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Occam’s razor is attributed to a 14th-century friar named William of Ockham. He doesn’t seem to be widely remembered for much else. The simplest explanation is: his idea that the explanation with the fewest elements is probably the most logical one was by far his best work.
The Houston Rockets had a disappointing 2025-26 season. It culminated in a disappointing first-round exit. Now, it’s time for explanations, diagnoses, and plans.
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Here, the focus is on the playoff exit. There’s minimal value in considering plans that will bolster the team’s regular-season record if they aren’t playoff viable. So, why did the Rockets lose to a Lakers team that was without Luka Doncic and largely without Austin Reaves?
There are likely multiple Occam-friendly explanations, which may disqualify the razor from being applied. Firstly, and most obviously, the Rockets were without Kevin Durant. That’s a sound explanation, but it’s not very satisfactory. With Doncic and Reaves (mostly) sidelined, the Rockets’ young core should have taken care of business.
So, the task becomes explaining why they couldn’t. Here’s where the razor cuts:
Having two non-shooters in the same starting lineup is likely the primary culprit.
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People don’t like that explanation. They’d prefer to believe there are multiple ways to build an NBA contender. It’s a reaction to the NBA’s optimization movement. It’s disheartening to think that team-building concepts are so rigid.
Here’s the issue: Everyone else is optimizing. The only other would-be contender to feature two non-shooters in the starting lineup would be the Detroit Pistons. As of this writing, they’re due to face the eighth seed in the weaker conference in a do-or-die Game Seven in seven hours.
So it’s not going well for them either (Editor’s note: The Pistons won last night, but doesn’t take away from James’ point).
Otherwise, go look at the playoff bracket. Every other serious team’s starting lineup features four, if not five, players whose three-point attempts must be defended. This is reality. The Lakers predictably packed the paint,…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/rockets-two-non-shooters-decision-093028654.html
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Publish date : 2026-05-04 09:30:00
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