WCQF: Oklahoma City Thunder vs Houston Rockets | P1

[ThunderBolt]

Pass the ball. Move without the ball. Guys just stood around and took difficult shots. It looked like a poor imitation of last years offense with less talent.

[Old Man Game]

I was a little afraid of that. They tried to feed Adams but Adams isn't Jokic or KAT. Adams isn't even Marc Gasol. He can't score consistently enough to make it worthwhile and it just completely **** up the offensive pace. On the defensive end wow were we out of sorts. That whole defend on a string rotate to shooters thing was almost entirely absent.

Hopefully, we'll get a gameplan that we can actually execute at some point in the series.

A footnote, we all love SGA's upside, but his status as 'presumptive franchise cornerstone' really took a hit tonight. Still young but jeez, you can tell the difference between a guy who is a cut or so below the truly elite talent in a setting like this.

[getrichordie]

Pass the ball. Move without the ball. Guys just stood around and took difficult shots. It looked like a poor imitation of last years offense with less talent.

You kind of need players who are good at moving w/o the ball and are a threat to actually make a bucket for that stuff to be effective, though. If we don't have the personnel, we just don't have the personnel. Houston is stronger, longer, and more athletic than we are at this point. They also have far better shooting. Also, we are relying on so many young guys whereas HOU is relying on strong, grizzled veterans for the most part. Hard to expect much better. I definitely thought Paul would be more impactful. Relative to how he had been playing, I felt like this game was a dud for him.

Hopefully this was just a dear in the headlights kind of thing for SGA and hopefully Schroder shakes off some more rust for Game 2. We sorely need Dort back so we can bench Ferguson's ass.

Overall, we were just passive. We don't know how to get into the teeth of the defense when they are just sagging off the perimeter.

[Dadouv47]

I’m not going to be able to watch this series.

Come on. Its a bad half. Hopefully they wake up. We saw some positives late.

Considering how the thunder have performed in the playoffs the last three years and the fact that I didn’t want them to be here, I’m kind of on edge.

Same feeling. Wanted a rebuild and a good pick and losing in the first round of the playoffs playing like a terrible 8th seed team sucks. Ferguson can't start a game in a playoff series, he's beyond terrible

[ThunderBolt]

Pass the ball. Move without the ball. Guys just stood around and took difficult shots. It looked like a poor imitation of last years offense with less talent.

You kind of need players who are good at moving w/o the ball and are a threat to actually make a bucket for that stuff to be effective, though. If we don't have the personnel, we just don't have the personnel. Houston is stronger, longer, and more athletic than we are at this point. They also have far better shooting. Also, we are relying on so many young guys whereas HOU is relying on strong, grizzled veterans for the most part. Hard to expect much better. I definitely thought Paul would be more impactful. Relative to how he had been playing, I felt like this game was a dud for him.

Hopefully this was just a dear in the headlights kind of thing for SGA and hopefully Schroder shakes off some more rust for Game 2. We sorely need Dort back so we can bench Ferguson's ass.

Overall, we were just passive. We don't know how to get into the teeth of the defense when they are just sagging off the perimeter.

This is the 4/5, matchup,we beat them 2 out of 3 times in the reg season and they are missing Russ. Come on. The team looked nothing like they have looked all year. The team laid a big egg in game one, coaching staff and players both. Shai played well in the playoffs as a rookie against the warriors and now he has a deer in the headlights against the westbrook-less rockets? Nope. No excuses. Maybe game two will be better.

[Galloisdaman]

Pass the ball. Move without the ball. Guys just stood around and took difficult shots. It looked like a poor imitation of last years offense with less talent.

You kind of need players who are good at moving w/o the ball and are a threat to actually make a bucket for that stuff to be effective, though. If we don't have the personnel, we just don't have the personnel. Houston is stronger, longer, and more athletic than we are at this point. They also have far better shooting. Also, we are relying on so many young guys whereas HOU is relying on strong, grizzled veterans for the most part. Hard to expect much better. I definitely thought Paul would be more impactful. Relative to how he had been playing, I felt like this game was a dud for him.

