There must be a reason why Scola was not put in in the 4th by Adelman. It's either a good reason i.e. a pre-planned move or it's a poor one i.e. thought we had the game in hand and let the bench such as Novak play.
Luis was taken out pretty early in the third quarter, so apparently there was something there that Adelman didn't like. Does anyone know what it might have been?
I hate to rain on your parade but Artest didn't have any trouble last night. He scored 30 pts, 4 rebounds, and 4 assists. I looked at the minutes distribution of last nights game and it seems that Adleman wanted to focus more on defense against the Kings. Instead of the Landry/Scola tandem he went heavy minutes with Battier/Hayes. Nothing against Hayes and Battier but Bonzi had a -8 +/- rating. Bonzi played too many minutes and was completely ineffective. Novak also had a -7 +/- rating. So you have to look at which pts in the game these guys came in to play. Kudos to Hayes for his +18 rating.
I don't know what you're trying to say there. This isn't about "ratings". Chuck did a solid job defending Artest, and he didn't hurt us on the other end offensively (reflected in the fact that we outscored them by 18 points while he was in the game).
Scola was not effective after half of 1st quarter. One big reason Rockets made a huge run in late 1st quarter AND 3rd quarter was Hayes replaced Scola. Kings instantly couldn't score.
But of course, Hayes need Yao on the court at the same time to be effective. Yao somewhat covers up Hayes offensive liability.
Scola missed a layup, made a bad pass in traffic, made defensive mistakes like when his man Artest went for layup and got blocked by Yao, he forgot to block out Yao's man and gave up a tip in etc. Rockets lead was down to 7.
Chuck Hayes is our best Artest stopper. Shane and Tracy don't have the meat to even affect Ron's balance when he is in a zone. Chuck, on the other hand, has meat. And meat makes Artest uncomfortable. Artest makes a living on offense beating up skinnier and weaker guys. When he faces someone who can bang him back, he is much less effective.
sorry to say this, working hard is a great ethic, but it doesn't guarantee absolutely everything in life.
Chuck Hayes is what he is and thats an exceptional on the ball and help defender + solid rebounder. I think he is finally being used correctly by this team as a situational defensive stopper and game stabalizer. What a weapon it is to have a player like Chuck at your disposal when an opposing 3,4, or 5 is going off on the offensive side of the ball.
