Holy crap, over 1200 posts in this thread?? Geeez, the end of the world came early. Anyway, from last night: The refs officiating seemed to be designed specifically to take us out of the game early and often. Once it became clear that the refs were going to blow their whistles for even breathing in the general vicinity of any jazz player, our defense went into the toilet. Someone needs to remind the officials of the respect Yao earned last year. They cannot go back to whistling on him all the time like they did early in his career. Stern needs to take a look at this issue. Our offense broke because they seemed to be in the mindset of 'perimeter shot! permieter shot!' .. Alston, especially, seemed to be forcing, instead of just taking shots within the flow. His first option should be to drive and dish, when he is left open like that. I am sure this is part of JVG's 'new' offensive mindset, and it's going to take a handful of games to get everyone settled, Alston should be looking to drive in and distribute to Yao, Battier and TMac. Heck, even Snyder is good at cutting in on the backside on someone else's drive. Hopefully the next game will see this adjustment made. And the jazzholes.. well, nothing you can say about that, other than the fact that they probably will not have as good a shooting night as they did last night for the nest of the season. They were unconscious, and they still almost lost this game, so I am not all that worried about us. The refs need to swallow their whistles a bit, we need to use better judgement when the passes come out to the perimeter, and Bonzi needs to get his fat a$$ in shape and out on the floor! Oh, and what the heck is up with Bullard? Did you hear that last night? Yao makes some kind of a diving play under the basket, the ball goes the other way, and Bull yells out something like, 'Look out! Yao just sprained his ankle!' And then there's Yao running around just fine 3 seconds later.. he did something else like that last night too, but I can't remember what it was..
It's only one game, but yeah, would have liked a better effort...I only saw highlights, so I can only gather game play from the posts... We should have a great game against the Mavs (suck)
Well I'm from Greece and I don't saw the game. I'm a new Rockets fan(yeah because of Spanoulis ) but let be more possitive with this team. It's too early to analyze things. I think this team has potentials and with more effort will be better for sure. Maybe Spanoulis didn't play this first match but I think JVG will give him the chance to prove how good he is. It's my opinion, but Spanoulis playing better when the game is difficult. I don't know If I'm right but that's my opinion. Anyway, I saw the statics of the game and yeah there aren't so good but It's early to tell anything.
Negatives: Free throw shooting, poise, defense, Yao/Battier Foul trouble Why we're alright: Low turnovers, we're not gonna allow many teams to shoot 54%, Yao and T-mac looked sharp in the second half.
Not to make any excuses for the Rockets play, but if this is the type of product we can expect from the NBA and its officiating, then I'd like a refund for NBA League Pass. The Rockets clearly looked surprised by how the game was officiated, as well they should. I don't recall hearing nearly as many whistles during the preseason and that was played mostly by rookies and sophomores. The Rockets defense looked horrible because they weren't allow to play any. Period. Think about it. Battier is a smart player and was never able to adjust to the officiating. That should tell you something. The pace, rhythm, flow of the game was completely destroyed and brought to a screaming halt every few seconds in the first quarter. Just ugly.
Shane had one play where he stood up as Boozer was barreling into the paint. Boozer crashed into him and shane got whistled for the blocking foul. Same play against Yao in the WC was blown for Shane. Sure looked like Shane was set on that one. I thought the offciating totally ruined the flow of the game. Neither team could really get a flow going until late in the 3rd. 31 fouls in a half???? Get real man.
The Good: - As a whole, the Rockets are definitely a stronger team. Last year, the old team would've folded a lot sooner, but this team almost clawed their way back in it. Utah ain't no pushover although they did have some ref help, especially in the 1st quarter. - Yao looked pretty solid in last night's run. - When Shane was actually on the court, he looked quite good. - Quite happy with Snyder's overall hustle and aggressiveness to the rim. - The starting 5 look good in the 4th quarter. The Bad: - Can someone buy Luther a layup? Plus, he really didn't do anything in the game it seemed. - Tracy had a pretty bad game and shot one too many step back jumpers. - Not enough touches for Yao. - Alston trying to force the issue with a trey late in the 4th when the Rockets were down 5 with the ball in hand. That was a poor decision...instead of trying to stick a dagger with a trey, they should've fed Yao for a higher percentage shot. The Ugly: - Free Throw Shooting...ugh - The refs...they most definitely took the Rockets out of their aggressive defense with all that early whistle blowing. You couldn't breathe on a Jazz player at all. - Was it me, or did any of y'all catch Tracy limping towards the end of the game? - I'll say it again, the refs. It was quite obnoxious how they dicatated the play and controlled the tempo. I could not believe how many fouls were called against the Rockets in the first 5 minutes.
FRUSTRATING!! Everything from the Officiating to the Free Throw shooting....I hate to see TMAC settle for the outside shot..They guy is unbelievable when driving to the basket....Rafter started playing better so that was encouraging...God Padgett looked bad WHAT THE HELL WAS DEKE doing out there....that is ridiculous. The guy can't even make a layup....We need to pick up or trade for a back up center...He is killing us when Yao is out
yea you learn to expect this kind of reaction over the years since we rarely get off to good starts. but it just seems to be magnified with all the new posters..if you notice...most of the really whiny posts are from noobs...and the rest are from the usual suspects. I aint worried...one bad opener does not make or break a season (unless you lose your main guy of course...knock on wood)
Utah played better. They were quicker and shot better. Out hustled and rebounded us too. No real excuses though. If this trend persists for us, I will be real worried. I am waiting to see how they perform the next couple games.
I still don't understand why JVG always wants the PF to do the inbound. This kills all our fastbreak chances and rhythm.
We were always complaining Yao's first couple years why he always inbounded the ball, it killed his chance to get down early and get good position.
What we need more is Penetration, we have two guys who can do that, Bonzi and Vspan, we need to play them.
Yeah 1200 posts is really something to see! I disagree with you here. The refs were calling it tight on the perimeter and it looked like the Rockets did not adjust at all. There was a lot of reaching as they were getting beaten by their man. I downloaded JVG's interview with Padillo and he said that what the league is doing now is to have the refs clamp down on all contact on the perimeter while anything goes under the basket. That's what I saw happening last night. It looks like teams will continue to run a guard at Yao when he gets the ball in the post until the Rockets find a way to make them pay. Outside of the PF position, Alston is the next biggest weakness on the team. I consistently watched Fisher leave him to double Yao because they (Jazz) weren't afraid to leave him alone because of his poor shooting ability. He didn't score until around 8 minutes in the 3rd period. He's basically a one dimensional PG and I just don't think that you can win in the West with him as your starting PG (my personal opinion). Expect other teams to keep exploiting this weakness until the Rockets come up with a workable counter strategy. How they play against the Mavericks on Saturday will tell us a lot about how opposing teams will be attacking them (Rockets) this season because the Mavericks are keen on creating and exploiting mismatches.
If I remember correctly, they ruled that Shane was on or inside the circle. If that's true then it doesn't matter if he was set or not.
