But this is so clearly a work in progress and with so many new players, it's a bit premature to criticize too much ya know? You have to give them a chance to play a bit and gel, and figure it all out. Basketball is really a team game - thats why the U.S. team has a lot of trouble beating the country teams. Getting a feel for guys takes many many games. Not just practices. Just knowing where to move and understanding what your teams do on a natural instinctive level takes a lot of time. A lot more then 12 games. You have to allow this team to "gel" and get more familiar...once that happens, weakness that are more of a coaching nature then other factors will become more apparent. Right now, you can tell the Rockets are still a bit choppy on execution. And this goes with the fact that the only people who played a lot last year was Juwon Howard, Rafer Alston, and Luther Head. That's it. Rafer has to get used to everyone except head. And T-Mac and Yao are basically walking onto a team where they have only played with each other. Think about it - gone is Sura, Barry, Wesley, and Mike James. This team's rotation is drastically different. It's not even worth criticizing right now. I wouldn't even bother until Jan roles around. And by the way - usually really good teams start making their moves around then......
.. special players at special situations? I won't even go into the first "paragraph." What are you talking about? Let me guess, you want Novak to play when we're up by 1 with 29 seconds left so he could hit a 3? What if he doesn't get the shot and he has to defend with 5 seconds left? Spanoulis was crowding Arenas way too much late in the game, and Arenas broke him down twice as well as the rest of the defense by getting the ball inside and handing it off for almost layups. The defense that the Rockets played in the last 6 minutes of the 4th quarter was amazing. Arenas made some ridiculous shots to keep it close, but there's a reason why they couldn't take the lead. During that "blowup," the Rockets had a GREAT shot each and every time. They went to the "Shaq" rule and just double Yao every time he touches the ball and the Rockets have wide open shots and should be thrilled. Now, they need to learn to make it to hold leads instead of making it a heart attack waiting to happen. The offensive set has been amazing and the shots were great. Some players still seem hesitant, especially Spanoulis, who had a great shooting game. There were multiple times where he received the ball with a great shot at the end of a great set of passes. He pump faked it almost every time, INCLUDING the first 3 that he made, he had to pump fake first before throwing up the shot. His passing was great, but there were 3 instances that I counted where Yao got the double team, passed it out, went through Spanoulis, and he was hesitating to make a turnover and gave the defense time to catch up. With these players, there needs to be more flow to the offense and to their game. The team is playing well enough to win these games. Knocking down some shots and more practices together should do the trick. You have to remember, this team is shooting a crazy amount of 3 pointers, like our 94 and 95 teams. They live and die by it, which is probably also why those teams seem to give up leads a lot too. What we need is Yao to establish the inside after we get such a lead. To do so, he needs to see the defense coming just a little bit better.
Exactly, Jeff! Everyone talks about the blown leads (and they are certainly a concern), but how many teams would love to have that problem? Anyone would be hard-pressed to find another team in the league that has had this many games up by 12-15+ points in the 3rd qtr. And, I don't care what anyone says, if you would have told me before the season that they would be 8-4 with the schedule they had to open up the season, I would have laughed. Not that I didn't think they would be a good team, but I always felt like (and still do) the team we see now will not be anywhere as good as the one we will see at the end of the season. It was always going to take time for this team to really gel with all the new faces, JVG having to have time to find a good rotation and lineups, Yao & McGrady having to get readjusted to each other, and TMac and the whole team having to learn how to play through Yao now that he has emerged as a superstar. Actually, I'm not too worried about the 4th-quarter melt-downs right now. They are still learning and feeling each other out and they all have to figure out, when in crunch time and or a play needs to be made to stop a run, where is the ball going to go. The last couple of years it's been easy since TMac has been THE man. Now, with the emergence of Yao, the team as a whole is still learning how to play with TWO guys that can put the team on their backs. It's going to take a little time, but they'll figure it out and then be REALLY dangerous.
