Ime Udoka after loss to Knicks: "We regressed in a lot of areas."

Is it time to move on from Coach I/Me/U Doka?

 

Community Note: It took Udokas Boston team half a season to figure it out. With 2 superstars.

Now back to your regularly scheduled extremism.

 

It's interesting that people are so dead set on it being one thing or the other. I think it's a little of everything being mentioned. Yes, they probably are getting tired from all of this intense physicality. Yes, they aren't that good of a shooting team and they're in a shooting slump. Yes, we did sneak up on the league, and now they've had time to adjust. Sure, maybe there was a little more one on one iso than Udoka would like. Yes, we're young and going to make mistakes and be inconsistent at times. And yes, it's tough for young teams to win on the road. Sometimes, Udoka and the team are able to minimize our weaknesses and gut out some big wins. They haven't been able to do that on this road trip against a whole lot of the best teams in the league. I'm unconcerned. We're going to go back home at some point and pop off a 5 game win streak. I didn't expect this team to break 32 wins this year, and it appears we have a really good shot at 42.

Sengun is even better than I thought he'd be.
Bari has made huge strides in year 2 and is starting to look like the guy we thought he was.
Tari is awesome and is flashing kawhi type potential.
Whitmore looks like he might be a monster and he's only 19.
Amen is starting to look like who I thought he'd be in year 1.

And Jalen....


There is a whole lot to be excited about moving forward. And we don't even know what rabbit Stone may pull out of a hat at the deadline. I'm excited about both where we're at now and where we're headed, and a tough road trip hasn't changed that in the slightest.

P.s. Brooklyn is losing too and it's looking like we're getting another pick somewhere between 7-11. It isn't the best draft, but I see some guys I like to be good roleplayers in that range.

 

Of course not. There's no perfect coach. We were originally forecasted to win 30+ games and we have already had 18 before the trade deadline. Sometimes I don't like Ime's rotation, yet his defense is real. Detroit has been bad because they got blown out by 3s almost every single game, and if that's not an indication what we are lack of, I don't know what it is. We almost lost to Detroit when they had 12 threes and we had 8. Unfortunately, this is the norm in the current NBA and whenever a discrepancy in the 3s you are almost certain to lose a game. The coach can only do that much, and it's dependable heavily on how GM construct the team. We have multiple expiring contracts, draft picks and trading pieces, our GM should be calling another team to upgrade our SG and backup center in the midst of the losing streak. I don't know why Stone is still waiting, waiting for what? All the assets are tradable, and sometimes it's okay to overpay a little bit as log as you don't touch the cores (Sengun, Tari, Bari, Amen, Cam). People say Green has no trade value, and that's wrong because he is also an expiring contract at the very least and he has potential to be something decent. Hawks is looking for 2 FRPs + expirings for Murray based on the news, we can give them 2 FRPs + Green + expirings and we can use the Net's pick for one of the FRP. It's fine to overpay a little bit. The FRP we save won't help us much when you are a win-now mode, especially Stone sucks at drafting players. We gave away Tyty, Garuba, Josh, and Jalen is in the cusp of becoming a bust. Everytime there are good players available, our GM always wait and scoop for whoever people don't want or leftover. How can we win a championship with that attitude? Stone needs to make a trade to upgrade the roster right now or he has to go.

 

Ime's offensive philosophy is to give it to Jaylen and Jason..... oh wait, wrong team.

We don't have an offensive philosophy now.

 

Where is the "Hold em accountable" Ime?


DD

 

Very revealing interview. I think he's talking about the young core when it comes to watching film on your own to be prepared for games or following a game plan. I also didn't know the team hasn't practiced since December so that's a big part of the slump. Seems to me that some of the younger players aren't professionals in the way they prepare for games.

There's only so much he can do. The roster is not talented enough.

 

You sit the guys that aren't doing what you ask and you play backups........that are.......doesn't matter if you lose, you are making a point.

DD

 

Think many of the low hanging fruits have been collected, first 1/3 of the season.

The iterative cycle of reviewing mistakes and correcting them should still continue. The reps are important. Young guys will continue to learn and grow. However, think the remaining improvement will be more gradual and not see it immediately in Win/Losses columns this season.

This year Rockets is a mid to mid-low team.

Wins in the 30's may still prove Vegas correct.

 

Odds were 31.5 wins before the season. Pretty sure the people that said that is an easy over were right.

 

Community note - that was because Robert Williams played out of his mind in a different defensive schme for a half season before getting injured again.

On the plus side, it was the rare instance of a coaching adjustment (of having Williams as a weakside help defender rather than a point of attack defender) paying huge dividends.

On the negative side - Robert Williams ain't walking through that door (because he is out for the season again)

 

People holding out hope team will finish with a .500 record. At this rate, I can easily see us slip under 40 wins.

 

I didn't realize CFs had so many professional coaches posting here.

 

I'm with you to an extent. We did miss a ton of 3s, but we did not generate a lot of uncontested looks. By the numbers, both teams gave up 47 uncontested shots (Houston making 15, NY 18). That shows that the Knicks and Rocket defenders were out there.

The problem is that NY made 69.3% of their contested shots (23 out of 33). That means our defense didn't bother them at all. And this has been a recurring theme of late.

If you go further inside the numbers, Jalen Green gave up 8 of 11 on the shots he contested. If you watch the tape of those defended shots, you'll see what Udoka is preaching about. There's a lot of standing, loafing, and flybys. He's killing us out there on both ends.

Since we don't have the firepower to trade punches with teams, we have to have higher standards on D. I'm glad Udoka has high standards, and it's frustrating to watch regression. I hope we get some shooting and make other roster changes.

Some changes of scenery would do wonders here.

 

Opposing teams are figuring out how to defend Rockets. Rockets are getting frustrated and breaking away from the game plan.

Ime needs to show adjustment, keep players aligned and bought in, and find ways to set up his players for success more.

 

The biggest question is how much autonomy Ime has over the roster construction and who Ferntits will side with. Stone is going to want to keep Jalen starting and on the roster. Udoka is probably mentally done with him. I just wonder how iron fisted Ime is going to be with this. Looking around the would be stars that people said just needed more time....change in scenery....etc etc. Like another poster said, Jalen is just Andrew Wiggins. And trying to make him a "thing" is just lost time and a disservice to the players actually doing their jobs.

 

40 games in and the honeymoon phase for Ime is looking like its over

Boy that sure changed up fast