MacMahon: Whole Point Of Rockets Trading Clint Capela Was To Maximize Russell Westbrook

Post #1 » by **RealGM Wiretap** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 7:14 pm

Russell Westbrook has played better since the Houston Rockets moved to a small-ball lineup.

"The whole point of trading Clint Capela was to maximize Russell Westbrook," said Tim MacMahon on The Hoop Collective Podcast. "Just because having two non-shooters on the floor with James Harden in that system, it was clunky. All the analytics backed up the Rockets' decision in a small window of this season right now: they were better without Capela off the floor than with him on the floor."

The Rockets are vulnerable to scoring big men defensively and on the glass, but MacMahon points out how teams have had to adjust to their small-ball system rather than the other way around so far.

"They're all-in on this," said MacMahon. "Analytically it makes sense."

MacMahon, however, argues that Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets could be the matchups Houston doesn't have an answer for.

Via Tim MacMahon/ESPN

Lockdown504090 · Post #2 » by **Lockdown504090** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 7:32 pm

reading between the lines hes saying that giannis and AD are not good enough to drive a sucessful offensive attack against pj tucker and robert covington.... thats pretty damning, especially after how that game the other day went down

popfan · Post #3 » by **popfan** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 7:37 pm

And when has a small-ball strategy won the NBA title? When has Mike D'Antoni -- a coach of 30 years -- ever won a real championship?

These news articles are a bit one sided. The analytics adds up? To what? To whatever story Morey wants to sell. People who know basketball yawn at such one-sided "reporting".

KevinMcreynolds · Post #4 » by **KevinMcreynolds** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 8:41 pm

popfan wrote:And when has a small-ball strategy won the NBA title?

Steph/Klay/Iguodala/Barnes/Draymond in 2014-15

lekasjeda · Post #5 » by **lekasjeda** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 8:48 pm

KevinMcreynolds wrote:
popfan wrote:And when has a small-ball strategy won the NBA title?

Steph/Klay/Iguodala/Barnes/Draymond in 2014-15

bogut was the starting center

KevinMcreynolds · Post #6 » by **KevinMcreynolds** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 8:56 pm

lekasjeda wrote:
KevinMcreynolds wrote:
popfan wrote:And when has a small-ball strategy won the NBA title?

Steph/Klay/Iguodala/Barnes/Draymond in 2014-15

bogut was the starting center

He never finished games.

IWishIWasHarden · Post #7 » by **IWishIWasHarden** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 9:09 pm

Only thing is there is no difference between being without him off the floor and being on the floor.

DoItALL9 · Post #8 » by **DoItALL9** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 9:09 pm

I like the strategy but they'll need more guys in case of injury. How many pj Tucker replacements are there? No team wins without their Superstars but the Rockets will be more reliant on specific role guys than any other team before as I'm seeing them right now

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spree2kawhi · Post #9 » by **spree2kawhi** » Mon Feb 10, 2020 9:28 pm

Maybe should have subbed him out more instead of trading him. I wonder what they say if they miss the playoffs.

levon · Post #10 » by **levon** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 12:23 am

They're not going to win a title emphasizing this. If they win a title, it'll be because of Harden going supernova. It's not going to matter who's starting at the 5.

If the Rockets actually did their job and closed out series' against the Warriors the last few years, we wouldn't be having this discussion.

hyberx · Post #11 » by **hyberx** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 3:54 am

It'll be interesting to see how well the Rocket can do with small ball. Warriors won with the death lineup small ball, but we always had a big like Bogut/Zaza etc to take the regular season pounding. The death lineup was applied at clutch time to finish games or to catch up when behind. Now MikeD is asking the Rockets to play the majority of the minutes with small ball. Can their players hold up especially deep in playoff?

Pickled Prunes · Post #12 » by **Pickled Prunes** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 6:01 am

IWishIWasHarden wrote:Only thing is there is no difference between being without him off the floor and being on the floor.

I don't think I'm not understanding you.

t-rexCity · Post #13 » by **t-rexCity** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 11:00 am

Pickled Prunes wrote:
IWishIWasHarden wrote:Only thing is there is no difference between being without him off the floor and being on the floor.

I don't think I'm not understanding you.

I actually get his point. I had to re read that sentence few times before realizing it didn't make sense

Pickled Prunes · Post #14 » by **Pickled Prunes** » Tue Feb 11, 2020 7:10 pm

t-rexCity wrote:
Pickled Prunes wrote:
IWishIWasHarden wrote:Only thing is there is no difference between being without him off the floor and being on the floor.

I don't think I'm not understanding you.

I actually get his point. I had to re read that sentence few times before realizing it didn't make sense

I don't think it's likely that you didn't misunderstand my comment.