The more I review last year's games the more I am convinced..

love this thread and some great stuff flowing, but had to pull this back up.

also making my way through a bunch of last seasons games on tape (thanks R2K)

are you serious easy, Eggie is terrible on and off the ball guarding his player, sure he gets some nice blocks but it either a block or a lay-up and playing that percentage game against the PFs of the West is stupid. He gives up position way to easily, and yeah loses his player looking for weakside blocks and by then his player has established an unstoppable position, he stands up too much when his player has the ball, his lateral movement is non existent and he read the players moves (when guarding the ball) appallingly. for us to make some serious noise, it is going to come from Eggie, MoT, Yao and Cato dominating the paint and making it slightly tough for opposition front courts to score.

Eggie must find a way to get that memo on his D destroyed.

 

Look Smeg, I'm not saying that EG is a great defender. I'm just saying that he's better than people give him credit for, which is not much. He is very inconsistent. And he looks too much for blocks rather than concentrating on his man. But he can do a good job if he puts his mind to it. That means we can still hope. I just don't think he's a poor defender by nature, like Mo Taylor.

 

Easy,

don't mistake my criticism of Eggie's D as doom and gloom, playing D especially at the 4 is very tough, especially when you have one year of college experience, and i have a pile of optimism for Eggie. His shot blocking skill is a great skill to have and if that can be combined with at least average ability at the rest of the defensive skills required to man the 4, he will be great at defense.

if there is one thing JVG brings i hope it is to get all the team playing better INDIVIDUAL defense, the one positive consequence for having poor (almost non existent) on the ball defense by Eggie and Steve is the their team defense and rotation to help is actually pretty already. So if JVG can improve the individual defensive skills of all the players 10% at least it will be great start, especially for Steve, Eggie, MoT, Boki and Yao. Cat's D was pretty good last year, patchy but pretty good (was just watching a game @miami and he does a great job on E Jones) but imagine how good it will be if he isn't having to leave his player and come and help steve out so much.

we will have to disagree on Eggie's level of defense right now, for me it pathetic and i'm content you think it is better than that, but at the end of the day he is going to have to work damn hard to get the memo sent round the league changed, certainly last season you can see the opposition players licking their lips to score at will against him, he's got to change his mentality, a block is not his only option, make em pass, make em shoot over your hand and make em shoot tough shots for tougher positions on the floor.

JVG will make it happen, if not he will get a big dose of pine.

 

I personally have not read these scouting reports that you're talking about. Maybe I just missed them.

The ones I read said that he's a shooter and has great fundamentals. Later on, it was uncovered that he's not a shooter like Peja, but has great strides to the basket and can dunk comfortably. Another thing we learned is that he cuts to the basket well. But these were all notes made in practice.

Not once did I ever hear Nachbar is a good finisher on the fastbreal. Not once did I hear Nachbar is fast and athletic. I definitely heard he's deceptively quick to the basket because of the huge strides he takes. But I think that comes from the expectations we had. He's not fast and athletic, he just takes long strides to the basket and can dunk.

To think that we expect Boki to pick up ANY rebounding at all? how could he? he's going to be much further from the basket than Posey is ever going to be, he can't jump as high as Posey, and he isn't like Posey in that he jumps for loose balls and goes for steals, etc..

Listen, I think Boki's going to be great. But he's more of a Glen Rice than a James Posey. He most certainly won't be able to defend, rebound, or finish on the break like Posey. However, I fully expect him to hit a better % of his 3's, cut to the basket just as well or better, and provide some spacing throguh range. Also, I expect him to surprise some people while he'sdriving to the basket.

 

http://www.clutchcity.net/news.cfm?NewsID=1032

http://www.nbadraft.net/profiles/bostjannachbar.htm

http://www.chron.com/content/archiv...t=&type=&user=houston&sview=1&hview=2&dview=1 (this one has a direct quote from Dennis Lindsey talking about his finishing skills)

 

From a Clutch report

Clutch's Draft recap

Nachbar, who turns 22 next month, is a terrific shooter and an excellent finisher on the fast break. He can create his own shot off the dribble and has no problems draining jumpers off picks. While Nachbar needs serious work on his defensive game, this is a player who has a real chance to be a special offensive player in this league.

....................

You will recall we passed along back in early May that the Rockets were eyeing Nachbar in Italy and Rudy T spoke on the radio after the draft saying he was impressive there, throwing down numerous slams.

"The scrimmage I watched over there, he had 10 dunks," said Rudy. "They were not [just] going through the motions. He's a competitor and a very good fit for our team."

 

Why do I need to rank them? Certainly you don't feel that Mo or EG is one of the top PFs, or close to it, in the West.

You still haven't given a bonafide reason as to why Utah would want MoT. You have fabricated the reason being that Utah needs a PF. Utah also needs a PG, a SG and a bench, but you don't see them trading for overpaid players. Teams don't trade for bad contracts just to fill out a roster spot.

I don't have a problem keeping Mo either. In fact, barring a trade that gives us something equivelant to him in return (i.e. low production/high contract), I expect him to be an integral part of the roster next year. We don't have much of a choice really.

Unfortunately, the season isn't 1/3 long. Its 82 games. Teams go on streaks and we were hot starting out. Its how you finish. The cream always rises to the top.

We never beat the Kings in Sac to my knowledge.

We also lost to LA, without Shaq, in LA. We also lost at home to teams like the Clippers, Knicks and Miami. Which means, we were a very young, inconsistant team. We could beat anybody on any given night and we could lose to anybody on any given night. Perfrect example of why we weren't close to top 4 material (in restrospect, we weren't even close).

