The Rockets Must Find Their Balance To Regain Footing

The Houston Rockets have struggled to find the balance between their offense and their defense as they've tried to keep a top position in the Western Conference standings. Houston's biggest struggle has been on the offensive end, failing to create efficient opportunities or finish them at a high rate.

Their failures on offense often lead to miscues and frustration on defense, making issues that ccould lead to an early exit for the Rockets in the postseason.

The Rockets have gotten some quality production from Reed Sheppard in his last several outings as he provides a quality ball handling option along with his ability to knock down shots from deep at a high level. Unfortunately, his defense is his biggest weakness, and the Rockets don't have the level of paint defense needed to support their perimeter players when they are beaten on the outside.

Amen Thompson, Tari Eason, and Jabari Smith Jr. have gotten plenty of starts due to their ability to defense, despite none of them having the ball handling or initiating capability Sheppard obtains. Even worse, Smith Jr. displays poor perimeter defense at times despite being billed as a switchable big on defense.

Alperen Şengün can have good moments on defense, but he isn't a stalwart like some other bigs across the league.

Şengün has also been struggling with his touch around the rim recently, which is a big part of Houston's offense when the team need a bucket in isolation.

Kevin Durant is Houston's other isolation option, showing the most consistent ability to score on the perimeter. However, teams will always put their best perimeter defender on Durant, forcing him to either make tough shots or pass the ball to his teammates.

At this point, Durant can't necessarily trust his teammates to deliver in their opportunities, and most of his teammates wish to defer to him anyways.

With Steven Adams out and Clint Capela still ahving somewhat llimited minutes, the Rockets don't have enough paint presence with their rebounding to make up for poor shooting. The Rockets haven't been playing good enough defense to make up for bad offense, and the offense doesn't seem capable of scoring enough to allow the defense to slack.

These issues will likely show themselves in the postseason when the Rockets are consistently going up against elite teams. It's difficult to imagine the Rockets fixing these issues before they become magnified in the playoffs, but it'll be their main priority to find the balance and more success on both sides of the floor.