Speaker 1: Let it No.
Speaker 2: One Sports Talk seven Andi, We're gonna spend ten minutes
with our friend he May Doka Rockets will be taken
on the Oklahoma City Thunder tomorrow and OKAC we'll visit
with coach about what has happened so far the last
couple nights. Disappointing performance is obviously against Boston and against Charloie. Coach,
thank you for the time. It feels like and this
happens with every NBA team. You certainly be in the
league long enough, maybe there's sometimes a race to the
All Star breaking. You guys, especially your stars, have played
a lot of minutes, and I know that's an excuse,
but how much does that play a factor with the
way that maybe you think your squad's played the last
couple nights.
Speaker 1: I mean, it looks like our energy isn't there no doubt?
Speaker 3: And so for us, you know, before the Boston game,
we talked about our last five games with Boston, Charlotte
go on to OKC and then the Clippers on the
back to back. We want to finish on a good note.
A lot of teams in the league. League is struggling,
are struggling right now, and we don't want to be
one of those who want to go the opposite way,
and obviously haven't had the right energy or competitiveness in
the last two games.
Speaker 2: And one of the things that has been such a
trademark of your front, your team, well you've been in charge,
is winning the fifty to fifty balls, and I'm sure
there's a metrics to determine that the last couple of games,
and it feels like those have not been a part
of the Rockets repertoire the last couple of nights.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that stood out for sure, that lack of rebounding.
I think you know, you can count fifty to fifty
balls loose balls or offensive rebounds for other teams, and
you know, to be to give up twenty against Boston
and then be out rebounding last night on offensive glass by Charlotte,
you know, a team that's playing more small than you know,
one one or two bigs at a time shows that
the competitiveness on the glass is not there, the race
sales balls not there, and areas that we usually dominated
we're getting beat in.
Speaker 2: There was a comment that you were responding to about
the pick and roll with Alpie, and there was some
defensive issues again last night. That's got to be something
that you know that Alpi has got to feel bad about.
Obviously that he had used a couple of times on
baskets he was so fluid offensively, and then the last
couple of games, is that ankle causing maybe perhaps more
issues that he's want to.
Speaker 3: Let on to be at this point, I mean, there's fatigue,
no doubt, and you know, you tweak it a few times,
you're going to be a little limited with your movement.
But I don't think Albert was going to use as
an excuse. So you know, obviously played through it and
they had a great game in Indiana, and it's going
to be up and down until you can kind of
rest it. But you know, I think just in general,
it's not just on the outpeat picking roll as.
Speaker 1: A two two main defense.
Speaker 3: Two people after guard and our guards are getting clipped
way too easily on screens and not really fighting through.
Speaker 1: So it's tough when.
Speaker 3: Guys are coming downhill, you got a lot of threat
behind you, and uh, we just need to do a
better job overall being up at the level initially to
take them off the jump shot and then keeping the
roller in front of you.
Speaker 2: On that it's you're not teaching this. I mean, these
are grown men that have been playing basketball a long time.
They've been around picking rolls all their life. But what
kind of adjustments can you make? Is it it simply
showing Alpi or anybody else involved in that that here's
what's happening on videos. You got to fight through these things.
You got to be able to get a step ahead.
What do you all of a sudden in the middle
of a season, when you're trying to play three games
in four nights to say, hey, if this is on tape,
other teams are going to try to do this against you.
Speaker 3: No, you definitely can teach it and still walk through it,
and then you know, shoot arounds and get our technique
back to where we were, you know, obviously training campus
for those reasons. And when you're one of the best
in the league at it, you know, the technique starts
to slip, obviously, And so for us, it's like I said,
it's not just out for and it's guys impacting the ball,
getting into the ball when the screen's there and kind
of fighting over and blowing it up. But that's the
first point of it. And so you know, we're taking
a circular route to try to get back in front
or running right into the screen, which leads two on one,
and so starts with the ball handler. We always put
the onus on them to get through and the contest
guys and get back in their rear view. But if not,
Alpi has to you know, play two for a second,
hold up for a little bit and let guys get
back in front without giving up the lob.
Speaker 2: Like I said, a similar bad stretch last year heading
into the All Star Break. And then of course we
know in December, with a lot of traveling games on
the road, there were some losses that you guys would
have liked to not have. What do you take away
from that as far as trying to get out of
this funk.
Speaker 3: The shooting will come back around eventually, and that was
the case in December. So it's a little bit different
here where you know, yeah, guys aren't playing at their best,
no doubt, but the energy and the competitiveness was there
in December. It was just a case of missshots and
if you don't compete at the level we did and
you missed the shots like we did, and there had
been a lot of blowouts but they were very close games,
some overtime losses, and so that's what we got to
get back to the edge and just the competitiveness on
the defensive side, offensively being aggressive and confidence still and
that's the main thing now, you know, it's just missing
shots before and we're still in games where now we
got to bring the juice and energy that we didn't
have in these last two games.
Speaker 2: Head coach imy Adoka with us here on Sports Talk
seven ninety No moves made at the trade deadline? Was
there anything that as far as discussions you were involved
in where there were some moves that were possibly close,
And I guess it seems like the chalk topic is
that you guys might be active in trying to find
some buyout moves.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no doubt.
Speaker 3: People called we have a lot of young, talented players
and a deep team, So teams were definitely calling about
our guys that we like where we're at.
Speaker 1: I think with our group.
Speaker 3: You know, you have Fred Out, you have Steven Alis,
so some of our depth has gone there and some
of our you know better than leadership and.
