April 28, 2025 • 12 mins
The Houston Rockets have blown two leads in two losses, including on Saturday night against a Golden State Warrors' roster without Jimmy Bulter. So, what's the problem? Is Steph Curry and the hot-scoring Golden State offense too much for Amen Thompson, Fred Van Vleet and the Rockets to contain? Is it coaching? The A-Team has a better theory.
The Rockets are simply losing to themselves. Adam and Adam explain during Monday's epsiode of The A-Team.
The Rockets are simply losing to themselves. Adam and Adam explain during Monday's epsiode of The A-Team.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
The Rockets are beating themselves more often than not in
this series. When they're losing, when they're down, when things
aren't going well, one of a number of things is happening.
Either the defense that they're starting the game with, because
all three games they've started defending very well, is south
has gone south that they've gone away from the game plan,
or foul trouble happened.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
There's any number of things.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Or they're not hitting shots on the offensive end nearly enough.
This isn't like I mean, it's thirty seven year old
Steph Curry. He's clearly still very effective. I'm not saying
he's not. But on a night where you don't have
Jimmy Butler and you're up by twelve in that game,
thirteen in that game on their floor, you need to
finish that. You just need to And they didn't. It
(00:43):
wasn't the Warriors, in my opinion, taking them out of anything.
It was them doing a lot of the turnovers alone
could have maybe changed the outcome of that game. They
didn't have so many of them.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Yeah, it's like I said, there's a lot of different
ways to look at it. At nine turnovers after half
time led to eleven points, Warriors have four led to
six points. There's certainly a differential there, but a lot
of that happened again that late third quarter. I don't
dispute that six of those nine did happen in the
fourth quarter, but they also missed fourteen of their twenty
(01:14):
one shots. I don't really think they're giving it away
by any means. I think Golden State is just simply
out playing them in every facet. Once they get to
a point where like, well, we still have a chance
to win the game, we don't care. And there's also
twenty seven minutes left when you got a thirteen point lead,
holding onto the lead. That's what was so remarkable about
Game two. What they did in Game two is hard
to do in the playoffs if you have in a
(01:35):
lopsided series. Sure, it's easy. Indiana's in a lopsided series.
When they get the lead on Milwaukee, the game's over,
thunder series is over, and then Rockets are just now
playing Game four. By the way, right I mentioned that
over the weekend. It's that series began with no days off,
and it would have had many days off if it
ever reached that point. But now series like the Clippers
and the Nuggets they played on Sunday. Just like Houston,
(01:57):
they have two days off now before their Game five.
The Rocket in the Lakers respective series, got those two
days off on the front side, the guaranteed days off
because who knows how long the series will go, but
I imagine it's probably going to do the Clippers a
little bit of good to clear their heads knowing they've
lost by two and two and have won the other
two games. Thus they could already have advanced, but they haven't.
(02:19):
And it's an even series that will definitely go at
least six, the only series we know that will go
six yet in the Western Conference. The other series while
we're running through the West, well, they're one game away.
What I'm trying to tell you the Rockets want to
avoid this evening the Lakers could not avoid yesterday they
fill into three games to one hold to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
The Timberwolves are a lot of athleticism and fire and
(02:43):
intensity for the Lakers to handle, and too much for
them to handle so far, three times out of four
been blown out once and each of the last two
games the team that was capable of finishing has been
the other team. We'll spend some time on our favorite
West Coast basketball team on over the course of this show.
But like I said, we got a little time before
(03:03):
they hit the court. Just one Western Conference game tonight,
and it is the Rockets and the Warriors, and what
the Rockets need to do. And I'll go back to
the point I made late last week after Game one,
before obviously they were in Game three. They need to
make it simple. This is the simplest point I can
(03:23):
make among the fifteen things they need to do. They
cannot run things through Fred van Dlid anymore. That has
to stop, not forever, just no longer. In this series.
It is absolute disaster basketball to the nth degree. They're
too slow, their pace is too slow, can't get anything
done in the half court, which is leading to their
incredibly awful shooting percentage team wide. Alpi's under fifty percent
(03:47):
obviously with a five for fifteen a men fell to
under fifty percent, Fred shooting twenty seven percent, in Jalen
shooting under forty percent, even with a thirty eight point game.
And some of it's on them individually, sure, with where
they're trying to take the ball. And that's uh, let's
take all the street lights down and play in the
middle of the intersection. That's what they're doing. We love traffic,
(04:10):
we love the crowds, but the slowness to with which
their offense is running no passes for ten seconds, one pass,
first pass. Now there's ten on the shot clock and
it's Alpu's got it and he's twenty five feet out.
