Mitchell & McHale discuss what is ailing the Rockets defense

Tbh i don't remember who was injured, but i do remember we were out there playing like 7/8 guys in at least a couple games, that's why Clark and House got some minutes, we didn't even have Rivers and Nene was probably injured, i think...regardless, what would be interesting is to know what teams we played in the first 5/10 games, cause this season we played Milwaukee, Miami and a bunch of lottery teams, like, Washington, NOLA and OKC are bottom 5 if not 3 teams in the league.

@HP3 i just gave it a look and this is it, firts 6 games:

Lost against NOLA (which was much better than the current team)
Won against the Lakers (Lebron + scrubs)
Lost against the Clippers
Lost against the Jazz
Lost against the Clippers
Lost against the Blazers

So yeah, we were 1-5 but we played against playoff teams aside for maybe the Lakers, so far this season we played Bucks, Heat, and 3/4 bottom of the barrel teams.

 

If you don't switch you have to fight over screens, do you see Harden fight over screens? I don't, and that's probably one of the main reasons why we had to switch everything.

 

We were the number 2 defense over the last 25 games of last season after being 25th through the first 57.

Absolutely time to turn things around, but the team isn’t exactly the same. We will see.

 

And weird enough, Harden is actually excellent at switching screens.

We need to get back to it.

 

Exactly and he knows it which is extremely troubling. Hardens fine with jacking up threes as nauseum when they going because he’s “just trying to find his shot“, arguing with officials when he doesn’t get calls, making half ass efforts all around of , but yet he’ll be barking at other people when he’s not getting back on Transition plays. It’s a lot more glaring this year because he had other guys covering his ass last year and the year before. Harden can play defense but he just doesn’t care to want to at all so far this year, save some of the first half of the Bucks game, probably because Giannis /mvp narrative

 

I mean Bucks(kept it close)Brooklyn(err....kept it close) and Heat...are pretty damn good. They got a win off the Bucks even without Jimmy Butler. OKC and NOLA arent exactly pushovers either. I know it looks bad but i wanna give it more time to see whatll happen.

 

You can't really blame 1 person it's all communication imo

 

The Bucks are good, the Heat too, but the Nets are trash, they're 2-4 and just beat us and the Knicks...they lost against Detroit without Blake, Minnesota, Memphis, Indiana...i mean, they're not good. And NOLA is 1-5 and we lost against them without Holiday and Zion, OKC was literally trying to lose keeping Paul and Adams out even with the game on the line...i agree it's still early, but so far it's looking really bad.

 

I mean we beat NOLA...kept it close but we beat them. I just wanna say both Paul and Adams looked really bad in that OKC game, like they were doing better when those guys werent in the lineup. As for Brooklyn.....yea I got nothing to say

Man....538 really needs to work on their model am i right haha.

 

He needs a Pop or Doc Rivers type coach to challenge him. Elite talent is missing elite coaching.

 

Dantoni gives too much slack to all his superstars all the time. Superstars starting with Harden get away with murder under Dantoni

 

If the ball is not in his hands Harden is not interested in giving max effort

 

Simple go back to switching...its the lazy mans defense that works. All u gotta do is talk.

 

Ding ding ding.we need to go back to that. U gotta do what ur personel is good at. Mean aint that obvious. Why is dude mad about switching when it has us a top 5 defense when we did it. Do what works

 

Im all about it at this point, just make it simple for these guys.

 

This team is not going anywhere with this system. It's basically street ball out there.

 

Okay, now you're going on ignore for real.

Not really though.. good jokes can't be ignored.

 

Looking at the stats I think it's obvious what the answer is:

Team last year: 36% 3pt fg for us and 34% against us
Team this year: 30% 3pt fg for us and 43% against us

That is going to change. However, it won't change without an effort by our players. We really need to figure out where we're supposed to be as individuals and as a unit. The where-to-be stuff is mind-boggling. How often are we out of position? When you watch the games it feels like we're out of position about 43% of the time. Maybe out 3pt defense needs an adjustment.

Communication is huge. Every player should be yakking it up loud enough that the whole stadium can hear them. TALK fellas! Communication is key.

 

somehow they got to get into the other team's bigs..in the same way that they get into rockets' bigs

 

This is nothing new. We have known that Harden isnt interested in a team oriented offense. His hands so he can shoot or get assist. Ball not in his hands, it becomes 4 on 5.

Same on D. When was the last time any of us saw Harden lose the ball and chase the transition down? Grind at all? He can play spot D when he wants too, but he has no effort....no hustle.