Ime Udoka after Rockets brutal home loss to Hornets to open 2024-25 season

2006 - 2007 Lineup - 2024 Lineup Role Players Similar

52 Win Team But a Fluke in the Playoffs
Defensively are Slow and Old

PG Rafer Alston - Fred VanVleet
SG Tracy McGrady - Jalen Green
SF Shane Battier - Dillon Brooks
PF Juwan Howard - Jabari Smith
C Yao Ming - Alperen Sengun

Amen Thompson replaces Jabari Smith in the Starting Lineup

 

Rafer Alston gets replaced by Aaron Brooks, Kyle Lowry, Goran Dragic

Juwan Howard gets replaced by Luis Scola, Carl Landry

The 2009 Rockets were Special

The 2024 - 2026 The Transition from Fred VanVleet to Reed Sheppard

Dillon Brooks, Jabari Smith to Amen Thompson, Cam Whitmore

 

Eventually if Ime Udoka doesn't get a Uptempo System for Reed Sheppard, Jalen Green, Cam Whitmore, Amen Thompson.

Ime Udoka needs to be replaced by a Offensive Guru, Defensive Assistant Coordinator.

Same way Jeff Van Gundy was replaced by Rick Adelman

 

We just fell asleep in the second half and we need to tighten up on our defense.

 

I think we need to stop reacting to one bad game. We all know Harden >>>> FVV. There is no doubt about it. It makes no sense to start wishing for Harden after one bad game. Granted, FVV is not going to have the stat lines that Harden is going to have throughout the season, but Fred will have plenty of good games for us. He forced plenty of bad shots last night, but he wasn't the only reason we lost.

We are going to lose games. We are going to continue losing games the way we did tonight from time to time. We don't have to ****ing overanalyze every damn lose and want to throw away everything due to one bad game. Sure, some players are not looking like they will take another step (Jabari) but others are destined for take off (Amen). My complaint from tonight is that we should have played Cam more. Cam is instant offense if you give him enough time to get in a rhythm. Dillon wasnt doing spectacular tonight defensively, so I would of ran more with Cam to see if he could of provided an offensive boost when we needed it in the 3rd quarter.

We know Ime is stubborn with his line ups. I've seen Adelman thrown out there, but that man was also just as stubborn with his line ups even when the offense was not working. Mike was so damn stringent in his line ups that he only had an 8 man rotation and sometimes it would go down to 7 players only. So Ime is doing what every coach has done prior to him, being stubborn with his vets.

 

I like this take quite a bit.

 

Ime was selecting his 2nd half lineups via that balloon pop game from a carnival. I get it -- the staff needs to tinker, get some data all that good stuff, but why not do it when the game is firmly out of reach? His weird ass combos allowed the Hornets to come back and by the time he went with the starting 5 at the beginning of the 4th Q Charlotte had all the momentum and confidence.

Once they started to double Sengun in the 2nd half nobody knew what to do like that is something new all of a sudden.

Blame starts with Ime and then trickles down.

 

Ah I remember those. Basically free points every time we were under the basket.

Ime is a young coach and hopefully he can learn to delegate some of the areas he's not very good at it. We do lack offensive creativity and for all Silas's faults, he let Al-P really thrive in a creator type role where he was flirting with Triple Doubles a every other night. I'd love to see us throw some wrinkles where he is used on that high post especially considering the amount of cutting / slashing talent we have available.

 

The second half sucked.

 

The Rockets had an offensive rating of 108.7 last night...horrible

Last season, the Rockets had a record of 5-21 in games they had an offensive rating worse than 109.

They can't afford to have another season where they have 26 games of trash offense. Fix this nonsense immediately.

 

Let's look on the bright side, the Rockets clearly made a trip to Best Buy and bought a new microphone so you can hear the post game presser now!

 

damn watched the last 5 minutes for PTSD.. they could not get a rebound to save their life.

 

Maybe we need to hire Silas back as an assistant for offense lmao

 

Some of the main points that stuck out:

1) Selfish ISO offense

2) Sengun missing bunnies at the rim

3) Jabari doesn't hunt the ball on offense like Dillon does. Gave up a critical offensive rebound because he gave up on the play.

4) Went with the starters (Fred) because the 3Q unit basically threw up on themselves

5) Didn't punish the Hornets for sticking Williams on Sengun.

 

I have a great respect for Ime as a coach, and I honestly don't like to question the decisions of even lesser NBA coaches, as I understand they all know a great deal more about basketball than I do; HOWEVER, I have some questions about last night's rotation. I am super excited about Reed, but did he need to be playing more minutes than Tari and Cam last night? Could Tari not have gotten a few more of Dillon's minutes? Or Jabari's? Neither of them played well last night. Why no Uncle Jeff? I understand he's likely to get less playing time this season, but if the youngsters are looking shook and sloppy, why not bring out the reliable vet?

 

What I'm confused about is Ime saying before the season started that he wants to reduce Fred's minutes this season as he thought he relied on him too much last season and if there was a night for Fred not to play 37 minutes it was last night with his horrible shooting. But he still played 37 minutes.

 

Will someone tell Ime to tell Reed to let it fly!!! @ch44

 

It might be a good thing to lose this game the way we did. There's so much hype surrounding our team, and we have a bunch of young guys, including two who just got life changing money. It's human nature to let that go to your head.

Remember the 2016 Astros? Super-hyped up young team coming off a 2015 surprise playoff performance; everyone in the media said we were on the come up because of how loaded with young talent we were. What happened? We flopped. Sometimes these young teams take time. In 2017, those young guys came right back and won the World Series. I wouldn't be surprised with a 2016 Astros type season this year for the Rockets. One way to avoid it is to get punched in the mouth early and never let your guard down again. So hopefully they use this.

 

Obviously the key to your star being double teamed is to run 1 basic screen and then chuck 3's from the top of the arc. Peak level offensive strategy and we just need to work harder on defense.