Houston Rockets Jalen Green, Alperen Sengun and Amen Thompson: ELITE Big 3 or a BAD Fit?

Houston Rockets Jalen Green, Alperen Sengun and Amen Thompson: ELITE Big 3 or a BAD Fit?

P Welcome to another episode of rockets talk I got my boy roou here with me and we are about to get into some uh some real real good basketball discussions uh typically you know right now most fan bases would be just happy that their team is winning but um for us

There’s always some narratives being built one of those is and you know basically that Jaylen and Shang goon um are two best young prospects on the team um people asking whether they can play together as a trade one of them yeah you gotta trade one you gotta trade one uh

If one is doing good we gotta trade the other and if the other one’s doing good we got to trade him uh but the question does come up like you know we see jayen is balling and obviously the team is on a uh a long what is it 10 or 11 games

Now is it 11 games 11 game winning streak for the first time since Gerald Green another green since Gerald Green hit the gamewinner against Phoenix in March of 2018 when theck it’ss won 65 games that season six I remember that game and and that game was like uh yeah

It was it was crazy I remember that game and I think after that they started sitting a bunch of our starters um but we are this this many win streaks in I think um part of the streak I think Shang gun only accounted for three games

Two two or three games in the streak oh because he was they were five and one four- one with him in there and the loss was the um I think it was one game right to the two games Portland and Sacramento I think okay I’ll look it up right now yeah yeah

So two games in um but obviously we’ve seen the team kind of win in different manners they you know beat OKC uh beat Cleveland beat a bunch of other teams uh recently last night beat Utah in a game that was kind of ugly it was a real ugly

We were on um on uh uh on Rockets watch uh kind of going through the game we saw the first half was nasty and then Jaylen went into Superstar mode and was able to lock it down um but but the question you know for for those that who who have

That question about shenon and Jaylen playing together um from your estimation like what is what is overall what do you what do you um what is your response to that to people who say that they cannot fit together yeah or let me frame it better what is

Um do you think that they can fit together long term let me ask that yes of course so we talked about this a little bit last night but um I don’t think it’s a basketball thing I think it’s if if they won’t fit it’s it’s because of something other than

Basketball like ego right um or like one of them saying no I got to be the guy or you know I’m not getting enough touches anytime we’ve seen this is not the first time we’ve seen a finesse you know scoring big man with other skills work

With a a perimeter player who you know who can score and light it up that’s like for a long time that was like textbook you know what wins in the NBA right uh we saw it with Hakeem and Clyde we saw it with t ma and Yao we saw it

With James Harden and Dwight Howard even though Dwight Howard’s not that type of big guy um but still they took the Rockets to the first Western Conference Finals in I think 18 years right 97 to 2015 it can work um and there’s a million reasons it can work um Jaylen

Green was just playing bad like I don’t think alprin shenon being out is why he’s playing well um I think and if we look at the numbers he was playing well Jaylen was when shenon was in there um it it just shenon just got hurt and jayen continued on and he was playing

Well and then got increased usage and that’s why you’re seeing these crazy numbers but you know it’s interesting one of the main goals of any NBA team is to get Premier Elite offensive Talent right you can you can plug defensive holes um for relatively cheap an example

I love to bring up is when the Rockets went 16117 they had that super supercharged offense with Eric Gordon Ryan Anderson James Harden Mike danton’s first year and then they got better the next year of course they got Chris Paul they lost Pat Bev for Chris Paul but

Like defensively those are still you know Pat beev is is a and was a really good Defender and Chris Paul was a really good Defender but what they really did is they signed luuk B mut for the veteran minimum and they signed PJ Tucker for the mle at the time it was 8

Million a year four years 32 million and that is what transformed their defense those two signings basically like less than 10 million per year at the time right so you can go out and and buy Defenders I mean the Rockets just did it with Dylan Brooks um what what’s

Difficult to do what you really have to spend big money or big assets to do is to find Premier offensive Talent so I say all that to say if you got two premier offensive guys why would you look to dump one of them right because you’re just like if we dump shenon and

