Okay, not to jump the gun on end-of-the-season posts, but I would like to know what people think of Rudy's performance this year - especially people in the "Fire Rudy" cult early this year. I am going to give my take and a letter grade, feel free to do the same. -------- I think Rudy is clearly a coach who thrives with players still seeking their NBA niche - rookies, young guys, underachievers, etc. I also think the one sentence tag on this 99-00 team will probably be "they were a mess with Barkley and Dream, but showed a lot of improvement, chemistry, and potential when the young guys took over." In the context of what happened to the team this year, there was probably no better guy for the job than Rudy, who kept the team from falling apart and put them in a position to beat some good teams (Port, Sea, Utah) as the season is closing down, which will give everybody a good feeling for next year. That being said, had Hakeem and Charles stayed healthy, this team might have been fodder for a "why Houston's experiment went totally wrong" feature on "Inside The NBA" so the injuries may have been a slight blessing for Tomjanovich. Regardless, he did a very good job keeping people's spirits and confidence up, and adapting his coaching style to suit young guys in a guard-oriented offense. Nice work, Rudy. Will consider a grade raise once you get us Tim Duncan. Grade: A- ------------------
F F F F FF F F F F F F F !!!!!!! RUDY is the reason HOUSTON is going to the lottry instead of the PLAYOFFS!! If RUDEY had been fired when DUKE OF TRUTH first sugjested it, do you know where we would be now. Huh? Right! IN THE FROG-LICKING PLAYOFFS, THAT'S WHERE! F stands for FIRE RUDY!!! ------------------ A HOUSE is not a HOME if it is ON FIRE.
I give Rudy an Incomplete leaning towards a B+/A-. Did he ever have his whole lineup playing together? That is unfortunate. You may be right CBFan, that hte injuries helped, but who knows. Barkley was starting to come around to the new style before he went out. Hakeem might have as well. It took Rudy a while to really implement change, but that is to be expected. It has been great to see the progression/improvement of all of the players and coaches as they find their role. Steve knowing he can take over Shandon finding his way around the offense Cat forgetting he can miss shots Drew gaining confidence Drew losing confidence Wizard turning into Nicholas Scoby (character from a Paul Beatty book who could never miss a shot) KT showing the low post moves Cato breaking out Cato hiding again Rudy trying new things. it has been fun. ------------------ rimbaud post-a-thon 2000
I see the injuries as a situation that caused a transition to an offensive style that Rudy probably did not want to make until next year at the earliest. The only thing that kept me from giving him an A was the fact that he kept trying to change Drew from a post up PG to a run and gun PG, and that just ain't gonna happen. I knew it, you knew, Drew knew it, Rudy knew it. As soom as Moochie came in it was time for Drew to ride the pine. With the (post injury) crew he had this year I expected us to pick about 5th in the draft. We did better than expected late in the season and I have to give it up for a team that fights just for fighting sake. B ------------------ The truth is out there.
The only frog licking I know produces hallucinations. Now the Duke's behavior is all beginning to make sense. ------------------ The farther the Rockets move down the standings, the farther I move down the bleachers.
