How low can Battier go?

Adelman after the game:

[rquoter]
(Shane’s shot): Huge three. But when he takes it, he has such a history of making those shots, I felt… and it looked like he let that one go nice. If we can get him back on track that will really help us. But he does so many little things for us; he’s got to be on the court.
[/rquoter]

Looks like our head coach is sipping the Battier koolaid.

 

I think they have to consider both scenarios. If he comes back and is healthy then great, more offense, but if he's done, just doesnt want to be here, etc and he has to be traded then I'd assume they could fetch a solid offensive player. The way the team is structured now, if tmac came back he wouldnt be scoring 20+, not consistently anyway, because they'd want to continue with the balanced attack. So tmac would probably avg 15-17. So let's say there's 2 possible scenarios for tmac not coming back:

1. Battier is traded this year/offseason for more offense. That would leave a hole on defense, and we'd miss having that glue guy. So we'd have to trade tmac for one, or eventually use his cap space if he leaves via free agency to sign one. That seems possible, but the problem is there aren't many guys like Battier. So although we'd have the funds/trade bait available, that type of player may not be. (except if he is a BIG name in FA, which i dont think we'd have a shot at)

2. Battier isn't traded, but we still need offense. that keeps our defense intact, but leaves us that 15-17ppg short. So again we'd have to get one by using tmac for trade bait or wait until his contract is done to sign one. The difference between this scenario and the first one is that 15pp scorers are more readily available and tossed around from team to team.

 

Why do you keep brining those same guys up?? It was over a decade ago. It's like you dont know of any other role players who fit what you're looking for so you have to go back 14 years back in time to find them. Always them and Posey. If that's all you can find then maybe there's a problem with your expectations because there doesn't seem to be many guys who meet them this century.

 

Let me ask you this. If you were the coach, with the situation as it is now, winning games and battier playing so much, and you went ahead and cut back his minutes, and the moment you do the team starts to struggle, losing more consistently, then losing more than winning. (i'm not saying that's exactly what would happen i just want to know what you would do if this scenario would occur) Would you:

A) Go back to playing shane big minutes

B) Leave shane with reduced minutes and look to tweak something else.

 

i wish I had access to video of all the rockets games since shane was here, especially last year, because i feel like he's been making those shots when he takes them too. A couple people mentioned he doesnt hit big shots and i wrote he doesnt hit game winners, but more shots with like 2 mins left that push leads out to safety. Since no one agreed with me I was beginning to think maybe my memory was failing me, but i'm glad Adelman can back it up.

 

i guess he has pretty much hit rock bottom..........WAKE UP DUDE! shane is not a offensive player, he is here stricly for one reason and one reason only. DEFENSE. now he can and will hit that open 3 if he has his 3 seconds to spot up and take that swan dive of a shot, but if he gets up, ill put money he makes it. battier never went low enough to have to even ask yourself and others, " how low can battier go?" our defense for the past 4 years has been great and HE is a big part of it. who is the person for the past 4 years is the player that has been asked to guard the big dogs of the other team.....SHANE. so think before you go and try to call a player that has done nothing wrong except get injured, and you can't even complain about that.

 

battier is at least equal to few of those guys.

 

Thank goodness Rick Adelman is running this team and DM is running our management, instead of some random internet poster named Kwame

 

From what I've observed, Battier seems to be rushing his shot lately. He's obviously not taking a lot of shots, but the ones he does take, he seems to be in a hurry to get them off.

Also, he doesn't seem to be relying on his two favorite shots as often. The clutch 3-pointer from the corner last night in Denver was something you'd see once or twice a game in the past, but not so much lately. He hasn't taken his running jump hook (right-handed IIRC) so much either.

Instead, I've seen him take (and most often miss) several open mid-range jumpers, particularly from the right side, something he wasn't doing earlier in the season.

These changes may be due to a change in the overall offensive pattern, and Battier may be just taking what the offense is giving him. However, I get the feeling that this is quite intentional on Battier's part.

It's as if he's methodically expanding his limited offensive repetoire by trying new spots on the court instead of relying on his standbys. He's experimenting now in order to have new weapons in the playoffs.

