People are fond of using that phrase when something seems obvious, but, in this case, it's just not that obvious to most people. On both offense and on defense, the key for the Rockets is not what the guy with the ball does. The key is what the guys without the ball do. On Defense A good, correct rotation means a defender in the face of an offensive player at every point on the floor. It also means efficient close-outs on shooters making more difficult shots and creating lower shooting percentages. The best defensive teams are almost always teams that rotate well. You have to work at it. It's not easy. It is why players like Shane Battier are so valuable to a team. They are smart. They understand rotations. The smarter the team, generally, the better they are at defensive rotation. Guys like Battier are the equivalent of a good passer on offense who knows the angles and may not always get the assist, but sets players up in the right spots. On the flip side, a player that doesn't fully understand the concept of defensive rotations can cause serious headaches. Carl Landry, a fantastic and exciting player who I love, has never been accused of being a high basketball IQ guy. As a result, if there is a guy out of position on defense, it's usually him, which is a shame because his ability to block shots from the weak side would improve if he could rotate better. It's why he is better assigned to guard centers instead of forwards because they don't cover as much space. You don't want to rely on Landry to close out on a four like Mehmet Okur out at the three point line. Wafer is another culprit of the poor rotation on defense. Brooks too. They can occasionally make up for it with their sheer speed and athleticism, but mostly, they struggle and that is something they will have to learn and work on. When the Rockets focus and rotate well, they play great like they did against New Orleans. When they don't, guys like Jason Terry and Dirk Nowitzki light them up like last night with wide open jumpers. On Offense This is perhaps the most misunderstood and important (especially to Adleman's offense) part of the offensive game. Interestingly enough, guys like Landry, Wafer and Brooks seem to excel at rotating on offense, getting open on screen and rolls and the like, whereas players like Artest aren't as adept at moving without the ball. Like McGrady, these are the types of players who need the ball in their hands to succeed offensively. Yao has special problems because he is slow afoot and has very soft hands. It is great in some ways - soft shot, good footwork - but problematic when dealing with rotating out of fronting and double teams. Because he moves slowly and is such a big target, it's tough for him to rotate quickly enough to get in better position to get the ball and he can't front anyone to take advantage that way. It means the Rockets have to come up with alternate ways to rotate, but that isn't the easiest thing to do with their current roster. They don't have a traditional facilitator on offense at really any position. McGrady was the guy that did that for them and his first step - when he still had it - and court vision forced defenses to play him straight up. Without a guy who can really get them into their offense or break the defense down when they cheat, it is going to be tough to do what they need to do in the half court with Yao or anyone else unless they are very disciplined in their rotations, which they just aren't yet. I think they can be, but it's going to take another year or two of learning for the young guys and that doesn't help us in the playoffs.
The points Jeff brings up remind me of Yao's interview after the game in which he explained that they had been practicing what to do when he gets fronted, but that they didn't properly execute the new strategy in the game. My at both this as well as Jeff's thoughts is......after preseason, 82 games, and half the roster having been here last year as well.....why is this all coming up now? Why are they having to implement and execute an anti-fronting strategy in the 82nd game of the season? What the hell have they been up to in practice since October?
Good take on the defense. As a team they've done very well since the trade deadline, holding teams to a stingy 42.9% (and shooting 47% themselves) ... but it's definitely worth pointing out that some players don't get it yet. I think it's easy to overlook Wafer and Landry since both have made positive contributions to the offense. Bigger story though is Jeff posting in the Rockets forum again ... it's like ...
I agree with you Jeff for this team to be sucessful they are going to need guys like wafer, lowry and brooks to be aggressive.... Wafer is gonna be there, Lowry will do the best of his ability, Brooks however will be the ? He is at his best when he is aggressive from the start, his confidence seems a little shot right now but it's no time to sulk about it. Gotta Play All the have the ability to break down defenses and make the right passes, we just need someone to show them they need to be THOSE guys when Yao can't get the ball.... It's alot to put on young players but some can handle it some can't... I personally think Wafer and Lowry and handle it but not sure about brooks!
