When the Rockets won seven straight games from Nov. 24 to Dec. 8, they had an elite offense at No. 3 in the NBA in net rating (118.6) and the No. 16 overall defense (111.4). Five of those games featured Kevin Porter Jr., and the defense actually ranked No. 14 in those contests.
But when the 6-foot-6 guard limped off on Dec. 3 with a re-aggravation of a nagging left thigh contusion, Houston’s defense went with it. The offense has stayed in the top quarter of the league, but the defensive rating has plummeted to the league’s worst among 30 teams (122.7).
As head coach Stephen Silas sees it, the timing isn’t coincidental. Before Tuesday’s home game versus the Lakers, Silas was asked about Porter’s importance to his team’s defense and its recent decline. He said:
Last year, his defense wasn’t something that anybody was really remarking about. But now, it’s remarkable that he has kind of turned the corner defensively. It’s his ball pressure, it’s his size.
Last time we played the Lakers, he guarded LeBron some, did a good job. So him trying harder, him using the gifts that he has and applying initial ball pressure as the ball is brought up the floor… it kind of gets everybody else in the right spots and going. Because when you see that first wave of ball pressure, it helps everybody else on the floor.
The corner that he’s turned defensively is really, really good and gratifying, because it’s not like a young guy to make a big jump defensively. It’s like a young guy to make a big jump offensively and then the defense comes later. But for him, he took a lot of pride this summer on doing all the closeout drills that we did and working on the ball pressure, and it’s translated.
The Rockets lost Tuesday’s game and gave up 132 points, so Porter’s return did not immediately fix their problems. However, it’s an extremely small sample from one game in which three future Hall of Famers (LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, and Russell Westbrook) combined to score 80 points on better than 55% shooting. There’s reason to believe that could be an outlier, just as there is a reason why Porter has the best individual defensive rating all season mong Houston’s current rotation players.
After the game, the third-year guard was asked about his growth on defense, and he said it is a clear priority in the 2021-22 season.
It took me a minute to learn the spots on defense regarding the help, but on ball, I’ve always been good when I wanted to. But this is the first year that I’ve taken pride in defense to a whole other level, and I just want my guys to have that same energy.
On Tuesday, it was veteran forward David Nwaba who had the LeBron assignment, and the 21-year-old took some inspiration from it.
“I want to be basically like David — be an energy on the defensive side, with my on-ball, with my help rotations, but more so vocally,” Porter said. “Communicate where the low man’s supposed to be, the switches. And if I don’t hear a switch, then I’m going to call it for them. Things like that, just having my boy’s back, because I know he got mine.”
Porter and the Rockets will return to action on Friday when Miami visits Toyota Center on New Year’s Eve. Tipoff is set for 6:00 p.m. CST. Houston (10-25) enters with nine losses in its last 11 games, and badly in need of a win to head into 2022 with momentum.
For that to happen, it almost certainly requires a better performance on defense. “The thing about us is just consistency,” Porter said after Tuesday’s agonizingly close loss to Los Angeles. “We showed the team that we can be, especially in that 7-0 run. We just got to be that team.”
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Kevin Porter Jr with great defense on LaMelo Ball pic.twitter.com/1SjxHXpQzY
— Adam Spolane (@AdamSpolane) November 28, 2021
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