ClutchFans Game Thread: Rockets @ Hawks 1/10/2014

Sorry for the late post reply... I went off to watch Lone Survivor, it was a pretty cool show.

Yes, I did take it as a positive, especially when it wasn't a play drawn up for him, and he was reacting to the situation presented at that moment, and still calmly hit the shot. It was basically a toe on the line, and the comments about it are way overblown. Pretty cute on the play on my moniker. I am still cautiously optimistic about this team.

 

Why do you think that I would be happy that they lost? I didn't post emotional outbursts like half the posters here. Doesn't mean I'm happy they lost. Lol.

 

I can't totally agree with this. The game scheme has changed with Howard in the lineup. Lin cannot play the same attacking style in the starting PG role as if the team is still running and gunning like last year or if he and Harden were the two main scoring options, especially given the current makeup of the team and what their needs are at the PG position that he's filling in for. With this most recent game against NYK, I thought it was a mistake for coaching to give the directive to Lin to attack, which actually led to his game collapsing in the second half, and AB coming in to replace him. Yeah he scored 14 or whatever points in that first half of the game, but so what? The offense was not focused around Howard and Harden, which made it easy for NYK to reverse the table in the second half. What the team needed was for him to focus more on defense and play more of a controlled game so that the offense went through Howard and Harden. If Lin came off the bench, then I could see him doing more of that attacking. Also, please stop using Linsanity. Linsanity is the past. As much as I enjoyed it when it occurred, I think it only harms him whenever it is mentioned.

 

I agree with what you are saying. Lin crumbled tonight on plenty of occasions. Bad passes, confused, etc. But the lack mental toughness could've gone around to everyone tonight AB missing his 2 FT's was huge. That was nothing but mental right there. And Harden not being at his spot for a play that was clearly calling for him to be at the corner of the key and he was nowhere near. Also, both Lin and Harden made some terrible turnovers that stifled every attempt to get back in. And lastly, DH needs to be able to get in position to get the ball. We never saw Hakeem not be able to muscle his way into position and DH is much stronger.

I will chalk it up to us still being young and I think we can see this team grow before the playoffs. It's just the growing pains we are going through right now.

 

Thank you for the level headed post. I agree with many of the points you observed, especially the solid effort on defense. The part I thought was a repeating weakness on defense was during transition. Also, on offense I think their struggles are related not only to Parsons not playing, but also how they want to get the ball to Howard more, which immediately slows down their game and ball movement whenever the ball handler (whether it's Harden or Lin) slows down and tries to set up a pass into Howard on both sides of the arc. Hawks did a good job of shoving Howard out of position, and it seemed like attempts by both Harden & Lin to throw the ball to him were thwarted. I'm yearning for a little more of the running style of last year, which was much more fluid and much easier to watch. This current style favors a player like Bev at the point more so than Lin, who seems to have dropped off on some of his strengths from last year, such as assists and rebounds. I'm not trying to pit the two against each other, I'd rather see both playing fully healthy.

 

Nice Post.

 

All true.

 

I think we win this if Garcia plays halfway decent. He was atrocious tonight like usual this season. Missed every wide open shot, especially those 3s in the 4th.

 

Lin is starter ready. He proved that last year. But this year he's being yanked around that he's no longer sure of his role. So I do agree that in our current system he is not a good fit.

Also, he has shown that he can take clutch shots as well. There were several last year and this year as well that when the game was on the line, he was ready.

The problem is again that he's not a good fit for our current system because I was sure Harden was going to take the shot and it looked like Lin was moving in the grab the rebound. Why? Because that's what they would always do.

So not sure of it was a miscommunication, a bad play, or what.

 

are you talking about that last shot? there were 3 guys around him. he woulda got blocked. if he missed, we woulda been talking about how he wanted to be the hero taking big shots over triple teams. i agree he was stupid for passing it considering the time...but he had no shot to get it off anyway. #reactiontionaryisreactionary

 

Ugh. Even that stupid mohawk experiment is pissing me off now. What a disappointment.

 

Without Parsons, Rockets basically are not playing like a team.

 

Lin fans have more excuses for lin then a chinese phone book has name listings.

 

That shows flaws with this team. There's no reason why Parsons' absence should be an excuse for the Rockets to lose a 3pt game to a team that is not better who was also missing their best player. Rockets had Dwight and Harden, they had Korver and Milsap!

 

Not true. There is one poster tht joined in 2000 that has at least 5 highly anti-Lin posts in this thread.

 

I think everyone thought he was going to shoot.

 

What is so infuriating is that the coach would give up that beautiful uptempo fast ball movement type of team ball of last year to this year's ugly slow down stagnant & selfish hero ball. The assist is way down, the fast break points way down. Even the Hawks had a lot more fast breaks than us, and 10 more assists than us. Toronto now leads their division because after trading so call a star ballhog in Rudy Gay, they now play the kind of beautiful team ball-moving ball like we did last year and they pile up win after win, even over Indiana and almost beating the Heat. Why is it that McHale not seeing this regression in the team offense? Why no adjustment made? So did the team players meet and the two so called stars demand more hero ball? We are toasted if the offense is so inefficient compared to last year and the defense remains just as weak.

 

Lin looks like he has no clue what his role is on this team. Plays get drawn by the coach but get overridden by Harden, Lin gets blamed. Guys miss defense assignments and it looks like Lin overhelps. Too many guys are playing selfishly so when a pass comes their way they fumble. Read and reactoffense with not all 5 guys on the same page is making this team look messy. Looks to me like this is the effect of sticky ball. Lin looked done in this game.

 

Jeremy Lin fans want him to be the hero.
The question is if Jeremy himself wants to be the hero.

 

So much ado over a mediocre PG like Lin with limited upside. Never seen so much focus on someone like Lin who will struggle to be a top 20 PG in the NBA. That is the problem here. Rockets should not be relying on average players like Lin. And no Bev is not the solution either.

The whole PG situation needs to be fixed.