Facing the No. 1 Timberwolves in the West, the so-called "talent" and "superpowers" of the Rockets seem to be gone.
That's right, Udoka has the Devils' home-court advantage, but Dillon and Eason watched from the sidelines, paralyzing the entire team's defensive system, and after entering the rotation, the youth of Amen Thompson and Whitmore still buried a lot of mistakes, and the Timberwolves took advantage of the Rockets' mistakes and scored 18 points in the whole game. The Rockets' interior advantage this season is simply worthless at the moment of Gobert and Towns.
The Rockets scored just 95 points in this game, which is far below the season average, and the reason for this is that the Rockets' offensive style of play has been thoroughly studied by the Timberwolves, which is of course an exaggeration. Both east and west, facing this rocket
The competition is still very fierce, not to mention that the Rockets are now beating the Lakers in the Western rankings. However, relative to the rationality of the lineup, the current advantage of the Rockets is still worrying, and the root cause is injuries and lack of roster depth, especially the lack of interior lineup, which also points out the direction for Stone to strengthen.
I didn't expect Landale to be so ignorant, as a first-year fully guaranteed contract, he will most likely be waived in the middle of this season or after the season, and the Rockets will consider using Landale's trade value plus Oladipo to pursue an experienced veteran. However, through this game, Udoka also observed the weakness of the lineup, which is closely related to the core of the team, Van Vleet.
During the game against the Timberwolves, VanVleet played 30 minutes, shooting 2-of-9, cutting 7 points, 1 rebound and 8 assists, with a plus/minus of -13 and the lowest start.
So far this season, Van Vleet has averaged 37.2 minutes per game, which ranks first in the league, which shows that Udoka relies on Van Vleet's organizational ability, averaging 17.2 points, 3.9 rebounds and 8.6 assists per game. Despite being able to hit 3 three-pointers per game, fans are sure to prefer Haliburton to Haliburton's efficiency.
Look at Harden again, now with the assistance of Harden, the Clippers have reached the fourth place in the West, all thanks to the gift of the Rockets, if it were not for the change of formation during the home game against the Rockets, Harden would not have sent a three-point quasi-kill, and at the same time, Wei Shao would not take the initiative to sacrifice himself to play on the bench. The current Clippers are a good fit for each other, and under the leadership of the Big Four, the goal this season is to challenge for a championship.
In comparison, the Rockets grabbed Van Vleet with a 3-year 130 million top salary, and more voices from the outside world still questioned it, but it is undeniable that when Van Vleet was on the floor, the Rockets' offensive end was very clear, but he lacked personal ability, and his finishing ability was still somewhat incomparable with Harden. In terms of strength, VanVleet is far from reaching the maximum salary or $40 million, but this Rockets team is still on the rise, as long as it develops according to this line of thinking, it will still surprise fans when Amen Thompson grows up.
Text/Lao Wang Kanqiu next door
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