Where being too small happens

by Mike Prada on Jan 9, 2008 2:07 PM EST in Recaps Comment 10 comments

Box Score.
Game Flow.
Post recap.
Times recap.
The Dream Shake.
Live blog.

Highest plus/minus: Darius Songaila, Nick Young, Dominic McGuire (+6).
Lowest plus/minus: Caron Butler (-17).

I have to admit, it was weird watching that Rockets team last night. They looked like some sort of hybrid between a Jeff Van Gundy team and a Rick Adelman team, which is kind of the ultimate goal for them. When I projected them to be a juggernaut coming into the season, that was the type of team I envisioned. The final score was only an 8-point margin, but it certainly felt like a blowout. Only strong play in the second quarter by the much-maligned reserves kept the Wizards in the game.

I think this was one game where we really missed Gilbert Arenas. The Rockets have two extremely physical forward defenders in Shane Battier and Chuck Hayes. Each completely took Caron Butler and Antawn Jamison, respectively, out of the game, with a nice assist from the big fella patrolling the paint. Butler, in particular, never got any open room to shoot a stepback jumper. Oh, he tried, but Shane Battier was right there in his face. Butler did try on occasion to drive to the rim, but Battier was doing a phenomenal job angling him off to Yao, who, at 7'6'', bothered all of his drives. Perhaps Battier and Yao were angry about this play from last year.

As for Hayes, he really impressed me with his defense on Jamison. When Jamison was setting up, Hayes pushed him away from the basket, and he didn't let Jamison spin inside him for his little flip shot. Offensively, he made really good cuts that opened up space for Yao and the Rocket guards. I think we'd benefit a lot having a guy like Hayes on our team, but alas, we don't.

Now, normally, we'd counter by exploiting their small guards defensively by using Gilbert extensively. Rafer Alston and Luther Head are both small guys that can't really guard the stronger offensive options one-on-one. Alas, Antonio Daniels isn't that type of player, and DeShawn Stevenson did horribly every time he tried to post either guy up. About the only player who was effective was Nick Young, but once the Rockets switched Bonzi Wells on him, Young became a lot less effective. With Gilbert, we could have punished the Rockets for playing small, but without him, that was a weakness in which we couldn't take advantage.

I was impressed by Young's scoring ability, and Brendan Haywood, despite giving up lots of size, played a very nice game, both when he was guarding Yao Ming and on the offensive end. But otherwise, we're just too small everywhere to deal with this team. In the backcourt, I felt Eddie gave too many minutes to Roger Mason, when it might have paid to go with Young and Stevenson and try to post up Houston's small guards. Up front, we didn't have the muscle to deal with Hayes, Luis Scola, and Bonzi Wells, especially with Darius Songaila hanging too much on the perimeter (again). With Gilbert, perhaps he scores enough to sneak us a win, but without him, we're toast against big teams.

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where was AD last night?

did he not show up to play, or could he just not stay with alston? hopefully the former.

not sure if it would work, but seems to me that the wizards should try to push the tempo more against the rockets and open the game up a bit. when the wiz get in a half court game with the rockets, it seems like they are trying so hard to get stops on defense that they have nothing left on offense. and they get tight because they're thinking each stop they get will take maximum effort so they'd better not miss and get further in the hole. outscore them, don't outgrind them.

i guess put more effort into trying to dictate the flow of the game somehow. houston seems to make it their game every time. and they just drill us.

by DarrellWalkerFan on Jan 9, 2008 4:27 PM EST reply actions 0 recs

Totally agree

That's another way that Gil would have helped us last night.

Problem is that we didn't rebound yesterday, and Houston's one of the best in the league at transition defense. But you're right, that would have made the difference.

You know you'll get devoured by Cheaney, Wallace, and Juwan Howard.

by Mike Prada on Jan 9, 2008 6:57 PM EST up reply actions 0 recs

I dont know man........

I think we missed more layups and inside baskets than Ive ever seen last night.... Yao effected everything inside, EVERYTHING.

