What to Do When Your Team is Loaded in the Wrong Places

First, I do believe that the talent on the active roster at the Point is not talented. Ward as a 10 - 15 mpg reserve is OK. Lue has shown me something only once, when he was the D on Iverson in the Finals.

Second, if Howard really is Eddie Curry's 'mentor' in the NBA, then Da Bulls (or whichever team trades for him) should make acquiring Howard a priority. Otherwise, Zo appears healthy enough to take a flyer on. There's the rugged 4 spoken about. In any regard, I believe there are real options for bringing back a consequential piece to Rox puzzle. I am not knocking the guy, I only am wishing that his value be used to acquire more balanced value.

Finally, help is coming. If Sura can healthily get in the flow that will help. A lot. Might Big Dog be p/u after getting dropped in Philly? If so, there's some O on demand.

 

Concerning Badiane - was he even invited to training camp for a look and to rub elbows with the rest of the team? Don't remember hearing anything - but it would seem we would at least want to invest an airline ticket and hotel cost for 3 to 4 weeks in the guy, esp since his skills and athleticism are so different from our other 4's.

 

Good post. We should balance by cutting redundancy.

I'd try to eliminate Taylor, Boki, JJ and Lue.

We brought in Ward and Bowen, I think they are keepers. They're cheap. Padgett is playing his role, and he's a 1-year guy. Howard is cheaper, smarter, and more of a team player.

I think JJ is done. We should cut bait now. We can platoon there until we find a wingman that can shoot or do something special swinging the ball, boarding and playing d.

You can actually get something with those 4, plus the TE and picks.
I'm sure a swap would be 1 good player with problems at his current team, and 1 bad contract. I think that's worth it. We'd swap redundant players for something we need. I hope there's a deal at the break. We can do the best we can with the MCE in the offseason.

1 more real quality starter will put this team into gear.

 

I know it wouldn't do anything to make the team younger, but I've always felt that if we could work out a trade for PJ Brown and put him in as our starter with Mo backing him up, that would be ideal. PJ would get the tough rebounds that Yao tips around and plays very solid defense. Plus, his jumper is not atrocious out to 15 feet or so.

 

I don't want to lose Taylor, he's a great scorer I think he is better served off the bench as the 6th man but we seriously need a rebounder

 

RL -
Assuming that a division rival would make a trade, it's worth noting that PJ has been on a small downward spiral for the last several years and IMHO he's having trouble thus far in the WC (currently 8 ppg, 3.7 DRebs, 2.0 ORebs in 33 mpg). At 35 and with 3 more $8+m seasons on his contract, I'd pass.

 

I think Boki's game is diferent from Scott and Ryan's. I see Boki as being a little more athletic than the other 2. BTW, should we just call this group the Whiteboys? I'd put Sura in there, but his game's got some street in it

 

Point Guard - I also believe that Sura could be the answer to our problems at the point guard position. I believe that a Sura/Ward combo could work just fine, and in a year or so Ward could easily be swapped out for someone equal or better. Lue has no place on the team except on the injured list (what he is basically doing now).

Shooting Guard - No problems. JJ can do an admirable job filling in when McGrady is ailing. Sura will be able to contribute also.

Small Forward - I agree with you completely Jeff. Too much of the same thing. Jimmy is not a small forward for a championship caliber team. To be completely honest, he amazes me with how well he has handled the position because I don't even think he is a 'tweener. Padgett (on occassions), Nachbar, and Bowen do not offer any skill that would be desireable enough to start at this position over JJ.... obviously, or they would be doing it already.

The one thing I don't agree with you on, is that this is not fixable. Shane Battier. Surely between Nachbar, Bowen, Lue, Taylor, Howard, Ward, Spoon, and Padgett we could land Battier whose production and minutes have gone down practically every season since he came into the league. We could get this stat line out of him if we got him:

Points - 14.5
Rebounds - 5.5
Assists - 3
Steals - 1.5

Those numbers are from his rookie season 4 years ago. Right now he is scoring 8 points per game. You could nickname him Mr. Intangibles. I would kill to get Battier on this team.

