First of all, the Lakers are clearly the best team in the league right now so losing to them by six points isn't the end of the world, especially considering that the Rockets played them tough and lost by a similar margin in their last game. That said, both those games were winnable. And the reasons why the Rockets lost were not unique to the Lakers. They're problems that have been plaguing the Rockets throughout the season and they've shown up in losses, like Chicago, and wins where the Rockets have let their leads evaporate in the fourth and ended up holding on by their fingernails, like Denver. I'm going to single out two players. Yao: The big issue is the Rockets' offense goes completely stagnant when Yao can't get the ball. Half of that's on Yao, but half of that is on the rest of the team. 1) Yao does a terrible job of sealing off his defender. 2) When he does get the ball he needs to kick it out and repost it sometimes. I counted zero reposts last night, which is crazy considering how well it's worked recently. There's no need to always try and back your defender down. Don't be predictable. 3) Related to point 2, every time the ball goes in to Yao he doesn't need to take the shot. Don't be predictable. Keep the ball moving. He did a great job of that games earlier this season. As for the rest of the team: 1) When everybody in the arena knows the entry pass is going to Yao, that includes the other team. Don't be predictable. When the defenders know the ball's going to Yao, and last night they had about five or six seconds warning every time, they're going to mug him from the weak side. 2) If you're worried about getting the ball to Yao don't be static and just try the same pass over and over. Swing it back around the perimeter and let Yao cut across the paint. This worked so well in the past, why the Hell didn't it happen last night? 3) Don't be afraid to use Yao as a decoy. Let him create, but there's more to letting him create then just letting him draw the double. 3a) Yeah, moving might screw up the spacing when you're trying to get Yao the ball. But to my mind the Rockets looked much, much better last night with Lowry and Wafer on the floor with Yao because they were consistently aggressive and drove to the basket. Brooks is looking way too tentative out there. The second, smaller issue is that Yao needs to learn how to rebound. Watch last night's game--the Lakers as a team clearly made the adjustment of allowing Yao to get the rebound and then trying to knock it out of Yao's hands rather than contesting him for the original rebound in the first place. This is clearly unacceptable. I posted a week or two ago that Yao needs to be defending the ball with his elbows. Where the hell is Deke? Artest: Ron just goes off the reservation sometimes and tries to do way too much. His thinking is completely transparent--"I've got to put the team on my back and carry them". But the team doesn't need that, they need him to play within the offense. Last game he stayed within the offense for the first half and didn't force shots or overdribble and the Rockets prospered. In the second half he was completely off the reservation. Note why though: because the Rockets couldn't get the ball to Yao, the offense stagnated, and Ron decided he had to do whatever he could. (The same thing happened in Chicago, btw.) That's why I think there's hope for Ron. A word about Adelman: maybe he should have thrown the second unit out there when it was obvious the starters were bogging down. On the other hand the starters obviously need the practice. I'm not going to ding him for that decision. He's got to play not only for that one game but for the rest of the season. Finally, this wasn't the worst loss in the world. The Rockets kept it close despite completely breaking down in the second half. They kept it close despite Yao being completely ineffective in the second half. They kept it close despite Artest's lousy shooting night, and Battier's. There's still hope.
That man who usually took shots at will is named Ron last night. Maybe T-Mac called him and told him sometimes you should go at it yourself instead of sticking to the plan.
Thankfully he's one old problem that the Rockets don't have to worry about right now. There is such a thing as progress.
The reason why they didnt do any repost on Yao is that the help defense is always coming from the weak side, so there's no way he can do repost. And their double team became more and more effective because rockets cant hit any outside shot.
Why are do these points/threads only pop up after a loss and when you hear Bill or someone comment on the exact points? Does it just remind people or something? I'm not just talking about the thread starter here, but just in general. This is stuff that has been going on forever, and should have been concerns all along. As for last night, the Rockets' inability to execute was of course a big issue. At the same time, when a guy like Kobe decides he wants to start playing, there really is not much you can do.
do you see why some of us wanted to have a healthy mcgrady this season? tmac can get yao the ball, there is no question about it
I say that stupid plays from Yao and Artest let the Lakers win, but they do have Kobe. A win or lose was just determined by a few key plays, and this team did not finished any of them.
