Griffin got 23 points on 25 shots. Aside from the 3 minute stretch where he just murdered Jones, we played him pretty well.
Tjones absolutely could not do anything with Griffin. Inserting Dmo in was the right choice. Not because he can defend Griffin but because he could stretch the floor on offense better. Asik did better job on defense but offense suffered. We need Asik and Dmo to merge and become Dmoasik!
we need a starting PF and DMO will be a solid backup. Him and asik play well together. Our bench is actually really SOLID !! we went on a 20+ point run first half with asik, lin, dmo, hamilton on the floor. I wouldnt take DMO from the starting unit.
We are blessed to have such a problem because of our depth. I believe time will solve a lot of our problems. I enjoy the way they grow together as a team even with all the turnovers and inconsistencies. We have to remind ourselves you don't win championship overnight.
Right now with the current personnel playing the way they are our 4/5 rotation should be Dwight/Asik/DMo. Jones shouldn't be getting minutes. Any minutes that DMo doesn't play at the 4 should be divied up between Parsons/Harden/Casspi. Dwght 32 Omer 26 DMo/Casspi 25 (whichever one is hot from 3) Parsons 32 Harden 32 Bev 32 Hamilton 30 Lin 30
Something is going on with Terrence Jones. Starting with the Milwaukee game, he's averaging 8ppg/4.6rpg. That's down from the 7.5rpg he was averaging. The points come and go, but rebounding is all effort if you've got the gifts and he's got them. The drop-in-rebounding stat tells me there is effort that was lost. So, I'm not as worried about the game Griffin had, nearly as much as Terrence Jones lackluster performance since the trade deadline. I know he's young so I'm expecting mistakes, but his fire usually makes up for some of that. I'm not seeing fire lately and that's what's bugging me. I bench him for DMo until he shows he's figured his energy issues out. TJ is twice the player he's shown to be lately. DMo is playing smart and hard. It's a no brainer for me. They both earned their keeps and in a good company, which I believe the Rockets are a good company, you give more to those that have shown they've earned it.
You don't wear out your players by playing them out of position before you get to the playoffs. And last I checked, 58 minutes split at the C position is tough for coaches.
I think Jones should stay in the starting lineup. He is aggressive on the boards, seems to work well with DH12, and finishes plays by going strong to the basket. DMo is great but he need to use his height to his advantage. Learn to be more aggressive on the offensive and defensive side without fouling. He is getting better though. Overall, this is a good problem to have if I'm the Rockets. You have two young players are working hard to become a starter and creates match up problems for most 4's in the league.
That's 10 minutes of Twin Towers, Don. Like last night, you know. When we're facing big teams that overpower Jones....which is what we're gonna face in the playoffs. Rotation players don't get worn out playing 32 minutes or less a game.
So we're going to do that every night? How do we get the other team to cooperate so we can achieve this? I can't wait to see Harden's reaction to playing PF every single game! That's going to be awesome!
We should do it every single night. We don't have true 4's that warrant us playing them above the twin towers for 10 minutes a game. Harden's reaction to playing the 3 or 4? Ummmmmmmmm I think he volunteered to do that. And I think he'll enjoy playing some minutes there over trying to chase lightning bugs around the perimeter.
