Signings of Anderson, Gordon Reflect Emphasis on Culture

Meh; Les is a petulant child who wants the quick fix instead of doing things the right way, and that's the culture that needs to change.

 

I pretty much disagree. We've not hit bottom yet. The culture of les meddling and Dantoni bringing his no defense system doesn't make me optimistic.

This team isn't good. Hopefully we are smart and tank at the all star break.

Vegas has us as 200/1 for the championship. That's bottom 10.

 

The "D'Antoni teams don't play defense" is a popular misconception.We'll play at a fast pace and when D'Antoni's teams play fast they are usually middle of the pack on defense.

D'Antoni's Suns teams always played at a fast pace (110 to 112). His first season they finished 20th in opponents fg% and then in subsequent years finished 14th, 17th, 14th and 13th. So they were top half of the league 3 of those 4 seasons and 17th the other.

The only other D'Antoni team that played at a pace of 100 or above was the 2014 Lakers and they were 19th in opponents fg%.

None of D'Antoni's teams that played at a pace of 100 or better have been in the botton 1/3 of the league in defense.

His teams weren't elite defensive teams but they weren't terrible either. They were pretty much average, middle of the pack teams.

As for the Vegas odds, you do realize that people frequently bet on their favorite teams or players and that the odds reflect that, right? The odds are trying to set a line to get near equal bets on both sides. The odds reflect how they think people will bet.

 

hopefully it is healthy culture

 

That was the best pro-Rockets free agency moves article that you can pretty much hope for.

 

Just a friendly stat I found. D'antoni's Suns played better defense than the 2003 Spurs.

Signed,
Aelliot

 

I'll add to this that those Suns teams didn't really have the personnel require for an elite defense.

Marion was a great, versatile defender, but Nash, Diaw, Amare and Joe Johnson weren't exactly stoppers.

Being a middle rung defensive team with those players is actually quite good in that respect.

 

Do you disagree that the D'Antonio Suns were middle of the pack defensively? If so based on what?

Nobody said they were elite but they certainly weren't terrible. Saying that they played no defense is just as inaccurate as somebody saying that they played elite defense.

If you disagree them maybe you can cite the stats that back that up.

 

That's correct but it's much easier for people to complain when they don't have to base their opinions on facts.

 

Part of it, though is perception other teams had facing the Suns. Same is true of the current Warriors.

Essentially, other teams go into games feeling that they have to score 100+ points to have a legit chance to win. Even then, at any point the Suns could have just caught fire and it would not have mattered. Effectively, it causes other teams to press, make mistakes, and play off book, so they are less effective on offense.

It works really well during the regular season. But in later playoff rounds, the teams left typically have better talent, coaching, and preparation as well as more confidence that playing their game/style can still beat anyone. So they do not make those mistakes or press.

That is what Spurs did to those Suns teams. That is what Lebron/Kyrie did to GSW in comeback and what OKC did to GSW to build that 3-1 series lead.

 

...the advanced analytics weren't as common during those peak Suns years so people weren't adjusting the Suns team stats to account for pace at the time. Hence the prevailing school of thought that they were a sieve defensively. I'm pretty sure the adjusted defensive stats back up Aelliot's point that D'Antonio lead middle of the pack defensive teams rather than poor ones. Here in 06, they were slightly better than the league average, the year before they were slightly lower than the league average.

http://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/NBA_2006.html

 

You guys take a good look at their roster and then take a look at the rockets,yall are clearly trying to turn water into wine. Smh.

 

The article is making it seem as if Harden wanted the team to be fast paced and forced things to go that way when we all know that Les and Morey wanted that. They didn't want a low post slow game and Dwight wasn't good at it even if they did want that.

 

Ryan Anderson and Kyle Wiltjer are like two peas in a pod. They will be a great one two scoring punch.

 

I agree that culture was the real problem with the Rockets.

But I totally disagree that hiring D'Antoni is moving to the right direction in fixing it. The author seems to assume that style=identity and identity=culture. That is too simplistic. D'Antoni couldn't change the toxic culture in New York. What makes you think he can do it here?

I actually like Anderson and Gordon as players. But I don't think they can move the needle in terms of changing the culture.

 

Here's a couple of good article that talk about D'Antoni's defenses and points per possession. His teams were middle of the pack, not great but not terrible.

http://espn.go.com/blog/truehoop/po...worst-defensive-coach-out-there-mike-d-antoni

http://thesportsquotient.com/nba/2015/6/11/most-of-what-you-know-about-mike-dantoni-is-wrong

It's like Pop said, it's a better story to believe that he doesn't coach defense.

 

If you get a new coach and get mostly new players in key positions you can change the culture pretty quickly. IMO if we get rid of Brewer it would probably be one of the last changes we need to make. Letting Dwight go was a big culture change and a step in the right direction. Dwight no matter how you feel about him wanted to play opposite of what the Rockets wanted to play with him gone I can see a renewed energy in Houston. Part of letting Dwight know they wanted him gone was getting D'antoni.

 

Speaking of culture, Brandon Jennings just tweeted this....

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Find a way to get Trevor Ariza to the Knicks. A vet that wanna win</p>&mdash; Brandon Jennings (@thinkiminthe90s) <a href="https://twitter.com/thinkiminthe90s/status/750191751139201024">July 5, 2016</a></blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>

 

intradasting