Not even close - Golden State's ball movement to get open shots is a thing of beauty. The Rockets have no ball movement at all.
Jordan also had a borderline pathological desire to win that was well documented. You never saw him slacking off in a game or playing piss-poor defense. James doesn't have that kind of motor which means he doesn't have the same margin of error for behavior incompatible with playing basketball at a high level.
Looks like this years excitement will stim from GSW vs SAS in the playoffs. Rockets ugh I don't even want to talk about it.
They are basketball players. And as such they have to take care of their bodies and minds to a greater degree than the average pastor. They also have to take care of their bodies and minds better than professional rappers and prostitutes too. That is if they are going to be able to perform optimally. Can they still perform well while drinking/partying/etc.?? Sure. But they cannot perform optimally. Character/discipline is what is separating Curry from Harden. While Harden is out partying and ingesting alcohol into his body along with all other sorts of dietary junk, Curry is at home eating salad, fish, and spinach and drinking his protein shake before he trots back off to the gym to finish off his day with another 1000 jump shots and a couple quarts of water. Curry then goes home and goes to sleep at a decent hour and gets in good recovery sleep...while Harden is out clubbing and finally stumbling in late and falling into bed. Curry then wakes up refreshed, recovered and alert, not hung over with flies buzzing through his brain. He then gets in a short morning workout, and another breakfast that does nothing but good things for his body, and then he's on to the rest of his day...in tip-top shape....and squeezing every ounce of performance out of his body. It has nothing to do with the God-complex so you heathens can get off your high horse about that. It has to do with living a life of character/discipline to get the optimum performance out of your body and mind while doing the job that you are paid millions of dollars to do. Harden came up short on these things this summer. It's obvious. That doesn't mean Harden didn't put in work. I know he did work. But he wasn't able to work optimally the way Steph was able to work. Harden watched video, and decided to emulate Steph's pull-up jumper, a huge key part of Steph's game that makes him great. Steph can pull up from anywhere with just a sliver of daylight and get the shot off....accurately. So, Harden obviously saw that and decided to emulate it. But the problem is Harden did not put in the necessary work to emulate it. Steph has spent years honing and refining his pull up and release. He's simply on a different level than Harden is at that skill because he's had years and years of discipline that was bred from his character that caused him to work a certain way. Harden thinks he can emulate that pull up game in one summer of watching video and getting out on the court and tossing up pull-ups. You see the results. He's shooting 20% out there. That's not going to change until he eliminate about 80% off those stupid pull up jumpers he's trying. Because Harden simply did not work hard enough for long enough on that skill this summer for it to translate to NBA games. Harden needs to work on his character/discipline. He needs to make better choices both in his off-court life and his on-court game if he plans on challenging Steph for best team/player status anytime soon.
it's like they're the bizarro rockets. Thompson setting picks for steph, team ball, open man shoots if not makes the extra pass. They embrace the PnR not waive it off. They play team defense. They all sit at the same table and wear pink on wednesdays.
Rockets basketball has been largely super ugly to watch since the late 90s. Most think there is some conspiracy for the media to hate on the Rockets, i've just thought all along what i always admitted but wasn't bothered by because i was a hardcore Rocket fan....media doesn't like the Rockets because were always boring. Steve Francis dribbling out the clock forever the entire game negates his highlights. Yao Ming was just Yao Ming...only Rockets fans and Asians truly appreciated Yao, yet even TONS of Rockets fans hated on Yao all the time in my experience. TMac? We took one of the most exciting players of his era and built a squad that had zero offense other than post Yao up or let Tmac shoot deep 2's and heat check 3's in games that routinely were won by the team who scored over 80 points. Lots of meaningless years where we were competitive but barely missed the playoffs Harden. We've found a superstar. All around well liked player from his time with OKC. We turn him into a shoot 3s or draw fouls player. The stats get there, the fans mostly leave other than Rockets fans. No one wants to watch Harden draw fouls all game long even if they are 90% legit and even if you respect the skill to draw fouls. Next up, Dwight Howard. About as mechanical of a big man as there is. The exciting dunks and leaping blocks largely forgotten as he struggles in a league that has seen an increase of big man talent. The player that destroyed scrubs like Primoz Brezac and Zaza Pachuilia has to now play real big men nearly ever game and he's still a good player, but not very exciting anymore and can't stay healthy. I'll admit lots of media hate for Harden and the Rockets started with Dwight leaving the NBA's precious Lakers, but i think the hate would have been forgotten if Dwight ended up in GS or Dallas. The Rockets don't have the right brand to make the haters disappear. Lets talk about that next. The Rockets brand. Boring logos. Boring color. Hideous and dated uniforms. Boring home floor. Boring arena. Boring fans. This team needs a revitalizing re-brand. Something exciting. You might say the old colors and logos were far from that, but it brings something else more valuable with it. Something memorable. Something respectable. A rebrand to something that reminds people of our championships. Fans in general don't see Rockets today and associate it with anything historic. But once they see us dressed in the red and yellow/gold trim. They will remember because of one man. Most youth love to hate. I see them hate on legends all the time on youtube and how their players of today are so much better than the legends of the past, but i rarely ever see nothing else but respect for our hero, Hakeem the DR34M Olajuwon. Their favorite players of today were big fans and still give Hakeem constant praise and props and paid to train with him, etc. We have to distance ourselves from Pajamas, shark dildos, chinese takeout boxes, the color black for blacks sake, the spurs gray, or any other stupid uniform ideas Adidas has in the next two years before Nike takes over. We have to go back to the only real face of our franchise. This is the Houston Rockets. This is what people NEED to see. Are you with me?
GSW is lethal now that Harrison Barnes has taken the next step. Barnes could average 22 ppg as a 1st option. GSW has developed their guys like no other. Curry, Thompson, Ezeli, Barnes, and Green have all grown by leaps and bounds.
I agree, while Thompson was a good player coming out of school, they get a ton of credit for ezeli, Barnes and green.
Speaking of which 2012 draft. Rockets pock lamb, Royce white and Terrance Jones. Warriors select Barnes, ezeli and draymond green.
2012 Warriors pulled off a great stealth tanking job. They realized they weren't making the playoffs and also realized they needed to lose enough games to keep their first round pick or else it went to Utah. They started resting players for bogus reasons and they lost just enough to keep it. That pick became Harrison Barnes. To be fair, the rockets tanked in 1984 for the Olajuwon pick.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Cavs?src=hash">#Cavs</a> LeBron on Warriors: "They've been healthy. They've been the most healthy team I've ever seen in NBA history & they have great talent"</p>— Chris Fedor (@ChrisFedor) <a href="https://twitter.com/ChrisFedor/status/668829090229723136">November 23, 2015</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Wrong. You also forget that Klay guards the opposing team's best perimeter player most of the time, including PGs. If he gets injured, that leaves Steph susceptible to fouls and putting more effort defensively.
"I hate the Clippers more than I love my own team" I was cheering for GS against DAL in that 1/8 matchup 10 years ago though. I'm happy GS's fans. After all those years of suckage, they have a winner. Their passionate fanbase has earned it.