You don’t get equivalent value back in some type of trade like the Pacers did with sabonis for halberton where they did get you know Elite offensive Talent back and by the way you can put a pin in the Pacers if you want to talk Miles Turner and we’ve had those discussions

Before about you know how he’s like a prototypical defensive Center and they are terrible on defense but unless you’re doing a trade like that where you get a super offensive player back you’re not going to get the same level of of offensive player back and you know

What’s going to happen in a few months people are gonna say damn Jaylen green needs help so I I it’s it’s working backwards to me to to think that they don’t fit yeah and you saw it in the game yesterday I think we we literally said Jaylen green needs help in the

Middle of the third quarter while we were uh uh duking it out with uh with young bull over there Colin sexing and I call him sexting uh now and said a SE then but um I mean this like you said bro the formula for winning I think in 80% of NBA history is

Always been the twom Man game right you know obviously in fact not even 80% I would say 100% because who just won the championship Jamal Murray and Nicolo joic before that Draymond Green and Steph Curry and even with um with LeBron LeBron always has somebody whether it

Was Kyrie or D way to run that Twan because when LeBron gets in the finals where’s he working out of the post yeah so I mean I I think a lot of this comes down to um a lot of N and by the way he only LeBron specifically only ever won a

Championship with a skilled big man Anthony Davis Kevin Love you can hate on Kevin Love all you want still a very skilled big man um and then Chris Bosch so yeah so so to me it just comes down to like what you said it’s going to come down to cuz basketball-wise we could

Take this back to their rookie years um Jaylen and Alp have never been an issue together right uh every time in fact the onoff numbers with Alp with Jaylen and Alp without Jaylen for the past three years has been Jaylen green has shot better has finished better um the the

His shooting percentage on passes assisted by opan shenon is higher than anybody on the team um in the past few years I mean you know they’re they’re perfect fit all his high and scoring games prior to this run were with changon at uh as his big man I think

Think where the dynamic that we’re seeing this year come in is what you alluded to which is more of a interpersonal Dynamic and I’m not saying that they have any beef this is not beef this is just regular a athletes Sports figuring out we got two great players how do we get

Them to work their magic at the same time and I think if there’s ever going to be a barrier or a a learning curve for the both of them it’s going to be how do we get these two guys to use their talents and maximize while they’re

Both cooking at the same time and this is not you know new to them same thing happened with LeBron and dwade when they hooked up any good duo trio or however many people that you want to put together they need time to figure it out the problem with Jaylen was in this in

This stretch that um he of season earlier in the season he was a negative in fact I’m going to read off this is from cleaning the glass the starting uh five without Jaylen green um was a plus 19.8 for this for the Year this is Alp Jabari Fred and Dylan Brooks they

Were a plus 19.8 on the season how many minutes 170 possessions right 170 possessions uh I mean 106 defensive rating 127 offensive rating uh the reason I bring that up is that I think we just have to give jayen the accountability and coach adoka said

It he said it guys believe him he was playing bad and now he’s playing good you take this player that we have right now you put him on that team from the start of this season um it’s a whole different ball game um so I don’t think

It’s any individual people BL blame Fred Van vet for why he was playing bad early in the year people say was that by the way was thing we should have got hardened look at Tyrese Maxi all of that I mean break out you know shout out

To harden for uh finishing out the year really strong I’m I’m kidding by the way um but they blamed him they blamed coach adoka now I’m going to agree coach adoka leaves a lot on the table on offense but they blamed him and all of a sudden that

Kind of disappeared and if if you’re going to be consistent you can’t have your cake Andy too by saying that oh wow Fred and coach of unlocked jayen at the same time when he was playing bad earli in the year it was like it was their

Fault so now that shenon is out it’s his fault uh it’s it’s always somebody’s fault when we can just say Jaylen played bad and give him his flowers in that now he is a great player he has turned it around he’s done done the work he’s

Gotten in in his uh grind fixed the things he needed to correct and now he’s a different player and I don’t think it has anything to do now obviously there’s some differences with um how they’re playing Jaylen is getting more more opportunities to shoot now because shenon and him basically were uh tied

