maybe adelman got so pissed with him trying to draw that foul and falling to the floor that he took scola out for the res of the game...that's what I think.
At some point last night I could not recognize 3/5ths of our team on the floor. That should say a lot about what this team is trying to do, and where it's going. Considering what this team has been through and what it will go through, this loss is not so hard to take. And yes, AB did iso Martin (quite blatantly I should add), but more out of him being unfamiliar with Martin and the need to do everything he knows to win in the fourth (familiarity). Unfortunately Aaron hasn't really figured that part out yet. (or he's figured it out but just unable to make it happen). If Lowry was on the bench, believe me, coach would've yanked AB out and stuck in Lowry in.
Scola NEVER guards the 3pt line, even when it is his responsibility, he NEVER leaves the paint. And because of this, Lewis gets wide open looks. Luis is a horrible perimeter defender, because he gives up that shot...on purpose. probably drives the coaches nuts. DD
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA *catches breath* AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Scola cannot defend lewis or howard. But that was to be expected. Hayes couldn't defend howard either. So...they used andersen to draw howard out of the paint- feel like it worked somewhat offensively but the double teaming defensively didn't really work.
No doubt...it's not like the 6 time champion Bulls were led by the 1 and 5 positions...but they were very solid at the 2, 3 and 4...with Jordan, Pippen and HoraceGrant/Rodman!
Apparently it drives them nuts enough to trade Landry and increase his minutes. Nobody is going to shut down Howard, but Hayes makes him work and on a couple of occasions (that is all Hayes got last night) he forced Howard further out than he wanted to post so they didn't pass him the ball. This team with Yao (IF he comes back like the Yao from 2 years ago) is still an 7-8th seed and Rick Adelman has forgotten how to coach.
Down 20 points with the starting point guard and shooting guard on the bench until the 6 minute mark in the 4th quarter. Yes, I saw the entire game.
1 and 5 are the hardest positions to fill to build a team. yao is no kareem nor dream, but he's good enough (when healthy) to be an anchor on a champ contender. in the back court, you either have a great pg (think stockton), or a super 2 (mj, kobe). when you have both an excellent 5 and a great 1 or 2, you're sure in the contention. if thinks work out, you could have a dynasty (lakers, spurs since i consider td a 5). for right now, martin is not in the class of kobe, so we need a better pg. lowry? maybe, maybe not. ab？absolutely not. of course, there will always be exceptions. but that's the basic build-up, imo.
Scola's flop in the 2nd quarter was stomach-turning. The Rockets' body language of late has been alarming. None of the swagger, confidence, or competitiveness from the first half of the season is left. They'll have to find some way to recapture their spirit if they don't want to fold like an accordion. Wrote a few thoughts on their post-trade progress here: Rockets' playoff push: A flop?
I don't disagree, but who has more upside? You can find a lot of guys who can hit that 15 footer, but you can't find many finishers like Landry. I liked the trade if it was simply McGrady expiring + Landry for Martin. The Jeffries side of it will be what screws The Rockets. Without his almost $7 Million, The Rockets could have gone after a Landry replacement. That $7 Million will hurt next season. The Draft Picks will be worthless with New York getting a bigtime free agent. Morey seems to be one of those GM's that makes one or two key moves and then everyone falls in love with him and think he can do no wrong. If you look at the entire picture, it really looks pretty bad: -Battier over Rudy Gay. Nothing wrong with winning now, but Battier could have been gotten for less than the 8th overall pick in my opinion. Just the fact that Jerry West was on the other end of the phone should have been a red flag. The next year they unloaded Gasol. -Let Keith Bogans walk. -Cut Azubuike. -Fired Jeff Van Gundy for Rick friggin' Adelman? How could you look at your roster and think Rick Adelman would be the right coach for that team? Hmmm lets see. We have the best defensive team in the NBA. Lets hire a known offensive minded coach... -The entire handling of McGrady was strange to say the least. His trade value could have been higher or he could have simply helped the team win some games. It will be interesting to see what big name free agent would come to The Rockets knowing what would happen if they got injured. -Aggressively going after Gortat. Imagine The Rockets this season without Ariza as crazy as that sounds. -You actually can't fault him for actually signing Ariza because they had the injury exception, but Ariza's play goes back to the hiring of Rick Adelman who lets Ariza do whatever he wants.
