With 70 regular season games in the past, the Houston Rockets' current record is just 17 wins and 53 losses. After losing to the Pacers in the previous game, the Rockets went on a four-game losing streak. The Rockets will play another game with the Western Conference powerhouse Grizzlies tomorrow morning, and while Morant may not play, the Overall strength of the Grizzlies is far better than that of the Houston Rockets, and Hughes wants to replicate the miracle of the recent victory over the Grizzlies.
But some of the Rockets' players have performed well, and Jaylen Green's recent performance has been remarkable, scoring 20 points in a single game in the previous game, although Green's shooting rate is not high, but for a newcomer who has just turned 20, it is already quite rare. Even The Rockets' main center, Christian Wood, has been an efficient offensive performance in recent games.
Why is there a specific mention of the "offensive end"? Because fans who often watch Rockets games and often pay attention to Wood must have this feeling, Wood can always get beautiful data in rocket games every time, even if it is not in good shape, he can generally blast out two double-level data. On the defensive end, however, Wood's ability is simply the level of the league's last-rate center, and each center who is in line with it can always play a beautiful stat far beyond his own ability.
Take the example of the previous Pacers center Bitazer, the 23-year-old Bizeta is only the league's second and third-rate center, although it is the Pacers' starting point for the time being, but we also know that it is because the Pacers' main center Miles Turner is absent, which pushed him to the starting position. In 43 games this season, Bitazer averaged only 5.9 points and 3.3 rebounds in 12.6 minutes per game, but against Wood, the big man exploded with 23 points, 9 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 steals and 1 block.
This performance fully proves the view that Wood's defensive ability is not good as we just said. But from another point of view, although Wood is not well defended, the offense is really sharp, which can be seen from the data. Against the Pacers, Wood had 32 points, 13 rebounds and 7 assists, and according to statistics, in the last 10 games wood played, his average per game reached 21.3 points, 10.6 rebounds, 3.4 assists, 1 steal and 1.6 blocks, and the true shooting rate was as high as 71.6%.
Ironically, in the 10 NBA regular season games in which Wood played, the Rockets' record is really unbearable to look at, in 10 games, the Rockets only won one win (against the Grizzlies), and the remaining 9 games, although Wood's data brushed up, but the Rockets have been pressed by the other side to rub underground, there is no power to fight back.
Indeed, the average of 23+10 per game in 10 games is really good, and the true shooting rate of up to 70% is even more impressive. However, the weakness on the defensive end also directly offsets Wood's efforts on the offensive end. How to solve it? Presumably there was no other way but to get Wood to hurry up and improve his defensive ability. But this is definitely not something that can be solved overnight, and the Rockets will either continue to endure Wood or quickly clean it up and put Shin Kyung in the starting position.