Agreed. The Blazers, Suns, Mavericks, Grizzlies, Warriors, are all right there with the Rockets. Not to mention, the Hornets improved drastically. Right now, the Rockets are not a complete team, and until Morey makes his moves we won't know how competitive this team will be.
I think we're essentially the "same team" but with improved defense Also I think with the H&H boys getting that off season together again will help them Get better therefore making our team much better. Could miss playoff of course but I think we make it and maybe sneak into the conf semis Be positive.. Too many Debbie downers here
I don't think parsons was much of a playmaker as some suggest he is. Sure he was great at driving to the rim and finishing Also did put up decent assist numbers for a foward. Also had some clutch in him. And did have some amazing games that lead us to victory.. Hmmmmmmmmm, on second thought $h1t ! You're right!! I miss you parsons!!! Lol
The West is so tough that I wouldn't call us a lock. I say we're about 10-15% chance to miss. There are just way too many variables at play here. So many teams could randomly surprise such as Pelicans and Suns and all the middling teams at our level such as Blazers, Warrios, Griz, Mavs, Nugs. I just listed 7 teams there. add The Rockets, plus the elite Spurs/Thunder/Clips and that's 11 teams that you could argue could make the playoffs.
I don't think it's ever a sure thing in the West, but I think you play this season 15 times and we make it 14.
Maybe we should wait til November at the start of the season to ask this. I believe the Rockets are not done in FA and will add significant talent before the start of the year.
No question our team is weaker this year than it was last year and the West is the West. I'd say the Rockets are 50-50 as currently constructed when it comes to making the playoffs.
I voted 100% for laughs but their is no way the roxs miss the playoffs. It'll be another first round exit if they get the 6-8th seed. That's Spurs Thunder and Clippers. You can't beat those teams.
Everyone worse than us has questions; no one got significantly better save New Orleans who I expect to leapfrog Dallas for one of the final playoff spots. It's like that Rocket-hater on Grantland said: people are way too down on the Rockets this year. It's just been a ridiculous overreaction on the part of media who believed Mark Cuban's hype. If anything the Mavericks have sustained much more turnover than the Rockets this year, so they have the most variability in play as far as how their team goes. Almost everybody is looking to the upside: Dirk equals or surpasses his play from last year, 38yo Chandler surpasses Dalembert, Ellis and Harris = Ellis and Harris from last year, and Chandler Parsons tells all his teammates off, shooting the ball 20 times per game and scoring 23ppg in the process. Oh, and Carter/Calderon/Marion are ably replaced by Richard Jefferson, Al-Farouq Aminu, Jameer Nelson, and Raymond Felton. You see how absurd that sounds? I'm betting to the downside on them. Portland also, since everything broke right for them last year and they still only made the 5 seed. I think Memphis had some bad luck last year and should still be good if not better. Golden State, who knows how good a coach Mark Jackson was, but I definitely know they were a lotto team before he came on and without much talent he seemed to will them into the playoffs each of his years there. In the end, I think the Rockets tell all these national critics off. It's a propaganda machine going on out there in favor of Dallas. Thankfully these things are handled on the court, and the post-David Stern era of officiating does seem to my eyes to be more evenhanded than before. Let's get it on then.
only if dwight or james has a big injury. they can miss 10 games, we'll still make the playoffs assuming the team picks up the slack. the power of two high scoring star players can get you far in the nba. rockets did it with tmac and yao, doing it again with james and dwight.
McHale aka Milk Hair will be gone when that happens. Les and Morey are not going to take responsibility just yet.
That Math doesn't work Mathloom. You are saying the Suns can overtake the Rockets. Well, OK, but there were four other teams between the Suns and Rockets. If the Suns make up those 6 games on the Rockets, that means they are beating the other four teams ahead of them, which drops those teams down, too. Magic Numbers don't work the way you are describing. So, yes, 6 games IS a LOT, when you're talking about four other teams between PHO and HOU. Somebody has to lose when the other team wins.
Barring injury no way! People are creating out over nothing. Our starting lineup minus Parsons has had a year to get to no each other. Beverly's shot got better as the year went on. He's had all summer to work on that. Jones flashed last year and should only get better. Surely he will be extra motivated by the lack of respect he received this offseason. Howard has really started to develop offensively in the post. He was already good there but you can tell his work with Hameem is paying off. Harden is still so young. Ariza improves our defense and three point shooting. He actually comlpaments Howard and Harden better than Parsons IMO. If you think purely about what Asik and Lin brought to the team on the court neither should be hard to replace. Asik really wasn't that big a part of our success last year. He really only brought two things to the table. Solid rebounding and he was a good team defender in the post. Capella's strenghts match up well for him to fill that role in limited minutes. Lin was a streaky player. When he was hot he made a difference but it wasn't often enough to make a difference in the big picture. Troy Daniels easily replaces his off the bench scoring without the turnovers. IMO we will be a better team this year than last.
