In my opinion, the only Rocket who played better than he usually does last night was Mo Taylor (and maybe Hakeem). Other than that, everyone had average or sub-par performances. I think all of our guards played poorly. Actually, I think Shandon played the best of all of our guards. The fact that our main strength (our backcourt) played so poorly along with the fact that Kobi was en fuego was the main cause of our loss, in my opinion. And we only lost by FIVE!! I think that if we had just one of our guards making smart decisions then we could have pulled it out. ------------------
Newtown--no we don't all realize that. And save your "I told you so's" for arguments with The Cat; he likes those. Tacoma...you cannot hack a shaq under 2 minutes. And I don't think he would touch the ball anyhow. gr8-1 don't apologize, just speak your mind. We have to shoot a three there. How can you blame an open three? And how can you only blame Mobley ISOs when Moochie clearly got yanked by Rudy at the 4 minute mark for his poor play in the pick-n-roll. If blaming our playmakers over and over is becoming an in thing, blame all the playmakers fairly then. Francis sucked it up in the last second at Denver...picking up his dribble with no clue what to do and launched an airball. No Francis SUCKED threads. Moochie lost our lead last night...nothing about Moochie except from verse and I. [This message has been edited by heypartner (edited December 22, 2000).]
heyP, I think you are right when you think that many of us flat-out don't like Cuttino's game, thus we are more apt to criticize him. But, sometimes, I don't know what Cat is thinking. Remember the Golden State game ? What was he doing exactly ? Was he spotting Mooch up for a 35 footer ? Cat, has taken more shots than Walt and Shandon combined, and I think there is something wrong with that. It can't be anything personal towards him, I just think he's a stat padder and he isn't as good as he thinks he is. I appreciate him staying in Houston, as he is an integral part of this team. Rudy loves him, Steve loves him so much that he defers to him. Sometimes I think Cat being around may not be good for Cuttino. Flame away. ------------------ "I am" is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that "I do" is the longest sentence ?
HeyPartner, I was at the game and I remember quite well Francis' airball but at least he took what the defense gave him. Before he made his move to the baseline he had Van Exel one on one and I'm sure Rudy told him if he had single coverage take it to the hole. Matt Bullard was wide open but Steve couldnt see him so I dont blame Steve for the Denver loss, without him we lose by God knows how many. The one MAJOR thing you fail to mention was Cuttino's horrible shot taken with 12 seconds to go in the game. He shot a fadeaway over 2 defenders with plenty of time on the clock that was an AIRBALL. It took a miracle rebound by Kenny just to give us another chance to tie the game. I am in no way a basher of Cuttino I like his game but he needs to drive the ball more which is his strong suit instead of dribbling the ball and bobbing his head at the defender 20 times in a row just to throw up a bad shot ------------------ www.truebballfansite.homestead.com
verse, I would take Steve in that situation. The ankle wasn't bothering him that much so that didnt really play a part in it. The time I saw Steve try and assert himself I saw him once blow by Kobe and get fouled and a 2nd time go to the middle and get fouled. Even a semi-explosive Steve can still get past Kobe. Also what does a player being on an offensive role have to do with his defense?? If you think it pumps him up to play better defense I disgree. It just makes him want to get to the offensive end ASAP to keep on shootin' the ball. I think both Cuttino and Steve are good at gettin to the hole I just think that Mobley has his mind set to shoot while Steve is more open minded to dishing it off if he doesnt have the shot ------------------ www.truebballfansite.homestead.com
newtown so he should have passed it to francis who just sprained his already sprained ankle while he was being guarded by the best perimeter defender in the league? PLEASE. if that's the case, just roll the ball to the other side of the court and get ready to play d. and i cannot believe that you said you blame cat for suiting up. do you blame steve as well? his ankle's in bad shape, bro. how bout cato? do you blame him despite his ankle being sore? how bout dream, who still favors his knee? do you blame him? do you blame shandon for his hurt spirits for suiting up? look. as a ball player, you suit up until the coach tells you you're hurting the team. you try to go until you can't anymore. obviously, you're not a barkley fan. as for cato...shaq posts EVERYONE far under the basket. cato kept shaq from getting the "and-1", sent him to the free throw, and promptly watched shaq build a condominium from the stripe. i'm pissed he didn't get more minutes in the 4q, as a matter of fact. but that's another subject.... croutons did you just say you thought shandon played the best of all our guards???? i guess you missed the beginning of the game, where shan the man got torched. or the air ball he shot in the 1st. or the layup that hit nothing but glass in the 2nd half. yea, he played great. i thought steve, prior to his injury, played superbly. he was taking what kobe gave him and hitting his shots. then he got hurt. i guess we should blame steve for suiting up. gr8-1: so you want a inconsistent spot shooter like the wiz to get more shots? how