One problem is Ime and Harden would just be a giant bandaid as Durant has been. It does not help that Senguen and Amen can't shoot as well.
The Celtics blew us out on the second night of a back to back on the road, without Tatum or Brown... They shot 0.6% better from three than we did... The difference is they took 51 and we only took 30 of them. The Celtics shot about the same as we did from the floor, but 3 is more than 2....Even with Amen and Sengun playing so many minutes, we have guys who are capable of getting up threes if the coaching staff emphasized it more and had a system which got us easier looks...There's too much KD shooting middies in traffic and Sengun rumbling to the basket. And then they have not shown any counter to guarding Amen with a big and sagging waaay off him. The offense was this way the last two season with healthy Fred also so it's not just a lack of a PG....It's a philosophy and a lack of ability by the coaches to implement a more modern offense.
Last years team started one sieve on defense. This year's team starts two. That's our problem. We cant stop anyone from scoring because KD and Sengun have no interest in that. Its one or the other but running both out there is suicide.
The stats don't really agree with that...I mean, even from the eye test I don't agree that KD is a sieve on defense...He may not be a high energy guy, but he's effective on that end and is still a really good help defender: https://www.nba.com/stats/players/d...P*GE*15&TeamID=1610612745&dir=D&sort=D_FG_PCT Now Sengun, I think he was better last year but I would not say he was a lock down defender or anything... https://www.nba.com/stats/players/defense-dash-overall?TeamID=1610612745&Season=2024-25 Okogie, that guy that Ime starts for "his defense" actually gives up the most ass on the team...But I guess because it looks better and he plays hard and is tough it doesn't matter. Okogie gets scored on a bunch.
The stats say we're a Top 5 defense and offense. Like...im so sick of what the stats say man. I know what I'm watching.
Ime built this rotation, so that's on him. Stood by this roster construction proudly just a couple weeks ago. He wanted more rebounders than normal and they obviously have to be good defenders. Well guess what: if they can shoot AND defend AND rebound then we can't afford them so we essentially just chose rebounding over shooting. Voluntary choice to add a ton of rebounders to a team that was 27th in TS% last season, 1st in rebounding and lost two guys in the trade who shot a combined 37% on 14 3PA last season. This was the mother of dumb ideas. If you don't have shooting, you're just a treadmill team. You just look good when shooters happen to be hot. It's not a viable alternative to pace and space. It's just a dead end. Meanwhile rebounding is least correlated to winning out of all box stats (tied with steals). In fact, nothing is an alternative to pace and space. There's never going to be anything that is better than attempting more overall points and doing it more frequently. It takes too much to overcome that. This plan will not work even with a superstar scorer - even if he's one of the best jump shooters in human history. He theorized this would work and we can only call it a failure at this point. Let's call a spade a spade.
Doesn’t matter. Houston rockets fanbase isn’t loud. And then more importantly, the media doesn’t blame Ime. He has narrative armor .
thats a good point. Clutchfans is probably the most vocal part of the fanbase and a very small fraction of it as a whole Most fans are complacent or genuinely clueless about the team and would consider any form of criticism as "hating"
True contention ended with Fred's injury, but even still, Ime doesn't instill any confidence that he will out-coach anyone, especially in the playoffs. Wack offensive schemes, slow adjustments, and players lacking effort are all repeated offenses. Brooks was also a bigger loss than they probably anticipated - that falls on Ime too, since he's in the locker room. Having Ime is like having Stroud at QB. You hope for enough luck/talent around them to overcome deficiencies. A terrible strategy for a good outcome.
Not sure if this is Udoka's or Stone's problem. Maybe a bit of both. We were successful last season with the offensive rebounding strategy. So we "quadruple down" (to use Ime's words) on it this season. And they ignored the elephant in the room, which is the lack of scoring efficiency. Maybe they didn't totally ignore it. Stone's fix is (1) all in with Reed, and (2) getting Durant. Reed is s redshirted sophomore. Totally unproven and unacclimated to the NBA game. I am all for developing him. I'm a fan. But counting on him to solve our offensive problem is not wise. Losing FVV just magnified the dumb overconfidence on a roster decision. Durant is what he is, a great scorer. He would be a good fix to our shooting problem. But he is turned into a crutch for Ime's unimaginative offense, not just helping to shoot more efficiently. The most important job of a leader (head coach/GM) is to see the big picture and make the right decisions. The details can be delegated to people under them. (How and what to delegate is part of the big picture.) If the big picture then see is a wrong picture, or distorted picture, or outdated picture, they will make wrong decision based on what they see.
Asked Ime Udoka & Rafael Stone to assess the Rockets half court offense, which ranks just 22nd in points per play, and if the offensive rebounding edge is sustainable: "We want to maintain that identity. Continue to work on pace and movement. Ball and body movement in the half court. Not being as stagnant and dependent on isolations."
We seriously need to all sign a petition that this isn’t acceptable. I know that it won’t lead to anything but it would at least put this organization on notice that we are pissed off. i don’t suppose that threatening to boycott the arena would help but we need to voice our outrage by this.