For field goal attempts you have to divvy up those shenon attempts Jaylen is getting more opportunities to shoot um there’s been a lot of kind of uh cap about the spacing on his drives I was going back and forth with guy on Twitter um the last the game I always used that

Second Phoenix Suns game as like the the line of demarcation for this team prior to that we all of us were they were all were terrible they turned it on then in those five games um with Jaylen and shenon Jaylen was finishing at The Rim 63% since shanga has been hurt he’s down

To 53 it’s gone it’s gotten worse yep so y’all narratives um so so to me I mean the natural question then roou bro is if we know they could play together obviously the Rockets have come out and say that you know they they want to kind

Of build with them too give them time Etc coach adoka kind of quieted some of that narrative about that the natural question is if you were the coach and you were scheming up a a way for them to play how would that look for you like

What would that two main Dynamic be like and what does that look like in the context of the team yeah that’s a great question um and also by the way uh udoka I think in one of these pregame it was either a pregame or a postgame I can’t

Remember um recently said something to the effect of he’s addressing this kind of question about shenon and Jaylen and he said something to the effect of uh Jaylen was just he was getting open shots earlier in the season he just wasn’t making them and now he is and he

Didn’t boil it down to just that but he was kind of like he stepped it up right and I think that’s a that’s a much more fun way to look at it instead of like oh it’s everyone else’s fault Jaylen had it in them all along I think it’s way

Cooler to be like yo this is an insane turnaround and he deserves credit for that because I’ve never seen anything like it so and real quick to that point real quick that’s what actually what we want because that means that the change is actually tangible and real yes and

Not based on circumstantial because if it’s circumstantial then you got to be finding okay he can’t play we can’t have this guy on the team we can’t if it’s a real change he could play with anybody and he’s just a better player but just had to say 100% I was talking to

Somebody close to him actually the other day and he was kind of saying the same thing he was like look man he’s a rhythm guy he just struggled to find his rhythm and now he’s finally broken free it was it was nothing like oh Alp was slowing

Him down it was just like he had to get his rhythm and if you watch the games man the formula didn’t change the Rockets know he’s a rhythm guy how do we know that because every game what were they doing first quarter jayen would come out sacrificing yep right and they

Would they were they would make it a point to feed jayen the ball get him his shots early get him going early he just was he was just missing and then udoka got to a point where it was like okay we tried to get jayen going he’s not going

Game is on the line third quarter now I got to try to win it let me get someone in there you know he’d put Aaron holiday in or whoever would go in and Jaylen would get benched that’s what they were doing but now they’re doing the same thing and Jaylen is fulfilling the

Prophecy that is the difference so he deserves credit it’s one of the coolest things I’ve ever seen on one of my teams because it makes no sense to go from statistically one of the worst starters in the NBA objectively statistically to I mean I think he might win Western

Conference player of the month I think he might be the first player drafted since like 2019 or something going to win a player of the month award something like that which that’s crazy crazy that’s crazy that’s crazy but it’s crazy but to answer your question what

Does that look like shenon and Alp uh sorry shenon and Jaylen green um it’s simple man there’s it’s so varied and you have so many options that it doesn’t have to be one thing you have dhos you have pick and roll you have P pistol action which involves some dhos gets

Jayen going downhill incorporates some pick and roll depending on how what options they choose to do you have um Shen Hub post outp up let him work when doubles come kick it out now Jaylen can attack Closeouts now Jaylen is proving he can catch and shoot and hit that shot

Um you have Shen hub from the high post and you can again incorporate some some pistol action and some dhos there rub Jaylen off the shoulder if it’s not working he cuts then a men cuts set an off ball screen like there’s so much you

Can do you can post shenon up and just watch him ISO like it it doesn’t have to be this I mean you go look at Sacramento we’ve talked about this a million times but you go look at Sacramento you go look at Denver that’s the blueprint

Right uh left hand don’t get you the right one will yic Jamal Murray sabonis dearn Fox and honestly the dearn fox comparisons I didn’t think were very accurate for Jaylen green they might be a little more accurate than we thought but now Jaylen can actually shoot and dearen fox the way jaylen’s shooting