bout a terrible shooting, slumping, non-dribbling, alleged shooting guard? yea. mobley is a catalyst. he, steve, motay, and mooch. those are our only catalysts. and all of those players, outside of mooch, will - AND SHOULD - take a lot of shots because they are the only catalyst (aka: creators) on the team. so, as long as the defense gives them shots, they MUST keep shooting them. as for why mobes was in the game, and i'm surprised heyp hasn't brought this up... francis, as our main offensive catalyst, was hurting (ankle) and was guarded by kobe. that leaves mooch. ooops, he left his game on the bench in the 4q. so who does that leave you with to bring the ball up and ignite the offense? MOBLEY. especially since he just hit a big three a few moments before. had motay been open, i'd be OK with arguments that mobes should have fed motay. but he wasn't. NO ONE ELSE WAS! go back and watch the tape. ------------------
tacoma park legend: i agree with you about steve, except for the fact that those blowbys he had against kobe were prior to the ankle sprain. and no, a semi-healthy steve is not better than a healthy kobe with a shaq who can't commit a foul behind him waiting to put his crowbar down. ------------------
I never said that I thought Steve would be better than Kobe in that situation I just thought that Steve would have been able to get by him and create for either himself or others.Cat could hit the set shot yesterday but if he had a defender in his face you could tell the elbow was hurtin him. Yea I know those blow by's happened before the injury but we never got to see him try to assert himself again after that and I would have wanted to see if he could still have gotten past Kobe that easily ------------------
oh no, i understand what you meant. and i didn't mean to imply that steve would be better all around than kobe. only that he would not be better than a healthy kobe when steve was at 1/2 speed for one offensive set. here's something to think about: if steve, as this club's leader, thought himself healthy enough, do you think he would have said so to rudy and DEMANDED the ball down the stretch? i think he should have. that, though, is something steve will have to learn to do: TO GRAB HOLD OF THE REIGNS OF THE TEAM. until he does, there will be plenty of "Thanks Cuttino" and "CUTTINO SUCKS" threads. there's no real reason to b!tch about cuttino's 3. sorry. it was the best of the remaining, poor options. i know some will say, "yea, but we could have gone for a quick 2", but that doesn't hold water. think about it. if we go for two, and make it, what do you think phil would do? pull out shaq. he would not need shaq anymore. just inbounds the ball, get fouled, and hit at least 1 free throw. then you're in a situation with less time on the clock, less timeouts, and a damn good defensive team hawking you. oh yea, put shaq back in on defense to clog the middle, and watch the rox try to jack up a quick one from the outside. sorry, i'll take that cuttino 3. ------------------
gr8-1, first I'd like to say I am having fun in this thread. juicy! cheers all comers! Everyone is speaking their mind! yeah...I'm not a big fan of Two Shakes. I look forward to us using it less and less. Maybe Rudy isn't ready to do MoTay in crunch time, yet. If he continues improving, we will see that. I truly believe that Mobley isn't as good as a finisher this year without the plethora of Two Shakes repetition he got last year. There is simply no way to practice above the rim ball through a crowd. I don't think he is relying on 2 Shakes as much, especially since the a huge defensive plan this year to stop Cuttino. Now I want him to improve his mid-range, and I want Rudy to use him more on the weak-side. I think he is an excellent weak-side flex option when the shot clock is running down. I hope Mobley will take on another dimension, but a lot of that is dependent on Rudy, the success of other playmakers and scorers. Rudy isn't going to completely kick out this ISO crutch just yet.
and he won't kick that crutch until we start running plays correctly...consistently. how many times have we seen players drive and dish only to throw a blind pass to the spectator in the first row? how many times have we seen steve directing traffic before - or after - a play? that 's part of the learning process. and that's the cool part about a young team, watching it happen. but, when the games on the line, rudy has to go to the option with the greatest success ratio, and that is two shakes. ------------------
gr8-1: so you want a inconsistent spot shooter like the wiz to get more shots? how bout a terrible shooting, slumping, non-dribbling, alleged shooting guard? yea. mobley is a catalyst. he, steve, motay, and mooch. those are our only catalysts. and all of those players, outside of mooch, will - AND SHOULD - take a lot of shots because they are the only catalyst (aka: creators) on the team. so, as long as the defense gives them shots, they MUST keep shooting them.MOBLEY. Walt is shooting 41 % from 3 point land. Cuttino, when his elbow was fine, was shooting 31 %. Now, what was your question again ? Who would I rather have shoot the 3 ? Mobley is a catalyst for who ? He's averaging 2.2 assists a game, Walt is averaging 1.6. Not a big difference, considering how much more Cuttino has the ball. ------------------ "I am" is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that "I do" is the longest sentence ? [This message has been edited by gr8-1 (edited December 22, 2000).] [This message has been edited by gr8-1 (edited December 22, 2000).]
