i am a little lost on this one. i dont believe bev is good enough to be a starting pg on a team w/ title-contending ambitions; terry is obviously too old to be the answer long term; lawson doesnt seem to be working, either. i can wait a little longer, but for now he sure doesnt bring any confidence on the pg position to anyone. so before we think about what to do with dwight after this season is over, what do we do with the 1 - now? for as much as the game has evolved, i still believe 1 and 5 are in general the most important positions for any team.
I want Darren Collison. He's not elite but he would be a solid backcourt mate with Harden. Knocks down the 3 at a great clip, can handle the ball unlike Bev, and plays defense.
Spoiler Call him a 1, call him a point guard, don't call him a 1, don't call him a point guard... As long as he's here, he's gonna have the ball in his hands the majority of the time, for better or for worse. So what they're looking for is "3&D" next to him. They have Ariza on one end and ??? <strike>Lin</strike>, <strike>Beverley</strike>, <strike>Terry</strike>, <strike>Lawson</strike> ??? on the other.
Sounds like we're starting Terry at least until Bev returns. Then I'm think we'll start Bev and have Ty/Terry come off the bench. I know, you're blown away.
This is why I advocated for us to steal Danny Green away from San Antonio during the free agency period. He'd be perfect for Harden.
I still think it's Lawson. What we've seen so far is not what he is capable of. Harden needs to defer bringing the ball up the court and let Lawson do what he does best. Until he does, we'll have games where Harden gets 5+ unnecessary turnovers. He's weak bringing it up. That's why teams press him before he gets to the 3 point line. The offense can still go through Harden without him getting the ball in the backcourt.
I don't think we can rule out Lawson all together since the Rockets didn't have much preseason to work out the kinks and had a horrendous start to this year. We've only played 12 games. 70 left to play.
We should start out the game as of now with: JET, Harden, Ariza, Jones, Dwight. Sub out Dwight after 5 minutes and let Harden play with Clint for few minutes. Than bring in Lawson, Brewer, and Dwight back in. You can than sub out Lawson and bring in the line up of Harden, Ariza, Brewer, Jones and Dwight. The last line up should be for the last 5 minutes of half and end of game because we know James like to have ball in his hand so why even have a PG and lets get the best defensive lineup out there. Repeat in the second half and of course adjust it a little bit. Later with P. Bev coming back, have him start in place of JET and D-Mo in place of Jones.
Probably the long term solution will have to be either Pat Bev getting better and sharing the role with someone like Lawson coming off the bench & excepting a 6th man role (can probably get someone better suited at a lower cost), or making the change long term to someone more like an Avery Bradley type whose defensive minded, and can play off the ball alot. So the long term solution is probably already on the roster in the form of Pat Beverley. The Lawson experiment was a good try though, and still has some potential of working although its unlikely they can exist next to each other at least defensively. Lawson actually makes Harden look good at times on that end. I don't know how someone so quick when he wants to be has absolutely no ability to keep anyone in front of him. It DESTROYS their defense. Lawson, at this point, just has to go to the bench.
I was never in love with the theory of Lawson because I never saw him as a great fit with this team. He's not a shooter nor a defender so playing next to Harden is a waste if Harden dominates the ball. However, I think it can still work, but the rest of the roster structure needs to change. The team doesn't have enough floor spacing to work with a guy like Lawson. We don't have shooters on the floor. A stretch four would make this team work so much better.
i am not sold on this 3&D theory. harden's (or anyone who's a capable star) iso plays can be a lethal weapon, but the over-reliance of that play wont get you too far. look at the championship teams in the past, hardly any of them won the title that way. if lebron and kyrie can co-exist and still be largely effective, why not harden and his pg? and even within the 3&D part,,, where is this 3&D pg? who's the potential acquisition target out there? any names? also, if we're looking for a 3&D pg, then wtf we brought in lawson for? his defense was always a well-known defect.