Right now is the way that I don’t think Daren Fox can shoot right so um and obviously shenon is way more skilled on offense def then sabonis right he’s not just a DHL Merchant he’s not just a bully ball put the shoulder in your chest and go finish at The Rim there’s

So much more there and we haven’t even gotten to amen Thompson who has totally you know uh Diversified the offense because now you can run screen and roll with amen Thompson as the role man and shenon in the dunker spot there’s just so much you can do um honestly it looks

Like you know what I would love to see tell the truth I would love to see Rick adaman come in and not replace coach Oka but Rick adaman style of offense like we could run some old school Kings type yeah and some new school Kings type

but like you know some vat devox at the at the free throw line whatever basically like Shen Hub but that’s what it looks like to me um and maybe this is a good segue into something else to talk about that that all fits into the same

Topic which is amen Thompson has to start I think I think I think that’s just clear at this point and the exercise becomes okay well when shenon comes back who does who spot does a men Take and I think the answer is clearly Dylan Brooks personally um

And you had some awesome data on that if you want to share that yeah yeah definitely and and this was something that a lot of people have been talking about the trio of a men because we obviously we see now we said this on I

Said this on the last part we had and by by the way by the way I think that’s the big three I think Jaylen yes amen shenon is the Rockets big three yes that is our big three and on the last part got other stuff going on the way the

Warriors do it could you imagine shenon getting the pass a men screening for Jaylen Jaylen breaking off and then a men peeling off after that as one simple action that is we we’re not even like that’s that’s like the level 10 we’re right now on um on during the game for

And I’m gonna get to this step during the game for the uh the Utah Jazz there was a play couple plays that they ran I think in the second quarter where uh a man was in that kind of it wasn’t really in the post they did it out of really at

The top of the key close to the three-point line but Fred gave him an entry pass and then Fred would come out and screen for Jaylen gave him a split screen um it’s a delay dho action um I forgot who who they kind of got the name

For it I’m terrible with the different names of the actions because different people call it different stuff but um scissors um so basically Jaylen would come off of uh they have the stupidest name for basketball plays anyway he’ll come off for the screen from Fred into a

Attack either he’s going downhill on the big because amen is playing the center um or he’s going to have the choice to pull up because the guy that amen is posting up or standing next to is a big man and he’s in a drop and he doesn’t

Really know how to react to all the screen movements and all the stuff going on the reason I’m making that point the reason I’m making that point before I get to the stats is because you can have two non-shooters on the floor yes this is NBA history yes the idea that you

Need four Klay Thompsons out there and or stephs or whatever that is not true can I just say one thing about that go ahead the Warriors number one used to do it Draymond and Looney so no Draymond Looney and Iggy and there you go and they had bogot and Draymond for a while

They had fesus eil like they had Shawn Livingston they did it obviously they’re the Warriors they had you know they have Steph Curry and we don’t I get it but they did it number two this idea that everyone on the floor has to be shooter

Except for one guy is I think a hold over from the school of thought of darl Mur which I’m not discrediting that school of thought but I’m just saying it’s one specific school of thought it’s not the end all Beall if you want to play five out yeah they if you’re

Parking shanon in the corner and and you know a man in the other corner or a man on the ball and shanon in the corner or if you’re gonna put Jan Tate in the corner yes they got to be able to shoot correct but you don’t have to play like

That so continue and you don’t have to play out there in every lineup but you know when when you get into this the the split action stuff the fact that I saw us do a variation of split action with amen Thompson and they’re doing the most

Basic stuff right now and and even the off ball guys are just standing there watching because they’re not even getting to the off ball screens it just tells me like first of all people aren’t accounting for how how much gravity shanon has he is not just a guy that

Even if he’s in the D dunker spot you can’t leave him there just I’m gonna abandon changuna go do whatever I have to do and if you do give him the balls a outlet valve he can still work in ISO and get into his bag and you switch out

Into a postup that turns into some off ball screening it’s I’m not even going to get all that deep the point is that when you have a screener and a guy that can cut you can play basketball and if the to me the what all makes this work

