I've no clue. Well, obviously re-sign West, probably at 10-12 mil a year. Extend George, probably 5 year max. After that, I don't know. Most likely they just hope Granger gets healthy and adds depth, and search bargain bin in late July/August to spend a couple mil on a cheap veteran a la Delfino.
I called out the homerism and well and said they were close but you are taking anti-homerism by making the claim that PG is better than Harden at this point. You just can't make that claim, he's a better defender at this point but he is not the better player, almost equal at most.
People think highly of Pacers because they are still in the playoffs now. It's how the NBA works, advancing in the playoffs gets a disproportionate amount attention. In terms of how people perceive the Pacers' future vs. the Rockets' future, the Pacers are benefiting from being in the Eastern Conference. If the teams switched conferences, I am not so sure that it wouldn't be Houston in the conference finals and the Pacers losing in the 1st round. Houston had 45 regular season wins, Pacers 49. Houston had to play a far tougher schedule (12th toughest) than Indiana did (29th toughest) because it had to play Western teams 3 or 4 times vs. only 2 times for Eastern teams. http://www.basketball-reference.com/leagues/NBA_2013.html Had the schedules been switched, Houston may well have been the 3 seed in the East (45 wins got the Bulls the 5th seed, Nets and Pacers tied at 49), with a good chance of knocking off the Hawks, Bulls, Knicks or Nets in either the first or the 2nd round of the playoffs (Houston was 8-0 vs. those teams). Indiana, on the other hand, would have to deal with the likes of Spurs, OKC, Denver, and Memphis. They may well beat those teams (especially considering injuries), but I'd take playing against the Hawks and the Knicks over these guys any day.
I value defense a lot more than offense, especially since pual george is not a bad offensive player, he is just a lot less efective than harden, who is one of the top 5 off players in the league. But harden dosent play any D, and george is already a top 3 wing defender in the league and he can still improve a lot. So to me PG is a better player, its close of course and both are really good, but i will take good offensive with superb D over SuperB offense and none existant D.
Kind of interesting to see how many people think that Hibbert is a dominant center. I understand that he is having a good ECF but realistically he is playing against a team with no center. Have you seen the numbers that Hibbert put up this year? 11.9 pts/g while shooting under 45% with 8.3 reb/g. Hibbert certainly is a good shot blocker but it's hard for me to consider him an elite center when he has never averaged 13 pts or 9 rebs for any season. A 7'2" guy that has never shot 50% for a season? Hibbert is making max money and he only averages 2 pts per game more than Ask while Asik pulls in almost one and a half times as many rebounds as Hibbert. Additionally Asik's fg% is almost 10 points higher than Hibbert. Maybe it's just me but I will gladly take Ask at $8m over Hibbert at $13.6m.
Watching these playoffs makes me think the Pacer/Memphis way of trying to win with mostly defense is not going to work against the MIA/OKC/SAS of the league. Once the Pacers fall behind it's hard for them to make up ground.
Yup. As always, it's about stars. The Rockets have a legit top 10 player and a chance to add another in the next two months. The Pacers have neither. Thus, Houston's future is brighter, if the "future" we're talking about is the potential to win a championship. Pretty simple.
I'd take Hibbert over Asik, but for the price I'd take Dwight over Hibbert and Asik. Hibbert plays with a PG, who is more of a SG. If utilize with the right players especially at PG, he'd be a lot better. If he clocks over 35 minutes a game, he has monster games, but what hurts him most are foul troubles. When you have foul troubles, he is playing defense like Hakeem, who always gets into foul trouble. Remember Hibbert once had a triple double the hard way, 10 pts, 10 reb and 10 blk in a game. I don't think you'll see Asik get that ever.
Well, we are entitled to assume we might have the brighter future Indiana has the better team momentarily....West as a free agent is not getting younger and Hibbert can't improve that much
If we got to play Atlanta and the Knicks in the first 2 rounds of the playoffs, we'd be in the conference finals as well.
http://www.82games.com/1213/ROLRTG4.HTM Production *Team *Player Min Own Opp Net *MIA *James 72% 34 13.8 20.2 *OKC *Durant 78% 30.4 11.2 19.2 *MIA *Wade 60% 25.5 11.8 13.6 *LAC *Paul 59% 28.3 16.1 12.2 *NYK *Anthony 62% 25.8 14.2 11.6 *SAS *Duncan 52% 26 14.4 11.5 *LAL *Bryant 76% 24.2 13.6 10.6 *HOU *Harden 75% 24.1 13.7 10.4 *SAS *Parker 54% 24.2 14 10.2 *BKN *Lopez 56% 26.1 16.4 9.7 *OKC *Westbrook 72% 25.1 15.5 9.6 *IND *West 62% 21.4 12 9.4 *LAC *Crawford 56% 17.3 9.8 7.6 *LAC *Griffin 65% 24 16.6 7.4 *OKC *Ibaka 62% 20.9 14.3 6.5 *LAL *Howard 68% 21.1 14.8 6.4 *IND *George 75% 17.6 11.2 6.4 *MEM *Gasol 70% 20.9 15.1 5.8 *MIN *Pekovic 49% 21.6 15.9 5.7 *SAS *Leonard 45% 17.6 12 5.6 *BOS *Garnett 50% 20.3 14.7 5.5 *BOS *Pierce 64% 19.8 14.3 5.5 *CHI *Butler 53% 16.2 10.7 5.5 *GSW *Curry 75% 22.2 16.7 5.5 *MIA *Bosh 61% 21.5 16.2 5.3
Yep..it's the NBA..turns out superstars win championships. I can really only think of one season where it didn't work out that way.
Realistically the rockets probably don't have any chance at a championship as is, and even with howard I think OKC would be better. It would be nice if they could get to conference finals once in awhile.
Agreed that Hibbert can occasionally have huge games but day in and day out his numbers aren't that great. That means that those great games are being offset by some pretty underwhelming games. Bottom line is results and Hibbert's aren't superior to Asik's and he makes Max money.The fact that he had a triple double doesn't change that. It's similar to Jamal Crawford having 50 point games...very few players have had more than him but there are a lot of players better than him. Until he proves differently, Hibbert is what he is, 12 to 13 ppg, 8 to 8.5 RPG and 2 to 3 bpg. Solid numbers but not what I would want to spend Max money on.
You may be right..would be nice to be in the discussion, though..to think you had a legit shot if things fall right. Howard paired with Harden puts you in that discussion...you have two of the two best players at their respective positions at that point, arguably...that's the kind of mix it takes. I'm assuming we haven't seen the very best of James Harden, given his age. Just find the right mix around him at some point and make it happen...get hot at the right time...catch a break or 2. I'm good with that.
I say Rockets have a better future. We basically gutted our Rockets roster and this new team did so well for its first year. I think next year we will look a lot better.