I'm not into giving letter grades, but I have to say I'm very impressed with the character of this team, especially of late, and I think it is mostly Rudy's doing. Other teams in the same situation, LAC and the Hawks for example, and wallowing in self-pity and shame as the season winds down, but the Rockets seem happy, upbeat and confident. I'm not too happy with our recent slip in the lottery race, but I am happy with the way we're winning the games. It's too bad the season will be over in 5 games: it looks like everyone would like to keep playing. ------------------
Final Grade: I (incomplete) Rudy has coached with great enthusiasm, however I still don't know if it was a good or bad thing. Remember in the beginning of the year (before the injuries) that RT was still running the DIT offense w/out Rudy saying anything to Dream or CB. It didn't really look like a new offense at all. After the injuries the offense did change, but was it because of the coach's influence or out of necessity. I like RT and glad he is the coach, but I am unsure if he deserves an A or an F, so I give him the I until I see more progress next year. ------------------
Final grade : A++ I sometimes wonder whether or not anybody here is really paying attention. For most of the season the Rocks have fielded a starting team that consisted of two rookies (Franchise and Thomas), someone who had played regularly but had not started (Anderson), someone who is a bench player that should never get starter's minutes (Wiz), and someone who prior to this season had only sat at the end of the Portland bench (Cato). If someone at the beginning of the season had told you that a team with these five guys would win 40% of their games, you would think that they were smoking crack. Not only has this team won 40% of their games, but except for a few of their losses the Rocks have not been in the game in the fourth quarter (either having the lead or being 2/3 points from the lead). This to me is what differentiates the Rockets from the other lottery teams. The fact that we were so many games is HUGE. Without changing a thing, the Rockets will be a 500 team next year, while the rest of the lottery teams will be hoping to win just as many games as they did last year. ------------------
How the hell can you guys call out Rudy for this season? You call yourselves Rockets fans? I know that missing the playoffs has killed us all, but, let's face it: it could have (and probably should have) been a lot worse. How many games have we had our entire roster healthy for the whole game all season? How many times has great coaching put us in the position to win close games, and we just couldn't close the opponent out? That's not his fault...if the players can't deliver in the end, there is where blame should perhaps be dealt. Plus, let's not forget that Rudy has never been put in a position where everybody on his team is incredibly young, inexperienced, and injured all at the same time. Blaming Rudy is a weak cop-out. ------------------ Jazzkiller
Oh, by the way...A-. He made a few mistakes, but has salvaged our season (somewhat) after the worst start I had ever seen. ------------------ Jazzkiller
TheFreak, Dreamshake hasn't posted recently. I don't know if it is vacation, work or something else. I searched and the latest post I found from him was in: http://bbs.clutchcity.net/ubb/Forum3/HTML/006115.html Hope he comes back. Mango ------------------ A Ranking Official in the Serious Police
C+. - If the Magic can make the playoffs, the the Rockets certainly could have. I don't think they ever had a chance of doing anything there-not with the strength of the Western conference... but I think they always had the talent to challenge Sacramento (because Jason Williams is crazy and Divac has played passively) or Seattle (because it's a one-man team). In Rudy's defense, his team was young, and both of the teams I mentioned COULD actually be better than Houston. However, I think the Rockets had the talent to make a race of it, and they didn't. Positives: Strong finish, development in young players, good team unity-other lesser teams become cancerous after losing. Negatives: Had the talent to squeek into the playoffs, and didn't do it. Poor substitution rotation at time. THE CATO CONTRACT DROPPED HIM FROM A B- SINGLEHANDEDLY. Idiotic. ------------------
C+. - If the Magic can make the playoffs, the the Rockets certainly could have. I don't think they ever had a chance of doing anything there-not with the strength of the Western conference... but I think they always had the talent to challenge Sacramento (because Jason Williams is crazy and Divac has played passively) or Seattle (because it's a one-man team). In Rudy's defense, his team was young, and both of the teams I mentioned COULD actually be better than Houston. However, I think the Rockets had the talent to make a race of it, and they didn't. Positives: Strong finish, development in young players, good team unity-other lesser teams become cancerous after losing. Negatives: Had the talent to squeek into the playoffs, and didn't do it. Poor substitution rotation at time. THE CATO CONTRACT DROPPED HIM FROM A B- SINGLEHANDEDLY. Too much dump it down offense initially. ------------------