Just happening way too often, and not because Golden State
is forcing it, but because they're allowing Fred to walk
it up, because they are not going to get the
(04:31):
ball from Fred, not hiding him in the corner and
maybe turning him into a spot shooter or having your
least effective player stop playing forty one minutes a night.
Just a couple of different ways to look at what's
how Fred needs to be a lot less of what
the Rockets offense looks like.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
I don't disagree with anything that you just said. And
he had thirteen points in the first quarter the other night.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Yeah, he's hit the first three shots, including one as
a three point play, and then he went one for
his next ten right kill, absolutely killed that.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
It was vintage twenty twenty five Fred van Vliet basketball.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Well, but that's on Houston. That's not on Fred. Fred
knows he's not going to make the shot, so does
Golden State. Golden State says, well, he's got the ball,
then nobody else can shoot it while he has it.
I go back to the advanced numbers. As much as
they hate some people don't like them, his usage rate
is just simply too high in this series. It was
at nineteen nine in Game three, it was at twenty
two point one in game one, it was at nine
(05:26):
point four in Game two. Obviously Jalen being hot and
starting at helped to facilitate that, but it's clear as
day to me he can play him and he might
be more effective, but cannot be taking fourteen to nineteen shots.
Let me ask him. The rest of the team has
to do their part to make that happen.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Right, and Jalen not having a good game for the
second time in three games is a huge part of
why he.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
Took a back seat. Though, Yeah, I think part of
this is the Fred problem. He should not be taking
a back seat, but by design of what they're doing,
Like he's taken four shots and now he's up to
eight shots, and now they're not getting anything done. So
finally he got more aggressive offensively. He shouldn't do that.
They shouldn't even allow that to happen.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
You would you agree before I go further, that he's
actually defending Steph Curry yet pretty effectively when he's on him.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Who Jalen No? Fred? Oh yeah, I would. I think
I know that he's defending him as well as he can,
but he's also getting the Rockets as a team. It's
not like they play poorly defensively, but Golden State is elite,
probably number one in the NBA in taking advantage of
the Rockets defense mistakes. There aren't a lot of them,
(06:42):
but you can even see it with the fourth quarter
with Gary Payton. The second two of his layups were
because of a miscommunication and Fred had one of them
and the inbounds play they threw it into Curry and
Jabbari was like, I've got him. You have to switch.
He was initially on Peyton. Jabari was, but he made
the correct and as designed defensive switch and Fred didn't,
(07:03):
and Gary Payton just went to the basket while two
players were watching Steph Curry.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
And if he wasn't doing that, he was hitting the
threes like we all talk about Steph, and he had
a great game, but like they're losing to as many
guys that Steph is passing to as they are to
Steph himself.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
True, but expecting Gary Payton to miss layups and dunks
is silly. No, he's moving without the ball tremendously well.
He did hit two of three from three. Two of
those both of them were corner threes. But the other
shots were all layups. And that's not because they're letting him.
They're letting him go to the basket. But two of
those five layups were uncontested, just wide open. One was
(07:40):
a runout, one was the play I just mentioned, another
was when they lost him. This isn't they got to
get a hold of Gary Payton. They got to figure
out a way to slow No, they have to play
better team defense. And it's happened with a few other
players in this series. Just you lose. You know, the
offensive rebound battle. Matt and I couldn't stop talking about
it on Game three. And it wasn't because they got
(08:02):
demolished on the offensive glass on the Warriors end. It's
that every time it happened, you'd see a reposition three.
You know, for their first five second chance buckets were threes,
and it was destroying. You're playing great defense, they missed
the first the.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
Ball and not don't allow them a second and third,
a lot of time shot at the basket when what
was happening.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
It's this team, It's it's not the it's not any
team in the East. It's not the Thunder, it's not
anybody else they might end up with. Nobody is going
to kill you more on second chance the threes, reposition
threes than the team they're playing. That is why.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
And there's like you can look at anybody in the
Western Conference, mainly because of how tightly compacted it is,
and say, ah, it's not the best matchup for the
Rockets for this reason or that reason. That's the biggest
reason why the Warriors would not be somebody that you
would want to play in the postseason. But you can
find that with I mean, you're gonna if the Rockets
advance and they play the timberwol I mean, I'm far
(09:02):
more terri I am. I don't care if I'm in
the minority. I'm far more terrified of a seven game
series against Anthony Edwards than I am against Steph Curry.
At this point, I just sam.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Were talking about it through the entire year. You know,
the battle for seeding. I think most of the teams
other than Houston really didn't care about. Obviously the seven
and eight seeds would have preferred to be one through six.
