Shepard, a rookie from the Rockets, has officially returned and has appeared in previous games between the Rockets and the Suns. In that game, he made two three-pointers and was in good shape. Shepard is just a fringe rotation player for the Rockets, though.

In the regular season, he was able to play occasionally. In the pre-playoff stage, the Rockets are struggling to retain the second place in the West, so young players like Shepard and Whitmore will naturally rarely get a chance to play. The Rockets dropped substitute players such as Whitmore and Shepherd because the team needed to shorten the rotation lineup to keep the main players in better shape and feel.

Unexpectedly, it backfired, and in the game against the Lakers, the Rockets scored only 41 points in the whole game. In today's league, the 0-point score per game is quite low. Moreover, the Rockets shot just 0% from the field in this game. Although the Rockets managed to limit the offense of the Lakers' two superstars, they lacked scoring of their own. Especially on the offensive end, the Rockets lost to the Lakers, which is why the Rockets lost.

The Rockets have no problem defensively and are the top defensive team in the league. However, the Rockets have more or less shortcomings on the offensive end. For example, no player on the team averages 4 points per game, and even an All-Star center averages just 0 points per game. The other two main defenders, VanVleet and Jalen Green, have been up and down with good hands. Take this game against the Lakers as an example, Jalen Green made only 0 of 0 shots and scored only 0 points; VanVleet's performance was even more exaggerated, with only 0 of 0 shots and 0 of 0 three-pointers in 0 minutes of playing time, and only scored 0 points in the whole game, but had 0 assists and 0 rebounds.

最近三場比賽，范弗里特在投籃方面的表現相當糟糕。三場比賽他一共出手33次，卻僅命中8球，命中率連25%都不到。作為火箭隊年薪最高、拿著4000多萬美元薪水的球員，范弗里特的表現差強人意。不過，火箭隊主帥烏度卡在這場重要的比賽里，仍舊給了范弗里特40分鐘的上場時間，這一數據高居火箭全隊第一，還給予他14次出手機會，出手次數在火箭隊中同樣名列第一。

So, what is it that makes Van Vliet so trusted by Udoka? Van Vliet has been "promising" in this game and has also got 40 minutes of playing time, but he is still reused by Udoka. In fact, Coach Udoka was also helpless. The Rockets don't have any particularly reliable scorers on their roster, neither Jalen Green nor the other main players, like Shin Kyung, Amen Thompson and Dillon Brooks, who are inconsistent in scoring. So in contrast, the Rockets, who are short of main attack points, can only let VanVleet make more shots. After all, if VanVleet doesn't shoot the basketball, it will be harder for the Rockets' offense to open up.

Therefore, the biggest weakness of the Rockets this season is not defense, let alone rebounding, but the lack of a scorer who can output firepower consistently. The Rockets are in dire need of a top scorer like Durant right now. The Rockets have plenty of chips to trade stars this summer, and if the Stone manager sees the shortcomings exposed by the Rockets in this game, then in a sense, the loss is well worth it.

The Rockets are also using their current performance to force the Stone manager to bring in a star player with strong scoring ability this summer offseason. If this vision can be realized, the Rockets are expected to jump directly to the top team at the championship level next season.