Speaker 1: IQ and those things.
Speaker 3: But the team that we have now has got us
the fourth place in the West right now, not playing
our best right now, and we know we have a
much higher ceiling that we can get to, and so
what we want to see is just get back to
who we've been.
Speaker 1: You know, a lot of teams are struggling right now.
Speaker 3: If you look at the standings or the streaks right now,
we're seven and three on our last ten even with
those two losses, and a bunch of teams are five
and five, four and six, you know, kind of going
through it right now. And that's when you look at
okay See or Minnesota or the teams right around us.
A lot of teams are going through this right for
All Star breaks. So we're going to do stay of
the course with our guys, see growth and improvement with
our young guys throughout the rest of this season, and
that was our that was our mindset with it right now.
Speaker 1: As far as a buy out, you.
Speaker 3: Know, there will be guys out there and there will
be opportunities to look and we obviously can do something then,
but it has to fit has to kind of go
with our plan of improving with our young guys through
the rest of the season and seeing if anything we
can add will help us, like really, really jump into this,
into that lineup. You know, it's tough to beat out
some of the guys that we have now, and so
we'll look at that when the time comes.
Speaker 2: Hey, when I don't know if Rafel and you were
on conference calls or Rafel came to you, but were
there some calls you took that were like, are you
kidding me? Or are you too late in the game
to be doing silly kind of trade proposals?
Speaker 3: I mean, there always are guys will throw out names
of of the guys they like, and you know, throw
out scenarios, and it's just really exploratory things, and I
think for the most part, we shut those down pretty
pretty quickly.
Speaker 1: But no, when you have them out of talent that we.
Speaker 3: Have and guys that some of the guys aren't starters
that would be starters and other teams, teams are definitely
gonna call about them and and throw out some ridiculous
trades and stuff like that. But obviously, we love our crew,
we love the core of our team, and like I said,
it's all about getting back to doing what we were
doing previously before these few games.
Speaker 2: And when it comes to buy out guys and maybe
grabbing somebody late. Is that an agent, Tom GM call?
Can a player call you? Can you speak to them?
What are the what are the rules about that kind
of stuff.
Speaker 3: I mean, once guys get bought out, their agents look
for the best situation for them, and you know kind
of canvas the league and rosters for situations that might
be a good fit.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's got to be a mutual thing.
Speaker 3: But yeah, for us, like I said, it's it's going
to take something incredible to you know, crack rotation and
you know, kind of display some of the guys that
are playing really well for us, and so we're more
focused on ourselves. No doubt there would be some things
that will probably be appealing, but we'll see when the
time comes. It's just definitely a two way street as
far as that, let's go.
Speaker 2: To read real quick for let your run. There have
been some magical games for him, and obviously he's playing
much more than they ever played last year and it's
given you much more production. But there has been a
slump of the about the last five or six games.
I don't know if you want to chalk it up
to additional minutes going against the greatest players in the world,
ball doesn't leave his hands while angles. Where have you
seen the down production from reads in the last two
weeks or so.
Speaker 3: Yeah, definitely just the mainy chats I think, you know,
similar to Jabari going through it earlier and I'll be
going through it at times. Young guys specifically are going
to have these throughout their career, especially early on. And
so it's it's it's mentally staying confident, continue to be aggressive,
you know, and and and slowing down and taking and
make the same shots you got. You know, you can't
get better looks, and we are with a lot of guys,
and for us, it's not rushing the shot or getting
anxious with missus. But also you don't want to just
determine a great game on made shots only. And so
that's where we reiterate the point to the guys that
if you're missing shots, are still other ways to impact
the game, and we've seen guys do that without scoring
a ton. But obviously for scorers and shooters, it can
get into your head a little bit when you're missing
these open shots.
Speaker 1: You start to press a little bit.
Speaker 3: But we want guys to stay confident, aggressive of knowing
that you know, it just takes one game to kind
of get out of that shooting slump, but you know,
it sucks that it does happen to everybody. And then
the worst part is when it's a bunch of guys
at the same time. You know, he's the kind of
snowball effect there, and we've seen games this year what
that happened.
Speaker 1: And right now, if you guys are going through it, well, let's.
Speaker 2: End on a positive note. Jabarsmith Jr. Was seventeen points
last night. Nice to see him bouncing back and the
three point shooting has been better from that slump that
he went to in the middle of January. Just your
overall thoughts on him on both ends of the floor
and specifically that kind of pet go to bread and
buttershot of his that pull up mid range is really
going down nicely.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like I.
Speaker 3: Said, it's just continue to stay the course, you know,
trust the work.
Speaker 1: That you put in. We have faith that guys will.
Speaker 3: Continue to work their way out of these shooting slumps,
and he did that, and so it was great to
see him back, you know, making the shots that he
was making it a high clip early in the year,
and we know that's always going to happen, it's going
to come back around. But you know, as you're going
through it, it's hard, but guys understand that they have
to continue to be aggressive, continue to not shy away
from things, and then, like I said, impact the game
in other ways.
Speaker 1: But Jabari with his.
Speaker 3: Size and versatility and get to that spot and pretty
much shoot it over anybody. And so good to see
him obviously knocking down the threes, getting back to his
mid range pull up which is very confident, comfortable in.
And like I said, once he starts to make his
like he has and Alfie gets his touch back around
the basket and read makes these shots here you'll see
it start to flip for us again.
Speaker 2: Yeah, man, thanks for the time. Good luck you Okay,
so you'll see on the plane this afternoon, and we
appreciate you joining us as always.
Speaker 1: Thank you,