Artest and McGrady coming back in has us confused on both the offensive and defensive end. On offense, we've been hitting the open jumper thanks to dribble penetration or poor rotations by Detroit. On defense, we have atrocious defending and absolutely no inside presence. Playing zone when they have 2 point guards out there (when they had Stuckey and AI) is suicide as they break us down easily. Now with Hamilton in, we need to keep the tempo to slow down and have some interior presence. I don't see why we were helping on Prince but not on Wallace.
I'll tell you what's wrong. They don't have a coach that truly emphasizes D. Let's all just admit that last year's D was a result of JVG. JVG had his flaws offensively but he was a defensive beast.
If they played Deke, that would have meant Artest plays more at SF, and consequentially less minutes for Wafer.
They played lots of zone tonight mainly due to the defense from T-Mac might be horrible and they just try to help.So I'm not that surprised we gave up above .500 shooting percentage to the opponents. Under JVG,it was embarrassed,but under Rick Adelman,no pro man as long as we win it all.
I'd like to also put some of the onus of the bad D on Scola. A lot of times I saw him just wandering around out there not guarding anyone in particular. And those missed assignments resulted at least twice in backdoor lay-ups. I was yelling at the TV bc Scola so often loved to drift over into no-man's land, watching the passer only to find himself unable to pick the pass off once it was thrown his way. Shane deserves some leeway because of his track record, but there is no reason whatsoever Scola should not be glued to his man inside the paint, esp when he is the center.
lack of a shotblocker. our defense has been poor for a while now even with yao so we need to bring deke in just to show some intimidation. i doubt deke will play v. the knicks too
I think Wafer, Landry and Brooks are all really weak defenders and basically don't know where they are supposed to be or what to do. Once any of them get out of position or don't rotate, everything falls apart quickly.
It's not just been tonight, it's been the past 5 games. Denver, Indiana, Utah, and now Detroit - all have had a steady diet of dunks and layups even in half-court sets - something rarely seen in the JVG era. Seems like we are giving up the baseline a lot. Not sure why this is... What maybe happening is that Adelman is putting so much more focus on running and offensive efficiency and sacraficing defensive play a bit. Not sure...hard to figure after all these years of watching the Rockets as a great defensive team.
You take out our main shot blocker and shot botherer in Yao and put Scola in his place, then you insert two guys who have not played in 2 weeks and you are going to struggle. Color me, not worried at all. DD
Precisely,two guys who have missed all games the past 2 weeks came in to the lineup,it's gonna take time for 'em to adjust 'emselves to a better motion offense.Hope they won't struggle tomorrow night. BTW,is Yao's knee injury serious?or they just took precaution for him to take 2 days off meanwhile it's Chinese Lunar New Year and he needs to be en famille with his family and wife?
I think it is fairly clear that Adelman prefers to win with offense, and he puts guys that score the ball in over guys that play D, and when you do that, your defense suffers. Give our guys time though to get acclimated to playing together, the D will come around. I doubt it will be as good as the last couple of years, but our offense will be so much better that it will make up for it. DD
i don't understand why deke has only seen court time for 4 minutes since he was signed almost a month ago. otoh, any hope that inserting him into the lineup will instantly improve our overall defense is fishy, too.
Yao's defense is not that good at all,his quickness does not match with the small unit and he could not guard the big man who can pull out of the paint and shoot the 3s.Also he has problems defending pick-n-rolls.That should be resolved right away,we gave up way too much points per game than last year and the year before.
Tonight, what's wrong is the lack of Yao Ming, the backstop. For the season, there's nothing wrong the the Rockets D. http://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/NBA_2009.html They are 4th best in the league in points allowed per possession.
I'm a patient man if you haven't noticed....but I will say this - we can keep giving up easy layups and expect to win games against elite teams.
The D could be better, but look at the difference in whom is playing now over the last couple of years, particularly on the backups. Wafer Landry Brooks Barry instead of players like: Deke Hayes To me, it just looks like they are emphasizing scoring the ball more than playing lock down D......just a different approach to winning. DD