Hopefully this was just a dear in the headlights kind of thing for SGA and hopefully Schroder shakes off some more rust for Game 2. We sorely need Dort back so we can bench Ferguson's ass.

Overall, we were just passive. We don't know how to get into the teeth of the defense when they are just sagging off the perimeter.

This is the 4/5, matchup,we beat them 2 out of 3 times in the reg season and they are missing Russ. Come on. The team looked nothing like they have looked all year. The team laid a big egg in game one, coaching staff and players both. Shai played well in the playoffs as a rookie against the warriors and now he has a deer in the headlights against the westbrook-less rockets? Nope. No excuses. Maybe game two will be better.

I had 3 major issues last night.

1. There was no movement on offense.
2. There was a disappointing lack of hustle on defense.
3. The game plans both offensively and defensively were so bad. It was not based on a team effort.

The 2 bright spots for me were instead of making Gallo just stand and shoot outside the 3p line (like they did all season) they used him to post up a bit. Gallo is a much better player when he goes inside. The other is I thought Balzey looked good. I'm not sure why he only played 17 minutes. I might even consider starting him.

Now if the coach can get these guys to move and hustle they should be better. CP3 should be better. SGA should be better. Dennis should be better. If those 3 play to their norms they can make a series out of this.

This team looked like they barely knew each other last night. Could all the resting of players in the bubble have backfired?

[ThunderBolt]

Spoiler:

You kind of need players who are good at moving w/o the ball and are a threat to actually make a bucket for that stuff to be effective, though. If we don't have the personnel, we just don't have the personnel. Houston is stronger, longer, and more athletic than we are at this point. They also have far better shooting. Also, we are relying on so many young guys whereas HOU is relying on strong, grizzled veterans for the most part. Hard to expect much better. I definitely thought Paul would be more impactful. Relative to how he had been playing, I felt like this game was a dud for him.

Hopefully this was just a dear in the headlights kind of thing for SGA and hopefully Schroder shakes off some more rust for Game 2. We sorely need Dort back so we can bench Ferguson's ass.

Overall, we were just passive. We don't know how to get into the teeth of the defense when they are just sagging off the perimeter.

This is the 4/5, matchup,we beat them 2 out of 3 times in the reg season and they are missing Russ. Come on. The team looked nothing like they have looked all year. The team laid a big egg in game one, coaching staff and players both. Shai played well in the playoffs as a rookie against the warriors and now he has a deer in the headlights against the westbrook-less rockets? Nope. No excuses. Maybe game two will be better.

I had 3 major issues last night.

1. There was no movement on offense.
2. There was a disappointing lack of hustle on defense.
3. The game plans both offensively and defensively were so bad. It was not based on a team effort.

The 2 bright spots for me were instead of making Gallo just stand and shoot outside the 3p line (like they did all season) they used him to post up a bit. Gallo is a much better player when he goes inside. The other is I thought Balzey looked good. I'm not sure why he only played 17 minutes. I might even consider starting him.

Now if the coach can get these guys to move and hustle they should be better. CP3 should be better. SGA should be better. Dennis should be better. If those 3 play to their norms they can make a series out of this.

This team looked like they barely knew each other last night. Could all the resting of players in the bubble have backfired?

I'm not sure about the rest. I don't think there was a ton of unnecessary rest. Dennis was outside the bubble. Adams rest seemed justified with his leg injury. Shai has just been mediocre with his shooting the whole time in the bubble. Ironically the The team looked the least rusty the first game they played against Utah.

Maybe the thunder come out and turn the tables in game two. Its certainly happened before. I'll never understand why guys won't just let Harden shoot. Quit fouling him by closing out too hard.

[Galloisdaman]

Spoiler:

This is the 4/5, matchup,we beat them 2 out of 3 times in the reg season and they are missing Russ. Come on. The team looked nothing like they have looked all year. The team laid a big egg in game one, coaching staff and players both. Shai played well in the playoffs as a rookie against the warriors and now he has a deer in the headlights against the westbrook-less rockets? Nope. No excuses. Maybe game two will be better.

