I kinda agree with you Harden: no night life or whatever he does at night before games Lin: he needs to toughen up get some fouls hard fouls or get a tech after getting into the refs face for not getting an obvious foul. Howard: He can smile when we are winning but not on loses or bad loses. (tho i haven't seen him smile when we are) just demand the ball. Parsons: Stop turning the Ball over glad he hasn't pump fake much lately Rest of the guys , actually all of the guys need to keep practicing their free throws. shoot their 3s when their open and everyone needs to feed Howard more. Specially when he has a smaller guy or has inside position at point blank just to slam it down above all effort ( defense, keeping their man close, going for the ball, just hustle and keep running and moving the ball) Be smart with the ball. no dribbling till last second to pass or shoot (Harden), not to force shots (Jones),no driving in without a clue (Lin, Parsons) no risky passes. Know your personnel and themselves. if you know u aren;'t there to drive just shoot the ball (Casspi, Garcia) instead of feeding Howard with a bounce pass lob it near the rim
effort? effort? how 'bout play smarter, not harder. everyone is giving effort. harden plays 40min a game. he's human. you can only get so much out of him playing so many minutes. how about play smarter, not harder. coaches need to coach them up. if they're not doing what you're asking them to do, try another way to get through to them.
The theme of the meeting should be "know your role." And this "read and react" offense should be based on Dwight getting it in the post and reacting to what the defense does. That being said, Dwight has to cut down on his TOs in the post. Not all his fault though, people need to call out double teams.
Agree with all of this except, let's wait and see how Rondo comes back from his injury. It would be devastating to trade for him only to lose him to another injury a few weeks down the road due to overcompensating with his other knee, a la Kobe and DRose.
Maybe some of you guys should go under the assumption Rondo isn't coming to the Rockets. If Ainge was actively shopping him that's one thing, but the guy hasn't even played this year and who knows how long it will take him to get back in form when he does? This is a random trade post. The players meeting is for what we know is the case for the forseeable future and if Morey is thinking core of Harden, Howard, Parsons, Lin and Jones, that's the team to deal with working out their stuff. If he's still behind McHale, then the team will have to do the best job they can under his coaching. If you think it can't be done with this team and only trades can save the team, then whatever Morey can work out will happen. But Rondo may not be a part of the plans ever.
What are you talking about? The Texans player meeting netted us the number 1 pick in the draft! After the Super Bowl, the #1 pick is the next best thing. There is no prize for 2nd place.
seriously how much better would the team be if James and Chandler stepped up their efforts on defense. Chandler was much better last year but as his scoring increased his defense has gone way down. They need to get it together.
Harden apologist at his best. Guess what , the "every other players" blamed themselves after bad performance before, Harden have yet to say anything about he should have done better after 1 and a half years in Houston.
What system? This isn't football. Stop the ball first. Someone sets a screen on you, you switch onto that person. The person you're guarding sets a screen, you switch. I know with complex offenses in the nba it's a little more complicated than that, but these are fundamental things my son is learning in 7th grade. So thus tells me it's primarily a lack of effort. Communication and coaching too, but primarily effort.
Hope they watched Knicks/spurs nets/okc last night. Thise teams played defense down down the stretch & kept the ball moving. Shumpert hit the last 2 shots because melo moved the ball didn't ISO. Both teams communicated on D and we're determined to get stops. It's not just Hardens DEFENSE either, parsons, Lin, Howard, jones everyone needs to rotate better, stay close to your man, trust your teammates, communicate if a switch needs to happen, box out on rebounds, just go all out !
you fly off on tangents at times and this is one. have you seen the Dr. Rivers rant after the Clippers lost by 20 to the Suns. Please insert it here and continually refresh every time one of you has a meltdown. Do you remember the struggles we had early on integrating Tracy? Statistically speaking - Tracy and James are very similar down the line. Rondo would expose a lack of perimeter shooting (although I'd give an asik based trade including Lin a shot). we've won against good teams because of effort. Effort on both D and O. Cuts are harder, spacing is better, movement is consistent in these wins. So is individual man defense as well as defensive rotations. Against lesser opponents, they just don't bring it. Their meeting was spot on, but as others have indicated - they will seem to correct their mistakes for several games and then fall back into them. This is a trademark of young teams. They need time to mature - both as a unit and as individuals. There are also several redundancies on the roster and we aren't a complete product - but that won't be changed until the coming season at best.
Honestly I'm not even sure what posters mean when they say "mchale needs to hold him accountable" Does that mean put a player in timeout when he plays poorly?
The coaches and the Morey are the ones that need a meeting. THose players are lost with no direction. Someone needs to man up. It's no secret that morey loves that three ball stretch 4 p***y ball so come out and coach then or let Mchale do his thing, if he has it which I doubt it.
I wanted to finish reading the thread, because I assumed Bev's name would come up and I wouldn't need to make a post. On the last page, you finally did. I think his loss has had far more impact than a lot of people seem to think. Effort? When you see a guy like Beverley go balls to the wall on defense every minute he's out there, when healthy, it can't help but impact the effort of the other players, and that's putting aside the direct impact he has on the game itself. When Patrick Beverley returns and is well, my opinion is that some of our problems will begin to be reduced. Obviously on defense, but also just his over all play. Carl posted an image of Lowry earlier, and I agree that a point like him could help cure our ills, but the return of Bev and Omer will be huge. At least if we eventually see Asik playing in Houston again. Hell, even Smith could help. Our bench was a strength, and now not so much. Harden's been banged up, and so has Lin and Parsons. We need depth, we need our most important players playing fewer minutes, and we need a freakin' bench that's effective again. That and the uncertainty about Asik needs to go away.
This. I think people are losing sight as to how much of a perfect storm there is right now with the Rockets issues with the bench. A. Asik situation just keeps getting worse (injuries now on top of trade drama) B. Heart and soul of perimeter defense (Bev) out which leads to loss of impact of true impact 6th man in Lin C. Garcia, Casspi, and Brewer have ... more or less.... sucked D. Injury to Smith E. Up and down play of D-Mo Still with all the issues the Rockets are having right now they are still on pace to have the best season since the 2006/07 season when they had a relatively healthy Tracy & half a season of Yao. While I dont think that McHale is greatest X's and O's coach in the world, I dont think that He alone is the greatest problem the Rockets have as one would think just by reading CF... Well that and apparently James Harden is a immoral A#$ who can't play basketball and needs to be traded ASAP. The main problems are that the team hasn't been healthy, certain players have sucked, and there has been some major drama in the locker room... caused by A PLAYER... not a coach. Keep in mind that tankapalooza will start up in about 2 months making games against the likes of the bottom feeders that much easier. They will start unloading good veteran players at the deadline, and some of those players might become Rockets and really help shore up the bench at a very low cost. Getting just Beverley and Asik back will make a world of difference, but there are other things coming as well that will add to the benefit of making this team much much better than it looks on nights like Wednesday night against the Kings and the game before against the Thunder.