It was pretty clear the last game of the year
between the Clippers and Warriors was of great importance when overtime,
nobody wanted to be to fall into the playing tournament.
I don't mean to say that they clearly didn't want
(09:33):
to be there, but they weren't really concerned about who
they were playing or who had home court advantage. And
it wasn't just the final week of the season. They
played that way for most of the season. The Rockets
were different. The Rockets played the regular season to win games.
They needed it, They needed to prove to themselves who
they are and that they can play with these teams.
But we had talked about this before the playoffs started,
and it may sound a little harsh on Houston, but
(09:54):
if you ranked the Western Conference playoff teams, obviously Oklahoma
City would be one, and I think obviously Memphis would
be eight. And I'm not saying that in hindsight. I'm
saying that before they got wiped But the other six.
Nobody's putting Houston too, and I wouldn't have either. I
don't know that they're seven. But the quality of play
in the Western Conference is showing itself. Look at what
(10:16):
it's taking the Nuggets to beat this Clipper team. You
look at how the Clippers came back from down twenty
in their last game to nearly pull off that upset,
and they already had two wins in this series. We
talked already about the Lakers and Timberwolves. The Timberwolves can
be the Western Conference Conference game participants for the second
year in a row with five more wins. This is
(10:39):
very different. They would have had a hard first time
Atual No matter what. That's the point. It's not that
they're playing Golden State now or whenever, whomever they would
have played. Would they have been favored over the Clippers. No.
Would they have been favored over to the Timberwolves. Maybe
they have been favored over the Lakers.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
No.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
And this is why it tells me they can't beat them.
But the West is good.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
This is why, even if the Rockets advance, they've got
to make a deal this offseason. They don't have a
go to guy right now, and even if that ends
up being Kevin Durant, he's better light years better than
anybody on the roster right now in that you can
say I need a basket from you, and he's going
(11:21):
to be the number one option before anyone else currently
on the roster right now.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
An interesting way to look at it. None of these
games have been close late yet, but because the Rockets
struggled to score both Game one and Game three in
the fourth quarter, which I think is applicable to calling
someone a closer doesn't have to be the last shot
or the last minute, or only clutch time. The last
twelve minutes of games won in Game three were decided
(11:48):
in the last twelve that's where it was decided, and
they could not score. They had a very bad offensive
fourth quarter on Saturday night, and Golden State had an
outstanding fourth quarter on Saturday night.
The Rockets are beating themselves more often than not in
this series. When they're losing, when they're down, when things
aren't going well, one of a number of things is happening.
Either the defense that they're starting the game with, because
all three games they've started defending very well, is south
has gone south that they've gone away from the game plan,
or foul trouble happened.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
There's any number of things.
Speaker 1 (00:23):
Or they're not hitting shots on the offensive end nearly enough.
This isn't like I mean, it's thirty seven year old
Steph Curry. He's clearly still very effective. I'm not saying
he's not. But on a night where you don't have
Jimmy Butler and you're up by twelve in that game,
thirteen in that game on their floor, you need to
finish that. You just need to And they didn't. It
(00:43):
wasn't the Warriors, in my opinion, taking them out of anything.
It was them doing a lot of the turnovers alone
could have maybe changed the outcome of that game. They
didn't have so many of them.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
Yeah, it's like I said, there's a lot of different
ways to look at it. At nine turnovers after half
time led to eleven points, Warriors have four led to
six points. There's certainly a differential there, but a lot
of that happened again that late third quarter. I don't
dispute that six of those nine did happen in the
fourth quarter, but they also missed fourteen of their twenty
(01:14):
one shots. I don't really think they're giving it away
by any means. I think Golden State is just simply
out playing them in every facet. Once they get to
a point where like, well, we still have a chance
to win the game, we don't care. And there's also
twenty seven minutes left when you got a thirteen point lead,
holding onto the lead. That's what was so remarkable about
Game two. What they did in Game two is hard
to do in the playoffs if you have in a
(01:35):
lopsided series. Sure, it's easy. Indiana's in a lopsided series.
When they get the lead on Milwaukee, the game's over,
thunder series is over, and then Rockets are just now
playing Game four. By the way, right I mentioned that
over the weekend. It's that series began with no days off,
and it would have had many days off if it
ever reached that point. But now series like the Clippers
and the Nuggets they played on Sunday. Just like Houston,
(01:57):
they have two days off now before their Game five.
The Rocket in the Lakers respective series, got those two
days off on the front side, the guaranteed days off
because who knows how long the series will go, but
I imagine it's probably going to do the Clippers a
little bit of good to clear their heads knowing they've
lost by two and two and have won the other
two games. Thus they could already have advanced, but they haven't.
