

Harden was amazing, thats what he gets paid to do, bonafide superstar/spurskiller.

 

Once that I see consistent performances I will jump in the bandwagon. For the time being I am hoping he continues to improve against better PF.

He is showing signs but sometimes he just disapears.

 

Bum ankle to.He had a slight limp so with the national tv audience game out of the way he might be rested for tomorrow's or actually tonight's game considering it's past midnight.

 

The starters were great. The bench really struggled.

 

But if Harden had missed a few of these contested jumpers, people would be shouting about how he's playing selfish "iso-ball" and how McHale needs to be fired for not holding Harden accountable.

 

After an incredibly porous defensive job against the Maverick's scrubs.. Lin responds with an astonishing defensive shut down of a top 10 player in this league, Tony Parker.

I really don't know what to make of Jeremy at this point. Seems like he's incredibly smart & knows what he has to improve on leading to some impressive positive change but then disappointingly reverting back to his old ways.

Loved his performance tonight, I just wish he was more consistent. No ones asking for Linsanity.... We just want a performance like this on a consistent basis. (well at least i do)

I want the two headed monster that is BeverLin to excel, I really do. I don't want us to be forced to take the Rondo route which is incredibly risky. They just both need to be more consistent, Lin mainly.

Again, I commend you tonight Jeremy. Great players bounce back from adversity, great players also avoid adversity at all cost with solid consistent play. Keep it up.

 

Defense is his main issue. He still struggled the bigs like Aldridge, Dirk, West and so on but in time and a process of getting more time and experience under his belt he will get better.

 

well yeah.

then again thats why I don't really have that big an issue with 'isoball', you need players like that who can take their man 1v1 to really succeed in the NBA, the spurs just couldn't stop him once he was in that groove.

 

Dude just need more love from Mchale.....

 

Lin did great against Parker, but TEAM defense on the whole was much better than against the Mavs.

 

I've stayed out of the Lin vs "player" bickering, because instead of seeing the situation in terms of Lin or "Harden/Bev", I try my best to see it in terms of Lin and "Harden/Bev". Last year I thought there were many games where I thought Harden and Lin played excellent together (such as the OKC game after the ASB), and this year I thought Bev and Lin complemented each other really well.

Personally I tend to fall in the same mindframe as Murphy. I think that in order to maximize Lin's capabilities and thus in the long run possibly the team's ultimate success (especially when debating the starting PG role for the team), then there's needs to be slight adjustments to allow Lin to be the primary PG, as he was tonight. It'll require a permanent understanding from Lin that he has to focus more on defense and facilitating rather than just outright scoring, and allowing Harden, Howard, and Parsons to be the primary scorers (which Lin was very capable of doing not only tonight, but some prior games too). But I think there also needs to be a permanent understanding from the other starting four, and from coaching, that Lin is going to make mistakes along the way because he's not a plug & play product yet in terms of the type of starting PG the team needs with its current lineup. In addition, Harden is so elite as a scorer that there's no need for him to moonlight as PG so much. In fact, in certain situations I think it takes away from his offensive game and hurts the team.

Overall I think Lin has the natural capabilities to be the perfect PG that the current starting lineup needs, in terms of a balanced combination of offense, facilitating, decision making, temperament, and lastly defense. But, I think his capabilities have not been fully realized due to his fluctuating role. I commend Lin for not losing his temperament from last year to this year, as his role has again changed.

As of now, I totally agree with you Clutch, that Bev is the better fit with the starting lineup due to his primary skill. But I also think it depends on the team they play and the game situation. Bev is out right now, thus like you said, the numbers will get crunched and a net rating will be attained to see which lineup is best. But, given this short period and number of games played, I don't know if those crunched numbers will really tell which player may be best fit in the long run, assuming both players maximize their capabilities.