Yeah, clearly Cam's negatives outweigh his positives for Ime Udoka. I do wish the coach would admit when his starting guards are sucking hind tit and insert Cam or whomever into the lineup. But it isn't happening. I remember last two games of last season, Cam had 4 and 5 assists in those games (I'm pretty sure it wasn't a hallucination). That Cam is almost never seen, though. As I told my wife, "Cam catch ball. Cam see basket. Cam shoot. That's it. It's YMCA ball."
The hallucination is comparing those last few games of 48 minutes of garbage time to a playoff setting.
Sengun can hardly get a great game offensively, like 30+ points under Ime's system. His expectations from the center spot is mostly defensive than offensive. On offense he can hardly use Sengun's capacity imo. And does not overuse Sengun even if he is rolling or dominating. For example the first playoff game, he took less shots than fvv. If i remember correctly he was taken out when he was on a roll in the first half. He took 5 shots in the second half after dominating the first half. If the great game doesn't come in that game, it will not come. But I get your point. The great game is not there also because Sengun is underperforming this season and he has less chances of having a great game. But even when he is there to perform, ime doesn't lean to him as much as he should.
Not disagreeing with you but just to throw in an explanation: Post players are in the far extreme of consistency. Even a bad post player won't be that inconsistent. This is because a very high % of their shots are at the the rim and they start their plays closer to the rim. There's often just one player between them and the rim. Alpi spends most of his time between 5 and 15 feet from the rim. Guards or smaller wings are the least consistent players. They're further from the rim and a far higher proportion of their shots are jump shots. Among perimeter players, you have a more diverse mix of shots. The wings who take more of their shots at the rim are more consistent (these players will have high FTA's). Think Lebron James. The ones who mostly take jumpers are the least consistent and have a low number of FT's for their shot volume. Think Steph Curry - who has stinkers way more often than other scoring legends. So by default Green should be less consistent than Sengun. Now we add one more outlier layer that is injecting the data with a ton of noise: Jalen Green has played every single season of his career on teams with progressively worse spacing. This is such an anomalistic situation. That should increase the consistency gap between the two because Sengun doesn't have to drive from the perimeter to the rim for most of his points. Typically by year 4 these questions are answered because you've seen the player in a variety of situations. Hardly anyone lets bottom of the barrel spacing persist for 4 years though. I think if Green were traded to any of the top 15 3pt shooting teams in the NBA, his 3PA's would go significantly down, drives and FT's up and both his consistency and probably his efficiency would go up. Right now we've pushed him way past his natural ability to make jumpers, imo he should be averaging 1.5x the number of drives and maybe just 5-6 3PA if we want him to be efficient. However, when the paint is packed always, the "right" play for the team is to take more jumpers even though it's not right for him.
This season's playoffs is all about getting the primary players into as many games and minutes and to see what they have. So, I expect the same players to keep playing and that information will be used in the off season when evaluating what the organization needs to do. FWIW I think that the flaws are what has kind of been obvious - the lack of a franchise player and unreliable outside shooting. The Rockets may actually have to take a step back in order to take a step forward - the Rockets next year may not be the #2 seed, but may be a better playoff team making some changes like at PG and possibly at C or PF.
That is defeatist attitude. If this is all about development and deciding what to do then why is FVV playing 40+ mins a game. We already know what he and Dillon are. We should be finding out what the other guys can do without them if you are already ceding the series.
Please, do show me the typical examples of star franchise players averaging 19 points in the playoffs in the last 10 years? 90's-early 00's throwbacks don't count, show me the star players putting up 19, I'd imagine it's a lot less than the roleplayers putting up 19. Y'all stay making excuses for this guy. Let's be clear, Jalen Green is not a 1A franchise player, but neither is Alperen Sengun. Alpi has just as many weaknesses, including horrendous efficiency for a post-player, the only difference is he has a LOT more fans propping him up.
If you go back over the last 3 years, this is pretty much what I've been saying about him the entire time. He's either really good or awful and you never know which is going to show up from game to game. He's consistently inconsistent. Didn't do the numbers on this years games but last season he had 41 games where he shot worse than .250 from 3 and 28 where he shot .400 or better .... that leaves 13 games between .251-.399 (we'll call that "average" even if it is being generous on the low end). 41 games of terrible 13 games of average 28 games of really good. screw it, here's this years numbers .... 28 games .250 or lower. 24 games .251-.399 30 games .400 or better Some are gonna call that progress .... and maybe you could live with that if your other starting guard wasn't just as bad, if not worse. Wouldn't hurt my feelings if both of them were gone to begin next season.