I had 3 major issues last night.

1. There was no movement on offense.
2. There was a disappointing lack of hustle on defense.
3. The game plans both offensively and defensively were so bad. It was not based on a team effort.

The 2 bright spots for me were instead of making Gallo just stand and shoot outside the 3p line (like they did all season) they used him to post up a bit. Gallo is a much better player when he goes inside. The other is I thought Balzey looked good. I'm not sure why he only played 17 minutes. I might even consider starting him.

Now if the coach can get these guys to move and hustle they should be better. CP3 should be better. SGA should be better. Dennis should be better. If those 3 play to their norms they can make a series out of this.

This team looked like they barely knew each other last night. Could all the resting of players in the bubble have backfired?

I'm not sure about the rest. I don't think there was a ton of unnecessary rest. Dennis was outside the bubble. Adams rest seemed justified with his leg injury. Shai has just been mediocre with his shooting the whole time in the bubble. Ironically the The team looked the least rusty the first game they played against Utah.

Maybe the thunder come out and turn the tables in game two. Its certainly happened before. I'll never understand why guys won't just let Harden shoot. Quit fouling him by closing out too hard.

I agree about Harden but this team seemed to be going through the motions for much of the bubble season. Right from the start I was asking why Gallo was playing much less minutes than the other guys. I do not know why Billy even played Gallo, Adams, and SGA the last game if they were only going to play around 8 minutes. I just think our bubble approach backfired. I dont think what we saw in the bubble or last night was the OKC we saw during the season. Maybe that is not because of the coaches. Maybe the lack of intensity is because there were no fans. I saw a ton of intensity on Houstons bench last night. I did not see that from OKC. In my opinion hustle goes a long way. A lesser team can win even in pro sports if they out work the other team.

[1bigfan13]

I honestly don't see why Billy Donovan feels the need to keep throwing Terrence Ferguson out there. It's not like he's slowing down Harden and he offers very little on offense.

He's definitely not the reason they lost but his presence on the court does not help the Thunder at all.

His almost compete lack of impact on the offensive end hurts entirely too much to justify playing him more than 10 minutes. The guy doesn't even take his first shot of the game until halfway through the 3rd quarter. He doesn't dribble and he doesn't cut to the basketball to make himself available for easier baskets. He just floats on the perimeter. Hiding. I saw this coming the moment I saw the starting lineup.

I just don't understand why Donovan insists on throwing his bucket into an empty well expecting to retrieve water.

I'd rather see Bazley or Diallo out there in Game 2 if Dort can't play. Just give me a player who's going to be active and present himself as an offensive threat. That's all I'm asking. No one is going to stop Harden from scoring so at least throw a better offensive option out there than Ferguson.

[getrichordie]

I keep hearing about ball movement and off-ball movement, but what specific actions are you guys wanting to see?

Gallinari is our only real true threat from 3 (which is a problem) as of right now and he's never been a guy that runs off screens to get his looks. At least I haven't seen that this whole year.

The real issue in my opinion is that we definitely appeared very passive.

It felt like Paul couldn't get into his drives. Shai wasn't driving very much. It seemed to me that Paul only really could get anywhere when he was playing downhill in transition. If I were Donovan, I'd have Adams setting high screens early, fast and hard to get Paul into space because it appears Paul isn't able to create by himself all that much against HOU. Maybe he plays a little more aggressive and gets into rhythm next game, but I doubt it. I felt like Paul didn't match the intensity of a playoff game last night and if your best player can't get going, it's hard to expect better.

Not having Dort really hurts as Dort can be used to set good screens to help free Paul up as well and he'd do a much better job on Ferguson who Harden made a statue out of at times.

The only player I really saw getting downhill and getting into the teeth of the defense last night was Diallo. He's so explosive. We have to find a way to get him more involved if he's getting to the rim like that. Of course, that's problematic in itself because he will turn the ball over and doesn't have good vision so he's easy to read, but if everyone else is going to play passive/can't shoot, **** it — give it to Diallo.

