While Kevin Durant was yelling obscenities at Dwight Howard, the Thunder and the Rockets were engaged in an intriguing and ugly game of basketball. A 69-65 win for the Rockets does not quite fit the Rockets’ storyline. This is a team with tons of offensive potential and little in the way of defense.
The story on Houston is that James Harden cares only about offense and Dwight Howard’s patience for being defensive player of the year is gone as he sought stardom. This team is a good one, but will not go anywhere without a commitment from defense.
That is how the story would go. Obviously the story and perception is a hyperbole of reality. Because the Rockets did just win a game while scoring only 69 points, the lowest point total for an NBA winner in nearly a decade.
And Rockets general manager Daryl Morey did state:
We want to win games this year with our defense when our offense struggles. We have done it a few times now #pursuit
— Daryl Morey 🗽🏀 (@dmorey) November 17, 2014
So are the Rockets a better defensive team or is this some strange fluke of an NBA game?
The best measure of the team’s defensive mentality remains defensive rating, a team’s points allowed per 100 possessions. The Rockets are giving up an NBA-best 91.5 points per 100 possessions. Sure, it is a small sample size, but this is not insignificant. A top-10 defensive rating is usually a pretty good sign of a championship contender. That, and a 10.2 net rating has the Rockets sitting atop the Western Conference.
Last season, Houston had a 103.1 defensive rating, which was good for 12th in the league. This was not a team starting from square one.
Replacing Chandler Parsons with Trevor Ariza has helped boost the defense. Ariza is known throughout the league as a pretty strong defender. According to Basketball-Reference.com, Ariza has a 2.3 defensive box plus/minus and has a 4.3 value above replacement player. That means you would expect to win four more games with Ariza in your lineup than an average NBA player. Last year, Parsons had a 0.4 defensive box plus/minus and a 3.1 value above replacement.
So far, the switch for Ariza has done wonders to the Rockets’ defense. And, of course, they still have Dwight Howard as the ultimate backstop — his 3.7 defensive box plus/minus so far this season is more in line with his Defensive Player of the Year days with Orlando.
That adds up to a team that has begun to look like it is taking the step into contention early on this season.
