THANK YOU! I was expecting this answer and was wondering why it didn't get pointed out until the very last post of this thread. Hayes got minutes when Yao sat out. Swift was also pretty much rendered useless by then and sadly, Howard was one of our best scoring options =/. The thing that amazes me about this BBS sometimes is how people's attitude changes on someone so easily. One second, Howard was a warrior to battle heart conditions just to play and the next, everyone wants him gone even though he's going through a rebounding tirade and doing the dirty work. JVG's bleeding Rocket Red one minute after the playoffs with Dallas, and now he's an idiot for not playing Novak, but is giving time to Padgett, who is one of the main ingredients for the so called "White Man Power Squad," nailing game winner after game winner, but hey, he's taking time from a rookie that needs a learning period and needs to learn to stop running into his own teammates while learning to cut towards the basket on offense.... Swift was asked to leave town practically, but since he was traded with Gay, who could be a bad experiment with the Rockets or even now with the Grizzlies for Battier, and no one could understand why Battier can't rebound even though he's already had a reputation of being the team player that does thing that doesn't appear in the stats sheet. I have to admit, stats used to meant so much to me... but then I went to middle school and decided to open my eyes a little. I don't get all the crying around here and I guess it's a shame that we could've been hired to take over the job(s).
The +/- stat is not bogus. How people use them and interpret them are. It's no surprise that both Warrick and Gay have poor +/- numbers -- they are playing signfiicant minutes, are high in the rotation (meaning they face tougher opponents than the end-of-the-bench guys), and they are on a bad team. They are also both very young, so while they're individual numbers might look nice they're not necessarily mature enough to playing winning basketball yet. Understanding that context, the +/- numbers make sense.
I'm gonna change the story from you're wearing blinders to you are f*ckin' high, or drunk, or both. Of course Hayes didn't play much early on! The guy was an unknown. We knew jack about him. Like I said, he would have been just another merry-go-round player that went through here in the last few years at one point or another. And while we are on merry-go-round players, Torraye Braggs averaged 12 minutes for us at one point in time, and that was WITH a healthy Yao. Padgett and Novak's minutes were inflated? You know, last year there were quite a few games in which Swift was out too. In fact, he had (IIRC) two injuries during the year. Another thing that one notices right away was that playing badly or not, Swift was getting 20 to 25 MPG a game early. Then Hayes came along and his minutes miraculously dropped to about 17, with many games in which the guy gets about 13 minutes. How does Juwan's minutes even come into the equation at all? We could have kept Swift instead of Padgett and Novak, kept him in the same capicity towards the end of last year, reduced Howard's minutes that we have done right now and still found the same number of minutes for Hayes. In summary, you remind me of one of those guys that owns 19 shares of company ABC's stock, gave me a flattering story on how the company's stock will go through the roof and how you plan to invest in it, and ended up with 22 shares of the stock in total. Bottom line, statistical trends DOES NOT SHOW trading away Swift had any evidence to Hayes' increased minutes. The best thing you could claim is that it's inconclusive, which doesn't exactly measure up to the grand theory you put forth.
Actually, Hayes played plenty early on. His was injured around December, 2005. When he got healthy and got signed by Houston around January due to Yao's injury, he immediately started playing 15+ mpg. When Yao came back healthy, though, Chuck's minutes dipped. It went back up in April when Yao went down the 2nd time. Swift had some injuries, but when healthy during his 66 games, he was a regular rotation player (which neither Padgett nor Novak is). His injuries are also mostly early in the season. Toward the end season, he was available for all of these games after Yao went down the 2nd time. People were clamoring for Van Gundy to give him more minutes, to start him even... but Swift didn't see any increase in his minutes-- he played about 18 mpg in April. Instead, Yao's 35 mpg got pretty much split between Mutombo and Chuck. Juwan got a few more minutes, too... and people b****ed about that. Would Swift have prevented Hayes from playing? I think not. Swift isn't as good a player as Hayes... but if you play Hayes his 22 mpg at PF, either Juwan or Swift would be earning his MLE mostly from the pine. You play Hayes 22 mpg.. you give Juwan 18 mpg... then you have Swift getting, what? 8 mpg left at PF? Maybe he gets 8 more at C? Yeah... he might have been in the rotation, but worth MLE? Nope. Anyhow, the Rockets are winning and both Hayes and Battier are contributing big time. Juwan Howard is also doing a decent job off the bench... I don't see why people keep on bringing up Swift and Rudy Gay, who haven't exactly done squat for their team. Their team is crappy, and they are a part of the crappiness.
Two things: 1. I'm not bringing up the Gay/Swift for Battier traded 2. You contradict yourself by saying Swift wasn't playing much towards the end. It certainly is true, it just goes against exactly what you said. As I've said way before you responded that I buy a "salary dump" theory. It makes no sense to have two MLE+ players sitting on the bench while Hayes plays, but once again, that has NOTHING TO DO with minutes and EVERYTHING TO DO with money. Also, like I pointed out and you re-affirmed, Swift was a rotation player at the start of the season. He wasn't towards the end, in the same manner Novak/Padgett aren't. So I have no idea what you are trying to argue with. The transition already shifted from Swift to Hayes. If one believes in trends, one would already expect an increase in minutes for Hayes. Lastly but not the least, as I've said many times already, at first Hayes was simply an emergency backup not much different from Torraye Braggs. He played minutes when Yao was out. One logically expect his minutes to dip after he comes back. But then he played well enough to be kept. So despite Yao being back for the last part of the season, Hayes stuck around. And he got more minutes that Swift.
Battier has been great. http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/photo;_...347bb007_knicks_rocket_10_49_59_pm&prov=getty Isn't that Battier and Head, not Snyder and Alston..
We're outrebounding the vast majority of the teams we play. So who the hell cares? Your first explanation was probably right. Everybody else on the team is getting many of the rebounds Battier normally finds, and it's working. If we need more rebounding from him, I'm sure he's capable of providing it.
Looking at Battier's defense over the season, I've got a question: are all the charges he takes legit? Ofcourse most of them are, but I'm talking about those ones when he's defending the fast break - he's like the only guy I've seen who can draw a charge in that situation, and he does seem to be moving slightly and has not got both his feet set when he gets those calls, I'm thinking maybe his reputation as a charge-taker gets him those calls. Maybe it's because I watch mostly highlights (courtesy of R2K), but how many calls go against him when he tries to draw a charge? around 50-50?
I would say it is about 70-30, but who cares, he get it done. The only people should worry about that is Rox opponents.
