Rockets talk with Zach Lowe and Amin El-Hassan.....starts around 53:00 mark http://www.espn.com/espnradio/play?id=18287735
Thanks for the podcast. Anyone who knows basketball felt the players would play well in D'Antoni's scheme. I felt there was enough defensive players to mix into the game to be successful. It's the injury aspect that had people hesitant. Many people expect injuries to Gordon/Ryno/Bev/Nene/D-Mo. The win total would reflect the injury aspect. I expected improvement/progress from Harrell/KJ/Dekker/Capela. Capela started the season poorly endurance-wise; but has made tremendous progress since. If Harrell & Dekker continue to progress by playoff time.....this could get very interesting. I wish Bzdelik would take KJ under his wing like he has with Harrell. That one-on-one time would do wonders for this team come playoff time. Better sooner rather than later. Our thirst for knowledge(info) exceeds our cup
Interesting listen. It's strange that Gordon is considered a bad defender.. He doesn't look like some one who has ever slacked on D. It's weird people keep bringing it up. I know before the season everyone thought the Rockets were going to be bad defensively, and they always point to MDA, Harden, Anderson and Gordon(for some reason) as the biggest offenders. But I look at this team, and down the roster, are decent to good defenders: Ariza, Bev, Capela, Dekker, Brewer*, Nene (in spots), Gordon, Montrezl (not great but gets blocks) all solid defenders. Even Anderson, who is awful defensively, is an underrated rebounder I think Rockets being bad defensively has been overstated.
Before the season on another site i guesstimated the Rockets DRtg at 106.42. That would have put Houston between 13th-14th best in the league last yr. Gordon has been labeled bad (see him better than that), Ryno has been a notoriously bad PnR defender (due to poor lateral movement), To this point Ryno hasn't been exposed in PnR yet, Harden when playing off ball defense (tends to lose track of his assignment in the past). Harden has always rated well in PnR, one-on-one in the perimeter and post up defense. Without Bev and playing so many games on the road will give you bad stats defensively. Bev back & home games will help the DRtg stat.
Zach Lowe I'm not a huge fan of BUT he's a fair critic. The other guy on the podcast is a complete hater. I hate when "experts" get on a podcast and talk about a team they have no info about. Example: - Saying Gordon is a horrible defender; Gordon came into the league as a defender and was also a solid defender in the PO againt GS. - BEV took $6 mill because that's what the market was for him at the time and not to mention he was coming off serious knee surgery. - Dude said "rockets will came back down to earth" and "won't keep this same pace", if it was 10-15 games in and they were shooting 70% I would believe it BUT it's 26 games in and have had the toughest schedule by far so for someone to say that is completely moronic. The team you see right now is who they are and will be consistently. They've won tough games and find ways to win defensive games. A team that's bound to come back to earth regresses, rockets have improved So how is that flukeish? It's been 26 games, what more do you want?
How is it not hating? It's 26 games into the season and he's basically saying it's alla fluke instead of giving us the props we deserve. In that case every teams success thus far is a fluke until god knows how many games in. Coming back down to earth is a team like CHI who was leading the league in 3 point % and have since fallen dramatically, not a team who's ID is to shoot 3's and layups, play 15+ games on the road to start the season, and beat high quality teams at their place. Tell me how that's a fluke? It's cool I'll wait.
Let me drop some knowledge for those who think Rockets are just on a flukish streak: These are the Rockets stats versus the other top 4 teams in the NBA: HOU (18 Defense) -112.8PPG - 47.1 FG% - 14.5 3PM - 38.4 3P% - 11.4 OREB - 44.6 REB - 25.4 AST - 8 STL - 4.7 BLKA - 6.9 (+/-) GSW (8 Defense) - 117.8PPG - 49.5 FG% - 12 3PM - 38.1 3P% - 9.3 OREB - 44.3 REB - 31 AST - 9.4 STL - 4.7 BLKA - 11.7 (+/-) CAVS (14 Defense) - 110PPG - 46.2 FG% - 13.3 3PM - 39.9 3P% - 9.8 OREB - 44.2 REB - 22.1 AST - 7 STL - 4.4 BLKA - 7.7 (+/-) SAS (5 Defense) - 103.7PPG - 46.8 FG% - 8.8 3PM - 39.6 3P% - 8.8 OREB - 42.2 REB - 23.5 AST - 8.1 STL - 5.5 BLKA - 6 (+/-) LAC (4 Defense) - 109.9PPG - 46.7 FG% - 10.3 3PM - 38.6 3P% - 9.7 OREB - 43.7 REB - 22.5 AST - 8.7 STL - 4.8 BLKA - 8.8 (+/-) Rocket are up there with the top teams, yea the defense isn't with the rest but they have improved significantly from the beginning of the year and were #4 in the month of December.
