I am not sure if I have seen this point brought up yet, and apologies if has been discussed elsewhere. I think we have a strong advantage with a solid deep team in a compressed schedule. We may not have a superstar but our depth chart has to be one of the deepest in the league minus the center position. Every team will play back-to-back-to-back games and play something crazy like 4 games a week. Not only will players be fatigued who log a lot of minutes, but injuries will be magnified. As an example a ankle sprain which keeps you out for 2 weeks has the potential for a player to miss 8 games, that is a huge portion of the season. I think youth and depth will get an upper hand this year only. While I am not sure how I feel about this realization for the long term plans of the Rockets, I think we are going to be in much better shape then most people think without a superstar.
This is exactly why we sign Dalembert to a 1 year deal for ~$6 million and make the playoffs this year. As much as I would love to get a top 3 pick, it demoralizes a team that loses 56 out of 66 games and the locker room will be a mess with a new coach and etc. I would not be surprised to see more of the younger/mediocre teams in the playoffs this year than usual due to the short season and higher frequency of games in a shorter amount of time.
The compressed schedule favors established teams that don't need a regular training camp. Like when the Spurs won their championship during a shortened season. The Rockets, however, will have a new coach with at least one new starter. And we're probably overhauling our scheme to emphasize defense instead of offense. I think this shortened training camp definitely hurts the Rockets.
That really is a strong point. With so many 5-game weeks and back-to-backs, our overload of 10+ non-star rotation players can really distribute the load, keep a high pace in games, and survive inevitable injuries. Stars missing 3 weeks is going to have double the impact this year: more games than normal missed for a set period of time....and each game matters more in a 66 vs 82 game season. I guess it is a good year for small ball.
This is nothing more than an exercise in wishful thinking. If you are starting out with a non-competitive roster of players, then it really doesn't matter how many 5 game weeks and back-to-back games they play. They will still be non-competitive because it is NOT the schedule or how many jokes the McHale can crack during his press conferences that will determine their fate. Rather, it's the amount of talent on the team that will be the deciding factor and that has nothing to do with the schedule.
Frankly, any depth advantage we have on other teams in this shortened season will likely be negated by the fact that we have so many young players in a shortened training camp with an entirely new coaching staff. If this team was older, and we had some stability in regard to coaching, the advantage may be tangible, but, that not being the case, the beginning of this season will basically be an extended training camp. Just listen to what McHale is saying about the training camp. He might be saying that there are no excuses, and that the team's performance is on him, but, to me, it sounds a whole lot like McHale is already making excuses for what he's predicting will be a lackluster start to the season. They may be good and reasonable excuses, but they are excuses nonetheless. In short, any advantage we have in depth will be negated by the shortened training camp with the new coaching staff and young players.
If you recall, the bench was part of the reason they made that run last season. One of the top rated benches in the league. It will be better this season.
Kyle Lowry, Kevin Martin, Scola, Marcus Morris, Patterson, Dragic, and Courtney Lee all say hi. Don't watch if you think we have zero talent.
I disagree. Our youth is our advantage in this case. We have a few young players who have already been with the team a season or more(Hill, Lee, Williams, Patterson, Lowry, Budinger). Youth that will be running the same system as they had last season for a few games or more, early. One of them, Bud, even started and had success doing so.
Donut teams invented the high tempo small ball style out of necessity. With no dominant low post big, you are at a disadvantage in a deliberate half court set game. So go the other way - run the crap out of the other team. You'll get exposed in the postseason, since the playoffs force you to win with halfcourt sets, but it can let a marginally talented team with depth and legs overachieve in the regular season (Nash Mavs and Suns, 03-06 Grizzlies). We almost have to go that route. No one on this team can demand a double team inside the arc, which means we're left with high post P&Rs to get points. Use the depth, shorten the star minutes, go 10 deep, run and take advantage of any team on tired legs.