Is that if Jaylen green is really what we’re seeing right now the spacing point is moot because to me if you look at let me get to the lineups now I’m going to I’m going to build this up the first thing I looked at um with this was um

Amen Jaylen and uh shenon on the court together just to see they’re are minus 2.3 in 503 possessions just raw anytime any combination on who who amen Jaylen and shenon the trio onus three minus two on in 500 possessions this is overall okay is from Orlando all the way up till

Now and as bad as a man Thompson every the younger men bad jayen all of that minus two not badt hurt and coming off of an ankle injury all of that accounted for you put all that in there so the question then is like what is the reason

Like what type of lineups do they thrive in so I’m looking through and I’m seeing the the most frequent lineup for them is when amen Thompson plays two guard and Jaylen green is at the point guard position okay so that is a minus 12 and6 that’s

The most one the second most is Fred at the uh one and am man at the three in place of Dylan Brooks a plus eight then you go to the next most frequent one amen is at the two guard minus 16 then you replace him with Dylan Brooks in the

Next most frequent one Fred at the point Jaylen at the two a man at the three a plus 68 I’m like okay there’s a pattern that’s building up here so he’s not a guard well he’s not not right now anyways so logically what do you do

Let’s take out no no first I didn’t even take out Dylan Brooks I just wanted to see what does a man look like at small forward because every all the positive lineups for the Rockets with a man Jaylen and Alp he is at the three with

Jaylen at the two I looked that 214 possessions am man Thompson at small for just even with Dylan Brooks on the court with Jabari with Tay everybody plus 13 and 214 possessions 121.5 offensive rating 107 defensive rating those that is Elite right then I’m like okay well Dylan has to what

Does Dylan fit into this and I take him off the court 127 possessions they went up slightly uh a plus 14 offense got better defense slightly worse at 112 um so to your point about where the fit actually lies to me the question is is the Dylan Brooks question because with

Jabari they’re Elite at the four with Jabari at the four and the man at the three um and and I even add in the Fred Van vet part if you put Fred Van vet at point guard and you take out all the Aaron holidays and jayen at point guard

With a man at to three we’re a plus 30 in 133 possessions that’s those are real numbers bro a plus 30 in 133 possessions so the the quadruplet of Fred at the point guard Jaylen at the two guard a man at small forward and shanon at Center is a plus

30 my God so the yeah they could play together they could play 130 133 possessions and that’s not a small sample n that’s I mean uh cleaning cleaning the glass doesn’t give you um uh uh they don’t give you percentiles unless it’s over a 100 because that’s what they deem significant and that

Lineup is in 100th percentile would’ be like that’s basically one point that’s like a game in third basically y basically a game and a third of that lineup and it would be one of the best lineups if not the best in the NBA all of this to say that they can play

Together and I think we need to look at when we talk about how our players are being uh who plays well with who I don’t know why we pit the The Talented players against each other and not look at some of the context of what they’re playing

In one of the biggest complaints of this whole season was the CTE lineups that we’ve had with Coach DOA right and then you factor in the fact that um some of the worst lineups with amen Thompson and shenon and Jaylen featured jante T and Jeff Green and why why is that an issue

Because jayen was in shooting so you have Jaylen is a non-shooter 29% on White open threes you have uh alpie as a non-shooter you have am man as a non-shooter and then you have Tate so you have Fred with four non-shooters and people are saying oh they can’t play

Together so it we just got to just change that narrative yeah you know the the lack of imagination sometimes like I don’t want to talk down on anyone I just want to encourage like be a little creative man and this is why I always say if you play like you don’t have to

Be a D1 basketball player you could just be some dude that picks up play pickup at LA Fitness but when you play in different ways you you start to see how things open up and how you win games even though it’s just pickup I know people make fun of me for comparing it

To pickup I don’t care it’s a s it’s it’s an example that you can use to extrapolate and imagine basketball at its highest level when you’re you know an Elite basketball player you can see just all the different Avenues basketball is a beautiful game it’s a fluid game there’s no one way like

Trends always change right six seven years ago we thought the new rockets and the Warriors was like oh big men are extinct all of a sudden the NBA is run by big men again right embiid and Giannis and uh joic and sabonis and all that so when it comes to like how they