Grade A It's amazing what Rudy has done with this team. We went into the season with a deep front court of Dream, Barkley, Cato, Mass, Rogers, & Thomas... but we mostly played with only Cato & Thomas; the two least experienced players of the group. So look at this team: Francis - A rookie, that converted to the most difficult position in basketball from SG in college Anderson - Still a young player that didn't get alot of minutes before becoming a Rocket Williams - A long-time bench player Thomas - A rookie who was predicted a bust Cato - A young player that never got significant minutes until this season Norris - A CBA player Bullard - enough said Pig - A journeyman Mobley - Another young player who was thought to do nothing in this league Rudy put a bunch of young guys that never played together, installed a new system, and had them play against the tougher Congerence in the league. Any other coach would've made the Rockets in the same league as the Clippers or Grizzles... but we're clearly better than those teams... we've even beatten most of the elite teams. Rudy has taken this teams and did what no one expected, made them competitive. In order for us to be in the playoffs this season, we'd have to be better than Seattle, Sacramento, or Minnesota. All three of these teams are veteran teams, Seattle has two Dream Teamers, Sac has MVP candidate Webber, and Minnesota has arguably the most complete player in the league, Garnett. And don't compare the Rockets to the Magic, the East is by far a joke... To call Rudy the reason we're not in the playoffs is stupid... it just lets me know and everyone else in here you don't know anything about basketball. Don't just say it, explain it! ------------------
A- First off, haven, you can't compare an eastern conference team to the Rockets. The Magic played 53 or their 82 games against Eastern Conference opponents. Place that same team in the West with Portland, the Lakers, Utah, San Antonio and others and you have a different story. As for my grade, well, Rudy did about the best job anyone could expect. With all due respect to Doc Rivers who did an outstanding job in Orlando, Rudy had the toughest job of all because he planned for one team but got another. At least with Rivers, he knew what he had from the get go. With the Rockets, their starting line up included two of the 50 greatest players of all time at the beginning of the season. There is simply NO WAY to accomodate for those types of losses. He did an admirable job of keeping the team positive and focused (fokass'ed) despite the tough losing record and found players like Moochie Norris to fill roles that were needed. With all the injuries and problems, the Rockets managed to salvage a horrible season and make it seem respectable. Missing the playoffs may suck, but it is better than going 4 and out in the first round and not having a shot at the lottery. If I had one criticsm of Rudy this year, it would be the fact that he overestimated the health of Barkley and Olajuwon. After those early losses, he had to regroup which cost them games. That is the only thing that dropped him from a plus to a minus. ------------------ "No one gets out ALIVE!" SaveOurRockets.com
For this year, I agree with Jeff and would grade Rudy an A-. We may very well finish ahead of Denver and will blow the doors off of Vancouver (a team with Abdur-Rahim, Bibby, MD!!!). Given our stars are newer in the league than those teams stars, and given our worse injury bug, I would say the coaching staff stopped the leaking real good, in fact they did dam well. Now if you ask me about my Rudy grade from like 96-99, you get a completely different story from me--mediocre grades at best. Less talented teams consistently outperformed us in the regular season and playoffs during that period, no the least of which was the Jazz. But the fact is it is a different situation with different players now, Rudy looks like the man for this job. ------------------
I would normally give Rudy a C for this season, but seeing the enormous amount of adversity this team had to overcome, it gets bumped up to a B- Reasons For Being So Low: Sticking with Walt too long in the first half of the season. Allowing Cato to get away with expressing that he prefers not to start. Rudy should've been all over that, and made him play 48 min for like 10 games straight, or benched him. Trying too hard to make Drew fit this team. Not getting the team ready for the beginning of the season. I can understand some growing pains, but we were terrible (10 - 24 that's on pace for a 24 win season). The reason he'll never get an A+ from me.... substitution r****dedness. He has to be the most frustrating coach in the NBA when it comes to his substitution patterns. Lack of some fundamental basketball skills shown by his team. (playing the pick and roll, team defense, rotations, etc) Reasons For Being So High: We've played 21 - 22 basketball since the terrible start. He has had to endure more injuries than a herd of cattle at butchering time. (Hakeem, Barkley, Cato, Rogers, Walt {mental injury}) Has more young players playing meaningful minutes than any other team. (Francis[R], K. Thomas[R], Mobley[2], Cato[3], Drew[2], ) The reason he is a head coach... his ability to spot talent. Can anyone say they thought Moochie Norris would be our 'set in stone' back up for next year? Man, I sure hope he is. ------------------ I have a dream.........his name's Hakeem.
See Dreamer's post above, except I think the B- is kinda due to Rudy taking a test he couldn't study for.
