whos not? lol weak justification as to why you call them average. Those are elite experienced veteran ball clubs, the cream of the crop. the Rockets are a thrown together team that was gutted of its entire starting 5 from a year ago-on the fly- and oh btw, added a superstar talent a few days before the start to the season. oh btw, they are the youngest/least experienced ball club in the game and they STILL have an eye popping 20-14 record? impressive indeed, and to think this team is nowhere near a finished product is a scary thought for the rest of the NBA. This team is above average, highly competitive and very talented. The best is yet to come
\\ Your right, I agree with you. I know that we are on a hot streak right now but there is no way I would call this team just average.
Even though Morris and Patterson aren't best talent at PF position, that doesn't mean an elite PF would suddenly make Rockets a contender(unless it's prime Tim Duncan). Why? Because they are perfect fit. So would a guy like LMA or Milsap make Rockets a contender? No, maybe a better team, but even that is questionable since they don't have 3PT range. However, there is a line between better fit and talent and you need talent if you want to be true contender. Rockets are already elite defensive rebounding team(4th), mostly because of Asik so we could afford playing small forward(even Parson) at PF position, because it give us advantage on offense and it doesn't hurt us on the boards(that's the biggest weakness of the smallball). Best fit would be scoring high efficent forward with DRB% over 20%, but only two guys in the league fit that description(Lebron and Durant). But if you need to choose between Milsap and Iguodala, you have to take Iguodala.
Agreed!!!! I'ma rep you for that! Though unexpected, the way things are right now, I'd be disappointed in a first round exit. Making noise in the playoff would be such a mental boost to our young players that it has to be the goal. We are at present a dangerous team that should take nothing less than the second round as our goal whether we expected to be this good or not. And it's not like we're overachieving in terms of our individual players. Lin has underachieved, Parsons clearly has a better shot than he's recently shown, Asik can learn to catch the ball better, our rookies have yet to be developed, chemistry is still not all the way there. We're only getting better and to be honest we should have a better record that even this! We lost ones where we easily could've won when we were still figuring things out.
Pretty good, but still a team that will probably struggle and have to fight hard to make the playoffs. Again though we need to remember, making the playoffs would be insane for this team to do. What do we have again? barely 2 years avg exp for the team? Only like 3 guys from last years squad surrounded by completely new players. 3 of our starter (asik,harden,morris/patt) were backups last year, and lin and parsons shouldn't really be consider'd experienced starters. A relatively un exp coach in McHale. We could be a lot worse off right now, and making the playoffs would be a huge accomplishment for us. Very exciting team with a bright future, hopefully with the growth of harden and lin, and the addition of another key player we will become a contender in the next 5 years
a decent team people want to root for... even the bench is developing a personality.. fear the bench!
In my opinion, the bolded parts are not true, we only won due to iso-balling by Harden and plays by one individual. This team has lots of way to go, we got really lucky in the Cleveland game that Harden hit some shots. That step back two and a play prior or after, he waved off the screen and decided to do everything by himself. Even though he hit them and he's our #1 guy, we still need to learn to play teamball at the end of games.
I think that was Jeremy's passive aggressive attempt at asking McHale to have the ball distributed more evenly in the future. lol.
4th seed in the West if we pick up a All Star caliber Starting Power forward...With Millsap in this team Rockets can catch Golden St and Memphis... After the BIG 3 in the West 4th seed is there for the taking...For the playoff 4th seed would be big for the Rockets if Portland or Golden St finish as the 5th seed as I think Rockets cab beat them...
I've been thinking it over, and to be an even better team, what we need is not a stretch 4 as offense is not our problem. We need an athletic 4/5 who can block shots like Ibaka or Varejao. Last night's game is an example of how weak we can be up front. Love would be a step back and Cousins... I'm not sure that's right either. I think we need to beef up our defense in the front court, even with Asik. Btw, though he didn't have a great game yesterday, Asik is arguably up there with Harden as one of the most important players on this squad.
From your lips to Stern's ears. That would be fricken ridiculous. Not the Millsap part, not sure yet, the 4th seed part.
I have to disagree. When the game is on the line the ball needs to be in the super star's hands. Player's of Harden's caliber may look like they are playing iso ball, but if Cleveland had run a double team towards him, I feel sure that he would have made the correct pass. Lebron, Paul, Durant, those are the people you want to have the ball in the last two minutes of the game. Isn't that why they all have max contracts?
I'd like to see us beat MIA, SAN, LAC, and OKC. Beating the likes of MEM and NYK is great, but I'd like to see more, especially against OKC. It'd be nice to consistently beat PORT, too.
Exactly. If Harden was in trouble he would have passed it to the available player and they would have been able to make the right play. The fact is we have plenty of legitimate scorers that even with iso-ball we could have won. But of course we should stick with our bread and butter if Harden and do it.
Against Cleveland, Morris and Patterson combined stats: 48 minutes 26 points (11-21) 11 rebounds 5 assists Patterson played 26 minutes. Morris played 22 minutes. If the combined production from PF can be consistently close to this, that is obviously excellent. I hope that they can convince Patterson to accept a permanent bench role. He can be more valuable to the team if Morris remains starter.