Play another thing by the way until Jaylen green started going off the Rockets had zero Rim pressure zero nobody was putting pressure on the rim from the perimeter the best you’d get was cam Whitmore and he had a stretch where it was like okay hell yeah cam

Whitmore but you know he’s a rookie it’s been like a and even cam even cam Whitmore likes to shoot threes and he likes to step back a lot so it wasn’t like crazy Rim pressure we’ve already talked about this right Fred the Rockets were doing what they were doing with

Fred run and pick and roll Fred is not a threat at the basket really never has been in his career um and still still is not but now Jaylen is so you get Rim pressure Jaylen you get good I mean Elite shooter Jaylen I’m sure at some

Point he’s gonna come back down to Earth but I think he’ll still be a decent shooter Rim pressure Jaylen decent shooter Jaylen with shenon now you have a men Thompson playing the role that he’s playing he wasn’t playing that role he’s clearly a winning basketball player now

Fred goes all of a sudden from I mean your number one or number two option to your fourth right and occasionally your third occasionally your second on a game by- game basis but in theory he’s a setup man now instead of a closer or not even a closer but he’s a setup man

Instead of like a go-to man right and he I just want to point out Fred as that guy as as number four one of the most elite I think you’ll get as a fourth guy right uh in the NBA because he hits big shots he can

Score he can shoot he can put up 20 and 10 all of that and he’s having the most efficient career season of his career by the way and then Dylan Brooks right it’s like okay Dylan Brooks is obviously the guy to get replaced early season Dylan Brook shooting 41% from three 63%

TS maybe that guy you don’t want to replace Dylan Brooks has come back down to earth he’s at 55% TS still his career high but you know it’s not he’s barely more efficient than Jaylen on the season which is kind of crazy um he’s he’s down

To 36% from three um and so you think he was at 41% all the way down to 36% he hasn’t been shooting that well and he also hijacks a lot of possessions like he will take the ball and drive and fade or he’ll he’ll drive into a crowd and

Try to finish on some you know you talk about the C CTE moves like on some serious CTE um and he doesn’t do anything off the ball he’s not like an elite screener he’s not an an elite rebounder he’s not an elite passer so with Dylan Brooks it’s basically yo is

His three falling and are his wacky ass shots going in or not you know sometimes he hits that fade away earlier in the season they posted him up quite a bit they’ve gone away from that recently um but my point is he doesn’t bring enough

To the table to be to not be Expendable and then you replace that while you lose the shooting even though his shooting is whatever you lose the shooting but you gain a screener with a men you gain a guy who can actually not only screen but

Finish as a rle man you gain a guy who is crazy in the dunker spot whether he’s catching and finishing or just going up and snagging offensive rebounds and keeping possessions alive you get a guy who eats off of garbage points just going and snagging those rebounds and

Putting them right back up and in grabbing loose balls and just putting them right up and in and he’s a much better passer right than Dylan Brooks so you get what you lose with people get so simplistic with oh you know but he can’t shoot okay but he can do five other

Things that Dylan can’t so when you really balance it out is Dylan shooting that much better to Warrant losing a man and that’s not even to speak on defense about to say what were we talking about yesterday like you’re I think that’s the biggest part yeah the defense bro like

Um Dylan Brooks has fallen off with his defense am man Thompson is in Elite Defender you can afford a guy that is not like and I think a man he scores in so many other ways that people aren’t aren’t accounting for especially on the boards he can drive the driving is going

To get better and all this conversation we’re having assumes these guys don’t improve right how do we know right these are rookies these are rookies and how do we know like he could his shot could get better Shang goon could shoot better the mid-range could get better one thing I I

Forgot to mention all the way back to the conversation we were having earlier about their two man game can it work and how usually the barrier between that working is is non basketball it’s egos these guys were drafted together so there has never been that element of

Like yo this is my team and you’re coming into my team as a free agent or we’re trading for you to come into my team as 28 year olds to team up nah they came into the league at 1920 together they went through summer league together they went through the rebuild together