mmmmmmmmmmmmmmyeah that won't work. With this current mix of players our best move is to: 1. When Lawson and Harden play together, you've got to move Harden down to 3/4 with Ariza and have either Brewer or Thornton at the 2 depending on what the opponent has in the backcourt. You cannot have both Harden and Lawson attempting to defend at the 1 and 2 together. That's foolish. You've got to move Harden to 3 or 4 where he can match up against a bigger, slower opposing player. Offensively with Harden and Lawson out there together, you've got to run pick and roll with Lawson with Harden and two other floor spreaders. That means essentially you've got to go small until DMo gets back at least. Because Terrence and Harrell simply cannot spread the floor enough for us to have any kind of efficiency in our offense. And Lawson isn't a good enough catch-and-shooter to make a difference spreading the floor for Harden. Lawson's game is penetration. He shoots off the dribble. He's at 5-10 Harden with less turnovers. So basically, if you expect to play Harden and Lawson together, it's gotta be a small ball lineup and Harden needs to defend the opposing 3 or 4. Secondarily, if you're gonna play Terry with Harden you gotta have Harden at the 3/4 with a defender up top with Terry. Offensively Terry is a floor spreader so Harden can operate the top with him on the wing. But you still need a shooter at the 3 and 4 to make the offense work, so back to smalls. When Harden sits, we obviously need Ty out there running the show. But personally a Ty/Terry backcourt is not going to work except against bad teams. They can be exploited defensively too much. So when Harden sits I think your lineup needs to be Ty, Brewer, Thornton, Ariza, and your big. You hide Thornton the best you can by letting him take the lesser of the opponents 2/3. You can possibly duplicate this with Terry instead of Thornton but you're going to have to watch closely that Terry doesn't get overpowered by an opposing 3. As far as a true 3&D PG, the only thing close to that that we have is Bev. And the problem is that Bev is simply not the defender he was at the end of the 2014 season. He's lost something either through injuries or desire. I don't know which. But he's lost something. Other possibilities?? We need to see if McDaniels can defend 1's, specifically 1's like Westbrook, Curry, Paul, and Conley. The guys we will likely see in the playoffs. McDaniels has the size and athleticism to give those guys problems. We need to see what he looks like in that capacity. IF....he does have it defensively to give those guys problems...THEN...he could be a huge solution to igniting our defense and subsequently our offense since it is so important to our defensive scheme to turn point guards and keep them from getting in the pick-and-roll at the top. Barring that happening, I'm still advocating trying to sign Aaron Craft if he can get free from his contract with the team in Hungary. Aaron Craft is a difference-maker defensively. He will give Curry, Westbrook, etc. fits and drive them bananas. And he's a very good passer/playmaker. He's enough of a difference-maker defensively to more than offset his lack of 3-point shooting. Besides...he won't be a worse 3-point shooter than Brewer is already. So basically he could be Brewer (better yet, Tony Allen) for us from the PG position. Gets a lot of steals and forces opponent turnovers and bad shots. He's just a super nasty defensive player. Beyond that...we're going to have to change this roster. We simply do not have good enough 3&D guys around Harden. This mix of players isn't going to compete for a championship with Harden at the top. They can't shoot or defend good enough. So we're going to have to turn over part of the roster before we've got a chance to be really good.
it's a shame a huge reason why Harden doesn't seem to fit next to Lawson because your best player has been so bad defensively. Either way it's on the Rockets to put him in positions where he can play without overthinking/pressing which is what he is exactly doing now. Lawson also needs to take some more control of the offense and be assertive with being able to make decisions as a pg. huge work in progress but they're going to have to be able to play together eventually if they want to make a deep run in June.
We'll see. The challenge of this coach will be getting the most out of his players so if Bickerstaff is going to turn this team completely around it will depend on getting Lawson to be Lawson. Whether that be him gaining his starting job back and meshing with Harden or just becoming a complete 6th man terror like Manu was or Iguodala now...he has to get that guy going.
