This loss ain't on Francis. When every single one of your guards suck. When every single one is posting career lows it's not the guards. It's the frigging system!
Francis was SG in the Suns game in last quarter, Alston was PG. I think Francis is more comfortable at SG.
I agree its all of them...remember when head was one of our biggest role players and hit over 150 threes along with rafer last year. Under JVG's system our guards always had PREMIUM shots and made them. Rafer and luther never looked THiS bad...Yao was better utilized in the low post, becuase our guards had more opportunities to get open when yao was trippled teamed at every possesion...yao had less minutes but atleast our guards hit shots and won games.
I thought that Rockets fans knew this about Steve years ago: the guy played on his natural athletic abilities; he played hard and wanted to win but had little basketball IQ and wasn't a good shooter or a true PG. Now Steve Francis is 30 years old. His athleticism is declning and he still can not shoot or run an offense. This is the reason why he is no longer wanted by most of the teams in the league. When the Rockets brought Steve back this year, we didn't bring him back as a starter. There is not much to blame Steve. He has done well on and off the court under the circumstances this year. He is just not that good any more. It's time to give Brooks some minutes. The kid was a shoot first PG in college also. But he is young and quick, and that's what we need right now.
He looked a lot more sure of himself tonight, but unfortunately his reflexes and coordination weren't with him. If we're going to excuse the rest of the team for not gelling together and understanding the system yet, we should give Francis the same benefit of the doubt, especially considering what little playing time he's had. Addle-brained should have been working him into the rotation since day one instead of waiting halfway through December.
Good points. Almost everytime he got in the lane, I couldn't help but think "he could have dunked on those guys six years ago." By the same token, he was hammered on a lot of those plays and the refs just weren't giving him any calls.
I'd like to say that Steve is done from the play of these games. He is slow, hesitating, and turn over prone.
you all knew this was coming, lol steve isn't the player he use to be, and again he isn't a pg, brown and thomas tried this at the knicks with similar results. (well actually he's bloody playing worse ) but then again nearly all the rox players are playing at career lows atm.
Francis is alot closer to being out of the rotation all together than earning the starters role. That 3rd quarter was brutal. I wouldn't be surprised if Luther starts and Brooks gets the back up minutes next game if Rafer is still injured.
Since everyone has covered his negatives for this game, I'll try to point out some positives. He's starting to get in game shape and is getting his legs back. He brought up the ball much quicker this game. T-Mac was actually slower than Francis coming up the court. Steve wasn't as hesitant to shoot the ball this time. He attacked the basket more, although not much luck finishing. He put up jumpers but they weren't falling. Looks like hes getting more comfortable out there but needs to find his shot. He definitely has not shown anything to be a starter but I think he should get minutes off the bench over James and Head. Kind of hard to pick on Steve only when everyone else besides Yao played like crap. 5 TOs yes but the majority of those came from trying to create something in this dreaded offense. So really only a couple bonehead TOs .
I don't see how you can see any positives in that game from Francis. He shot like Rafer on a bad night, and turned the ball over like Yao on a bad night. His defense was poor. His total positive contributions: 3 points on 1-8 shooting, 3 assists, 1 rebound, 1 steal. Of course that goes with 5 turn overs, 3 fouls, while letting Harris shoot 71%. The game isn't all on him of course, but he was a major factor in going from a lead at half time to a double digit deficit by the start of the 4th.
i didnt think it was possible, but francis shoots like rafer, handles the ball worse than luther, and makes decisions worse than james, and thats only on offense. he's somehow combined all the negatives from our other guards
