There is some concern that the Rockets might decline defensively. Maybe so. Maybe not. But, I feel like at least personnel wise, we've added more athleticism and speed, better defensive players, and if not better than at least more players to help out with depth to keep guys fresh. Also, I think Adelman is better at implementing a defense with the personnel he has than he's given credit for. So..... 1. Have we upgraded defensively with our new additions? Are they better than what we had last year? 2. How would you evaluate the defensive abilities of our role players. What's their strengths and weaknesses in terms of their individual and team defense: Francis James Brooks Bonzi Snyder Scola Butler
Hard to answer. For example... Take Bonzi Wells. His increased playing time will take away from Battier and Snyder's minutes. Both of whom we can agree are stronger defenders than Wells. On the flipside, Wells will now be in the game against Dallas matched up with Stackhouse. Last year Head got abused. A lot of teams abused Head with size. That mismatch will surely be gone. Its a situational trade-off. Can't wait to see all this play out.
I can at least guarantee that the Rox won't get killed by big perimeter players with Stevie and MJ. Luther and Rafer were the weakest links on the defense last season.
Defensively, I think the Rockets improved slightly because of the addition of Scola. Steve Francis' and Mike James speciality isn't playing defense, it is shooting the basketball. Aaron Brooks is the wild card, he DOMINATED in the Las Vegas Summer League against mostly NBDL players, so I don't know what to expect from him. Bonzi Wells will be better than last year under Van Gundy because he loves Adelman and believes he can feast in that system, so that will help the Rockets out alot. I would consider Snyder another wild card, how will Adelman use him in the lineup considering he is ahead of NOBODY that is projected to make the team besides maybe Aaron Brooks. Snyder could help this year, I just see him getting V-Span minutes and playing in blowout games. With the addition of Luis Scola from San Antonio, Daryl Morey has to be thanking GOD for pulling that off especially for Spanuolis, WOW! Scola dominated in the FIBA Americas Tournament against the USA and averaged over 22 points per game. Jackie Butler I really don't think will help the Rockets for another 3 or 4 yrs and will join Snyder and Brooks in playing GARBAGE time for the Rockets this season. Butler couldn't dominate in summer league against the lower level professional players and there isn't one good thing basketball wise he currently does well and he needs alot of work to be a decent player in the league. Worst comes to worst, if I am Rick Adelman and I lose Yao for an extended period of time this season, I move Luis Scola to the center position and start Chuck Hayes at the power forward position. Keep Dikembe on the bench as a backup to Scola. This Rockets team has NO EXCUSE to NOT win 60+ games this year if Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming stay injury free the whole season.
Scola's a better defensive player than Howard. Other than the first few months, Snyder got spot minutes the rest of the way. Bonzi will be playing most of his minutes against the second unit. I do feel we added speed and athleticism with Francis, James and Brooks. Scola's faster and more mobile than Howard and even Bonzi is trimmer than Bonzi last year, so he'd be an extra body. Yes, Battier might play a few less minutes, but he and Tmac might actually be fresher and their minutes might be them at their best. Sometimes I felt like the starters were overextended.
On defense in ROX A Battier,Mutombo B Yao,Hayes,T-mac(angry version) C Alston,SF3,Wells(slim version),Scola(maybe) D James,Brooks, E T-mac(normal version),Snyder,Wells(fat version) F Butler,Novak,Head
Yeah. Though, I think Novak and Butler need their own special category. Head is a level better than them.
Well when you get rid of the reason why we were so good defensively, as in Jeff Van Gundy, a decline in defense would tend to happen. The defense last year started with JVG and his game plan. We're not going to be nearly as good obviously. The question is can the increase in offensive production from Adelman's scheme outweigh the decrease in defensive production from losing JVG? Better hope so. If not, we'd look like idiots for firing JVG.
Like I mentioned earlier, Adelman is a lot better than he is given credit for. Under JVG, we have very few possessions per game. Adelman may speed up the game, but as long as we defend as well per possession than we would be similar defesnively while improving offesnively. Adelman's had some statistically good defenses and better balanced teams that got further in the playoffs. We also added better athletes, so they might be able to be more aggressive and cover more ground.
