V-Span's big splash and other thoughts...
After a long time, I finally got to see this Rockets team up and close. Showed up at MSG and got a decent seat in section 50 - close enough to hear a few curses from the players - but only in the first qtr. The great thing about seeing a game live of course is that you see everything - not just what the camera's show. So here's some observations that you may like or not.
This was a highly entertaining game - not being decided until basically 4 minutes left, and no dramatic choke from our team...
The big news of course was V-Span. 30 seconds before the half, a few minutes at the end of the third, and most of the 4th QTR saw him on the court. He looked like an overactive energized kid - on defense looking every which way to make sure he was in the right spot. At one point, he left his man and I thought "oh no", but to my amazement, he had anticipated a cross court pass so early that he almost had it for a fast break. He defended drives by Marbury and Crawford relatively well. And played hustle defense, always getting a hand up. He did look a bit scattered though...frantic might be the better word.
On Offense - without the ball he tended to camp out behind the arc and seemed to disappear. He seemed timid with his outside shot, twice passing on open three's or driving. His passes were crisp, and when he did drive - good things usually happened - although he had one careless turnover. However; showing the potential that many here drool over - he made a slick pass to battier on a drive that led to foul shots by Yao.
When he got off the court, he got an applause from the garden - who appreciated his hustle - diving for loose balls, trying to open court steals, and a few of his nifty passes. Yup, this was V-Span's big night - playing the 4th QTR - and he's showed that he's going to make it in this league - and on this team.
Welcome to the rotation V-Span.
Juwon Howard played strong and within his game. However; we are definitely undersized at the 4 and that's clearly a problem. Yao played well early, but the last 15 minutes he was dominated by David Lee - not just in points and the block we saw with Yao grabbing his face - but just pushed around and you could see Yao bending over at times, once asking JVG to take him out of the game.
So Yao's drop in performance may simply be the increased physicalness that opposing players are going at him. They were clearly trying to wear him down whether he got the ball or not. And without a strong 4, opposing teams can use that many more players against Yao.
Battier while a solid player - still doesn't seem to quite fit with this team - is he a back-up to T-mac or a 4? This game, he was undersized - and while he did so many intangibles - I can't help but think what if we had that Kelvin Cato guy playing PF for us? How much easier would that make the game for Yao?
Other then that - the team chemistry is excellent - with that starters hugging each bench player before the game, and the bench players huddling on their own. The commrodrity is definitely there, and everyone seems to like everyone else very much. JVG has done a good job in the chemistry department, and you can see his team respects him.
Final note - Wells was no where to be seen. After seeing how this team behaves, the hustle away from the ball, the intensity on the bench - I have to say, Wells may not ever play. He has an attitude issue, and might only bring a distraction. I would not be surprised if Wells is moved in the near term future, possibly packaged with Howard or Alston....in fact, other then Synder's injury, this could be a reason V-Span saw a lot of time tonight.
Synder's injury was particularly sad - he's clearly our most athleticaly gifted player.
