I would have liked to see Asik stay in the backcourt or run away to kill precious seconds... or even set picks to get him free and allow him to delay the foul by 5 seconds.
It's not a good strategy for OKC in this case, because it gives Asik more time to rest. Therefore, Asik would have more energy on our defense end. Obviously, defense is Asik's strength. Also, with 54% chance of free throw shooting during 2012-2013 season, that means 108 points per 100 possessions, which is only slightly less than Rocket's offensive rating of 109.7 points per 100 possessions.
He's a 56% free throw shooter, so it's actually 112 points per possession and better than almost all NBA offenses.
It could be I'm not sure. That would seem to be an anomaly if true. That kind of stat should even itself out next year I would think to where his road average increases. I could actually see the strategy being a good one if you think a guy will only shoot 40%.
ESPNStatsInfo: Asik was 11-16 on 4th-qtr FT (1.38 PPP). HOU averaged 0.53 PPP on 4th-qtr possessions that weren't Asik FT.” Wow! #Asik
While that's true and I agree. I would factor in 2 misses due to Harden's half court heave, which came as a result of the hack-Asik strategy. 11-18 is still a PPP of 1.22.
Thanks for relaying that info. So basically it lost the game for them. Like I mentioned earlier in this thread this strategy showed a total lack of confidence by Brooks in the Thunder defense. If they would have just stuck to their normal defense they would have had a much better chance.
Oh I read your comment wrong, sorry. Well it's not fair to count that because it was an error in Harden jacking up that shot.
The Rockets score 106 points on 96.1 possessions, which would be equivalent to 55% shooting. Asik's free throws would give the Rockets the same number of points they usually score. As other have said, it does give the Thunder more possessions to try to come back.
That's what I was thinking at the time. It was like Brooks was telling his team, "You can't stop them from scoring, so let's try this desperation move and everyone foul the Turk." It reeks of not believing in your team. That's pretty strange after the season they've had, and the fact that they were playing at home. I bet the crowd was freaked out while it was going on. Too strange.
but I'll chimed in and with a 56% ft shooter, there is a lot of variance. That's his average over a long period of a season, so in a short stint, Asik could have easily shot worst than his average. Not to mention maybe other factors that could worsen his ft % like frustration, nervousness, and fatigue (being in 4th quarter)
It gives the Thunder almost no chance to increase the variance in the Rockets offensive efficiency, allows the defense to get set/takes away transition opportunities, takes fans out of the game, and requires that variance not increase in a bad way for them offensively. The variance did not increase enough for them offensively, and as noted, it would need to increase a significant amount.
Yeah but they let Omer shoot 14 times. The sample size was too large for OKC. For one thing it let Asik get into a rhythm at the line, which actually helps increase the variance in a negative way for OKC.
also to be fair, they got the lead down to 6 with like 3 minutes left and that's when they should have stopped with our offense possibly not ready after 2 minutes of straight ft's. I think it did work but they should have stopped right then instead of continually fouling
