I didn't say anything about his other skills just that they need more athletic bigs, at least one. There's a huge downside to playing this style as we saw, small ball is useless if you can't defend the rim, we literally just saw that. So having nothing but shooters still results in Lebron getting dunks whenever he feels like it.
He offered rolling with Gordon, posting up Harden and posting up Westbrook....than he talked for like a couple seconds about Harden moving off ball towards the end of the video. That is it....those are not good solutions. No....they put Davis on Westbrook because Davis can sag off him and protect the pain. Its not hard to guard Russ, you just sag off him and let him shoot, that's it. Yea that makes it easier. You can put a big on Russ because he has no shot. That's basically a center. That's not how any of that should work. Then why are the Harden only lineups are best lineups? We traded our big because of Westbrook. Because the guy cannot shoot and he kills spacing. Coach Nick talks about that in length. Even in that video every time you see the man sag off of Russ.
it's not even about having just athletic bigs. The lack of versatility was always going to be a big problem this year and going forward
Yes, they are. I mean really, we literally had Kobe explain this exact situation. This exact one and he even said in the playoffs this is what would happen if you play this iso heavy game. He also said posting up both worked. I'm not sure why you are so married to the idea that Harden CAN'T play any other kind of way. That he has to dominate the ball for the entire game and that's that. Yes, protect the paint from who...Rivers and Roco and Tucker? You can't put a big on Russ man, did you forget game 1? Davis is no ordinary big. But you can still work around his spacing issues, yes, you can. I know because I've seen teams win without good shooting and space and pace. Nick also offers other solutions and you're just saying they're bad and won't work but the Rockets don't even try. Harden gets his numbers and his stats but the team loses, that's all I care about man.
No they arent. They do not generate consistent offense. They are not good out of the post players. Kobe is wrong..it possible for Kobe to be wrong...if dude's cant create out of a 4v3 then that just flat out bad. That should be efficient offense every time. We didnt do Harden iso, Harden got doubled, that wasnt isolation. We also could have won a championship if Cp didnt get injured, Our 2017-2018 was a championship level. He can play it but that wasnt winning us that series because Russ destroyed our own game plan and was garbage himself. Rivers, Green, Gordon, and yea Roco can drive occasionally, this the NBA if guys have open space, they can take it. They literally did, Gobert was put on him too. That's how Utah bounced OKC in the playoffs...Gobert let him have his inefficient 2s and they got bounced. They put Giannis on Westbrook, they put Nurkic on Westbrook....see a pattern, dude who cant shoot and that stragety wasnt changing in the playoffs because Russ. Cant.Shoot. Which teams's did that. If the Bucks got countered with Giannis who's so much better than Westbrook its not even funny, than why would you say that? Harden is not an efficient post up player, you only think that because he's done is so little. Once you get a larger sample size, you would see it doesnt bare out. Mike got outcoached yea, but those changes you are talking about would not be affective. Check out teams with one really mediocre shooting in the playoffs...they dont go far.
You realize you're on a rocket forum saying post up can't generate consistent offense? Hakeem, Yao, Scola, and so many others would like to have a word with you. Jordan, Kobe, Lebron...man you guys have been ruined by this mathball stuff, so much so that you can't generate consistent offense through the post when historically it's been super consistent. You can't stop someone in the post once they have position. It really doesn't matter if we ISO harden or not, they doubled him when he brought the ball up the court unless AD was on him. I'm not going to argue the ifs and woulda, coulda, shoulda's. We have no idea what would have happened, CP3 does not have a good game 7 record either. Noo, Utah didn't put Gobert on Russ. You're also forgetting Playoff P and his shoulder popping up too...OH YEAH, and Carmelo Anthony's amazing defense on that team too... But watch those games again, or just the highlights, Gobert was not on Russ. Gobert can't guard the perimeter at all, that's why Utah never wanted any parts of this team. Well, if the smaller sample size is good that means you should at least look at the larger sample size, doesn't it? Bucks biggest team issue is that they don't really have a 2nd superstar. Well it also depends on what we mean by shooting, I mean 3 point shooting, some of the best shooting teams already out of it. Also, the Lakers can't shoot. I know they just did but...everyone shoots well against us...that's another problem. The Jazz were the best shooting team in the NBA from 3 too...Blazers...Spurs...
The irony is that we traded Capela BECAUSE of him. He was playing great after the trade. Small ball gave him the space to drive. But teams figured out how to defend that in the playoffs. And somehow Russ totally forgot about not shooting jump shots, especially not from the 3pt line. When Russell Westbrook is frustrated, he goes play bonker hero ball and throws the game plan out the window. We have seen him do that in OKC. He was doing in the bubble playoffs. That's just what he is. That's why his playoffs records aren't very impressive. It's funny that he's the opposite of Harden in this regard. Harden becomes depressed and gives up when the going gets tough. Westbrook becomes super charged and goes completely irrational. That's when he acts like the dumbest player in the league.