It's on Adelman. Everyone had him in the early running for coach of the year. They start Chuck, they are winning games, in the playoffs. Then he started going away from what was working and back to the old Rick Adelman. Subbing in all offense and letting the inmates run the asylum.
The recipe to a championship has almost exclusively been a dominant wing (2 or 3) + a dominant big (4 or 5). There are very few examples of teams that didn't fit that script. There are some but it's relatively rare. The best PGs in the game rarely win championships. They are almost always trumped by teams with dominant wings. Even in your example above, the dominant PG (Stockton) was almost always trumped by teams that had dominant wings. Sure, Jordan was the best ever but there are plenty of other examples. Part of the problem lies in the basic physical reality that PGs are the smallest players on the court. Basketball is a sport where height and length are critical assets. They're obviously not the only things that matter but they are fundamentally crucial characteristics to the athletes that play the sport. That's a big reason why great wings are almost always more valuable than great PGs. Plus, great wings usually have playmaking skills allowing them to effectively be PGs during critical stages of games. The bottom line is that in a sport where a salary cap is imposed, if you are giving out max or near max dollars to the smallest guy on your team, you are taking a risk of going against the winning formula since you won't likely be able to pay max to both a wing and a big. I'm not saying it's never worth it to go max with a PG. There are some exceptional PGs if you go back through history that go against my general argument. Still, a dominant 2 or 3 will amost always trump a dominant 1 when it matters in the playoffs. Just look at the best PGs in the game right now. Not one of them has won a championship. Parker is a unique case and is more of a scoring point. Ginobili also has been crucial to their last few runs. Duncan is obviously the key to everything. Billups and those Pistons were a special team that would qualify as a rare exception. They had a lot of very good players and tremendous chemistry/defense but they didn't have any players as individually gifted as Kobe or Shaq in his prime. Kobe and Shaq won multiple championships and they were the wing + big combo I'm arguing is the best formula for success. Rondo had the Big 3 and was just coming into his own but those Celtics also followed the formula of wing + big in terms of their best and highest paid players. Magic was a physical freak that went against my point above that PGs are the smallest guys on their teams. Good luck finding another generational talent at the PG position who is 6'9-6'10. Nash, Kidd, Paul, Williams haven't won a thing. Most of them haven't even tasted the finals. So, basically, I disagree that the 1 is the hardest position to fill when it comes to building a championship-caliber team. Just look at some of the players at the 1 who have won championships over the last few decades. There are a lot of pretty ordinary players on that list. Now compare that to the list of teams that had ordinary players at both the 2 and 3 positions. I imagine the latter will be a much shorter list as would be the one for the dominant bigs on those teams.
^^^ Brooksball, I understand the attraction of the "dominant playmaking wing + dominant big" formula, but I don't think it's the only way to get a ring. I looked through some of the championship roster from the 90s onwards and these are the teams that I'd say followed that wing/big formula: 95 Rockets (Drexler/Olajuwon, but kind of stretching it) 00, 01, 02 Lakers (Bryant/O'Neal) 06 Heat (Wade/O'Neal) 09 Lakers (Bryant/Gasol) In many ways, the formula reflected the dominance of Bryant and O'Neal, either together or apart. Instead, I find more championship teams followed a "Big Three or More" formula, meaning they had stars or borderline stars at multiple positions, and thus were able to compensate for not having a truly dominant wing/big pair. Plus, the point guard position seems to take on more importance on these teams: 99 Spurs (Johnson/Duncan/Robinson) 03 Spurs (Parker/Duncan/Robinson) 05, 07 Spurs (Parker/Ginobili/Duncan) 04 Pistons (everyone) 08 Celtics (Allen/Pierce/Garnett + Rondo) I think Morey is looking to follow the "Big Three or More" formula. He tried it by putting together the McGrady/Artest/Yao team last season, and he'll probably try to bring in another star player to complement Martin/Yao next sason. BTW I left out Jordan because he's in a league of his own.
.... If I recall correctly, we lost horribly without Ariza but Landry in the first time Ariza was out. Get over it. Landry was there for some games and not for other games. Another thing I dont understand why peeps prefer him to Scola. At Scola is there most of the games, always near double double. Just face it, Lowry and Ariza out means loss.
