I went to da Pheonix game Monday and I notice a few problems by the Rockets. 1 Whats up with the spacing on the floor. Seeing it in person made me notice why zones, traps and presses kill us. The Suns went to the press and the Rockets had players all bunched up together. The Suns were able to gamble for steals because we were too close together. 2 The press made us get into our offence so late that Yao didn't get the ball til 10 or less seconds on the shot clock. On times we couldn't get the ball because Pheonix setting on the post pass we seem to get the ball to Francis with 3 seconds left to try to bail us out. 3 The last thing is what kinda of offence are we running when Yao goes off the floor. We seem to look lost on the floor. It seem to be like a college game. We swing the ball to one side of the floor to the other. It was killing me to watch.
Here is a great article from the Chron which answers alot of questions: Failure to execute costly to Rockets By JONATHAN FEIGEN Copyright 2004 Houston Chronicle No problem. They'll make playoffs The Rockets don't advertise the extra perk for those odd few who sit in the high-dollar, lower-bowl seats at Toyota Center. Others sip wine in the wood-paneled clubs. Some broker deals or, odd as it seems, come to the arena to watch the action on television. But those close to the court get to hear Jeff Van Gundy shout commands -- rarely with more verve or volume than in the Rockets' collapse against the Phoenix Suns on Monday night -- that reveal much more than what he wants at any particular moment. "Attack!" he orders with telling frequency "Move it!" he barks with enough force to sometimes have courtside waitresses scurrying. "Run! Run! Push it!" he shouts, often in vain, to force the tempo his reputation would argue he discourages. But the orders from Van Gundy seem to reveal the Rockets' unresolved shortcoming this season and undoing Monday. They can't run. They don't attack. When the Rockets meticulously run their offense, they have become increasingly effective at getting the ball inside to Yao Ming or penetrating the lane, usually to set up one another for open perimeter jump shots, especially from beyond the arc. But they customarily get little from their fast break. And when the Suns, down 21 points in the second quarter, went to a small lineup and used a full-court press and half-court trap, the Rockets froze. The same qualities that have kept them for years from running a consistent break kept them again from beating the traps. No matter what Van Gundy commanded, the Rockets could only walk into the teeth of the Suns' defense. After committing 27 turnovers, seeing a 21-point lead disappear and the game forced into overtime, the Rockets were left with a loss Van Gundy labeled "inexcusable." They also had other coaches likely screaming how to beat the Rockets. "Our trap really bothered them," Phoenix coach Mike D'Antoni said. "They struggled against it the last couple of times we played them. We found they struggle against a smaller lineup. The full-court press really bothered them." D'Antoni, who was coaching the team with the worst record in the Western Conference, knew he had an advantage against the Rockets. "One of the reasons we give them trouble is we played unconventional lineups," D'Antoni said before the game of his team's mastery of the Rockets. "We played four little guys. They struggle with that." The Rockets this season have found ways, especially lately, around their deficiencies and have been effective in making multiple passes to find the open shooter. But that has usually been in the half court, where they seem to have become comfortable with their offense and each other. In the open court, players must improvise, driving up the chances one of their passes becomes a turnover. In the three games since they committed a season-high 30 turnovers against the Mavericks, the Rockets committed an average of 15. Even before the Dallas game, the Rockets had shown signs of improvement, committing an average of 11.4 turnovers in the previous five games. "It's just so frustrating when we revisit turnovers," Van Gundy said. The Rockets' inability to run an efficient fast break takes away the primary weapon against a trapping, pressing defense. But it is clear why Van Gundy commands that his team attack for other reasons. Forced to spend so much time just to start the offense, there is not enough time left to run it. He has worked all season to get the Rockets to initiate more plays, one of the obvious improvements during the five-game winning streak. Forced to slowly advance the ball against the Suns' press and traps, the Rockets had five shot-clock violations and forced up many low-percentage shots to beat the clock. "The press allowed them to slow it down, get into the shot clock, which the press was made to do," Rockets forward Jim Jackson said. "It wasn't really to steal the ball. It really was to make us waste time off the clock. It was to make us not be able to run our half-court set the way we wanted to, which was to really pound the ball inside, get movement, get cuts. When you take 10 seconds off the shot clock, instead of working with 18 seconds, you're working with 13, 14. "We didn't come down and execute like we did in the first quarter. It was a lack of execution."
