The answer to the question above, particularly after Thursday night’s win over the Los Angeles Lakers is … possibly!
When the Houston Rockets decided to trade Clint Capela and acquire swingman Robert Covington, there were so many P.J. Tucker jokes — he’ll be broken down when having to defend Anthony Davis, Nikola Jokic, Rudy Gobert and other Western centers if the Rockets want a title.
But we’re one game into the experiment — the smallest of sample sizes — and so far, it worked!
It obviously helped that Russell Westbrook had one of those huge games when the Lakers tried double James Harden and held the superstar to just 14 points on 10 shots.
The Lakers sprung doubles at James Harden all night in an effort to keep him out of rhythm.
Shading off of Russell Westbrook makes sense in theory — he isn't a shooter, can trust the defense to rotate behind the double.
The issue is that Russ is FAST. Can't give him a runway. pic.twitter.com/oFFRWpwLCf
— ahhhhhh (dats me yellin) (@NekiasNBA) February 7, 2020
But there’s more to love here than Westbrook going off. There’s the fact that Covington nailed 4-of-7 from deep, adding to the already-humongous group of shooters who will take advantage of an open look: Harden, Tucker, Danuel House Jr., Eric Gordon, Austin Rivers, Ben McLemore … it’s exactly what LeBron James feared ahead of Thursday’s game (via the Houston Chronicle):
“They’re already shooting 45, 50 threes a game. Now they’re going to go to 60, 65 3s,” James said at the Lakers shootaround on Thursday. “That creates challenges for everyone in the league because you have to be on your toes and guarding a guy who is averaging almost 40, and guarding a guy who has averaged triple-doubles in seasons before. So, it creates a lot more space for Russ (Westbrook) and (James) Harden.”
But what about on the defensive end? We underestimated Tucker’s toughness in the post, and we all know Covington can play D:
Next trip down, we get, for my money, HOU's best defensive possession of the night.
-PJ blows up the spot
-timely gamble by Russ
-FANTASTIC rotation & recovery by Harden
-RoCo cuts off Alex Caruso's path + recovers
-RoCo comes back over with the block on the Brow fadewhew. pic.twitter.com/INslV65gdD
— ahhhhhh (dats me yellin) (@NekiasNBA) February 7, 2020
Obviously, there are nights where this isn’t going to work. Westbrook will miss too much. The shooters beyond the arc will have off nights. Bigger opponents will out-rebound the competition. They’re banking on all of those things happening occasionally in a playoff series and not on a nightly basis.
But for one night, the experiment worked in a big way.
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