The Rockets often casual approach to games just blows me away. Here you are fighting for your positioning/playoff lives and come and play like it is another day at the park. I don't get it. Where is the fire, the intensity, the determination? Ho hum, another game, yawn, let's make the Suns look like the classic Celtics. Good grief. That really ticks me off. I want lock down defense, I want flying hair, teeth, and eyeballs! No prisoners! That's not what we got. A 15-0 run in the fourth when you have the game in hand is shameful. And what a masterful coaching response! Duh, what to do, let'em play I guess!?
No one said nash or any sun is unguardable on their own, THAT would be Bryant. I'm talking as a team, as an offensive style, not defending one on one. Yes they had easy shots, BUT WHY did they have them? Not because our defenders didnt try defending, but because the suns offense makes defenders scramble, once you scramble you're at a disavantage right away because you're chasing AFTER guys, you're no longer betweent the ball and the basket. Other teams donthave the players to work the pick and roll to perfection almost every time, so with other teams you can catch up, not with the suns. You just gotta hope they're not hitting their shots. It's not a cop out it's the truth. It's like guarding Kobe, you're not gonna shut him down. Is it a cop out to say you can just hope he's off? No, that's how good he is, and that's how good the suns offense is. We're not perfect, no one is, it's BS to think we're just going to be able to stop everyone whenever we want, like the other team had no say in it. Even the celtics didn't stop everyone whenever they wanted, they just did it enough times to win, which is the point.
Well, the Rockets aren't as desperate as the Suns. They need a leader on the bench -- someone like T-Mac to lead them through. Wait, it's April 2? Crap.
this is kinda how i felt right after the game. pissed. our defense in the first half was one of the worst this season. but we are who we are. the suns wanted it a bit more, and understandably so. have not seen shaq working so hard like he has lately in a long long time. i know no such thing as a perfect team. but our pg situation worries me quite a bit - especially the majority of great pg's are in the west and in these playoff teams.
the suns put up 111 against cleveland, 112 against Hou in our last meeting, 108 against boston, and 104 against SA.....all top defensive teams and they LOST all of those games. Not because they were shut down by these defensive teams, but because those defensive teams beat them at their own game and outscored them. Sometimes that's the only way to beat them, we couldn't do it tonight, period.
Well even though Kobe is unguardable, I mean at least when he plays us he's getting 'bad' shots. I didn't see many bad shots tonight for Hill and that was the game for me, het gets 10 points or under 15 points we win this game. Shaq and Yao are always a wash and Nash(nearly any PG in the NBA) are going to get theirs against Brooks. My main point though was that the team was playing bad defense because Artest and Battier was playing bad defense. I mean we can say they tried and that the Suns have a good offense but what was their FG% again? It was way too high at half(61% I think) I don't know what they finished with. That's not good defense. This game was lost on defense and rebounding that's why, I mean Grant Hill? This isn't Durant or Iguodala(a guy who tears us up everytime) this is Hill, the same guy that lost the Suns the game in Utah a few days back. I just think if Battier and Artest are letting opposing teams wing players combine for 41 points we won't win many games. I agree this game isn't the end of the world, but it's going to take one of our best efforts defensively to have a shot at beating the Lakers.
I remember when the Suns had Amare and everyone and everyone though they were back...Celtics then destroyed them. Were those games close? If not that means those teams made the stops they needed to. We didn't make any stops tonight. NONE. Team is shooting 61 something percent at the half...that's just wrong. I don't care how good you are good defensive teams shouldn't let that happen. Suns in the 4th ran the same play...high pick and roll and we act like we didn't know what to do to stop it. They got a good shot off the same play and it killed us in the closing minutes, a few stops and we win this game. But we played horrible defense all night. Then when we were up it's because we were playing defense. That's the point. We played bad defense. I really don't care how good they are on offense, bad defense is bad defense.
If you cant stop Nash's penetration theyre going to kill you. And AB was clueless. For chrissakes Nash basically went for 20 and 20 and put the nail in the coffin with a three. Nash embarrassed Brooks tonight.
That was why we lost the game. Even though Lowry wasn't exactly shutting down Nash tonight, I would have liked to see Lowry match up on Nash from the beginning of the game. Lowry is physical on both ends, and if he gets in foul trouble, well, we still have Brooks.
The Rockets played the game as if they thought the Suns were just going to lay down b/c their playoff hopes is slim to none. I was disappointed that I did not see any killer instinct or fire in their game. And I'm not surprised their defense was bad. All those days in practice and I betcha Adelman only went over offensive sets and barely any defense which he has admitted to doing in the past.
Well, I did not watch the game but sure, I tought we were gonna win. Suprisingly we lost, but I am ok with that. I mean, you are not gonna win every game. I like the 4th seed as long as we have Hornets in the 1st round with HCA.
You're missing the point. You're saying elite defensive teams ALWAYS stop teams. Yes, boston stopped the suns, but my point is they can't do it ALWAYS, but that doesnt make them not an elite defensive team. When the suns offense is clicking on all cylinders even the bostons and clevelands can't stop them, just try to outscore them. It's like if Lebron James went off for 50 because he was hot, hitting everything, and did it on Kobe. Does that mean Kobe is no longer an elite defender until he proves himself again? No, it means he faced freakin lebron james. It's a team game, you're never going to have a player ot a team that can just shut down EVERYONE and ALL THE TIME. Even the 72-10 bulls had nights wen they couldnt.
Since we clinch the playoff spot.. the game is about position-home court.. I dont mind with loss anymore.. even I am more concern if we win now and loss at the playoff it's even bitter.. So, Just learn the game and get better when the playoff come.. doesn't matter who we play agains
There are many teams that are more talented than us,therefore it is imperative to come out with a positive attitude,a game plan and to execute it. Having a lackadaisical attitude is a recipe for a first round flame out. The margin for error is minimal,we aren't talented enough to get by like the elite teams. Rick needs to intervene quickly when things are going wrong.
What a disappointing effort. If the Rockets just play average defense (for them) they win this game. A complete bummer. Where's the desire? And why did Lowry play only 17 minutes? And that's the quietest 33 minutes I've seen from Scola in a very long time. Brooks, Luis, and Yao each had 3 turnovers. Barry helped us more when he was on the bench. God, I can't stand listening to Mark Jackson. Argh!! Nights like this are so damn frustrating. You'd never know we were fighting for the 2nd seed.
The irony is that we had several days to practice and work on our execution. It looked like the team just spent the break just lazing around instead of preparing for the playoffs
I did not see the game but the discrepancy in the fouls called against us was almost 2 to 1 in Phoenix's favor which in turn meant more than twice as many FT's for them. If we shoot 35 FT's like Phoenix did, we would have blown them out imho. I believe the Rockets need to spend some quality time on referee management. I'm not advocating the Dallas/Utah style of getting calls but we need to get our fair share of calls too!