The superstar performances are few and fair between. People need to recognise that Alpi's no more our saviour than Jalen is, it's year 4 and he's not emerged as a true star either despite the few seconds he played in the All Star game.
They haven't ceded the series - they want the playoffs to go as long as possible and to have their core guys in as many high impact minutes as possible - which is more likely to happen with Fred and Dillon on the floor. There is a difference between having expectations that are tempered and being a defeatist.
No the difference is he Never completely disappears. I am disappointed in Sengun’s offensive regression this year, but he is a double/double machine and has improved his defense significantly. Jalen has improved, but being a net negative for half the games is much more damning than Sengun’s lack of efficiency this year. I’m not advocating getting rid of either of them as I think they will both continue to grow. FVV and Ime are the 2 main issues in their development and until that is addressed the Rockets are stuck in “meh” land.
Agreed, Sengun is way more consistent a player than Jalen Green, and it's not close. However, he's still putting up pedestrian starter numbers and not leading us the way a 1A franchise player would, so he's just as much of a failure on that front. We need a real star player.
The lack of consistency is a big reason why they are not true franchise players at this point. Green is at a minimum in a role that is not ideal - he needs to play off of someone else. If the Rockets trade Green for a better player, I am fine with that. The Rockets are one of a handful of teams that supposedly are going to be involved in efforts to get Cam Johnson to help the spacing and perimeter shooting.
Alpren Sengun isn't a 1A franchise player - and he likely never will be that. He is a very good starter, than can potentially be a #2-3 type scorer on an elite team. He is close to a 20/10 guy and every team can use those types of guys. I think that the expectations need to be better defined. He is already good and helps his team win - he just isn't "the guy" and the Rockets don't have that guy based on what we have seen..... so they will likely try hard to find "the guy" in trade or the draft.
on a team with better shooters or a better PG, JG would prob only take 1 3 off the dribble a game (2 if it’s a heatcheck 3 / grenade at end of qtr) his catch and shoot % would prob climb higher than the 40% from 3 he shot this year Put JG next to Trae or Halliburton or Cade - I won’t say JA because look how Bane plays much better when JA isn’t in the game vs in the game … I don’t watch them enough to see if that’s a JA problem or just because Bane is more aggressive
Cam is almost ALWAYS open when he shoots though, outside of when he drives into a crowd which Jalen also does. Cam takes better shots than Jalen does. DD
I'm still a little bitter that he's not a Rocket right now. The defense is worrisome, but he offers better spacing from 3-point ability than any Rocket and a little on-ball juice.
Yeah I agree 100% It's just a bit past tired now that the "he's not a guy" criticisms and blame always gets piled on Green and not on our "all star" franchise player. If the consensus is Alpi's the star and Green's the scrub, why are we blaming the scrub for the star's team not winning?
team is so reliant on streaky bum Jalen to be great because our “star” hardly ever steps up to carry the team if he’s not gonna do it, then somebody has to, and that responsibility has fallen on Green…except Jalen isn’t the one making All-Star games and being dubbed the franchise guy and when Sengun is out here not giving the type of performances his accolades and praise should warrant, here comes a bunch of lame ass excuses…it’s the coach, it’s the scheme, it’s his teammates…once somebody even blamed it on him being made to do dribble hand-offs all game, I kid u not it’s always something, but it’s never him Yeah, Sengun isn’t typically as horrific as say game 1 Jalen when he’s playing bad, but how often is he actually dominant or elite?
Neither of them are stars. The offense doesn't run through Sengun, he made the all-star game because someone had to go for the #2 seed in the West. No one deserved to make the all-star game this season for the Rockets. The team is winning because of coaching, depth, defense and strong effort. This year and this team should be applauded by the fans - they have gotten a lot out of what they have. Green was the first Rockets high draft pick in a long time and got all the attention when he joined the team - so fans with over inflated expectations are hard on him. It isn't Green's fault he isn't Jordan/Kobe like some pumped him up to be. He has worked hard and become a very good player, but that isn't good enough for some. Hopefully those expectations and nasty treatment by some fans stops.
