Average of 9+3! Is the strong forward staying in the team stable? He was named by the Rockets coach and is expected to replace Jaylen Green

The Rockets have been eliminated by the Warriors in the playoffs, and the 3:4 score makes the Rockets bid farewell to this season regretfully. In fact, the Rockets have used the same starting lineup in seven games of the playoffs, and only 3-4 players are used in the second team; in contrast, the head coach of the Warriors, Steve Cole, uses 10 or even 11 players to rotate in each game. In contrast, Rockets head coach Uduka is obviously more conservative and his way of using people is too rigid.

Take main defender Jaylen Green as an example. He performed poorly in 6 games. According to common sense, he should have shortened his playing time and given more opportunities to outside players such as Holiday and Whitmore. But Uduka still trusts Jaylen Green very much, and he basically guarantees his playing time of more than 30 minutes in each game, but Jaylen Green's performance is far from expected.

Looking at the Warriors, Podjemsky, Moody, and even Buddy Hilde, who scored 33 points and scored 9 three-pointers in the last game, all performed brilliantly. Compared with the performance of Rockets' substitute players, it is not difficult to find that Warriors' Cole is willing to give substitutes and role players more opportunities, while Rockets coach Uduka did not do this. As a powerful scoring striker, Whitmore was hidden for a long time in the playoffs and only appeared to "clean the battlefield" during the period when the winner was decided. At regular time, especially at the critical moment of the game, Whitmore never won the favor of Uduka. In fact, the Rockets may be able to improve in scoring if Jaylen Green, who was in poor form, was replaced with Whitmore.

Although Whitmore has limited passing ability, average dribbling skills, and shortcomings in defense, he has outstanding scoring ability. He can not only dribble through the ball and hit the basket, but also catch the ball and complete three-point shooting, and also create fouls at the basket to win free throws. In short, compared to Jaylen Green, Whitmore has more scoring efficiency and has stronger scoring explosiveness.

In the regular season, Whitmore's role this season is far less important than last season, so there are many rumors outside that the Rockets may trade him in exchange for superstar players this offseason. However, Rockets coach Uduka now mentions Whitmore and does not seem to be planning to give up on the 21-year-old striker. Uduka talked about Whitmore in an interview, saying that the two sides had in-depth exchanges and may have more frequency of communication than with other players.

In Uduka's eyes, Whitmore has great potential and needs to maintain a stable state; and Whitmore is also aware of his own shortcomings. This season, Whitmore averaged 9.0 points, 4.3 rebounds and 1 assist in the regular season. Although he was delegated to the Development League for a long time in the first half of the season, Whitmore entered the rotation many times after the All-Star Game, but was not fully activated in the playoffs. Since Uduka believes that Whitmore still has huge potential to tap, it means that he does not want to give up or send Whitmore away easily, and this powerful forward is more likely to stay in the team.

Even if the Rockets exchange Jaylen Green for star players next season, Whitmore is entirely likely to replace Jaylen Green at the shooting guard position. Judging from his scoring ability alone, Whitmore is no less than Jaylen Green, and is even better in terms of stability.