I still think the Gilbert thing is a bit of a cop-out. Its what everybody said when Gilbert got injured, that "we were done"... we've went 17-10 without gilbert since that 0-5 start, and our guys are gonna prove everybody wrong about that. We've got the team capable of beating Houston witout Gilbert, its just not gonna happen when Jamison and Butler have off nights (Especially Butler), and when Antonio Daniels has a bad game at point for us.

Another good job by our bench and young guys, but games like this happen to every team in the league. We let Houston control the tempo the entire game (Mostly A.D's fault), and Houston did a good job of not letting us run.......

I still love the way this team is playing though, and like you said it felt like a blowout but our guys wouldnt quit, they wouldnt let it get to that no matter what, even though it wasnt our night. That is okay in my book, and it showed alot of character.... Im real proud of this team and I still think we have everything (If you read my "Blazer-like run prediction" post, you know what I mean: everything) needed to win a ton of games even without Gilbert, and be an even better team once Gilbert is back in our starting backcourt, and when he returns into our system we'll be very dangerous come playoff time.

by billy332 on Jan 9, 2008 7:42 PM EST reply actions 0 recs

How is that a "cop-out?"

Antawn and Caron were off, thanks to great defense, so it would have been nice to have Gilbert to exploit their guards.

I saw great defense by the Rockets, and it makes me wonder what we can do against big physical forward defenders. Not too many teams have that, but it's still concerning.

I guess I'm just not seeing your point, if you even had one. This isn't about counting us out with Gilbert sidelined, it's just an observation that, in this one game, he would have helped.

You know you'll get devoured by Cheaney, Wallace, and Juwan Howard.

by Mike Prada on Jan 9, 2008 7:54 PM EST up reply actions 0 recs

Rocket's Red Glare

I went to this game with my dad last night. I wish I had stayed home.

I agree that Yao really changed everyone's shot inside. You knew it was bad when even a 7footer like Haywood had a bunny layup to make and he botched it because he was anticipating a Yao block at one point.

I was really dissapointed in Caron last night. I thought he played really passive for most of the game except for the last two minutes. He wasn't making any cuts or demanding the ball at all. Just seemed like he didnt want to be there and mailed it in.

And I know Yao is a great passer but we made Luther Head look like MJ out there. There's no way he should be scoring that easily.

Overall, ugh.

by LoDawg31 on Jan 9, 2008 8:59 PM EST reply actions 0 recs

take a different approach against yao

yao did dominate. maybe instead of looking for open space and trying to cheat for offensive boards, haywood should try to seal yao so people can get to the rim. swing the ball weak side, seal yao, and drive.

alternatively, you could put blatche in the game and try to use his quickness, shooting, and dribbling ability to draw yao away from the basket, or exploit yao's lack of quickness. blatche probably isn't ready for this, but just a thought.

this is my second post about this game, so you can tell i'm tired of getting waxed by the rockets. shouldn't happen, especially without mcgrady who always torches the wizards. i think it's an X's and O's thing more than anything else.

butler and jamison say they had bad nights and it was just an off night, but like prada, i think houston had a lot to do with that.

by DarrellWalkerFan on Jan 10, 2008 9:38 AM EST reply actions 0 recs

Nice thoughts

Alternatively, you could run the high S/R with Haywood and Butler/Jamison, so that Yao would be forced to guard someone away from the basket. If we had Gil, that would work even better, but Haywood's always been awkward doing that, and Butler isn't as good as Arenas coming off the screen.

You know you'll get devoured by Cheaney, Wallace, and Juwan Howard.

by Mike Prada on Jan 10, 2008 12:29 PM EST up reply actions 0 recs

yeah that'd probably be better

that's probably how utah beat the rockets last year, huh?

we don't seem to run a lot of pick and rolls. before the season i thought AD and Songaila would run that all day together off the bench, but i don't recall seeing the wiz run the pick and roll much, if at all this season.

by DarrellWalkerFan on Jan 10, 2008 3:13 PM EST up reply actions 0 recs