How Critical Is Dwight Howard to Houston Rockets?
The Houston Rockets have announced that Dwight Howard is out indefinitely after undergoing “platelet-rich plasma therapy to treat his strained right knee,” per Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com.
How much does his loss hurt the team?
In large part, that depends on how much time Howard misses. Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports tweeted just hours before the announcement that Howard might play against the New York Knicks:
While Wojnarowski’s suggestion didn’t come to pass, it certainly makes it seem that Howard may not be out for a long time, making short-term survival the apparent need.
A look at its immediate schedule indicates it could survive temporarily without him.
It already beat the Dallas Mavericks on Nov. 22 and the New York Knicks on Nov. 24.
This allows the superstar center some time to recuperate from his procedure. The Rockets have just three more games between now and Dec. 10. Only two of those—the Los Angeles Clippers on Nov. 28 and the Memphis Grizzlies on Dec. 3—are against teams who made the playoffs last season. Both of those are at home.
Even if they win just half of those games, it would mean a 5-3 record without him—a result Houston would gladly take.
After that, though, the schedule gets denser and more difficult. The Rockets will play 11 games in three weeks, with six of those games being against 2014 postseason teams. If they are still sans Howard, that’s when things will get difficult.
Other Injuries
There are reasons that there is a shelf life on that survival, though.
Most pressing is the fact that Howard isn’t the only injury the Rockets are facing. Starting power forward, Terrence Jones has been out for most of the season, having played just four games.
He is suffering from a peroneal nerve contusion, which means he has a bruised nerve in his knee which cuts off feeling to his lower leg, and there is no timetable on his return.
He recently told Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle he’s improving, though:
"It was scary, very scary for me not to have any movement in my leg at first and not being able to move it as a basketball player is going to scare anybody. Now I’m able to move it a little bit. It’s getting better.
I couldn’t move it at all and had no feeling. From the swelling of the nerve, I didn’t have too much feeling at all in my leg. Now, I can move my toes again. It’s getting better.
"
In addition to Jones and Howard, Second Team All-Defensive point guard Patrick Beverley missed the New York game. It was the third time this season he’s missed time with that injury and he may need more prolonged rest to recover.
Dealing with a Howard injury by itself is certainly a big enough issue, but compounding it with other injuries doesn’t help. The longer the Rockets are dealing with multiple absences from their starting five, the harder it will be to survive.
The Real Concern Is Offense
The Rockets defense is the peg upon which it hangs its hat now, and there’s some good news and bad news which comes with that.
The good news is that it means Houston can stay in a lot of games and win when those it really shouldn’t. Look no further than the aforementioned Dallas game.
The bad news is that Howard also happens to be its best defensive player, so continuing to dominate opponents without his presence is going to present a challenge.
The Rockets have been terrific on defense when Howard is playing. When he’s on the court, the Rockets yield a miserly 90.0 points per 100 possessions. Certainly he is an asset there, but even without him, they give up just 99.0.
The latter number would amount to the sixth-best defense in the league. Losing Howard a hit, but one which can certainly be absorbed.
Having a relatively light schedule will help to maintain that. Houston will be able to keep its battery charged and have the crowd behind it for its toughest games. Good defense keeps you in games, and if you’re in a game, you can win it.
The other concern for Houston has to do with its offense: Arguably the biggest weakness the Rockets have is reliable scorers, and Howard is the second-best it has.
The impact of his loss in that regard is the disparity between scoring 103.7 points per 100 possessions when he’s on the court and only 97.3 when he’s not. That’s the difference between the 16th-best offense and the third-worst.
So, in terms of points, Howard might matter more defensively, but the Rockets are still borderline elite without him.
The loss on offense drops them from average to horrible. Only the disastrous Philadelphia 76ers and the Kevin Durant-and-Russell Westbrook-less Oklahoma City Thunder are worse.
His impact isn’t just statistical either. It’s essential to their scheme. Houston needs to score in the restricted area, and he’s the team's best low-post scorer. With Howard on the court, it averages 78 field goals per 48 minutes inside the restricted area and shoots 60.8 percent.
When he sits, the Rockets take just 63.4 field goals per 48 minutes and shoot a mere 53.4 percent.
When they get shut out of the lane, the Rockets amp up their three-point chucking even more than normal. Their attempts leap from 29.8 per 48 minutes with Howard to 38.8 without him. But the nine extra attempts only result in 2.5 more makes—13.4 instead of 10.9.
In the Dallas and New York games combined, the Rockets fired an amazing 82 threes, making 29 of them.
The entire offense consists of either giving James Harden the ball and getting out of the way or passing the ball around the perimeter until someone fires from deep. It has all the imagination of “Houston, we have a problem” jokes.
The longer the Rockets are without Howard, the more teams will be able to plan for their lack of offensive versatility, the harder it will be for Houston to score and the more stress it will put on their already strained defense.
Those strained cables will start to snap on Dec. 10 when the Rockets travel to Golden State to face the Warriors.
If Howard is back by then, they’ll be competitive. If he stays out much longer than that, Houston fans will be willing to trade in their Christmas presents to see him return.
Unless otherwise noted, statistics courtesy of NBA.com/Stats.
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