Signs of life against another Florida team might have been premature. The Rockets were largely outsmarted today by the Heat. You might say Miami nightlife is undefeated, and that playing at 3:30 in the afternoon was never going to work out well for the young Rockets, but there might have been a little more on display today than that. Or a lot less.
What I mean by that is, over the Rockets past 20 games, roughly 1/4 of an NBA season, and 1/3 of the games they’ve played so far, the team has an NBA average
number of points or above, about 114 points, exactly five times. One was an overtime game they lost to the 76ers. But let’s count it. That means the Rockets did not reach NBA average scoring in 75% of those games. The other teams against whom they exceeded average, just average, scoring: Indiana, New Orleans, Utah and Sacramento. Those are all terrible teams, two are tanking deliberately and those teams have managed 65 combined wins this season, with none of them above 18.
That’s, frankly, inadequate offense.
You might want to blame this on the players, and to an extent it’s true, I think. You might want to blame it on the style of play, and the utter lack of offensive structure or purpose. I’d apportion that blame 25% Players 75% Coaching and Approach. Your view may differ and you are most welcome to it. There’s no guarantee I’m right.
The most positive thing for the Rockets long term, though, is that I am right. If the players are the heart of the problem, the future of the Rockets as a legitimate contender is in deep trouble. Unless more development occurs. It’s hard to see offensive development at the moment, as many of the young Rockets have flatlined, or declined as offensive players under Ime Udoka. You can blame them for their own decline, that’s certainly one approach. One I disagree with.
Why was 20 year old Alperen Sengun a more efficient player under Stephen Silas of all people? In Silas’ last season Sengun had a 60 True Shooting Percentage. It declined slightly in Udoka’s first season to 59% (rounding up both times). Now it seems stuck at 55% over the past two seasons, and currently falling. Why isn’t a maturing player getting better? Character flaw? Laziness? What changed? It’s a general rule of thumb that players tend to get better until around age 26-28. That isn’t happening. It’s not happening with most of them. Why?
It’s easy enough to blame the players, until you realize that even with one of the all time scoring greats, playing very well, the Rockets, as a team, have not broken average scoring against any but essentially the absolute weakest of NBA teams for 1/3 of the games they’ve played. So is the whole team at fault, individually, as bad players? Or is it something else?
The Rockets play two games against Miami every season. Lately, despite a recent Finals appearance, Miami has been good, not great, or even below average. That’s something you might well blame on their players, as they are never poorly coached. Miami’s front office, and their head coach Eric Spoelstra, however, seem capable of seeing the team’s flaws. They hired former Memphis lead assistant, and Ja Morant casualty, Noah LaRoche to teach them his motion, largely pick and roll free, offense. This, to me, was Spoelstra’s recognition that his approach simply wasn’t producing enough points. Has it worked? Well, their offense is better, but a talent problem remains if a team’s best player is Bam Adebayo.
I would argue that Miami boasts a lot less talent than the Rockets. Yet, once again, the Rockets got outsmarted and outplayed by the Heat. Sure, the Rockets have injuries, and it’s fair to mention it. But in the 4th quarter the Rockets simply got stonewalled by a zone defense. Again. They had no answer except to charge into 2-4 defenders and put up a terrible shot, over and over and over. This lead to predictably bad results, minus HoF player Kevin Durant, who took, but made, similarly awful shots.
There are ways to beat a zone. Good high school teams have zone buster sets, and attacks. The Rockets appear to lack any such thing. Still if the zone defense is good, and Miami’s is very good, and mobile, then there are certain things that must happen to break it.
One is, get behind it with baseline cuts, and player movement without the ball into the back of the zone, and either shoot, or pass it out when the zone reacts by converging at the rim.
Nope, the Rockets didn’t do that. Nobody moves.
Another is to overload the zone, and either find a screen for a shot in the overload, or whip the ball back to the non overloaded side that could be open.
No. Again, no player movement from the Rockets, they just stand, “spaced out” watching a one on four attack. Why the team stands around like that, as there isn’t a player really capable of a drive and kick attack most of the time (I include Reed, Amen AND Fred Vanvleet in this assessment) baffles me.
Another is to set up a distributor in the middle of the paint, and have players cut into or out of the zone. The idea is to force coverage of the player in the paint, and then catch the zone out of position with passes out, or attacks by that player.
Nah. That speaks to purpose. Of recognizing a likely problem, and having a solution ready. Miami’s “go to” change up is always a zone defense of some sort. The waited around in a close game, until the 4th quarter, then went to it and choked the Rockets out. The Rockets managed a losing 22 points in the 4th.
Another is to attack the rim, and then kick the ball to shooters, or cutters, having, again, pulled the zone out of shape and forced help.
Well, the Rockets certainly attacked into the teeth of the zone. They didn’t pass out, and no one moved, cut, or followed those attacks. They stood around waiting for offensive rebounds, as if those, rather than baskets, were the goal. (There are other zone breaking methods, of course, but rest assured, we saw none of those, either.)
The good news is that the Rockets lost their lead in the 3rd quarter, late. So they did not add a 12th blown 4th quarter lead to their already commanding 11 blow 4th quarter leads.
This looked like most other Rockets losses. The defense holds yet another opponent below NBA average points, but loses because the Rockets themselves can barely break 100 points against all but the worst of the NBA.
I wish I had more sunshine for you, but that’s what I’m seeing. With no change in sight.
