You forgot the smiley face at the end of this sentence. Or you forgot how boring ISO basketball was. One or the other.
All I know is that the pseudo-"ISO ball" was infinitely more entertaining to watch than the product on the floor this season...
Don't worry.......I think the city of Houston is already ahead of you with that one. Rudy was no Tex Winter, but at least he knew how to somewhat play to our players' strengths. Which 80% of the time looked to be some play initiated by an ISO. One thing you do have to factor in is the decision to include zone this year though. NBA...............it's FAAAAANTASSTIC.
Speaking of zone, why in Stern's name does Gundy not use a zone more often........IT'S LEGAL NOW! I oppose it, but if it's in the rule book, use it to your advantage o-great mind of defense.
Roger Clemens is signing with the Astros. I'm thinking the Rockets attendance drop after the Astros season begins will be dramatic. There's only so many sporting entertainment dollars available to be spent. Rockets better make a move. Astros and Texans are firmly in the top 2 spots.
Who cares......it's baseball. It's just above golf and not nearly in the same class as basketball and football. Again, pick pretty much any middle school basketball coach and he'll implement a better offensive scheme with this group of players. Hell, I'd rather have Mattress Mac calling the offensive sets.
Whatever ... I coach 6 YO's and they can run an offensive set that plays to the strength's of them team ... JVG seems set in his ways to cut out the "creative" portion of our offense. I liken it to a defensive minded football coach trying to force Payton Manning to hand the ball off every play or Mike Martz trying to pass every play instead of handing it to Marshall Faulk.
I like your football analogy. A coach who fights against the obvious limitations of his players is doomed to failure.
Let me put it this way. On defense: We were a good defensive team last year. JVG makes us a great defensive team. All credits due to JVG, but it's not a dramatic turnaround as some people imply. On offense: Rudy and JVG have very different styles. People complained last year about Rudy's team of being too undisciplined. Ironically, people is complaining about JVG being too rigid, forcing players (especially Francis and Yao) to abandon their natural strengths. Regardless, the results seems to be quite the same. We are an unwatchable offensive team. In terms of personnel, however, I think JVG has better offensive talents than Rudy did. We lost Posey, Griffin, and Rice, and gained JJ and Pike. Rice played too little to be a significant factor. I'd take JJ and Pike over Posey and Griffin any day for offense. And Yao has 1 year of NBA experience and gain some pounds. He should be better. So, JVG seems to be doing worse than Rudy, at least at this point. Rudy and JVG have one thing in common. They both seem to be quite stubborn in living in the "good old days." Neither of them seem to be able to adjust to the new defensive tactics under new rules. I am with the crowd who believe that it's the players, not the coaches, who are to be blamed for the poor offense. I doubt that any coach would have made much of a difference. I still believe that letting Rudy go was premature. Whether JVG is good for the team, the jury is still out.
They need to organize a player revolt like McGrady orchestrated in Orlando.....and like Penny did before him.
I hardly think Van Gundy is a hardly a hard-ass when it comes to Francis. He still plays ball the way he wants and makes plenty of mistakes,yet he never gets benched or repimanded. Van Gundy on the other hand is very hard on Yao, a good example of that was last night against the Celtics.
Majority of the time, it's the players, but in the Rockets' case it's a combination of both Gundy and the team. This is probably the only coach that could have some how messed up the Lakers/Celtics of the '80s and the Bulls of the '90s and caused them to average below 80pts. per game. Remember when CWebb used the be the most overrated player in the league a couple years back(no longer overrated because everyone that has watched a single game knows he isn't a true franchise player).......well Gundy is that guy now, but for coaches. We have players that have displayed an excellent amount of talent in the past: Steve, Mobley, JJ, Yao, MoTaylor, but all that is rendered useless if the coach can't come up with an offense no better than a chimp picking a play in NBA2K4(Live SUCKS). The guy at best is an assistant coach on the defensive end. Bring in a real coach LES.
Van Gundy was signed to a 4 year $18 million contract. Ya gotta wonder how much is Les is losing in attendance revenue from having the Rockets play this kind of basketball. It's all great if he wins, but the win-loss record is around the same pace as last year's.
I've been saying this for a while now. JVG is a HARD ASS on Yao and is clearly in the doghouse. You didn't want to believe me but I told you so! I also don't think his style is good for Yao or his development but we're stuck with him. Oh well!
Well said. JVG seems applying the zone defense well for Rocket's defense. However, he forgot completely that other team can also play the zone defense againt his players when he tried to assemble his offensive game plan. All I want is to have Rudy to come back and in charge of Rocket's offensive play, and have JVG for defense only. With our current players, Rocket can very likely get to the divisional championship this year.
