Houston Rockets: Effort Measured By Numbers

The Houston Rockets have been an unmitigated disaster after 11 games of the 2015-16 NBA season. Without a doubt, no team with so much promise has delivered so little thus far.

The Rockets have a dismal 4-7 record, and as incredible as it sounds, they could be even worse. Not one of their four wins have been by a margin greater than six points, and they have already lost three games by more their combined winning margin of 18 points.

The Rockets are 0-2 against the Denver Nuggets, losing both a home game to start the season and a road game that was point guard Ty Lawson‘s chance for revenge against the team that gave up on him in favor of 19-year-old rookie point guard Emmanuel Mudiay. Lawson went scoreless in his return game, missing all seven of his shots from the field.

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They were also the first team to lose to the hapless Brooklyn Nets, and they did that on their own home court in Houston.

They have been on the received end of two second-half bludgeonings, one to the Miami Heat early in the season and another Monday night against the Boston Celtics again at home.

Against the Heat, the Rockets jumped out to a hot start and a big early lead and took a 65-44 margin to halftime. The Heat came out ablaze in the third quarter, however, and put a legendary beating on the Rockets. Miami went on a 65-24 run in the second half and won a game by 20 points that they trailed by 21 points at half.

It was more of the same against the Celtics.

The Rockets led by as much as 15 in the first quarter, but the Celtics tied it by halftime and then torched the Rockets in the second half, leading by as much as 100-72 early in the fourth quarter and coasted to a 111-95 victory.

So, a team that went to the Western Conference Finals a year ago and then got better on paper after adding Ty Lawson to the fold has actually gotten worse to a spectacular degree. Where do they go from here? Why does this team that was heralded by many as one of the deepest and most talented teams before the season now look like one of the worst teams in the NBA?

The Rockets did do some soul-searching of their own today in the form of a players-only meeting,

What we can do, however, is dig into the numbers and understand just what is going wrong in Houston.

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