December 29th - New Orleans Pelicans VS Houston Rockets - 16-20
Tonight we take on the 19-15 Houston Rockets, fresh off of winning 8 of their last 9, led by perennial foul-getter James Harden. Let's take a look at their team:
Offensive Rating: 2nd
Defensive Rating: 26th
Rebounds per game: 29th
Assists per game: 28th
Steals per game: 16th
Blocks per game: 17th
2pt percentage: 3rd
3pt percentage: 20th (but first in attempts and makes)
Okay, so Houston's recent success is a little bit of a mystery based on those stats. They're a worse defensive team than us, they're almost the worst rebounding and playmaking team in the league, they aren't particularly good at getting steals or blocks, and they aren't shooting particularly well from 3. Heck, they're not even shooting massively well at the FT line, 17th in the league in percentage. So, how are they winning? Simple: James Harden is doing the one-man-band thing, and the refs are giving him 14 free throws a game for it. Across their last 9 games*, Harden is averaging a (frankly absurd) 39ppg, and is banging hard on the 50/40/90 splits (45/41/89). Combine that with Clint Capela's synergy with him in the pick and roll and the fact that they don't turn the ball over, that'll just about do it.
*Just for comparison, over our last 9 games, AD has averaged 34/15/3.6 on 52% from the floor and has received only 8.5 FTAs per game, almost 5.5 less than Harden. I do not want you to think of how many of our last few losses might have been wins if AD got to the line for 6 more shots shooting his 80%.
Their number one guy is James Harden, and there's really no contesting that. He's putting up 33/5/8 on the season so far, which is ludicrous. By comparison, AD is averaging 29/13/4.7, and he's not getting anywhere near the victories that Harden is. Part of that is the foul's issue, and part of it is the fact that Harden will force the offense (made of course easier by the fact that he knows he'll get fouls called if he does). When AD forces the offence in a similar way, he can sometimes have this effect too: for a good example, see last game.
AD and Harden can basically neutralise each other in terms of scoring. Harden's averaging 39ppg in this run, AD is averaging 34.4, so it's not too different. So who's second banana? For them, without CP3, it's Capela: he's averaging 17/12 on 64% from the floor. He's also setting good screens and defending well, especially when it comes to lateral movement, which is allowing Harden to slack somewhat when defending the PnR. For us, that second guy is Jrue, who is averaging 21/4.5/9 and shooting 47% from the floor, while guarding the other teams best ball handler. I think we actually win this battle.
After that, honestly there isn't much in it. We have Randle, and he's definitely the better third option against an Eric Gordon who's shooting 30% from 3, but Houston has the bench advantage with multiple players who are able to come in and provide at least temporary support whereas our bench doesn't seem to exist. Despite how much better Houston has performed in comparison to us, I honestly see this game being fairly close, especially at home.
Let's go out there and put our stamp on it: 2-0 against Houston after tonight. #DoItBig
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Originally Posted by 6warddude