All I know is that every time we play Dallas, Jason Terry is always OPEN and he just absolutely kills us.
Part of it is youth and, more specifically, inexperience. Scola seems to handle these things ok, but he's been at it a while. Wafer, Brooks, Landry, Lowry - these are all guys getting their first real extended action over an entire season. Some things can't be solved in one year, particularly for distributors like point guards. I think Lance Zerlien once wrote a really good article about how it takes point guards 3-5 seasons of full-time play to finally "get it" in terms of understanding the game, the angles, the offense, unless they are just superstars like Chris Paul. I think they'll get it eventually. That doesn't really help us now though. I always saw myself as more the Morgan Freeman type, but then again, I used to watch him on Sesame Street.
The Mavs ran screens really well last night. Nowitzki and Terry would constantly lose their defenders. Really lost faith in Scola and Brooks in terms of their defense. Fortunately, we've got Steve Blake in the first round but being able to adjust to guys that can "break the system" is going to be key if we want to get further in the playoffs. After watching Scola's performance against Nowitzki, I'm a little concerned about how he'd do against Aldridge, who has almost as much range but runs better. I haven't seen Aldridge as much as I've seen Nowitzki, but he's got that Garnett-like 20-footer thing going on.
I'm not sure I'd call it aggressiveness necessarily. I think it is more about basketball intelligence. Aggressiveness is something this team seems to have. It's not always under control and they sometimes get confused as to where to be or what exactly to do in certain situations.
I agree, and ron has a very bad habit of gambling when he doesnt have to, so he's messing up everyone else because if the ballhandler gets loose, they have to worry about helping on him AND covering ron's man who is now open. The worst part is ron often quits after he's beat and doesnt chase his man down, i sure wish Deke would cuss him out, not that he'd understand it, but still...
you've got to give Terry a lot of credit, he cant stop and pop as well as anyone, he doesnt have the size of a tmac or size and strength of lebron, but he can still get his outside shot off with a defender on him by fading away. the guy was also on a mission and should be the rest of the playoffs because he was called out by Dirk last year because he wasn't stepping up in big games, dirk told him they needed him to do it this year and terry's determined to do it.
I'll have to say though that there were several shots last night where there just wasn't anything you could do. You want Dirk to throw up a hop-shot off his weak foot or Terry to take fadeaways away from the rim. There was one sequence where Battier was on Terry with 4 on the shot clock and Terry sank a fadeaway on him. Usually those shots don't go in but you just had to shake your head at that.
I got a big smile when I saw you had posted, Jeff ... thanks for making your appearance, and sharing your always valued insights. We've needed more thoughtful and intelligent interaction, instead of all the panic posters who vent.
Defensively, I agree those guys are out of position quite often. Really those are the only guys that can make plays for themselves. I'm talking about aggressively going to the basket even when your not getting the call. Lowry kept us in the game for a while because he seems to understand the game, the best out of the younger guys .... Was there any reason we were not posting up battier on Kidd all 2nd half?
Matt Jackson talked about this today on the radio about how the Rockets should have exploited Kidd with quicker guards or bigger forwards. It's a good question.
What i don't understand is why we always adapt to other teams lineups and never exploit our their bad matchups..... You got 2 big SG/SF and the other team throws out JJ Barea and Kidd, we should have been all over those matchups. Portland series: There should be no reason Artest catches the ball higher than the elbows with Batum guarding him.... Post him up all night long.... After yao gets his 15 points and then they start to front him swing the ball to the weak side for artest post up Yao can seal his man 1-1 Artest and Batum.... We really need to exploit that matchup And they key to winning on the road in portland is get the into the penalty early and often and make your free throws
Wouldn't have mattered if we had done that because Artest and Wafer would have never gotten him the ball anyway.
Im not saying that hes not really really good, but I think that it helps that Paul is the team, rather than operating it- it would have been interesting to see him come try and fit into a system rather than just creating everything- again, im not taking anything away from him- just an observation.
