D’Antoni easing Paul back into rotation
Four games back from a knee injury that had cost him 14 games, guard Chris Paul is on a minutes limit.
Coach Mike D’Antoni had planned for Paul to play 28-30 minutes Saturday night against the Knicks. He played nearly 31 .
“That’s close to what he’ll play anyway,” D’Antoni said.
Recent blowout victories have let the Rockets ease Paul back into the lineup.
He played 27-plus minutes against the Nuggets on Wednesday.
D’Antoni said it is not predetermined how he will divide Paul’s increased minutes between the first and second units.
It will depend on how well James Harden plays, but mostly, D’Antoni watered down the notion that it would not make a difference because the team has so many scorers on the bench.
“To be honest with you, we don’t have a first or second unit,” D’Antoni said. “We could start guys on different nights and we have a couple teams that I could just flip them if we wanted to start other people.
“It wouldn’t matter. It’s hard to say where his minutes will come. He’ll play an extra couple of minutes and someone will play two minutes less.”
Depth permits easy transitions
The Rockets have intensified their fusillade on offense and improved their blockade on defense with their increased depth.
Coach Mike D’Antoni said normally a coach “never” has a Hall of Fame point guard to deploy, “but we have two.
“Then we have some guys, P.J. (Tucker) has started for Toronto, which was a great team, and Luc Mbah a Moute, started for the Clippers, which had the fifth-best record in the league last year, and we’ve got Eric Gordon, who can start on any team.”
The depth has allowed the Rockets to play the same style, with a stellar second rotation, with little disruption from injuries.
“We don’t change it up,” D’Antoni said. “How we play and what we do doesn’t change.”
Ryan Anderson credits general manager Daryl Morey’s vision.
“His basketball mind put together a machine,” Anderson said. “He wanted to bring guys here that would help the chemistry. He’s not trying to bring in someone to try something new. He put together a group of guys that know how to play and could play in this system. All the guys that we got are veteran guys. A number of guys have started on other teams.”
“It’s easy to work around guys when you are around veteran players and you know that guy was brought in for a specific meaning and a specific role.”
Still, the ultimate test of the Rockets is the defending champion and presumptive repeat champion Warriors, who to Knicks forward Doug McDermott seem too dominant for any addition to the Rockets to make a significant difference.
“It’s a little improvement,” he said of the Rockets’ chances in the Western Conference.