Think of this years Rockets team as the Tampa Bay Bucs when they won their superbowl a few years ago. Tony Dungy left his defensive imprint on that team, but it was Gruden and his offensive mind that came in and they won it all their first year. That's where I want the comparison to stop because Tony Dungy won a superbowl of his own and I doubt Gruden ever will again. Anyway, to answer the question, from a player stand point I'd say we have improved because we'll have a deeper more talented rotation that will stay fresh for longer. But, JVG was the reason why our defense was so good, while Adelman's defense has often been overlooked, it doesn't compare to JVG. So I expect the defense to suffer a little, however whatever downgrade there is in the D will be easily compensated with the upgrade in the offense. The flipside to this question is, how much better is our offense now?
With the strong defensive last season, our defensive mustn't down too much for keeping main starting 5. I said our defensive must down, cause we must improve out offensive.These two aspects(defensiv and offensive) are parallel. Last season, Supr do the best between these aspects.
Mike james is a very good defender. butler is a handy shot blocker. francis is well... brooks could potentialy be a solid defender. lets see Losses Juwan Howard- no defense whatsoever -SPAN. Potentily he was a solid defender. just never got a shot to prove it. Gains Mike James-Very good defender. upgrade over rafer Steve Francis, well he is not great Luis Scola. potentialy a solid defender Jackie Butler a very solid shotblocker. but not a great defender Aron Brooks - potentialy a sold defender. Also considering Adelman has coached a league best defensive team(Kings in 02), i dont think we'll slip alot.
Yes we improved defensivly too with these all additions. Francis a good defender the same as James. Brooks' very quick so he's also pretty good at steals. Butler can block the shot the same as Scola.
I think our defense will stagger a bit if only because of the coaching changes this off season. People will really miss JVG in that aspect. However I think our point differential will increase as well sort of making the whole defensive lapse null. Honestly I could care less if we gave up 100 points a game as long as we cranked up our defense when we need it the most. The truly great defenses know when to clamp down and not give up a point in order to swing the game in their favor whether it be to end a quarter, or turning a neck and neck game into a 9-0 run in their favor and holding it from there.
Yes and no. Yes our personel are better at all aspects of the game, so we have upgraded there. No, in that our new coach is not as good at coaching defense as our former one. However, we have more balance, so why we may give up more points, I expect our margin of victory to increase, as well as our wins. The team is better overall... DD
i was reading in that Basketball magazine with Tmac on the cover that the Rockets supposedly dropped significantly in defensive rank. But that could be due to the fact that we are no longer coached by JVG.
That is the bottom line! Individually, the players are better. However, the coach & his style are a shade less defensively than last year. The improvement is with the offense! This Rockets team will be better than last year at the end of the season, maybe even FINALS better!!! However 50 regular season wins is more realistic due to the mesh period needed to get RA & players on the same page.
I agree. JVG is a lot better at defense than Adelman, but remember we all wanted Adelman, we wanted offensive coach
Who cares about defense. YUK! I'm tired of hearing about defense. Let's see some points...lots of them. Seriously I don't think we'll be that bad. Defense is founded from the heart, and we have plenty of heart. We may take it down a notch defensively, but the points should come up. Remember that our offense last year with Gundy was also efensive in nature in that it dominate time of possession. The opposition can't score if they don't have the ball. Adelman's offense doesn't wait til the last five seconds of the shot clock to start making an offensive move to the basket. Our transition defense will probably end up being the most critical.
If we win 110 to 105 it just as good as winning 85 to 80 IMHO. I think our defense was over rated under JVG because Utah murdered us last year in the playoffs. We couldn't stop their half court plays. They just picked us a part because they have a great PG and I don't want to bring up what Boozer did to Yao. We have better team speed this year so we shouldn't lose to much on the defensive side of the ball. I want to see how Adelman uses Yao on the defensive side of the ball how will he play him on pick and rolls?