...

I will say this: I think Donovan should insert Diallo into the starting lineup, not Bazley. I don't like Bazley as a 3 vs. HOU. Asking a rookie to make the right switches, rotations and general defensive decisions over and over and over again against a high octane offense is almost never a good idea. Diallo at least has experience at this point and can do a better job of keeping up with the smaller players.

...

This is a very difficult match-up because if Gallinari is defending Tucker/House, then HOU is just going to use them to screen Harden's defender and force the switch. Same thing with a bunch of other defensive matchups on our end as well. We just don't have the personnel to make life difficult on that end.

And Donovan has a bunch of guys that are either solid defenders but are very limited offensively or are solid offensive players but very limited defensively so it's a pick your poison kind of deal. What's the optimal rotation here? How do you survive a series against HOU where the game is so back and forth and the speed/spacing of the game is so great that it becomes tough on guys like Adams and Gallinari who aren't necessarily built for it...

/brainvomit

[ThunderBolt]

I keep hearing about ball movement and off-ball movement, but what specific actions are you guys wanting to see?

How do you expect to get good shots in a half court set if guys just dribble and iso?

Gallinari is our only real true threat from 3

This isn't accurate.

[1bigfan13]

Pass the ball. Move without the ball. Guys just stood around and took difficult shots. It looked like a poor imitation of last years offense with less talent.

Exactly.

I was screaming about this in the first quarter. It was like they reverted back to playing like the OKC teams from previous years.

We hadn't played like that all season and all of a sudden they decide to go back to the stand and watch one guy dribble offense.

Frankly the thing that pisses me off the most is that Donovan was slow to correct this when it was painfully obvious the first few minutes of the game.

[1bigfan13]

I keep hearing about ball movement and off-ball movement, but what specific actions are you guys wanting to see?


/brainvomit

Just movement, period. What we saw yesterday was 4 guys standing and watching one guy dribble. It was easy for Houston to set their defense and defend driving lanes because the Thunder players chose to stand around the perimeter watching rather than cut and dive to the rim in order to move defenders and create driving lanes.

When there's movement in your offense it creates more defensive breakdowns and mistakes. Which lead to easier buckets.

The way OKC played yesterday made it way too easy for Houston to defend.

[Dadouv47]

Can't blame only one player for everything wrong we did yesterday but CP3 is the motor of this team and his first half was beyond terrible...It clearly didn't help the other players. That's really an issue that we are relying on him so much and SGA couldn't step up in those moments ;(
Obviously Donovan screwed up (oh boy he coached well this season but looks like he's terrible comes playoff time). Defensive schemes were really bad. Also don't get why Muscala played so much either.

We badly need Dort (Roberson not in shape and Ferguson shouldn't play)

We have a lot of room for improvement for this series but the outcome doesn't look good...

[ThunderBolt]

Can't blame only one player for everything wrong we did yesterday but CP3 is the motor of this team and his first half was beyond terrible...It clearly didn't help the other players. That's really an issue that we are relying on him so much and SGA couldn't step up in those moments ;(
Obviously Donovan screwed up (oh boy he coached well this season but looks like he's terrible comes playoff time). Defensive schemes were really bad. Also don't get why Muscala played so much either.

We badly need Dort (Roberson not in shape and Ferguson shouldn't play)

We have a lot of room for improvement for this series but the outcome doesn't look good...

As good as CP3 is and has been, he's not the type of star that dominates a game start to finish. He's been better at deferring early and picking and choosing his spots, specifically the fourth quarter. Yesterday he looked much more assertive early on. I'm not sure how much he has left in the tank to try to be the dominant player for the thunder start to finish each game.

[Galloisdaman]

The Rockets like to run. Our guys can slow them down if they start getting to the free throw line and on the offensive boards. I noticed the whole OKC bench only shot 2 FT all game. Gallo has to make his size an issue and get some offensive rebounds.

I have defended Billy this season because he deserved credit for the results but last night Hou was ready to play. OKC was not.