Odom and Bynum were out as well. If we had a healthy mcgrady we would've done alot better possibly won that game last night.
Thanks. The more I think about it the more I think the underlying problem is that the Rockets are not clutch. Adelman's offense is like jazz--it's free flowing and improvisational. The Rockets tighten up when they're under pressure, they seize up, and it's impossible for them to play the offense like it's meant to be played.
The Rockets don't have a lot of players who are used to stepping up and making big plays in crunch time with the ball in their hands. Even with the Jazz, we're talking about a team with a great, 5-man motion offense. But late in the 4th quarter, when the score is tight, what are they running? It's Deron Williams with the ball, running the pick and roll, and he's making the majority of the decisions. You can succeed without a player that gifted, surely. But it's much, much harder. It requires trusting in your teammates and the offense, not getting rattled, and playing with confidence. It would be great if we can become that kind of team, but the unfortunate reality is that most teams that win big in the playoffs keep it simple and put the ball in the hands of one or two players and ask him to go to work. We don't have that guy, or at least not one that's proven.
I would say that the key is having a veteran guy who can make those decisions. I don't know if you play any sports, but I think a lot of people who do are familiar with the phenomenon where you're in a game and suddenly the pressure's on and you lock yourself down. You're nervous and you start mechanically doing the same thing over and over because you think that's how you're going to win. It's like you've placed all your faith in some magic recipe that's supposed to be a guarantee of success and now you're terrified of deviating from the game plan. Except now you're just doing the same thing over and over, you're completely predictable, and the other guy is just going to take you apart. The sad thing is that the Rockets forgot about all the new stuff they'd figured out this season about getting Yao the ball--reposting, working the ball over to the weak side, etc.--and just tried the same entry pass over and over. That's what I saw in the Rockets last night in the second half. And for a read and react system like Adelman's that's not going to fly. You take what the defense gives you, you don't just run what you think is going to work. Don't plan, read the defense and react accordingly.
Being able to read and react is important, but again I think for most teams that win big in the playoffs it becomes easier because they can keep things simple. They usually have a guy they can just give the ball to, run a basic play, and make things happen that way. What were Lakers running yesterday? They weren't doing much read and react stuff in crunch time, because they didn't have to. They gave the ball to Kobe, had him ISO against Battier and Artest, and he killed us by himself. He's so good he didn't even need a pick, so it was even more basic than a pick and roll. Same thing with those great Chicago teams. They ran the triangle all game long, but in crunch time it was give the ball to MJ and let him win the game.
Sure, Kobe was great, but the Rockets had an absolutely abyssal second half. Even with Kobe the Lakers would have lost if the Rockets had just been able to execute their offense. My core belief here is that by killing their own offense the Rockets beat themselves. Ask yourself: mostly the Lakers' defense or mostly the Rockets' offensive ineptitude? My vote goes with the latter.
The Rockets have had very good third quarters of late, and I believe they've been pretty strong in third quarter the entire year. Against the Lakers, they've blown big leads in the third quarter. So, I actually tend to give the Lakers a lot of credit for that. They're not on pace for 65 wins for nothing.
I don't deny that the Lakers' D was a factor--that was why I phrased the question as "mostly" the Lakers or "mostly" the Rockets. But I don't see how you could miss the tentative nature of the Rockets' offense last night in the second half. No penetration, a bunch of guys standing around while somebody tries to feed Yao. And look how they tried to feed Yao--the same entry pass, over and over, with no reposts, no flashes across the paint, no creativity. Look at where Yao was when they tried to set him up--the exact same spot time after time. It's just a recipe for disaster against an elite team. The Lakers play great D, but there's no way that they got the Rockets' A game in the second half.