What is the point of this article? ANYONE with a quarter of a brain and a pair of eyes could see that they were not executing squat. The PROBLEM is that this keeps happening over and over and over and over again. This is beyond being tired - it's lunacy. All the Rockets have to offer by way of explanation are more lame excuses to add to the mound of lame excuses they've already given. The Bottom Line: IF the current cast of Rocket players cannot execute JVG's gameplan or play the game any better than this, then it's time to go out and get some new players who can. Let these bozos become someone else's problem. It's all about results. If they worked as hard at their game as they do at making excuses, we wouldn't be having this conversation.
Hillboy, Just for my own curiousity, please point out the areas of the article that you feel are "excuses".
Amen. Last night on the FOX 9:30 news they were interviewing some rockets players about the loss and steve said "we did not take them seriously like we should have" or something to that effect. Man I was about to throw my shoe at the TV. Steve and all the rockets (this is NOT just a steve symptom): REAL CHAMPIONS PLAY EVERY GAME LIKE ITS THEIR LAST. Sorry to yell, but man I'm getting tired of that bulls***. You have to play every game and every opponent like its the game of your life. That's how the real champions make it. They play their hardest every single game. duh. ugh, its irritating. --rhad
Wouldn't it be nice ,just once, to get the following sound bite from Francis: "The reason it seems that we make the same dumb mistakes throughout the season is simple. We're just plain stubborn and too flat out stupid to do what Coach tells us. We realize that we have spurts where we do what he says. During those freak times, the game becomes really easy and we win games. But what you people need to understand is that we wanna play the game our way...not his." Ok I'll give him credit for that last part. He has said something like that already. But it sure would be nice if he'd at least "man up",as he's fond of doing , and admit that they're too ignorant to permanently change their bad habits.
lol Feigen doesn't have to visit this site (although I believe there is a possiblity that he does) to reach that sort of conclusion. Thats just standard basketball knowledge, not something unique to this site.
A more telling indication that they need a smart pass first guy at the point guard position could not be made. Attacking a press is taught in Junior High, it is as easy as tying your shoes....but only if you push the ball and are capable of making good decisions. DD
The best way for the ROX to deal with unconventional lineups... "four smalls" like PHX showed us... is to go to a zone defense. You have to leave Yao in the game. Stick him in the back of a 1-3-1 zone instead of trying to match up man. Also... perhaps we should work on our pressbreak.
What gives people the impression that the press was killing us because the players wouldn't execute VG's plan? Do we know that Van Gundy had a plan for breaking the press? Was the plan any good? Does he spend any time at all practicing breaking the press?
Which scenario do you think is more likely: A. A workaholic coach who's a stickler for the smallest of details and is always looking for ways to get better...comes up with a plan that will effectively beat a press(or revises such a plan) and his players fail to execute said plan much like they frustrate him with many of their other failed executions, or B. That same coach refuses to do anything about their failure to beat the press,or C. That same coach comes up with a really crappy plan to beat the press, but the players have a tremendous amount of respect for what he says and execute his crappy plan exactly as he instructs even though his plan fails.
I can't believe that's what Francis said indeed! SA Rockets or anyone, could you point out the link/site or original sound bite(audio file). Thanks.
It weems to me that Steve has a problem with passing in the half-court as well as during full-court pressure. He is always trying to rush his pass, does not follow through properly, and thus ends up with a Soft pass that ends up stolen or at Yao's shoes. You would have to assume Coach V has said something about this to him. But I have never heard it brought up.
Hey ayears........read SA Rocket's post again........pay special attention to the words "Wouldn't it be nice..." There is no truth to the statement......just very wishful thinking
My bad. I just skip it and only pay special attention to sound bite from Francis: "..." Thanks for reminding
Mike Fratello said the defensive pressure forced the ball handler to pass the ball which in turn exposes poor passing teams. Of course, he said this right after a turnover was committed passing the ball. The Rockets are a poor passing team.
