You're right it most certainly can be. If a team doesnt have enough offensive weapons and the ones they have play at thier best, then there are times that Shane does indeed need to step up his game. This team does have enough weapons, but they were just god awful tonight. But Battier came in tonight, did his job, handling Jefferson...yet the mob has decided to try and make him thier scapegoat after every loss this year since McGrady, Head and Alston are all gone. Nevermind Ariza's 5-21 shooting, Brooks 5-15, Hayes 0-8, or the wreckless out of control Lowry 2-6, or even Landry 5-13. No no, it was Battier's fault for only taking 2 shots....Thats just ignorant and stupid. Sorry, Im not going to stand by while Ariza gets a pass and Battier gets lynched despite, at this point, being a more effecient player on both sides of the ball. FFS Ariza left Jefferson wide open for what would wind up being a critical play. How does that even happen? EVERY criticism of McGradys play and his "me-mac" style, Trevor Ariza has shown this year, and I mean every single one...ill advised threes, bad FTs, turnovers, lazy defense.
you're right, adelman needs to cut down on ariza's minutes too. if tracy isn't going to play, more budinger. A LOT more budinger.
adelman needs to do this or that, blah-blah. you've been saying that all night. sounds like you're more competent in nba coaching.
Battier 0-2 and Hayes 0-8 both are starters. Your delusional if you think Shane is stopping the growth of Budinger, Chase is freaking rookie for christ sakes.
Battier hasn't improved since his rookie yr. he does nothing better now than when he came in as a rookie. I've watched him from college and into the pro's and i thought he was going to be a 16ppg 6 reb good defender type. he got better every yr in college and after his rookie yr, i thought he was going to continue, but somewhere in there he didn't. His offensive game never got better, one of the years when memphis started posey, they went to the playoffs with shane playing 20 mins a night. He never worked on his weakness and now and for the last 7 or 8 yrs he's been a stand around and wait offensive player that has 0 explosion and is scared. A player cant play scared and be effective. I saw him tonigh go baseline and instead of going up strong, he threw a terrible bounce pass all the way to the top of the key with the clock running down and brooks had to force up a shot. He's not the blame for this loss, its a team effort, but the guy is a bench player and has been one for 5 yrs or so. Its not that he cant contributem but he and hayes starting is a terrible way to start a game and neither would start for any other team thats competing for a playoff spot.
Is becoming a every game thing. Rox get a lead in the 1st quarter. Then the opposing team realizes shane can't dunk,attack,elbow back, talk ****,dribble,penetrate,hesitant to shoot . It becomes 3 on 5 (chuck and shane). By that time our players are worn out because shane passed up on all his three's. Here is where ariza comes in trying to revive us and he gets flamed for it.
battier is a perfect compliment player to stars, obviously we have injuries, but in the bigger picture and the long run, we need this guy, he brings the best out of the stars and ultimately they are going to be the one to win any hopeful titles
Jefferson did okay tonight. Although FG% was 20%, his "actual" FG% is much better because his FT% was 100% (7-7). This means he missed many shots because he was fouled. Fouls on a good FT% guy is not smart play or good defense.
In the big picture of things, Shane needs those minutes right now so his perceived value stays high. I don't see him being here next year, because McG's return will push Ariza into Shane's role. With the contract and commitment we've made to Trev, rest assured he will get preference in minutes vs Shane. Even if McG does end up leaving Houston, by hook or by crook, we'll definitely be looking to replace his wing prowess with a player that will keep Trev in a supporting role (if this year has shown nothing else, it has shown that Trev cannot and should not ever be expected to be a leading wingman). Chase will get his minutes in due time, but we need (imo) to continue trotting Shane out and touting him as the "backbone" or "glue" of this "scrappy, gritty" team. Some contender or psuedo-likeness-of will eventually/hopefully bite on it and maybe supply us with a decent (mid-round) pick or average bigman. In the meantime, Chase needs to keep working on a mid-range game, a separation jabstep, and continue rounding his game off. If he ever fulfills his purported "lotto talent" he may fill TMac's role as lead wingman (though I have my doubts). For now, though, Bud's where he needs to be...~20mpg with the ability to gain or lose minutes depending on how aggressively and effectively he plays.
See, that's what still keeps you in the "shane-hater" category....it's one thing to not have the skills or abilities to do something and a different thing not to want to work on them. When it's convenient for you to argue that he's refusing to improve, you argue it, but when it's convenient to argue he just doesn't have the skills necessary to improve, you argue that too. It's one or the other. Personally i've always said he's not a truly talented ball player, but instead a guy who happened to be blessed with a basketball body and made the most out of it with hard work. That's obviously good AND bad for shane. any guy who's been playing ball for so long isn't going to be scared to do just that, play ball. The guy just religiously sticks to what he knows he can do. Is that a bad thing with this lineup? Of course, but is that a knock on him as a player? I don't think so. He is what he is, what he has been. No surprises. Yet he's still in the league, has pretty much always started and played big minutes. He's obviously not a bench player on any average NBA team. He may become that on this year's team, but i think we all know we're anything but average..
And i can respect any anti-shane thread when he plays poorly, but what i can't respect is this idea that he needs to be traded for a center. WE HAVE A CENTER. He's injured. He'll be back next year. A back up center? We have one too, his name is David Andersen. Chuck Hayes too. So unless we're including one of those three in a trade it makes no sense to waste Battier on yet another center. As much as I like budinger, he's not going to save the wingspot within the next 2 yrs, he's still a rookie and we need someone consistently solid at that spot.
He never worked on his game period. Call me a hater or what but you don't flatline like shane has at a early age if you work on your game. You can call it craty or you can call it whatever, but after his rookie year, he stopped being effective offensively almost overnight. You don't have to believe me, go look at some games in memphis and look at him now. Thats not hate thats the truth ad we can see when guys work on their games. He may not can blow by people, but meither can finley and he's still a better offensive player than shane. He can triple threat a guy, put the ball on the floor, get to 18 ft and stick a jumper at the age of 37. Shane should be able to do those things. Kobe is a prime example of improving after 30 while shane is a guy content to stand in the corner. i'm ready, we can do this tonight :grin:
no one is perfect. adelman has been a great coach, but sometimes coaches can fall in love with particular players. i think other teams scout also. they don't just go by what that team says. right now, i'm sure the elite teams would love to have shane, but his value isn't as high as it was 2 years (or even last year) ago. i just feel if we're not going to play mcgrady, we might as well as speed up the development of cbud and allow him to have the green light like ariza has right now. cbud is a better ballhandler and offensive player than ariza already is, and it won't be too soon until cbud surpasses ariza. this is wrong. ariza definitely does more offensively (penetrate better, willing to go to the basket, get to the ft line). ariza is not just someone who hides in the corner and chillax. ariza right now has the green light so he's trying to do too much. when/if mcgrady returns, look for ariza to be a much more efficient player.
Unfortunately, Adelman has to go with the status quo. He appears to be the kind of coach that wouldn't want to step on anyone's toes(this same sickness seems to be suffered by other Houston professional coaches; such as when David Carr was never benched because of poor performance, or even Matt Shaub who is currently stinking up the joint and is still the starting qb). So I don't see this happening in the near future.