(02:19):
And it's an even series that will definitely go at
least six, the only series we know that will go
six yet in the Western Conference. The other series while
we're running through the West, well, they're one game away.
What I'm trying to tell you the Rockets want to
avoid this evening the Lakers could not avoid yesterday they
fill into three games to one hold to the Minnesota Timberwolves.
The Timberwolves are a lot of athleticism and fire and
(02:43):
intensity for the Lakers to handle, and too much for
them to handle so far, three times out of four
been blown out once and each of the last two
games the team that was capable of finishing has been
the other team. We'll spend some time on our favorite
West Coast basketball team on over the course of this show.
But like I said, we got a little time before
(03:03):
they hit the court. Just one Western Conference game tonight,
and it is the Rockets and the Warriors, and what
the Rockets need to do. And I'll go back to
the point I made late last week after Game one,
before obviously they were in Game three. They need to
make it simple. This is the simplest point I can
(03:23):
make among the fifteen things they need to do. They
cannot run things through Fred van Dlid anymore. That has
to stop, not forever, just no longer. In this series.
It is absolute disaster basketball to the nth degree. They're
too slow, their pace is too slow, can't get anything
done in the half court, which is leading to their
incredibly awful shooting percentage team wide. Alpi's under fifty percent
(03:47):
obviously with a five for fifteen a men fell to
under fifty percent, Fred shooting twenty seven percent, in Jalen
shooting under forty percent, even with a thirty eight point game.
And some of it's on them individually, sure, with where
they're trying to take the ball. And that's uh, let's
take all the street lights down and play in the
middle of the intersection. That's what they're doing. We love traffic,
(04:10):
we love the crowds, but the slowness to with which
their offense is running no passes for ten seconds, one pass,
first pass. Now there's ten on the shot clock and
it's Alpu's got it and he's twenty five feet out.
Just happening way too often, and not because Golden State
is forcing it, but because they're allowing Fred to walk
it up, because they are not going to get the
(04:31):
ball from Fred, not hiding him in the corner and
maybe turning him into a spot shooter or having your
least effective player stop playing forty one minutes a night.
Just a couple of different ways to look at what's
how Fred needs to be a lot less of what
the Rockets offense looks like.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
I don't disagree with anything that you just said. And
he had thirteen points in the first quarter the other night.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Yeah, he's hit the first three shots, including one as
a three point play, and then he went one for
his next ten right kill, absolutely killed that.
Speaker 1 (05:01):
It was vintage twenty twenty five Fred van Vliet basketball.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Well, but that's on Houston. That's not on Fred. Fred
knows he's not going to make the shot, so does
Golden State. Golden State says, well, he's got the ball,
then nobody else can shoot it while he has it.
I go back to the advanced numbers. As much as
they hate some people don't like them, his usage rate
is just simply too high in this series. It was
at nineteen nine in Game three, it was at twenty
two point one in game one, it was at nine
(05:26):
point four in Game two. Obviously Jalen being hot and
starting at helped to facilitate that, but it's clear as
day to me he can play him and he might
be more effective, but cannot be taking fourteen to nineteen shots.
Let me ask him. The rest of the team has
to do their part to make that happen.
Speaker 1 (05:46):
Right, and Jalen not having a good game for the
second time in three games is a huge part of
why he.
Speaker 2 (05:51):
Took a back seat. Though, Yeah, I think part of
this is the Fred problem. He should not be taking
a back seat, but by design of what they're doing,
Like he's taken four shots and now he's up to
eight shots, and now they're not getting anything done. So
finally he got more aggressive offensively. He shouldn't do that.
They shouldn't even allow that to happen.
Speaker 1 (06:09):
You would you agree before I go further, that he's
actually defending Steph Curry yet pretty effectively when he's on him.
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Who Jalen No? Fred? Oh yeah, I would. I think
I know that he's defending him as well as he can,
but he's also getting the Rockets as a team. It's
not like they play poorly defensively, but Golden State is elite,
probably number one in the NBA in taking advantage of
the Rockets defense mistakes. There aren't a lot of them,
(06:42):
but you can even see it with the fourth quarter
with Gary Payton. The second two of his layups were
because of a miscommunication and Fred had one of them
and the inbounds play they threw it into Curry and
Jabbari was like, I've got him. You have to switch.
He was initially on Peyton. Jabari was, but he made
the correct and as designed defensive switch and Fred didn't,
(07:03):
and Gary Payton just went to the basket while two
players were watching Steph Curry.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
And if he wasn't doing that, he was hitting the
threes like we all talk about Steph, and he had
a great game, but like they're losing to as many
guys that Steph is passing to as they are to
Steph himself.