Power Forward - Lots of problems, the second most difficult position to trade for in the league (right behind center that is almost impossible to trade for). We need - athleticism, rebounding, shot blocking, maybe even someone who could spread the floor.... we need (dare I say) Eddie Griffin. Or someone exactly like him who isn't mentally ill. Won't get fixed this season. We'll have to draft a project, sign a free agent, or develop someone. Griffin, and McDyess were both signed by NBA teams this year. Who knows if it will work out for them, but I guess there is always hope. Rembember Chuck Brown!

The other solution is to take a hit at this position and trade a valueable Howard or Taylor for a Cato type. Someone with athleticism but was highly limited in other ways. Basically, trading overall talent for a higher quality platoon of forwards than we have right now. I'm extremely skeptical about this though.

Center - Yao/Mutombo. Great combination. No problems.

 

Great now there are gonna be a 1000 threats about Badiane, thanks

 

I agree wholeheartedly with your analysis. That's why my expectations for this season were never very high to begin with because I did not like the makeup of this team. I expect this situation to continue until concrete changes are made in the organization (some folks have got to go) and someone is brought in who can evaluate/draft/sign talented NBA players.

 

Sura=X FACTOR!

 

Yeah I'm happy with Dikembe..he's a great backup. Mo has done a good job..Juwan isn't bad either..I like all our Rockets

We seem fine when Tmac is in. We should win Monday's game.

We are pretty unathletic though..we seem pretty slow..James Poseys and Amare Stoudemires would be nice lol..maybe it's our style of plays..Lue is fast..wait and see

 

Sura = Vaporware

 

Rebounds and block shots.

 

Hey Jeff? Was this thread created based on our close loss? If McGrady had been playing the last two game probably would've resulted in two wins.

Unless you are suggesting that we should be on a two game winning streak with Yao leading, and our role players. Or better yet, we should win some games without Yao OR McGrady. I'm not disagreeing that we shouldn't improve our roster. But, do think that the tone of this thread would be different if we had won the last two games.

Put it this way, our teams weaknesses seem "clear" after losses. But unclear after wins.
There's really nothing we can do about it now, right? I think it's more important is that Yao is learning to lead right now. Better role players or not, Yao needs to go through this. Because without his development, we go nowhere.

Another important issue is this....Ask yourself this: How good do we play with BOTH Yao and McGrady on the bench? Are we getting STOMPED? Or are we KEEPING the game CLOSE?

 

I think the odds of the Rockets winning a game this season making under 35% of the 3 pointers for a given game will be very low. Most of the Rockets attempted 3 pointers are either open or wide ass open. These are not the same kind of 3 point attempts taken by other teams. With other teams having to collapse into the paint to defend against the 2 franchise players, the roleplayers have to TAKE and MAKE a good percentage of 3 point shots. I think 35% is the demarcation. If JJ has become a bricker, Sura certainly can't pick up the slack. Sura has always been a bricker. The Rockets may not have an ideal roster until the contracts of Mo and Weatherspoon expire.

 

Of course. That goes for every team in the history of sports.

 

Jeff, whats up with our trade exception. Has it already expired, like previous ones we required and WASTED?

If we do sill have it, where does that fit into your ideas of upgrading?

 

I agree with most of Jeff's take. One thing I don't get is why do so many people here think that a healthy Sura is going to fix the PG problem. Sura has always been eratic. He is good energy guy for both guard positions. But he is not a steady playmaker. Ward is our best floor general on the roster right now. But he is slow on D and he can't create his own shot. With Ward starting and Sura backing up, I think they are not great but adequate.

I think our only thin position (after Sura comes back) is SF. I think we should experiment starting Boki and have JJ coming off the bench behind Boki and TMac.

 

The Sura situation kinda reminds me of how people talked about Pike last season. A lot of people thought Pike would fix the jumpshooting problem, and instead he barely played any minutes. I'm expecting energy from Sura but in regards to fixing our pg problem, I'm not putting a lot of stock into it.