newtown: "What does Cato do? Let Shaq catch the ball wherever he wants and then try and block every shot which sometimes is okay, but not against Shaq. I cannot remember the last time I EVER saw Shaq get blocked. You can't remember last time you EVER saw shaq blocked? I'm sure you don't watch much ball then. I didn't see any games in a while, but last year when Rockets beat the lakers, Cato swatterd his sh*t twice.. so I'm pretty sure he gets blocked every once in a while.. and also some of you are allready suggesting trading the cat?? ha ha, damn, he missed the rim, you guys remember a few years ago when kobe shot those air-balls in the playoffs.. 4 of 'em if I can remember. yeah yeah, his elbow and all that, so what, he felt like he had the shot and he took it. Now don't get me wrong, I think that Francis is the best player on the team, it's just that we're so quick to jump on our players. I'm out. ------------------ against all odds
Heypartner, I do not see why you have to defend Mobley so much. He has been on a shooting slump recently, and does not have the best shooting % in this team. I see your point on why he took the three, and I agree with you; however, I also agree with clutch in that he made several mistakes during the game. You are also bringing Mooch mistakes to cover for Mobley's mistakes, but the truth is that when Mooch made two mistake, Rudy took him out of the game in the fourth quater. Mobley makes four mistakes, and he plays 38 min. I personally do not like what Mobley does in garbage time (when we are either winning a game or loosing it) He just keeps shooting and shooting just to keep his stats (in my humble opinion). He is out of this world. He damages our team, and our chemistry. ------------------
I think Cuttino was open for the shot but it was still a stupid ass play. WE should have gone for the easy 2 so we would have been down by 1 then fouled shaq. The free throw shooting aside from Francis tonight was atrocious. I grimaced when I saw Cuttino throw up those 2 bricks from the line.Anybody else think Rudy has way too much confidence in Moochie? I dont understand why we sit our best player, Stevie, and bring in Mooch for basically the duration of the 2nd quarter. We were on a roll when Steve came out but we slumped after that with mooch in the game. Rudy needs to learn that a superstar caliber player needs to be DOUBLE TEAMED when the game is on the line and you need to make another play try and beat you. In the last 2 game against the Spurs and Lakers he has failed to realize that.Can somebody tell me why he fouled shaq when we were tied with them with like 3 minutes to go??? Am I the only one that notices that when Moochie is in the game and Steve is at the 2 steve never touches the ball. I hate Steve at the 2 because he never gets to be in the offense.Somebody mentioned the Denver game and how Steve took a bad shot at the end trying to defend Cuttino's boneheaded play, well maybe you forgot the completely idiotic fallaway against 2 defenders shot that Mobley took with 12 seconds left that was an airball and had to be boarded by Kenny Thomas just to give the rockets another chance to tie. ------------------ www.truebballfansite.homestead.com
Where the hell were all of you when I opened this topic about 7 or 8 games into the season? Finally it seems you all realize that my "CUTTINO SUCKS" thread was not a take strictly against Cat, but a take against his head. He has a lot to do with several of our wins. He is close to being a great offensive player. I do like him But it is the games that he will lose for us that are the killers! His shot selection and mentality is still not even close to being where it needs to be to become a team player and help the Rocks succeed. And what really pissed me off about last night was the fact that Cuttino was even in uniform. It is a big sign of maturity when you sit out a game because of injury because you know you will HURT YOUR TEAM if you go out there and try and play. Pardon me, but what are Cuttino's strengths? The drive to the whole and the outside jumper. His left arm and shoulder are all f#cked up right now and he cannot shoot. He even said so the other night. Did you see his freaking free throws last night??? Off the backboard? I could go on forever. Oh, and Rudy's subsitution patterns are horrendous. ------------------
ok, heyp. hmmm, let's see. would i rather have a) a hurt elbow iso from a man who just hit a big three or b) a hurt ankle iso defended by the nba's best perimeter defender who - by the way - has 3-4 inches on him and is in a zone? tough decision. ------------------
maybe i'm missing something here. but are you guys (newtown, etc.) blaming cuttino or are you blaming rudy for having cuttino in there? i mean what do you want him (cuttino) to do? not shoot that shot? pass to...ummm...ummm...ummm...no one? because that's who was open at that point. no one. if you want to say "cuttino sucks" tell me exactly where he sucked at. and tell me what he should have done differently. ------------------
Verse - I am largely blaming Cuttino for most the last 45 seconds of our meltdown last night. The 3 was uncalled for because of (a) the amount of time left on the clock and (b) most importantly - the guy cannot shoot right now. His shoulder is broken. So, to answer you, yes he should have passed it. To anyone really - actually either Francis or Mo, both of whom had excellent games. As for Rudy, I am not blaming him for having Cat in the game (that is Cat's fault for even dressing out). What kills me about Rudy is his painfully obvious substituion patterns (i.e., Dream not playing the entire 2nd quarter). Why is that bad? Case in point - who comes in for Dream last night - Cato. What does Cato do? Let Shaq catch the ball wherever he wants and then try and block every shot which sometimes is okay, but not against Shaq. I cannot remember the last time I EVER saw Shaq get blocked. Offensively what did Cato do? Due to the fact that Cato has abnormally bad/small hands for his size, he missed at least a couple dishes to him that would have been easy baskets/dunks, one in particular coming on an awesome dish from Moochie. I believe in combinations and going with what has worked in the past, but if it doesn't happen to be working during a game, you need to adjust as a coach. ------------------
ok, everyone that criticized Cuttino apologize right now. I'll start. I'm sorry, if it weren't for Cuttino's great all-around game (near triple double), we would have lost by 20. Cuttino is the Houston Rockets and it will never be his fault when we lose. ------------------ "I am" is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that "I do" is the longest sentence ?
