It's early but the Rockets have obviously had a disappointing start to the season. The CP3 suspension has definitely hurt but it feels like it's more than just that. Some of the new guys haven't exactly fit as well as we all hoped they would. Even usually reliable players like EG and CC seem to be struggling right now. It's a long season but should we be concerned that this start is less about missing players or lacking chemistry and more about a lack of talent, youth, and athleticism?
Pretty concerned. I don’t see a lot of reason for optimism. We have no ahooting and an offense that relies on it. A defense with holes and a big man who seems to have regressed. How many times in 2015 did we say it is early
Not worried. Last season, it took the month of October (5-3) for our team to really gel. In November, we went 12-1. Give this team just a little more time to gel.
Very worried. We really need a trade to happen to bring in a real Ariza replacement. Would be nice to have a sturdy big to defend too. Butler and Dieng would be a dream.
A problem I see is that we look old and slow. I don't know how that changes, since we are old and slow. And our defense got worse, as many expected. Utah didn't get much outside of Mitchell on offense last night and that was more due to them having an off night than our defense playing well. So we need to find the fix for being old and bad on defense. Not sure what that would be outside of trading away the old for some young defenders.
Yes. Do you not remember 2015/16? Slow starts coming out of a crappy training camp kill your season before it even starts.
Still slightly worried for now, i think there were some sort of good signs (on defense) yesterday...in the end we still lost to a good team without Harden, Paul, Ennis...but obviously if the overall situation isn't going to change in the next 4/5 more games i'll be very concerned, if not in complete panic lol
1) I think we were a hair away from being defensively mediocre, and a hair away from being mediocre shooting team, and we lost those hairs. Easy to fix though, need a 3 & D wing who can give us 25 solid minutes. 2) There's just too much going on right now with multiple players trying to find their personal identity while the team also tries to solidify its mechanics. I didn't think we would be this unprepared 4 games into the season. This team out hustled opponents the past 2 years, regardless of their weaknesses. That hustle has been replaced by multiple simultaneous identity crisis'. 3) This team used to try to counter its age by pushing the pace. It seems MDA let go of the leash and everyone is super comfortable taking their sweet ass time, including Harden and to some extent Paul. 4) This team used to insist on high % shots, but suddenly mid range shots are creeping up. Again, MDA let go of the leash and people got super comfortable with this shot. There are only 3 acceptable mid range shots: if Chris Paul takes it, if Harden is guarded by an elite defense, and late in the shot clock with no other option but a turnover. 5) The average bball iq of this team fell significantly, and that was supposed to be countered by improved athleticism. There's no point having athletes if they are incapable of playing defense and scoring in transition. That's a bad change that I'm not sure we can reverse. It's STILL so early, but Morey should be holding that draft pick and seeing what he can cash it in for AND the staff needs to tell these guys play time is over and we are not a 60 win team without out-hustling 9 out of 10 opponents.
yeah its the 2018-19 team that looks just as bad but just wait til the game 5 thread where we'll learn next to nothing about the year
I didn't think the loss vs Pelicans was discouraging, they beat us twice last season and this year they're clearly better. Then the losses vs Jazz and Clippers came, and this is a different story. We should be eating them up for breakfast if we have championship aspirations, even if it's the beginning of the season. Right now it looks like Morey would try a riskier midseason trade if we keep playing at such win loss pace.
Yes, because the pieces don't fit, we lack effort, energy, and understanding of how the Rockets want to play. And removing our 2 best versatile defenders in Luc and Trevor has been a DISASTER - both off them were long and could guard PF on the perimeter.....now we have Melo who can't guard a parked car. DD
Depends on the barometer. If you thought we're contenders then yes absolutely. It's time to panic. We're not as bad as we look but we're not what we were and that's disheartening. We were historically good and now just whatever. It's funny seeing the keep calm guys were the same ones who thought we should keep calm after we lost Ariza. You dopes upset that he missed a bunch of threes one game didn't understand his value. D'Antoni did and that's why he played more minutes than Harden quite often. We'll be an interesting squad but I have no delusions about our chances.
Not sure what makes this team that much more special. Yes... this team has CP3, but that team had tons of grit and grind & veteran leadership as well. Some of those players like Pat Bev, and Montrezl would be pretty useful right now honestly.