I'm not talking about this game only. Several previous games when things went ugly and no player could step up, JVG definitely could have tried Vspan or Novak etc. It's better than helplessly watch things going south.
I think a lot of people still go crazy and are being negative, but I guess they want improvement and better results..mistakes aren't allowed We're definitely doing better than last season..and honestly, can't remember 2 seasons ago, what our record was, heh. But it's nice to know that we are capable of beating any team in the NBA. I still fear teams like the Suns, Kings, Jazz..Spurs, Clippers? I'd like to see how we fare against them. Go Rockets!!!
I actually enjoy Rocket's game. If every game is a blowout, that's no fun at all. Close game make me happy
You know, I don't think the complaints are completely invalid...but I just feel blessed to have two class superstars...two ego-less, humble, hungry athletes playing for my Rockets, not complaining about the coach not coddling them, not complaining about teammates, not bailing on the team to watch football, not concerned about rep. Maybe my expectations are just low, but between the Hakeem/Clyde years and the TMac/Yao era, I feel like we as Rockets fans have been giving a blessing few teams have shared and frustrate me as they may, I just have a hard time being mad at the Rockets. I'll take what they give me.
It could be worse.. we could have been like last year (a productive tmac that doesn't score as much but improves other parts of his game is better than one that's sitting injured), Chuck could have been out for longer.. but came back early.. sucks about Snyder.. but it did give V-Span to shine.. or even worse than that... we could be Heat fans right now instead of Rockets fans. (Imagine what their boards are like right now)
T-Mac is going from the scoring champ to a true swingman, 2 assists shy from a triple double. Ever seen Kobe do that? I'd much rather see T-Mac going 5-16 on the floor, 12 rebounds and 8 assists and win than him scoring 40 points, 2 rebounds and 0 assists and we lose.
Cmon, this is just silly. If a plane crashes, 'should' it have happened? You play the percentages and deal with the variance and over a long period of time things start to even out. That's the fun of sports; the seasons are so short that 'anything' can happen and a lot of luck is involved.
Oh you are COMPLETELY wrong. We are just as good as the Spurs, Mavs, and Basically any other team that gets thrown at us. (Right now Jazz scare me ALOT, because we matchup very poorly with them). We could/should have beaten Spurs, Mavs have won 7 straight which everyone is making a fuss about but against who thats good? (suns were their best opponents and they aren't exactly playing great this year). We should win 55+ in my opinion and we SHOULD be one of I think only 5 teams who can win it all. (Rockets, Spurs, Jazz, Cavs, Mavs... maybe) I think right now Hornets are good but aren't built for playoffs they look like a very good regular season team, not so much playoffs, and their center Chandler has been huge 1st few games, im expecting a dropoff just like with the Bulls (he did this same thing last year was 10/15 1st 10-20 games, then stopped performing, I don't know why). Yea we are an elite team, just need to learn how to close out games.
That, or those two rookies could commit 10 turnovers per game and we end up with a miserable 4-8. Come on guys, we're starting much stronger than previous years. Yeah....maybe the blown leads do concern me a little, but if our defense holds up like it did today I think we're in good shape.
i think the rox is not yet as good as the elite teams but will be as the seaon progresses... most importantly because we have 2 SUPERSTAR while ALL the other elite teams have only 1 superstar, or just a couple allstar level players. 2 SUPERSTARS win games... period. if u compare the rox, say to the spurs.. the spurs has already reach its mid-season form, but the rox still has a long way to go especiallly we know jvg will have on-going nusisance with team's rotation. once this team has fulfilled its potential chemsitry-wise, we can rest assured that yao and tmac as the spiritual leaders of this team will take us to the promise land
Good post... I think people focus too much on the negative things, when there are alot of things we can be happy about, and safe to say most fans of other teams would look upon the Rockets with a not insignificant amount of envy... in fact they'd probably kill for what we've got...