Speaker 2 (07:18):
True, but expecting Gary Payton to miss layups and dunks
is silly. No, he's moving without the ball tremendously well.
He did hit two of three from three. Two of
those both of them were corner threes. But the other
shots were all layups. And that's not because they're letting him.
They're letting him go to the basket. But two of
those five layups were uncontested, just wide open. One was
(07:40):
a runout, one was the play I just mentioned, another
was when they lost him. This isn't they got to
get a hold of Gary Payton. They got to figure
out a way to slow No, they have to play
better team defense. And it's happened with a few other
players in this series. Just you lose. You know, the
offensive rebound battle. Matt and I couldn't stop talking about
it on Game three. And it wasn't because they got
(08:02):
demolished on the offensive glass on the Warriors end. It's
that every time it happened, you'd see a reposition three.
You know, for their first five second chance buckets were threes,
and it was destroying. You're playing great defense, they missed
the first the.
Speaker 1 (08:20):
Ball and not don't allow them a second and third,
a lot of time shot at the basket when what
was happening.
Speaker 2 (08:25):
It's this team, It's it's not the it's not any
team in the East. It's not the Thunder, it's not
anybody else they might end up with. Nobody is going
to kill you more on second chance the threes, reposition
threes than the team they're playing. That is why.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
And there's like you can look at anybody in the
Western Conference, mainly because of how tightly compacted it is,
and say, ah, it's not the best matchup for the
Rockets for this reason or that reason. That's the biggest
reason why the Warriors would not be somebody that you
would want to play in the postseason. But you can
find that with I mean, you're gonna if the Rockets
advance and they play the timberwol I mean, I'm far
(09:02):
more terri I am. I don't care if I'm in
the minority. I'm far more terrified of a seven game
series against Anthony Edwards than I am against Steph Curry.
At this point, I just sam.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
Were talking about it through the entire year. You know,
the battle for seeding. I think most of the teams
other than Houston really didn't care about. Obviously the seven
and eight seeds would have preferred to be one through six.
It was pretty clear the last game of the year
between the Clippers and Warriors was of great importance when overtime,
nobody wanted to be to fall into the playing tournament.
I don't mean to say that they clearly didn't want
(09:33):
to be there, but they weren't really concerned about who
they were playing or who had home court advantage. And
it wasn't just the final week of the season. They
played that way for most of the season. The Rockets
were different. The Rockets played the regular season to win games.
They needed it, They needed to prove to themselves who
they are and that they can play with these teams.
But we had talked about this before the playoffs started,
and it may sound a little harsh on Houston, but
(09:54):
if you ranked the Western Conference playoff teams, obviously Oklahoma
City would be one, and I think obviously Memphis would
be eight. And I'm not saying that in hindsight. I'm
saying that before they got wiped But the other six.
Nobody's putting Houston too, and I wouldn't have either. I
don't know that they're seven. But the quality of play
in the Western Conference is showing itself. Look at what
(10:16):
it's taking the Nuggets to beat this Clipper team. You
look at how the Clippers came back from down twenty
in their last game to nearly pull off that upset,
and they already had two wins in this series. We
talked already about the Lakers and Timberwolves. The Timberwolves can
be the Western Conference Conference game participants for the second
year in a row with five more wins. This is
(10:39):
very different. They would have had a hard first time
Atual No matter what. That's the point. It's not that
they're playing Golden State now or whenever, whomever they would
have played. Would they have been favored over the Clippers. No.
Would they have been favored over to the Timberwolves. Maybe
they have been favored over the Lakers.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
No.
Speaker 2 (10:55):
And this is why it tells me they can't beat them.
But the West is good.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
This is why, even if the Rockets advance, they've got
to make a deal this offseason. They don't have a
go to guy right now, and even if that ends
up being Kevin Durant, he's better light years better than
anybody on the roster right now in that you can
say I need a basket from you, and he's going
(11:21):
to be the number one option before anyone else currently
on the roster right now.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
An interesting way to look at it. None of these
games have been close late yet, but because the Rockets
struggled to score both Game one and Game three in
the fourth quarter, which I think is applicable to calling
someone a closer doesn't have to be the last shot
or the last minute, or only clutch time. The last
twelve minutes of games won in Game three were decided
(11:48):
in the last twelve that's where it was decided, and
they could not score. They had a very bad offensive
fourth quarter on Saturday night, and Golden State had an
outstanding fourth quarter on Saturday night.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com