[Galloisdaman]

Can't blame only one player for everything wrong we did yesterday but CP3 is the motor of this team and his first half was beyond terrible...It clearly didn't help the other players. That's really an issue that we are relying on him so much and SGA couldn't step up in those moments ;(
Obviously Donovan screwed up (oh boy he coached well this season but looks like he's terrible comes playoff time). Defensive schemes were really bad. Also don't get why Muscala played so much either.

We badly need Dort (Roberson not in shape and Ferguson shouldn't play)

We have a lot of room for improvement for this series but the outcome doesn't look good...

As good as CP3 is and has been, he's not the type of star that dominates a game start to finish. He's been better at deferring early and picking and choosing his spots, specifically the fourth quarter. Yesterday he looked much more assertive early on. I'm not sure how much he has left in the tank to try to be the dominant player for the thunder start to finish each game.

CP3 didnt look like himself in the first half last night. He forced some shots. He made some turnovers. He looked like the first week of the season CP3 not the guy that played well the rest of the season. I know he does not push the ball much but that might help loosen the Rockets defense. The one bright hope is that we know CP3, SGA, and Dennis are better than they showed last night.

[getrichordie]

Can't blame only one player for everything wrong we did yesterday but CP3 is the motor of this team and his first half was beyond terrible...It clearly didn't help the other players. That's really an issue that we are relying on him so much and SGA couldn't step up in those moments ;(
Obviously Donovan screwed up (oh boy he coached well this season but looks like he's terrible comes playoff time). Defensive schemes were really bad. Also don't get why Muscala played so much either.

We badly need Dort (Roberson not in shape and Ferguson shouldn't play)

We have a lot of room for improvement for this series but the outcome doesn't look good...

As good as CP3 is and has been, he's not the type of star that dominates a game start to finish. He's been better at deferring early and picking and choosing his spots, specifically the fourth quarter. Yesterday he looked much more assertive early on. I'm not sure how much he has left in the tank to try to be the dominant player for the thunder start to finish each game.

CP3 didnt look like himself in the first half last night. He forced some shots. He made some turnovers. He looked like the first week of the season CP3 not the guy that played well the rest of the season. I know he does not push the ball much but that might help loosen the Rockets defense. The one bright hope is that we know CP3, SGA, and Dennis are better than they showed last night.

Exactly... we have to push the pace in order to create something. At some points I'd rather have Schroder with the ball because he pushes the pace and while he didn't play well last night, he usually can find some sort of crack in the defense and create something. He had a really nice live dribble whip pass last night when he did attack.

Also even if guys are moving w/o the ball, HOU is just going to switch so the defense really isn't being pulled. Like I said, you have to be enough an offensive threat to really move the defense.

Literally all HOU was doing was sticking on Paul and switching everything else and that was effective enough because we don't have the outside shooting threat to really cause the defense to step up and leave some room for cutting.

[Galloisdaman]

As good as CP3 is and has been, he's not the type of star that dominates a game start to finish. He's been better at deferring early and picking and choosing his spots, specifically the fourth quarter. Yesterday he looked much more assertive early on. I'm not sure how much he has left in the tank to try to be the dominant player for the thunder start to finish each game.

CP3 didnt look like himself in the first half last night. He forced some shots. He made some turnovers. He looked like the first week of the season CP3 not the guy that played well the rest of the season. I know he does not push the ball much but that might help loosen the Rockets defense. The one bright hope is that we know CP3, SGA, and Dennis are better than they showed last night.

Exactly... we have to push the pace in order to create something. At some points I'd rather have Schroder with the ball because he pushes the pace and while he didn't play well last night, he usually can find some sort of crack in the defense and create something. He had a really nice live dribble whip pass last night when he did attack.

Steven Adams agrees with you. He said they were jogging the ball up at times but that they need at least 18 seconds in the offensive end to run the offense.

[getrichordie]

Also, this thread is a perfect example of the classic coach's dilemma. If we play well, it's the players; if we don't, it's the coach. SMH