On Simmons podcast this week, (I think at about 1h30m) he talked about how hot the Rockets are and how Udoka has turned the team around much quicker than anyone thought would be possible. This is in context of the Rookie rankings. He says he thinks that is you are bringing in FVV, which everyone knew by draft day was a done deal, that they should have gone with Ausar instead of Amen because the Rockets could use another wing like Ausar.
I tend to disagree, and think Amen will probably be a good long-term choice there, because FVV turns 30 around All-Star weekend and the Rockets only locked him down a couple years.
FVV has shown to be an elite team-building and leader for the Rockets young players, but I think that Amen will be the long-term solution. Have FVV there for 2-4 years to install that toughness, defense and intensity and turn it over to Amen. Ideally, FVV would be a really great 6th man by then in his later years. Also, since FVV didn't become a full-time starter until he was 25, he will have a lot less miles on his joints than most guys like him and the pounding he takes will be less since he is a more normal-sized human being rather than a freak-sized guy.
So maybe Ausar would be the better shorter term (which is I think what Simmons is saying) but I don't think Simmons is looking at the longer term picture on that assessment. Everyone knew Amen was an athletic freak that would need some solid coaching to reach his potential and it looks like Udoka is doing a great job overall there.
In Simmons' preview prior to the season, he praised Udoka a lot, but said that he thought it would take until at least the AS game for the team to really buy in and gel with the pretty radical changes.
Green, Tate, Brooks, Eason and FVV are all hitting 37% or better from three, which has to be a big factor.
On 0-dribble three attempts, Green is hitting 42% and that is 17.7% of his shots. On 1 dribble, he is at 33% and 2-dribble at 25%. Last year, 16% of his total shots were 3pt attempts with 3-dribbles or more and he hit just 32% of those. That is down to about 10% of his attempts now. I know we talked about it early in the season when he had some frustrating possessions, but shot selection is everything with him and it seems like as the season progresses, the shot selection is improving and the results certainly are as well.