So now we are blaming Rudy for not finish in the top 4?? We finished 9 games out of the 4th spot. You really think that Rudy cost us 9 games with his coaching? If so, Id love to see which games you felt he cost us.

For the record, JVG may, MAY, do a better job than Rudy, but with the roster basically only changing slightly, I don't see a reason why we can compete for a top 4 spot again. However, Id be glad to make another bet with you.

 

I have said this before, and I will say it again. I believe that we do need to give the current players a chance under Jeffery (ha ha). I mean, I'm not saying that one year with Jeff can change a player dramatically, but Jeff hands down has to be the best thing that has happened to the Rox in a while. While I do agree EGriff is a better player than we sometimes give him credit, but he is playing in the west. conference. he must elevate his game, or he just might get traded to a team in the east (hint hint). I can see the Rox finishing six.

 

If it comes down to Utah having to just take players, I think they'd come to us first actually. MoT is one of the better bad contracts in the league. The guy is a proven scorer, he's had a 19ppg season hasn't he?

If Utah are really desperate (looking more and more like it) and have to take on bad contracts, they will definitely look at MoT, Rice, and Moochie.

But it might be worth losing a few games to see Utah REALLY suffer.

 

I agree. It took Posey a while to find his niche with the Rockets, but after the Allstar break, he shot 46%, and 36% from 3pt range. His other numbers( with the Rockets) increased across the board, as well. Of course, that was only 34 games, so it's open to question whether he could repeat those numbers.

 

Just a thought in brief (or not).

Someone said it's easy to say Posey's salary isn't a lot when you're not paying it. No sh*t.

Forgive me, but I'm just so tired of fans talking about the amount of money that players get talking about how "we shouldn't sign him because he's not worth the money." You're right, it's not my money and it's not my responsibility to care about how much Posey makes. I think he's great for the team. I agree with all the positive scouting reports that are being written in this thread. He guards two positions very effectively, he's young, very athletic, improves annually and he locked down opposing players before the Rockets brought in one of the two or three best teachers of defense in the league (JVG). Posey gets better on his own every year, with JVG? Oh man, he could have been Posey's Obi-Wan.

I don't care how much money Posey makes. The only time I want to concern myself with how much money a player makes is if it makes a serious impact on the salary cap and would prevent future acquisitions according to NBA rules, but isn't a big reason you trade for a player in the final year of their contract getting his Larry Bird rights so you're not subject to salary cap restrictions in the summer?

Look, it's not my money and not my problem. He's a really good player, he's not yet 27, I'm not the owner, I'm a fan and my team is losing a very strong player. If they have basketball reasons for not signing him (playing time sharing conflicts, blocking Boki's development) then fine, I respectfully disagree with the assesment. I'm just tired of hearing fans be so utterly influenced by the financial concerns of a guy who just sold the naming rights of his stadium for 8 figures.

I don't intend to offend those of you who make such comments, I find myself slipping into that thinking sometimes ( "10 per, for that MF?" ) and find myself satisfied when I hear a contract that finally makes sense (Kandi).

For all of the people out there who say professional athletes make too much money, I say free market loving billionaire owners b**** too much about paying them.

 

Anyways...I think Boki is a terrific shooter. I was watching the video of him and Yao before the home opener last season and he missed the first few shots...but after he got a nice steady flow he was swishing the shots easily...or do all NBA players do that?

 

No more questions or comments from me (collective sigh at this time)

I just wanted to note that this thread reminds me of the old-skool bbs more than any other in a loooong time.

Keep up the good work guys..

 

Rockets2K, I do remember that the solving of the "PF by committee" situation was the primary reason for moving Thomas, but I just knew I had read some kind of thread stating something about him not liking Yao or something along those lines (even if only speculation).

So, pretty much for the first time seriously, I decided to search through the thread archives a bit.

In doing so, I came across a few past threads, which are relevant to the current discussion everyone here is having about the PF position and Posey situations. There are quite a few, but here are links to three of them:

http://bbs.clutchcity.net/php3/showthread.php?s=&threadid=55947 ("PF by committee" and Posey discussion)


http://bbs.clutchcity.net/php3/showthread.php?s=&threadid=56712 (Thomas vs. Posey contributions to the team, fears of Posey leaving for more money, etc.)


http://bbs.clutchcity.net/php3/showthread.php?s=&threadid=57905 (the Thomas not liking Yao speculation/discussion)

It's really interesting to read about what people were thinking merely a few months ago. I'm going to have to do this more often. Hope this adds to the current thread. Thanks for the motivation Rockets2K.

 

Nice work....thanks Well I totally agree with DaDakota....and some people are very wrong. But I don't know if Kenny would have been that good....with Rudy as coach. He did very well once he got comfortable in Philly and now has earned a nice contract....Oh well. It's just sad. I'm not expecting too much from the Rockets. I just hope they win at least half of their games and at least make the playoffs as 8th seed....God Bless America!

AND YOU KNOW...it's very sad that many of the people in those threads are gone. I can't take this.....goodn ight!

 

you overvalue our talent, that is the problem. top 4 last year. we can compete with the big 5 this year? you are a dreamer (i think you asked to be called a dreamer earlier in this thread, too many pages ago to remember) no two ways about it.

 

I don't know if we can compete with the top 5, but if there's a darkhorse candidate to surprise everyone in the West, it's surely the Rockets (assuming they re-sign Posey or replace him adequately).

 

I agree with most of what you're saying DearRock, however, you can't add wins to our tally because JVG is our coach, but not subtract the ones that we won because of Rudy's style.

Basically, if JVG's style will add wins in some places (likely against weaker teams), you have to consider that Rudy's style got wins in some places where JVG wouldn't.