Like that that means a lot means a lot for team building so I feel like that ego piece is just out the window yeah personally and they’re good friends um I and that’s what it’s going to come down to ultimately for the Twan part like I said on the on Rockets watch yesterday

Um pick and roll which I think is the action they’re going to go to Laden game um if if you had one action and uh to the LeBron they were asking what is the hardest actions to guard and basically they basically said it’s either going to

Be a uh a split action or an inverse pick and roll and uh there’s only about three or four centers in n that could run an inverse pick and roll now you talking about two-man game there’s a two-man potential between Alp and and am men that has with Jaylen has an outler

Vow for that for shooting bonus points that two-man game between LP and the men could look something like it looked between Alp and KJ KJ Martin there you go so imagination guys I mean once again like obviously Jaylen is always going to be the to me if he if this is him and

I’m assuming it is because it looks real because those games where he struggles and then he finds a way those are encouraging for me if this is what it is Jaylen is the top of the food chain naturally just as a perimeter player as a scorer that’s always how NBA history

Goes regardless of how um and this is when it comes to options not running your offense joic is always going to be the first uh initiator for the Denver offense but in key moments they’re going to give the ball to Jamal Murray because he has more options to do from uh as a

Ball handler than as a post Dynamic players like uh like a man Thompson out there you have out vals like fanley you have Jabari Smith out there cam Whitmore and we haven’t even talked about tar een and some of the potential you bring there with the offensive rebounding and defensive side

Of well they just won 11 in a row without tar e so maybe they should trade him to the C he’s useless cam tar all of them but I mean to me it’s this is and you know I’m not even going to bring up the uh Tim McMahon thing about trade

Or the rockets that that was uh that’s cap guys that’s not that’s not a thing from Houston and and it’s just he’s framing it in a way that it sounds like they want to trade Jaylen or Alp or their debt set on it I think as new data

Comes in teams can change their minds like whatever the Rockets were talking about before the All-Star break I’m sure they might have wanted to trade one of them or or Jaylen now Jaylen is going to be the player of the month I think that changes everything so um I think going

Forward I mean you’ve hit the lottery as the franchise you have two premium positions of players that could very well be all NBA or All Stars next year there’s nothing you need to do but just keep building from there and you have a really good point guard so like the three most

Important positions big man perimeter scoring threat and your point guard they’re all locked in right it I mean it’s only up from here in my opinion um and yeah I mean I’ve had some conversations that basically indicated that the Tim McMahon stuff is definitely C um and Tim McMahon you know if you

Listen to the to the full thing which I didn’t when I first posted about it he said that he’s hearing that from other teams so at this point now that the Rockets are succeeding and now that things look like they’re working I don’t give a damn what other teams think and

Say personally because you know what I mean like we we have now we have something going that is attractive to the outside world of the NBA they can deal with that um it’s no longer you know like like the national media rumors and all that

It totally changes to me it used to it used to matter it used to be like man what do these Rockets do but now it’s like n we have something cooking y’all want to know what our secret ingredients are and that’s your problem not ours

Facts um so but yeah I mean look they’re on an 11 game winning streak Luca might not play tomorrow by the way um okay so if he doesn’t he’s questionable with the sore knee um so if he doesn’t they could win 12 in a row and they could continue

To make a push but but yeah I just think that whatever ever you’re supposed to do in the offseason just got a lot more clear and it’s like there’s no need to rush anything um this is shaping up to be on some Memphis Grizzlies rebuild on some Phoenix Suns with book and Aon

Before they blew it up rebuild this is shaping up to be like one of those like yo they did it right um and I had a lot of criticisms because it wasn’t panning out this way but like you said man it’s a they were a Jaylen leap away yep um

And and he’s not just taking a leap like he’s taking a catap out yeah he’s uh going through Dimensions right now there this is um and we can end it on this I just want to say that you know for coach adoka and I think he’s obviously weel

Stone um you give him credit for drafting these players bringing in the talent that’s his job um putting together bringing in some vets that’s his job and he’s done a great job with that I think where he’s lacked is um the day-to-day personel stuff with Steven Silas like making sure that your goods