Later on, he'll bring back his corner 3s and jump hooks and hopefully this will make him a (still limited but) more potent offensive threat.

Anyway, that's my theory.

 

This is one of the most rediculous threads on this site. Why would any fan want to get rid of a player who brings so many intangibles to the game. He is the most reliabable and steady player that the rockets have. So what if he doesnt score points? He doesnt need to. I still think he is one of the most underrrated defensive players in the league. If stats are all you look at then Dennis Rodman was a failure as a player, because he didnt score. Every team needs a player who does the little things, all players arent stars or superstars.

I really wish that there would be rules for putting posts on this site. This is silly, if we had a traded away Shane Battier since he cant score then people would complain that the rockets cant defend. As it is, the rockets situational defense is questionable at times; and now you want to take out the team's best defensive player, come on give me a break!!

 

Yeah i think someone else mentioned that Tmac being out has moved Battier more towards the top of the key, since Ron posts up more than Tmac or drives, then he takes up a whole side sometimes, including the 3 pointline and just bulls his way in. So shane isn't in the corner as much so he just may be adjusting to the new area. i know it may seem ridiculous for a ball player to not adjust immediately to a new shooting angle, but its no different than Ronbeing money when he's going left and having trouble going right. Most players have those issues.

 

battier has always been an average 3 pt shooter. the numbers he got his first 2 years here were an abberation and he only shot so well because t-mac created for him. now that he doesnt get as many open looks his numbers are beginning to look like his numbers with the grizzlies.

 

No, Battier's #'s are down because he had foot surgery during training camp and he is just now rounding into shape.

 

Battier did last night what I know he is capable of. A key offensive AND defensive play to close out the game.

Now I'd like to see him do it more often.

"clutch" players make plays ...but they don't need to be your franchise player to be "clutch." You make this more difficult than it needs to be.

 

Allow me to hand this argument its ass on a silver platter. This is something I've seen you spout repeatedly in your mindless Battier hate. First, I will concede to you one point: Kobe has scored more points per game against the Rockets since Battier arrived.

Here are the raw numbers from Kobe from two separate spans of time. First, we'll look at his numbers from the 03-04 season to the 05-06 season, when Van Gundy became coach to the last year without Battier. I've also included the game against the LA from the beginning of this season in which Battier did not participate.

24.4PPG, 5.6RPG, 6.5 APG, .424FG%

Not spectacular shooting on Kobe's part. However, in that 16 game sample (including the 03-04 playoff series), the Rockets managed to post a lousy 5-11 record against Kobe's Lakers (this exludes a pair of games in which Kobe did not play). Regardless of record though, that's not bad defense against Kobe.

Moving on, we'll look at Kobe's numbers from 06-07 to the present, all of the games that pitted Kobe and Shane against each other. Again, the first game against LA is excluded due to Battier's injury.

35.1PPG, 6.8RPG, 4.1APG, .398FG%

True, that is a rather gaudy amount of points per game, but his shooting percentage has dropped to an even less respectable .398, a change of -.026. This may not seem like much, but more on that in a minute. Also, in this 8 game sample, the Rockets have posted a very respectable 5-3 record.

So we're looking at Kobe's shooting pre- and post-Battier. Is .424 vs. .398 really a big difference? Some may say no, but consider this as well. In our first time frame, pre-Battier, Kobe shot .442 for those three seasons. This would mean the Rockets held him 1.8% off his average in that period, no small feat. But in his three seasons since Battier's arrival in Houston, he's shot at a .464 clip. So now we see that Battier and the Rockets have dropped his shooting a stunning 6.6% in his games versus Houston. You wanna say that's insignificant, or that Kobe "torches" the Rockets now? Good luck.

Next time, try putting a little research into your argument, chump.

 

Rafer could put up 35 points a game if he took enough shots. Anyone could. But you and I both know your intent was to make Battier's impact appear as though it were inconsequential when it's anything but. But if you want to sit there and revel in the fact that Kobe inefficiently scores more these days as if it makes Battier look worse, you'll just drive home my point that your entire case against Battier is ignorance at its finest.