You said Harden was playing 4. No take backs! Scroll down if you want to see how awesome the Asik/Howard combo is! We are going to be so much better now. Howard has played 100% of his minutes at center. So, you can assume that 100% of the minutes that Asik is listed at PF, he was with Dwight Howard. The results are awesome. Check them out. We are going to win so many games now: http://www.82games.com/1314/13HOU14.HTM
What I said was we should run Twin Towers for a few minutes a game, and then either DMO or Casspi (whichever one of them is hot) for a few minutes a game...and then we should cover the 4 spot with Harden or Parsons for the rest of the game. 10 minutes a game is a 2 1/2 minute spurt every quarter. It's easy to find those minutes to maximize our D. If you watched the game last night you saw Dwight have to switch on to Blake because Blake was abusing TJones. Then DeAndre abused TJones some more just for good measure. And then you saw McHale do the right thing which was bring in Asik with Dwight and shut off their bigs. Go back and watch the video. Dwight and Asik shut those guys off! Finally....after jacking around the whole season we got the right combo in Blake and DeAndre that I said we should have had from the beginning. Remember early we went Twin Towers but McHale was running Dwight on Blake and Asik on DeAndre. Wrong matchup. Last night they finally got Asik chasing Blake and he did great on him. Blake couldn't take him outside and he couldn't take him down low. That's the winning big man matchup against the Clips. Asik on Blake and Dwight on DeAndre. What didn't happen last night was McHale getting the backcourt matchups right going down the stretch. Here Chandler is with the flu, running a temp, out of gas and he's on the floor. Harden should have been dropped down on Crazy Matt and we should have run Lin and Bev out top with our twin towers down low. There is nothing decipherable at 82 games concerning the twin towers concept. The reason is because Asik didn't want it to work when we tried it early. Asik wanted to play 5 and he was jerking off out there. We stop the "experiment" and declared it a "failure". What it was was a hard-headed, stubborn human being not cooperating and being unwilling to accept that role and assignment. Instead of stopping the twin towers experiment, McHale, Dwight, Harden, and Parson should have climbed up on Asik and crapped on him for not being a team player privately. They should have all got in his grill and read him the riot act and demanded that he go out and be a professional and do his job. Now that the trade deadline has passed and Asik is still here he is miraculously healthy and playing much better........even playing much better in tandem with Dwight. The experiment failed because not enough pressure was applied to Asik to make it work. But the experiment was not a failure. Dwight and Asik playing together is our most effective interior defense.....by far!
So you're saying that because of matchup problems we brought in the twin towers. And it worked for that matchup. And you are using that argument to extrude into playing these guys together every night for 10 minutes. My question remains, how do we get other teams to put lineups out there that make a Dwight/Asik combo work? I ask that a) because it's a legit question and b) because if you don't get them to cooperate and put out players that Omer/Dwight matchup well against, you're just throwing 2 players out there that don't play well together because of skill-sets; saying "gel now". And if you can't read, just ask. Don't dismiss with big words like decipherable. I'm here to help you! Production by Position (For Omer Asik) Player Floor Time Stats by Position Position Min Net Pts Off Def Net48 W L Win% PG SG SF PF 3% -37 80.8 99.0 -18.3 2-7 22% C 9% +41 104.1 96.0 8.1 12-8 60% So, this is how this completely unreadable section reads. Remove all the other lines that don't have him playing in the twin tower system and you have this: Position Min Net Pts Off Def Net48 W L Win% PF 3% -37 80.8 99.0 -18.3 2-7 22% I hope my spaces line it up for you like it is on the link I posted, but I know how it is. "Stats disagree with my philosophy, so I'm not going to take the time to understand what they mean OR EVEN LOOK." But, it's cool and understandable to take this position, but it's definitely not the smart way to go about life. I'd urge you and any other young fans to explore the game. So he's playing PF for 3% of the Rockets total minutes at the position for the whole season. Overall, when he plays PF, his team, my team, your team, is a net NEGATIVE result during those minutes. It's a Net negative number of points. That adds up to losing, therefore, pointless to argue as a benefit to us unless matchups dictate reassessing; as they did last night. So the Net48 part is a sort of stat that says, "let's pretend they played the whole game like this and take an educated guess as to how it would work out". So that Net48 is -18.3. Meaning that the +4.5 point differential currently have, would become -18.3 if we played Dwight/Asik together constantly. So, it turns out that Philadelphia is widely considered the worst team in the NBA after losing to the Bucks by 20 points a few nights ago. They currently sport a -10.7 point differential for the season. In other words, you are arguing for our team to be more like the Sixers. I don't want to be like Sixer. I want Rocket ball. Which is to say, I like +4.5 and not playing Asik and Dwight together for 10 minutes a night. 'Asik should try harder so these numbers will change', is not an argument. Stop trying to make it. He's a center. A true center. So is Howard. They are clumsy together. And the worst team in the league, but what does that matter? It worked for a few minutes against the Clippers. Let's ignore what has already been tested thoroughly and test it again, by golly!
