It's fun to talk but let's be real, we are a fringe playoff team right now and wouldn't win against any of the top 3 seeds, maybe the 4th seed.
Yea, I wish we had a chance to get to the 5th seed and play Denver. While it wouldn't be a walkover, we would have a chance.
OKC is the toughest team for us to beat. They are the best. I do not want them in the first round. Our best chance of an upset is against Memphis or L.A. Memphis is a bit weaker without Rudy Gay...and L.A. is stacked but still better to play against than OKC or the savvy San Antonio Spurs. Basically, unless it's memphis, we be in trouble.
All of the teams besides the clippers we are not really afraid of because we like our speed against the spurs, Memphis, and thunder.
I kinda see Houston now keeping the whatever seed it'll be against OKC with blessing from Stern (and Stern's refs), because of the potential high drama and ratings:grin:.
I'm sure that Houston/OKC would make great press. However, if I were to rank the top 4 teams that I'd like to play of the current seeds, it would be... 1) Memphis. Our speed matches up well against their size and age. If we're on, I genuinely think we got a shot to run them off the floor. 2) Spurs. Their defense is top 10, but we've consistently shown that we can score against them. They'll still beat us most likely, but the games will be somewhat competitive, and if we can stretch it to a long series our young legs just might run them down enough to sneak out an upset. 3) Clippers. Young and fast is a bad match up for us, but they're not experienced in the play offs. At least not nearly so experienced as... 4) OKC. Young, fast, experienced, and one of the best teams in the NBA. They're comfortable playing fast, have knockdown shooters, one of the fastest PG's in the NBA, one of the best shotblockers in Ibaka, and they have deep outside shooters like Kevin Martin. As for the press dream match, that would be Houston vs Knicks in the Finals. If that happened this year, the media would literally implode. Highly unlikely? Sure... however how's this for an unlikely dream scenario... 1. OKC 2. Spurs 3. Clippers 4. Memphis 5. Denver 6. GSW 7. Houston 8. Lakers First round. Lakers upsets OKC (size vs speed) Houston upsets Spurs (outruns them and Parker not in form) GSW upsets the Clippers (pure scoring match) Memphis beats Denver (beats them on size) Second round GSW beats the Lakers Houston upsets Memphis (out runs them on guard penetration) WCF Houston beats GSW (slug it out scoring match) Extremely unlikely and would take multiple minor miracles, but that's the most reasonable scenario I can see in terms of getting favorable match ups assuming we don't manage to get to the 5th seed and get Memphis in the first round. If that ever happened, expect an international media melt down. :grin:
I have never been so frustrated watching the Rockets play Denver this year. Always felt like it was close then they Denver just completely owns us in the final minutes of the 4th. We make a ton of mistakes and Denver just runs with it.
Very possible. Matchups is the key, as you don't have any truly dominating team on either side this year. Anyting could happen once your in the dance.
To be fair, the Thunder had at least a day of rest for the first two games. Meanwhile, the first game the Rockets went to Minnesota for McHale's daughter funeral earlier that day and it was also the end of a back to back. The second game I believe was on the end of a four games in five nights stretch.
