I know I know, we have players inured, its going to take time, etc, etc. But it is no excuse. Start with some fundamentals: A) The Rockets are a horrible shooting team. It has only been two games but they were pretty bad last year as well. B) The Rockets are a horrible passing team - they don't understand that when a player is open, you have to hit him right then so that he can make something happen and another player can get in even better position. C) The Rockets have horrible clock management. Even running a simple pick and roll, it seems as if they try to wait until their are only about 10 seconds left on the shot clock so that whne it doesnt work they are screwed. D) The Rockets play awful man to man defense. It's simple - stay between your man and the basket at all times. Apparently the new way to play defense is to guard him from the side. More complex offensive schemes? None to think of, and to be honest Rudy has never had one. Defensive rotation? Sure, occasionally they try, but they are not very good at it. Inbound plays? Let's be honest, they've been running the same inbound play for two years, and they only have that one? Rotations? According to Rudy the answer to ever problem is to play three guards. Not only that, but somehow Jason Collier and Hawkins are in the rotation ahead of your number one pick and surprise sweetshooting Euro pickup. This team will get better when the players return, at least in the win loss column. But how many of you really feel confident right now that the team has a good shot of making the playoffs, much less at a spot as high as 6th? IMO, it is defintely not talent. Even with the injuries, we had about twice the level of talent on the floor as the Nuggets tonight. I think the game has passed Rudy by and they need someone new. I'd love to see a Byron Scott or Larry Brown coaching this team right now.
I felt they did a better job of the so called 5 man offense tonight. Mainly in the 4th quarter, the ball was moving pretty well... it could have been better but it's a start. It gave me some hope. Once players come back, once Yao gets acclimated, once we get back to normalcy, new wrinkles will be added every day I'm assuming. I'll reserve judgement about Rudy for a while... until maybe 15 or so games have passed by.
Personally I think Rudy is a great coach for a VETERAN team. I think he is far to passive for this bunch. He needs to assert his will a little on these players and get them motivated to play WINNING basketball. If he can not do that, then he should go. DaDakota
Rudy made a couple of comments on the radio the other time about how it will take time, give it time, etc., etc. Look, if it takes soo long to figure this stuff out, they should start training camp a month earlier. DaDa hit the nail on the head. Rudy dishes out responsibility to his players and expects them to get it done. It obviously doesn't work for this bunch.
Why do none of our players know how to hold a pick? Why do we seem to gain no advantage when a guard dribbles through a pick? I'm sure the pick was not designed to just be a mini speed bump, that just moves the isolation play 4 feet to the right or left. Our guys either don't know how to execute, or haven't been taught. My least favorite team in all of sports . . . the Utah Jazz. Yet, they set and hold picks. They use picks to their advantage. There's actually a discernable reason for the picks. If we're just going to wind up running iso anyway, we might as well not pretend with the picks. It just takes time off the clock. dribble, dribble, dribble. I've now gone from disappointed to ticked off. I'm glad this bbs screens for cussing.
I think he is a great coach. Young players that is it thats all you need to know.......................
I actually agree with you DaDakota. Rudy is a veteran specialist. I think he could take a veteran team like Portland over the top, but running a young team doesn't seem to be his specialty. Still, let's see where the team is at the all-star break. Just one thing: If the Rockets are blown out by Seattle on November 29th, then I will be coming to Houston to give Rudolph a piece of my mind, and my RAGE.
I agree with you.. the point i was tryin to make was that the offense IS coming along, especially from what I saw tonight. Therefore, I'll check to see if the offense continues to come along and improve with the addition of new players, new plays, etc. I personally think that it will succeed without a very long wait.
Why is everyone blaming this on Rudy? You are just using him as a scapegoat. Why do you think most players in the league want to play for him? He is a players coach. He will take this team to the playoffs and he will do better than Flip and his first round flops.
I think it's nearly impossible to take a bunch of young guys who've never tasted winning and make them play team basketball. You can't do it. All you can do is develop them and teach them and hope that once they get tired of losing the light will dawn on them.
Does anyone else get the feeling that Rudy shows up to tell the guys who is playing and then just takes a seat on the bench for the entire game? Maybe that is why he is considered a "players coach"....he never does anything. I know I am exaggerating, but I have to wonder sometimes about his rotations and why certain players never get taken out if they are sucking.
Some people will take this the wrong way, but I think Rudy is just like a "cool" parent instead of being a parent. Coaching is similar to raising kids to me in that in its a very thin line between being a "players coach" or "cool mom and dad" to being The Coach or Parents. Its times in the games where it seems like he doesn't say anything to Cat and Francis because he is so much a players coach and i think this is a problem for him. I've seen many times where Jackson would get in Kobe's grill because of stupid shots or mental mistakes. I've also seen Van Chancellor during timeouts get on Swoopes ,Thomapson and Cooper for not executing ofensive assignments or defensive assignment. How many times have we seen or heard Rudy getting on Steve ,Cat, or Moochie for dribbling the clock out or not passing the ball to open teammates? I can honestly say the times i have been to the games and sat pretty much behind the bench , none. I agree with people that say he is a good coach for veteran teams, but with guys who need discipline and what not i don't think he's right. I don't want to start the get rid of rudy threads and everything, but this team is clearly underachieving with the injuries. Sac beat the tar out of portland without Bibby,Christie or Webber but we claim to be playoff ready and can't even beat Indy without the backcourt and Croshere and slip by a rebuilding Denver. Whats even worse is the games are looking just like last yr and everyone said don't panic because its early. Well, it looks like a duck,walks like and duck so I'm going to call it a duck. 80.5ppg for a young atheltic team isn't really acceptable. If they want to run a good offense, hire Doug Moe and let him install the 80's Denver Nuggets offense.
One thing I notice about Rudy... Once he's comfortable with a successful offensive system, it takes him a long time to wake up and realize its not successful anymore. When Hakeem, Barkley and Clyde were playing here, they had the dump it in kick it out offense that utilizes the great post up abilities of his players...Once they all retired and Hakeem got old, and Steve and Cat were emerging as players yet Rudy keeps on using that ineffective dump it in play to hakeem for a while, even though it doesn't work anymore (Primarily because Hakeem got so old). Many many fans, including myself were so tired of the old plays to hakeem because its so ineffective and predictable. Slowly Rudy started creating that ISO play that takes advantage of Steve and Cat's one on one skills. This was really successful until the league allowed zones. Right now, Rudy is stuck in the bad habits of having the ISO offense, even though its not effective anymore. I think by the end of the year, our new 5 man offense will be very effective once all of the players get used to the plays.
mini speed bump, that moves the iso 4 feet left or right! that's classic! i don't know whether to laugh or cry reading this post. laugh because it's pretty damn funny, cry because for the most part it's true.
There is no such thing as a "complete" coach, meaning that some guys function well with vet players (like Rudy), while some thrive with younger players. Some coaches are great at massaging egos (Phil), some are decent at every spot they coach (Larry Brown). However, there is no coach in the league who can be succesful in any and all sitauions. With that being said, I think Rudy has deserved to remain as coach for the Rockets up to this point. However, if the Rockets do not play as well as they should, then he's ran out of chances IMO.
We'll have some consistent, good wins later this season. I'll be more interested to read through negative Rudy threads then. All of the negative threads started after 1 or 2 games are a joke.
