The reason why shooters lose their shot under Van Gundy is very simple. It's because he gets them in training camp and from Day 1 he is drilling them into the floor with all those defensive drills and making them play touch the floor defense. And he tries to install his whole defense in the first 2 weeks of training camp. Shooting is all about the legs. When your legs go, I don't care how good your mechanics are, the shots go flat and start clanging off the rim. Van Gundy's defensive emphasis takes away shooter's legs. It would not surprise me one bit if he breaks down Novak this way but I hope Novak just ignores it, gives what he can defensively, and maintains his legs for the jumpers. We did not draft Novak to play defense. Yes, his defense needs to improve but we did not draft him to be that mythical "lock down" defender. We drafted him to hit the trey on the kickouts from Yao and McGrady.
Yeah, Air-Vak is pretty good, but aren't we forgetting the most important thing? His first name is Steve! Steve! Stevie! Stevie... Franchise?? Where have I heard that before..?
Wow I was just thinking that exactly was whats happening right now. Novak came out shooting lights out in the opening of summer league and now he has cooled down a bit. And coincidentally the Rockets defense has picked up... Saturday they held Cleveland to 58 points. It sounds to me that Thibodeau has been instructed to curtail the free running offense and make these guys play some defense and the result is a slightly less accurate Novak. I am not saying that's a bad thing cause he will need to play defense for us but clearly he is being ask to concentrate more on defense and now his offense suffers.
I'm happy that we got Novak.His shooting will help. He does need to work on the other aspects of the game like rebounding,defence,avoiding foul trouble to stay on the court because shooters will get cold at some point no matter how good they are. He does need to know that he shouldn't stop shooting if he isn't doing well to keep his confidence up.
Has Novak got a nickname yet? I read it somewhere that somebody mentioned a "SuperNovak". IMO that is a perfect nick for him.
Yeah, if they had given Darko on average 10 minutes of playing time his 1st year, 15 the 2nd, and 20 in the 3rd then he would have been ready by next season to take over as starting center since Ben Wallace has left. They could have cut his minutes in the playoffs if he did'nt deserve them. It may have cost them a few regular season wins to give him those minutes but the dude just turned 21 last month and would probably be a solid NBA player by now with a lot more upside left. He might not become a great player but I think he will develop into a good one down in Orlando now that he actually has a chance to play.
OK I can hear it coming out of Bill Worrells mouth after Novak hits his 3rd 3 pointer in a row against the Mavs: "It looks like Novak is going SUPER NOVA on Dallas!"
That actually is a pretty similar comparison. peja is not really that athletic or that great on defence but he sure can hit a open jump shot. I look forward to Novak takeing the 3pt crown away from dirk at the all star game in vegas.
I would say that Novaks stats are pretty damn good for someone that has cooled off. If anything is responsible for not hitting 6 of 8 3 pointers against Cle I would say that it is due to play 3 games in 3 days and the legs may be a little tired
Just what I was thinking...when shooting 3-7 from behind the arc is considered "cooling off", you gotta give props.
Exactly. If we hadn't adopted the "win now" attitude three years ago, we would have youngsters ready to make major contributions today. And our current "win now" attitude could really bite us in the future: we're not about to win a championship this coming year, so why the rush?
Is there evidence that shooters shoot worse under Van Gundy? Objectively, I'd have to say no. Look up the career 3pt shooting stats of guys like Wesley, Allan Houston, Scott Padgett, Jon Barry, Bob Sura, Cuttino Mobley, I can't see any noticeable evidence that Van Gundy causes signficant drop in FG%. In fact, some of them have significantly higher FG% when playing for Van Guny. There are probably some exceptions... Piatkowski, for one, but he was not in good health that year. Van Gundy doesn't run the most exciting offense, but the offense does tend to create enough open jumpers for those capable of knocking them down. Last year, the Rockets simply didn't have the best shooters out there. There are things Van Gundy should be criticized for (playing Juwan Howard too many minutes, for one) but making ruining shooters confidence or taking away their legs are not something an objective observer can prove that he does.
There is no fact to what I am saying I haven't watched 1 game. It is just a thought that crossed my mind, but it is a fact the final scores have gotten lower and Lucas, Novak and Carroll or not as hotas they started out. I didn't say they were bad just cooling off a bit... It may very well be that the guys are just tired and now that you mention it that does make sense but it's also possible Thibodeau is teaching heavy doses of defensive startegy and putting an emphasis on that in the games and it is affecting the players offense. Again I don't know which is true but I suspect it is a combination of both. Also I don't think it's a bad thing to emphasis on defense and at this time I wasn't pointing the finger on coaching styles effecting players offense only pointing out a plausible reasoning behind the dropoff... Haven't you ever had something that you were normally good at dropoff because you were concetrating on something else. It doesn't mean once you get the new thing down the old stuff won't come back as usual.
I'd much rather defense be the backbone of this team than offense. Even if our shots arent falling, we always have a strong defense to rely upon.