The game is not the same, things change. There are only like handful of good post up player's in this league. Its also not Harden's game. Guess who made that double strategy work? That's very dismissive dude, it really is. Warriors are on all time great team, it doesnt mean Rockets werent championship caliber. Dude he shot a 49 TS% that series. That strategy was that whole series was to let Westbrook shoot mid range jumpers. And he did, and they lost. Melo was apart of that. I gurantee you Utah puts Gobert on Russ again if we met in the playoffs, because all you have to do IS SAG OFF him. Because the guy cannot shoot, he sucks at it. Sure Melo sucked, and PG wasnt at his best. But then next year happend, Russ still shot it poorly, he had worse impact metrics than last year and Paul George carried him....and guess what....they still lost. You can a big on Russ, that's why yous see all these teams doing it. And they can get away with it....because he cant shoot. No, because coaches can tell that its not efficient offense. Rick Carlise sent on record that post ups are not efficient. And its easy as hell to double team in the post. And we already have a turnover problem. Lebron didnt even post up that much this series. Anthony Davis post ups werent super amazing either. I would take Middleton any day of the week over Westbrook. They won their only game without Giannis, all their postive lineups were without Giannis, its not like Giannis wasnt getting any help. They built a wall and stopped Giannis....because like Westbrook he cant shoot. They put centers on Giannis too, but guess who's the better player with that. The best shooting teams for the last 4-5 years have been the best shooting ones. GS, Toronto, Cavs. Clippers, Celtics, Heat.....do you see any of those teams using post ups like that....no, they are all very very good shooting teams. Blazers also have trash defense, same with the Spurs. Utah actually lose their best shooter. And they lose their series to the Nuggets because they could not defend Jamal Murray. You have to be able to defend too. And Westbrook was bad on both ends.
Yep. 1000% agree. I don't think Russ has low IQ basketball wise...emotional IQ...well... I mean, look at how he responds to fans calling out to him? He has them thrown out, in the bubble, has done it multiple time in his career. Dame completly gets in his head, saying little next to nothing, and he can barely hold press conferences sometimes without throwing a fit. The team gets down and he's screaming at Rondo's brother and talking about they better double him and all this stuff. I mean, sometimes you need that fire, but sometimes it burns you. Russ really needs a coach that will realize when he needs to be calmed down and get put in timeout bench corner rather than someone that just watches him play through it. I've always considered Russ that, you have to bottle up his energy and release it at the right moments. I do think he could have played with Capela but Capela was hurt most of the year and any Russ-Capela lineup has to operate differently than how we usually play.
Yes, that's what I'm saying. Warriors were all-time great team, no guarantee we beat them. Also, there's no good post players, the best ones could not hold a candle to bigs in the 90s. They don't teach it no more, don't care to, because mathball people think it's 'inefficient' but when your team is down by two and you need two? Well, no way to stop a dream shake or a sky hook, no way, no how. Hakeem, Kareem, them dudes would dominate today. Even Yao would. Yao was IMO that last great traditional low post player. Actually, in fact, look at our games against the Bucks, they beat us just by posting up Lopez and he's good, not amazing...just good. They knew while we were jacking up 3s they were scoring 2s and moving the scoreboard. I'm just saying he wasn't guarded by Gobert. Also, Utah doesn't put Gobert on him today when we play them. Rick was defending KP mostly because people want him in the low post, he doesn't really need to. As for him saying it not being efficent and blah we have numbers on it blah blah we ran studies on it...well...I just know that guys can dominate low post. People are so obsessed with getting 3s they forget sometimes you just need to score. Rockets over here content with their 3-5 minute scoring droughts where they do little else but jack up 3s because mathball and eventually the threes will fall...and eventually the clock will run out. 3>2 but 2>0.
completely False. When Gobert is on the floor, his assignment is WB when they're on the floor together. that is something so obvious. you're better than this @JayGoogle
They are playing a zone and it's not working out very well for them either. Utah has never had any ideas on how to stop this team. They avoided us at all costs. It doesn't look like they told Gobert to follow him, in that clip he was on him 4-5 times? Huge difference here too, Gobert just can't react to anything Westbrook does in time for it to even matter, he's just too slow so what happened was Westbrook got nothing but open 2 pointers and yeah, even he's going to hit those.
no its not all zone. Gobert is assigned to wb and to let him have everywhere from 3 pt line to the painted area. they most definitely have Gobert guard WB Never said Gobert can stop him but the assumption that Utah doesn't put Gobert on him is completely false
Athlete trying to be a point guard definitely not a point guard that is an athlete by all his decisions. Concentrate on the damn game instead of arguing to the nba barber
I just don't consider that being on him I guess and more of a protecting the paint, which any team is wise to do with Westbrook. Not like Gobert can guard anyone on the perimeter any ways so it doesn't even make sense to drag him out there to guard him. Anthony Davis was a bit closer but I guess in general it's the same thing as letting Westbrook shoot threes. I think the biggest difference is a lot of WBs 2 pointers against the Lakers were contested shots.
it does make sense because he isn't guarding the perimeter. Gobert is assigned to him when he's on the floor and WB can have that shot any day which is what we've seen from everyone in the league.
You arent getting my point, that doesnt mean the Rockets werent a championship level team, hypotheticals about game 7 aside. It is inefficient, there are also rule changes. Yea that was then, this is now. One game, and look at where the Bucks are now. Gobert neutralized him with or without a big man. Russ is not a good iso player and you could stick Gobert on him for a series because you can just sag off him. Yea they do. Rick was right when he said post ups werent efficient, he wasnt lying. Okay, there is nothing to discuss here with you being dismssive. The reasons we usually havent won, arent because of offense. This year isnt the case because we had a historically, bad inefficient player. But I agree though, clutch time offense needs some work.
Still, that video was A LOT of zone, Gobert was watching him like 5 times at most. I would not say that is guarding him. Anthony Davis was basically there any time he tried to drive, either him or Lebron, they were not playing any kind of zone like that either.
