ClutchFans Game Thread: Rockets @ Blazers 4/27/2014 (Playoffs Round 1, Game 4)

I saw a replay. And Beverley made the game's last mistake. An opportunity to go to 2nd Overtime I believe. He overdribbled and his pocket was picked. Correct me if I am wrong.

 

Agreed. The trolls have mostly been banned. Most criticism of Lin seems fair or at least informed by what transpired on the court last night.

 

Bev did make a mistake, but he didn't cost them the game. The Blazers were obviously coming at Bev hard because they knew it would result in either A) a foul call which would mean 2 free throws instead of a shot at hitting a three and tying the game or B) a steal which would seal the game.

I'm not excusing Bev's turnover, but to compare it to what Lin did is a farce. Lin's turnover came with 33 seconds left and the Rockets up 2. He hangs onto that ball and the worst case scenario is the Rockets fail to score on the next possession and Portland has the ball with about 13 seconds left and a chance to tie or take the lead.

 

Growing pains are painful.

 

We're not growing though. We're making the same mistakes in every game. If the Rockets lost Game 1 and then corrected those mistakes during the series, fine. That happens to even great teams. But that's not what's happening here. We're losing games making the same boneheaded decisions we've made all year long.

I don't wanna hear any crap about growing pains right now. If the Rockets lose this series, it's a wasted season. Period. There's no spinning that or making excuses. They're not missing any key guys due to injury. They had the home court advantage. And they're facing an opponent that is mediocre on defense and younger and less experienced than them.

 

What say you now all you Lin Lovers.

 

No one is blaming problems on Lin, we're blaming him for the loss of two games. And if not for Troy Daniels, it would be the loss of three games.

No OT in this series and Rockets up 3-1 if wasn't for Lin.

 

How about Harden not converting a layup in regulation. Lin's play hurt but a lot happened after he lost the ball. There was still 18 seconds left on the clock.

 

Ok. I get it. Jeremy is the devil here but know that the Rockets had problems with Portland the whole series.
They have been disappointing. 2 home games lost in a row? Issues got to run deeper.

Whole team is talking they have been playing subpar, McHale is sounding he has no clue of how to elevate everyone's game.
Man, the kid from the D-league can't be expected to hit 6-9 threes a game to pull us out of this mess.

 

Help me out here, what other game did Lin "lose"? He helped WIN the 3rd game.

 

There is plenty of blame to go around, it's depressing and crazy to think the Rockets are in this position. No one to blame but themselves as they make the same mistakes over and over again...coaching, yes, but it's on the players...I still think they can salvage the series...

 

Also, the game was tied when Daniels hit that shot, they weren't losing.

 

I freakin am glad about every playoff win of the Mavs, there is definitely something wrong here.

 

Excuse me? Did you watch the third game? They only went to OT in the first place because Lin instead of holding onto the ball and using clock with 50 seconds left decided to go into hero mode and try to convert a contested layup. Instead he blew the shot, the Blazers got the ball, and Batum hit a 3 pointer on the other end to tie the game.

Yes, he redeemed himself in OT with that hustle play(although he did turn it over again a minute earlier BTW), but he nearly cost them Game 3. And let's not forget his intentional foul late in Game 2 when the Rockets were down only 3 with 30 seconds left. He's making a series of horrible late game decisions that are having direct impact on the outcome.

 

I didn't watch any OT. I just couldn't take it any more. I just want the series to be over with. It's exhausting to watch and I'm tired. Besides one game where a rookie sank a 3 to win it, this series is just not going the Rockets way. To expect them to win 3 games in a row now...it's just too much. It was hard enough just to win the one game and took a miracle play. We would need 3 miracle close-outs to win this series. I don't see it.

 

Typical blame going on here. Lin wasn't the guy who left a wide open Batum for the shot in game 3 and he wasn't the guy who missed 55 FREAKIN' shots over a 3 game span. (let that sink in, 55 shots missed by 1 player). If you want to isolate 1 play every game, go ahead, but Lin played good D yesterday and had some clutch rebounds and hustle plays prior to his mistake.

 

Have faith....this is how the Red Sox felt with 2 strikes and Rivera on the mound in the 9th. Win the home game, steal the road game and blow them out back in Houston!!!

 

No one is saying everyone else played great and Lin's the only one screwing up out there. Stop with the strawman BS. Harden is getting plenty of heat for his play in this series. On here and in the media. But you know what? Late in regulation last night, Harden did what he needed to do. He got to the foul line several times and made all his free throws. He also drove into the paint and dished to Dwight for that dunk to tie the game and send it to OT. He had plenty of bad plays and poor decisions in Game 4, but offensively in crunch time(at least in regulation), he made the plays he needed to make.

The fact that you're claiming Lin played well prior to that turnover tells me you either are an apologist for the guy or you really didn't watch the game. He was awful in the 4th quarter. He continuously dribbled the ball on offense for 20 seconds before doing anything. He couldn't even make a pass to Harden. He had a terrible turnover that allowed the Blazers to close it to 92-88. And other than a midrange jumper early in the 4th, he didn't contribute anything offensively. Stop defending him for a lousy game that was capped off with an even lousier ending.

 

I tell you what, I'll re-watch the 4th quarter and try to be objective.

 

This.

This series is the Rockets' season writ large.

Outside of Dwight, Asik and Bev on defense who else other than Troy Daniels showed up in even HALF of the games in the play offs?

Parsons? No show for the first 3 games. Very good 4th game.
Lin? Showed up in games 1 and 3, barely showed up in game 2, was utter crap in game 4, and made bad errors late in game 3 and 4.
Harden? No show for 3 games. Showed up in game 4 on the offense part of the game, but laid out a carpet to the basket for at least 20 points in the first half.
Tjones? Can anyone even SAY what TJones did this series prior to last night's game?
Garcia? Did he even play?

McHale? Our defense the first 2 games barely existed. Our Defense for games 3 and 4 was still a complete mess. He made some good adjustments for game 3 by putting Asik and Daniels in the line up, but other than that what did he do? Did our offense look even remotely organized?

Of the games we lost, how many should have even come down to the closing minutes?

Games 4 was "lost" in the final minutes and OT, but the team put themselves in that position through lack of consistent effort and sloppy play. Remember those 3 wide open transition TO's? How many points did those cost us? Harden's matador defense? How many points did that cost us?

Expecting the Rockets to win both games on the Road? That's unrealistic as an expectation however we did have our chances to put the game away in all three of our losses.

Lin's play for game 4 has no excuse.
Harden's no-show for 3/4 play off games and matador defense in game 4 has no excuse.
Parson's no-show for 3/4 play off games has no excuse.
TJones' no-show for 3/4 play off games has no excuse.

And we had no right to expect this series to be 2-2 when only 1 of our all stars played like one this series.

No, there's plenty of blame to go around. This team needs help. The Head Coach needs to coach. The roster needs a legit 3rd scoring option. And the bench needs more depth.

And no idea what's wrong with Harden. Harden was Max player who played like a rookie player for 3.5/4 games. I'm giving him the 0.5 because at least he scored like a max player in game 4, despite making the team play 4v5 defense.

And the idea that we're putting the outcome of the series on our ROLE players is absurd. The Play offs has first and foremost been about the Stars. We had one show up. The other one was MIA. And our "3rd" option Parsons was a complete non-factor for 3/4 games.

Based upon the Team's performance, the Rockets got the result they deserved.