610. 7pm. Call and voice your concerns. If you talk the talk here, pick up the phone and ask Rudy yourself any questions you might have.
He pretty much said there is no room in the rotation for him right now. He said it's going to get worse when Mo Taylor gets back. He said they want a 7 or 8 man rotation. Also mentioned he had a talk with Boki today explaining this and telling him to keep working hard. He told him about Othella Harrington how he busted his ass and when the opportunity came up he cashed in on it.
But there's plenty of minutes for Moochie's lame butt! Cut Moochie's minutes to only backing up our guards (which wont be much), and their is plenty of time for Nachbar. I thought Nachbar was the 3 point specialist, the Rockets so desparately needed this season!!
Thats what Im absolutely puzzled by Barboudg. How is Moochie hasnt earned himself a one way ticket back to the CBA? (Yes thats being a bit extreme) He offers the team next to nothing on either end of the court, is such a defensive liability, that we must continuously run support over to help him and leaving wide oppen oppenents. Right now Moochie is about as 12th man a player as they come. How is it Collier has seen more minutes than our number one draft pick on a few nights? How is it a 29 year old undersized SF rookie can find significant minutes at the SF spot ahead of our number 15 pick? Im not downing Hawkins at all, he seems to know his role, but its not like he's playing lights out on O, and is only barely respectable on the defensive side. I honestly believe Rudy is feeling alot of pressure for the first time to succeed and succeed NOW. So he's sticking with the offense he knows best, and rotations that he believes are more experienced and effective. I dont think he feels Ming or Nachbar will (at least right now) lead to wins, so hes going with what will see immediate results, instead of letting them get some decent time. I hope to God that Rudy starts working in a better rotation soon.
Rudy said there will be a long road ahead of Rockets, and his challenge has not begun yet. He implied Yao is not Hakeem and never will. He said Yao is way above average athletic ability for a guy with his height and he disagreed that putting more pounds would help. Instead, Yao needed to strengthen his middle torso and tone up. Yao is making development every practice, every game. And he was told to work on one step jump hook but he let Yao shoot his own shots in his own way. And he contended that players should not be reprogrammed like a robot and could change with a limit. But he showed his frustration that when one problem finally got fixed with Yao, a new one poped up in the next game. On MoT, he might not be able to contribute quickly just same as KT. He also claimed his decision on TBrown and picked TMo instead b/c TMo can pass the ball and play better defense. Let me know if you have any questions.
barely respectable on defense? yeah right. he has been outstanding at defense, imo even more than advertised. offensively he has an average jumper but he plays his role well there as you said. nachbar just got hopped over by a more experienced player with a more pressing need. if he plays well in limited minutes and in practice he'll earn the court time. as far as moochie i couldn't agree more. cut him down to 15 minutes max and spread the rest to everyone else.
Big M....I think Hawkins plays good D at a Guard spot, but at Small Foward, where he's been featured at lot lately, hes not as strong. I think his individual D is good enough, but his rotations and court awareness are a bit slow.
Francs,Cat,Nachbar,Griffin,Cato should start and see the most minutes right now. If Rudy thought about it, there is still plenty of room to play Norris, Hawkins, and Ming right now, especially that 3 of our key players will have to come along slowly
I agree 100% on Moochie, and have been saying that since before last year. Small ball/3 guard has its place...but not with our current personnel. The Moochie-Francis-Mobley trio doesn't have a lockdown defender in its ranks. Our frontcourt is very young and inexperienced, and doesn't need to be FORCED to make up for their constant allowances for penetration. Most of their fouls come on guards that penetrate our point of attack defense. Besides, neither Francis nor Moochie help promote ball movement, and are definitely inhibiting the alleged 5 man offense. You would think putting in 2 point guards would serve to increase ball movement, right? While on Moochie-watch him on defense. I swear he always tries to get near the man with the ball (without doubling him) and be a vulture on an unforced turnover, and in position for rebounds-no matter where his man is. The guy doesn't release on outlets, either. I've been watching him, and he hangs near the opponents' basket-eliminating any outlet opportunity, and negating any chance for a transition bucket off a def. rebound.
That's cool. I agree you need a 7-8 man rotaion if you want to have any cohesiveness at all. So if you assume that: 1. Nachbar, Maddox, Mickael, and Collier are already out, and 2. Griffin, Stevie, Cat, Cato and Moochie are locks, that leaves: Rice, KT, MoT, TMo, J-Hawk, and Yao Ming to compete for the remaining 2-3 spots. The way I see it is: 1. Yao and Maurice fight for one spot (C/PF), and 2. Rice, KT, TMo, and J-Hawk fight for one, possibly two spots (SF/PF). It's gonna be interesting. Yao is terrible right now, but MoT was mediocre at best before the injury and you can hardly expect him to be better. TMo, KT and J-Hawk can be valuable role players but none of them has Rice's touch. We'll see...
Rice no longer has Rice's touch. KT had a pretty good season last year, but he was played more at PF than SF.
In the games that Rice has played as a Rocket, he hasn't really produced once. I think Rice is worthless. It would be nice if he could shoot like he used to, but he just hasn't done it. He had some wide open shots in the Seattle game. He made is first one and missed the rest. I wouldn't mind giving him limited minutes and hoping that he heats up, but right now he should only have limited minutes. He has yet to really produce in Rockets uni.
Moochie backs up two positions guys. He spells both Francis and Cuttino. When he spells Cuttino, Francis slides over to SG. If he gets only 15 minutes per game, that makes SF and CM 41 mpg players. Add 5 minutes of 3-guard ball, and that is 20mpg. He is not the reason Nachbar is getting DNPs in the last two games, which coinciding with Rice and KT returning.
