ClutchFans Game Thread: Rockets @ Lakers 10/28/2014

tmacfor35 · Oct 29, 2014

torocan said: ↑

This went pretty much as expected.

A Lakers team with tons of new players, new coach, light on talent and playing a 10 man roster shouldn't even remotely challenge the Rockets.

Unfortunate that Randle got injured. He was looking like he was going to have an interesting development curve this year. Fortunately it's only a broken bone, so he'll be back in a few months.

Not a fan of Byron Scott's aversion to shooting 3's. I don't think a team can be competitive in the modern NBA without shooting 3's. Take away 3's and you basically destroy any on court spacing and remove one of your most effective offensive weapons from your toolbox. If he sticks to that philosophy the Lakers will be even worse than they should be (which is already pretty bad).

The Rockets were a bit worrying. Dwight did get in foul trouble pretty quickly and this will potentially hurt us unless the bench bigs can step up. The bench lacked fluidity in terms of offense. Barea can shoot but the offense stalled when Harden was off the floor.

That 2nd unit could cost us when we get to the actual play off teams on the schedule.

The biggest worry I have right now is depth if either Howard or Harden suffer injury. Over an 82 game season is anyone really betting on both of them playing all 82 games? Harden hasn't played an 82 game season since 10-11. And Howard hasn't played a full 82 game season since 09-10. I worry more about the potential of a Harden injury than a Howard injury. We can still outscore opponents if Howard is offline for a while. If Harden goes down I don't trust Dwight's offensive game to put multiple games on his back when he is so determined to be a post up vs PnR player.

I was actually very happy with McHale's minutes management. 31 minutes for Harden and Howard. Hopefully they can really push up the score early in a lot of games so that McHale isn't tempted to run them into the ground.

Still, first game of the season and every team looks rusty and somewhat disjointed. We probably won't know what we have until the All Star break.
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I think it would be important to get Terry on the floor when Harden is off of it.

He can create off the Pick N Roll!

I think you would be best off putting a speed line up in.

Terry
Daniels
Pap
DMO
Black

That would be a good offensive lineup in regards to moving the ball.

jordnnnn · Oct 29, 2014

count_dough-ku said: ↑

Uh, we were up 27 or 28 points in the 4th and Harden didn't have to check in at all in the final 12 minutes. I'd say we DID blow them out they way we should've.
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lol. This. We did exactly what we were supposed to. Our defense looked better, our offense looked smoother. I have a hard time complaining about much last night.

saleem · Oct 29, 2014

FranchiseBlade said: ↑

It was a fun game. Harden looked great. Team defense seemed improved. Beverley's effort is still a thing to be amazed at. Jones was an unsung component of the win.

Black looked lost the first half, but seemed to be slightly more comfortable the second half.

I was shocked by Daniels lack of shooting.

Ariza looked good last night. He isn't the facilitator or really able to drive and create but he did a nice job helping the Rockets get the win. His offense was tremendous.

Kostas seems like he will be able to adjust to the game, and made some positive adjustments as the game went on.

I always love seeing us beat the Lakers.
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It was great to see Terry shooting wonderfully. I was very doubtful about his physical fitness. I like your comments about the game. Hopefully Daniels will get going soon too. Terry can be a good mentor for him.

redhotrox · Oct 29, 2014

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jogo · Oct 29, 2014

Linsanity - 1 for 5, 7 pts. 4 TOs, all really bad. -17 eff rtg. 127 def rtg! Bad TOs, fouling 3pt shooters, getting scored on and getting blocked. Apparently will back up Ronnie Price once Ronnie Price is 100% again. Wow, Laker plan is for Lin to back up Ronnie Price, y'all. But I thought it was mean Mr. McHale?

Can someone tell me where to find eff rtg and def rtg per game?

torocan · Oct 29, 2014

crash5179 said: ↑

It's funny that people make excuses for Kobe and the Lakers based on too much turnover in personnel. The Rockets made the play-offs 2 seasons ago with exactly 1 returning player (Parsons), a bunch of players that had never started in the league and a 2nd year coach and everyone wanted to act like that was no big deal.

At least Byron Scott has coached his way to a couple of NBA finals.

It's time to stop giving the Lakers an excuse.
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The Rockets didn't have 5 players on the injury list, nor was their "star" returning from a 2 year lay off due to injury, nor was any of their starters over the age of 35.

Turnover was only part of the problem, if you take 5 players off the Rockets that season would have played out very differently.

Good job just picking out the "turnover" part.

cdrive · Oct 29, 2014

jogo said: ↑

Linsanity - 1 for 5, 7 pts. 4 TOs, all really bad. -17 eff rtg. 127 def rtg! Bad TOs, fouling 3pt shooters, getting scored on and getting blocked. Apparently will back up Ronnie Price once Ronnie Price is 100% again. Wow, Laker plan is for Lin to back up Ronnie Price, y'all. But I thought it was mean Mr. McHale?

Can someone tell me where to find eff rtg and def rtg per game?
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The +/- you can see in any espn box score. the def rtg is an advanced stat you can find on basketball-reference.com's box scores.

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ClutchFans Game Thread: Rockets @ Lakers 10/28/2014

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