Are in the hands of somebody that could take care of them and I think that could be very costly as Draymond said when he was referring to mares Chris FR organizations can ruin players and I think that if we made the wrong decision as a hiring for a coach uh Jaylen could

Have been very well the casualty of that but you know how I know coach adoka had his imprint on this not even the fact that he said it and Jaylen said it the fact that which you pointed out earlier that they let this kid play through a

Lot of bad games I just pointed the Rockets were winning a lot they could have won a lot of games if they just replace Jaylen with like I wanted with t een early in the season and am man Thompson uh towards like January and stuff like that but coach adoka didn’t

Because he had a vision in mind he let him play through that even though he got benched repeatedly he let him play through it and to me the rebuilding of jaylen’s as a rebounder Defender all the stuff we see can be attributed to the coaching staff and what they’ve really

To me they’ve sacrificed parts of this season for Jaylen green and that tells me that not only udoka but the franchise has invested heavily in his success as a player so when you hear these trade rumors um to me that doesn’t it doesn’t make sense um and and it hustling

Backwards so I think that if this is the returns we’re getting then um I next year is going to be just it’s going to be a movie me let me also say on your point about the coach it’s so important because people people see the success

Now and there’s you know a lot of people are like oh yeah you know y’all were hating obviously they were this good blah blah blah if you don’t get eme udoka and instead you get Steve Clifford you know or some NBA some guy who’s been an NBA

Coach hasn’t been like an a inspiring NBA coach but he’s just you know he’s been there he’s done that and like all right fine like vogle like Frank vogle yeah yes who was listen the Rockets were really interested in Frank Bogle straight up facts uh thank God he did

Not become the coach if Frank vogle who by the way has a ton of talent in Phoenix and really ain’t doing all that much with it if Frank if Frank vogle became the head coach does Jaylen turn it around like this I don’t know but I’m just saying like these things are that

Delicate right and so when you look at how the Rockets R they rolled the dice I mean Stephen Silas was taking care of the good so to speak right um and they had Jaylen in an environment nurtured by Christian Wood uh who all conversations I’ve had you know nothing about him

Being a bad person but just that he was not great for the locker room which is like you don’t need me to tell you that but like that you know but he wasn’t um Kevin Porter Jr obviously not good for the locker room and then surrounded by

Literally a bunch of kids you know Josh Christopher at the time 1920 or whatever garuba Tai Tai you go down the list of all the guys that you know’s a really young locker room um and to two of those years were spent right jaylen’s going to be a restricted free agent next summer

Which would be after season 4 they might get an extension done with him this Summer which is after season three but if you didn’t get this breakout after season three you would be heading into season 4 scratching your head like what do we do and obviously as the Rockets

Did knocking on some doors trying to potentially move that Talent right so it’s a really risky like I’m not knocking them I mean I’m kind of knocking them retroactively just because we got to keep it real but they really gambled because they put him in a

Position that was set up to fail and if they did if Oka didn’t come in and save this thing from a basketball perspective and rebuild him as a basketball player and a young man if we’re being honest who knows where he’s at and who knows if the Rockets have this type of bright

Future so don’t take that for granted um because hiring a Steven silus no disrespect to Ste step silus but hiring a guy like that when you have a bunch of kids that really need direction and and shepherding is it’s risky um and it could have bit the rockets in the ass

But then they were able to patch that up by hiring a top five NBA coach so big big moves um transcending coaching I think that’s going to be um the the kind of the theme going forward but with that not appreciate y’all for checking us out

And if you guys don’t know we are streaming so if you want to hear the podcast on the road while you’re driving to work or doing whatever you’re doing cutting your grass hit us up on Spotify or apple or any other uh Outlet uh that’s Rockets talk and obviously if

You’re new to our Channel hit the subscribe button if you like this video hit the like button keep rocking with the chop shop and we going to keep dropping that fire Bang Bang

In this episode of Rockets Talk Roosh and Frank discuss whether the Houston Rockets big 3 of Alperen Sengun, Jalen Green and Amen Thompson are a good fit going into the future! #houstonrockets #nba #podcast #alperensengun #jalengreen #amenthompson

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