Official Game Thread: Rockets at Hawks -- The Season Opener!

[marco102]

4 minutes ago, sturt said:

 

. The All-Star would confess later that he'd just felt bored by the regular season. 

 

Did he say that?

[sturt]

Dang. Did you see who tied for the lead for HOU in assists tonight?

Same guy who led them in blocked shots.

 

 

[marco102]

1 minute ago, sturt said:

Dang. Did you see who tied for the lead for HOU in assists tonight?

Same guy who led them in blocked shots.

 

 

Bruno played much better.

[sturt]

1 minute ago, marco102 said:

Did he say that?

If memory serves, it was that piece that Kirschner did where he'd interviewed Capela and Trae, talking about the disappointing season to-date... sometime before or after the ASG break, I think.

[REHawksFan]

3 minutes ago, Peoriabird said:

Trae's 1-9 or the other players

Trae will be fine as usual.  There's really no one else to rely on until bogi comes back unless Nate plays AJ. 

JC doesn't take enough. Same with Dre. 

[marco102]

1 minute ago, sturt said:

If memory serves, it was that piece that Kirschner did where he'd interviewed Capela and Trae, talking about the disappointing season to-date... sometime before or after the ASG break, I think.

I know what you're referring to, but it takes a little interpretation.

I forget the question asked, but what Trae was saying was the rough start was probably due to motivation of coming off the highs of the playoffs.

People took that quote to make it seem like he was bored and that's not what he was meaning. Trae's not the best speaker as is. 

[REHawksFan]

6 minutes ago, Diesel said:

You say that as if our defense had nothing to do  with their misses. 

Yeah on some. No on others. If you say we're going to hold teams to 25% shooting then we have no problem. But I doubt you'll say that.

You also said the other day that we'd shoot 45% or whatever from the preseason. Doubt that happens as well.

[Peoriabird]

1 minute ago, REHawksFan said:

Trae will be fine as usual.  There's really no one else to rely on until bogi comes back unless Nate plays AJ. 

JC doesn't take enough. Same with Dre. 

The other guys were 6/16 which is 37.5% which is respectable...You always kill me when the team's poor shooting is cause by Trae but the other players bare the responsibility for Trae's bad shooting.

[marco102]

1 minute ago, REHawksFan said:

Trae will be fine as usual.  There's really no one else to rely on until bogi comes back unless Nate plays AJ. 

JC doesn't take enough. Same with Dre. 

Look at the career percentages of the other guys and you'll see they're above league average.  

As long as Trae and Dejounte are getting them open looks, they'll be well above league average. 

Three point shooting shouldn't be a concern as long as your team is scoring efficiently.  

Again, they put up 117 points on 7 threes.  It's all about scoring.  There's no one on the team that you can just leave wide open and that will give the spacing required to run the offense which is what I believe you are concerned with.

[bleachkit]

1 minute ago, marco102 said:

I know what you're referring to, but it takes a little interpretation.

I forget the question asked, but what Trae was saying was the rough start was probably due to motivation of coming off the highs of the playoffs.

People took that quote to make it seem like he was bored and that's not what he was meaning. Trae's not the best speaker as is. 

It was like when LeBron said the "not 4, not 5, not 6" remark and people tried to hold him to that. It's just an off the cuff remark. They arent professional public speakers or anything. 

[REHawksFan]

3 minutes ago, Peoriabird said:

The other guys were 6/16 which is 37.5% which is respectable...You always kill me when the team's poor shooting is cause by Trae but the other players bare the responsibility for Trae's bad shooting.

Trae will end the year around 40% so there's no reason to be concerned about him. If the rest of the team is also in the 37-40% range then fine. No worries.

I'm just skeptical.

At some point if they aren't hitting their outside shots teams will cheat off them and clog the interior which will make being efficient in the mid range mire difficult. That's when the problems happen.

 

[Sothron]

Great win tonight. A little shaky at times but good Lord can Murray play some defense. I haven't seen a Hawks guard just go out and torture a backcourt with steals like that since Mookie was here.

[marco102]

Just want to add. 

Some outsiders may have doubted it, but Dejounte is a legit all star player. That clutch three in the 4th is what we've been missing.

Trae said he didn't have his legs because of the illness. If that's the case, I'd like to see him take less shots and even more playmaking.

I think we are in for a treat this season.

[sturt]

4 minutes ago, marco102 said:

I know what you're referring to, but it takes a little interpretation.

I forget the question asked, but what Trae was saying was the rough start was probably due to motivation of coming off the highs of the playoffs.

People took that quote to make it seem like he was bored and that's not what he was meaning. Trae's not the best speaker as is. 

You'd have to dig out the quote for me to take that interpretation, but where we agree is that Trae had to have wished he hadn't said it no matter what words he happened to choose. I'd dig it out myself but I'm not a subscriber anymore. Even if we say for the sake of argument that how I characterized it wasn't consistent with how Trae intended, still, how they'd played up to that point (even setting aside the Fake Hawks six weeks) suggested they were suffering from significant complacency.

[Peoriabird]

3 minutes ago, REHawksFan said:

At some point if they aren't hitting their outside shots teams will cheat off them and clog the interior which will make being efficient in the mid range mire difficult. That's when the problems happen.

 

They?  Who are you talking about? Would that be everybody but Trae?  This is so irritating.

[sturt]

On the down side....

 

I want to see Trae and DJM have 37-38 minutes in crucial games.

Not in a home game against one of the worst teams in the league.

That's too much.

I suppose Nate was nervous, and I don't blame him. It would have been an embarrassing loss. So he reverted to Playoff Coach, and the short bench.

I don't know who to blame, actually, but we just can't have them asked to play that many minutes in lesser opponent games.

[BangHolman]

34 minutes ago, benhillboy said:

Damn I never realized that.  You’re right that’s something State Farm should’ve been peeped.  Having your announcers sit there is so ‘90s.

Even football stadiums are moving press boxes to the corners to make room for premium suites.

[Marvin24Williams]

I am in love with Dejounte Murray. Also shoutout Aaron Holiday. LOVE his defense

[JeffS17]

Great win.  You could tell the whole team was jittery in the first quarter and eventually settled down -- nice to see the guys all antsy to get out there and ball. 

Just got home and everyone has covered most of what I was going to write up but a few things people haven't touched on (good and bad):

• It feels like there was a directive for everyone to work on their handles after that playoffs series.  Obv Murray acquisition is huge for us in this regard, but Dre's handles look tighter as do JC and OO the few times they put in on the floor briefly
• JC had a really nice game... like, probably the single thing I'm happiest about because I was really worried that nasty looking finger was going to be an issue for him.
• Hunter looked confident out there -- seems to have picked up where he left off in that game 5.  He's using his size to get to the rim a lot more than last season and his middie was pure
• The box score shows we struggled on the boards, and we did, but a lot of that was Houston just crashing them on offense.  We had 28 fast break points, partly because of how aggressive they were getting offensive rebounds.  Not terribly worried but something to watch
• Defense was sloppy at times but the effort was there.  I feel really confident we can be top 10-15 defense this year and top 5 offense if we keep giving effort on that end.
• Something a little odd I noticed is that we had like zero lobs all game.  This has been our bread n butter for two years but everything was a bounce pass inside or a wrap around.  Not sure if we're trying to lower injury risk or what but there were a few plays I was sure one of our bigs was about to get a lob and it just wasn't there -- just interesting
• There's a lot of talent on this roster.  We're probably not quite as deep as last year but this has to be one of the most talented 1-8 we've ever had

[sturt]

SIAP...