Tag: Mike D’Antoni

Eric Gordon becoming more efficient, explosive after surgery

It’s a small sample of two games, but Houston Rockets guard Eric Gordon appears significantly improved after his return from knee surgery.

It’s a small sample of two games, but the recent right knee surgery for Houston Rockets guard Eric Gordon may already be paying dividends.

In two games this week since returning Sunday in New Orleans, the 6-foot-3 guard is averaging 16 points in 24.2 minutes per game. He’s shooting 52.6% from the field and 58.3% on 3-pointers.

For the time being, head coach Mike D’Antoni is holding the 31-year-old Gordon to an approximate minutes target of 25 per game as he works his way back into playing shape after a layoff of more than six weeks.

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By contrast, in his nine games of the 2019-20 season before the procedure, Gordon scored 10.9 points in 29.4 minutes per game. His efficiency in those nine games was especially dreadful, with shooting percentages of 30.9% overall and 28.4% from 3-point range.

When asked before Tuesday’s win over Denver how Gordon had looked since returning, D’Antoni told Rockets Wire:

Eric’s going to be good. He was playing with a lot of pain before. Some games he was okay with it, and some games it hurt him.

Regarding whether Gordon had regained some of his prior explosiveness before his right knee began bothering him, D’Antoni said:

I don’t know that yet. I think it’s going to take him a while to get that back. But he’s going to be the Eric of old, before he was injured halfway through last season. He’ll be explosive.

Through two games: So far, so good.

In the 2019 NBA playoffs last spring, Gordon was arguably Houston’s third-best player after James Harden and Chris Paul. In 37.3 minutes per game, Gordon averaged 17.8 points on 44.7% shooting overall and 40.0% on 3-pointers, and his on-ball defense was especially valuable against the likes of Utah’s Donovan Mitchell and Golden State’s Klay Thompson.

In 32 games to start this season, Gordon missed 23 of them and was well below his standard in the other nine, likely due to the knee problem. Yet, the Rockets still managed to win 22 of those 32 games — good for a pace of more than 56 wins for a full season, and enough to keep them within a half-game of Denver for the No. 2 spot in the Western Conference.

Assuming Gordon is now healthy, the Rockets (23-11) are effectively adding a player who was their third-best last postseason to a squad that was already quite competitive in the West this season.

The two-game sample since Gordon’s return remains quite small, but it would seem to be a very encouraging sign as the Rockets enter 2020.

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