Western conference gets far too much props for being mediocre as hell. OKC and SA are the cream of the crop; rest of them? Scare you for a series/takes advantage of injuries to escape a series. MEM, GS, LAC fall into the latter. We overhype the hell out of the Western conference. Acting like this is 2000-2004. Those days been over.
Hedo was NOT an All Star and never has been one. (Nor has Josh Smith ever been an All Star) Surprising, I know. Hedo won the Most Improved award the year before. He got TREATED like an All-Star after and PAID like one cashing in off Finals. But it was fool's gold. Prime Hedo was better than Parsons, agree. Better passer/playmaker. Not close to Harden, though. Thats like Lamar Odom to Kobe. Rockets are setting up for that 3 point shooting. A sign of doing their homework. Garcia can hit jumpers and 3's. They've added Casspi who can shoot from the corners. Reggie Williams has to prove he's no fluke shooter but he's been good from 3 before. Their draft pick Canaan is a 3 point bomber. Even street free agent signings like Robert Covington are that Rashard-like stretch 4. Besides Dwight, Asik and Smith, everyone on the Rockets is a threat from outside, Jones and D-Mo included. (Can see why Morey likes Stan Van Gundy as a coach lol)
In 2008 and 2010, the West #8 playoff seed had 50 WINS. Both times that would have been a #4 seed with 1st round home court advantage in the East. Since 2004, the East has sent 11 TEAMS with LOSING RECORDS into the playoffs (If you count non-winning .500 even records, 14 teams) The West in that time? NONE 2 out of the last 3 years the Rockets missed the playoffs, they would have EASILY made it in the EAST. The East sucked THEN and sucked even MORE after. The only time East was respectable in last 10 years was 2 years ago the strike shortened year when everyone was behind and was more parity.
As a team they have a lot more consistent, better knockout shooters but outside of that, the players outside of Dwight were very limited overall.
Rafer Alston was the player that meant a lot to that team during their playoff run. He was the heart and attitude of that team... He brought toughness to them.. He slapped Eddie house and didn't back down to those celtics. Always thought he was under rated in Houston.
Yeah they only had a team with Lebron on it to beat... That's why I feel the only thing we are missing is another wing defender, a designated Lebron/Durant/Melo stopper. Parsons can D up Durant really well, but I feel like someone stronger is needed for Lebron.
Pretty sure clutch posted once that Alston had the lowest shooting % of anyone ever that was a starter or played a certain amount of minutes.
Turk was a beast on Orlando and his stats were great despite playing a team game where everyone got shots I think he was much better that year than Parson's was last year and will be this year for us. You guys arent getting Turk enough credit
How does Harden > Rashard? Rashard and Turk were key into the Magic reaching the finals, both were extremely clutch during the playoffs, something we have yet to even remotely see from Harden.
This thread is unnecessary. This is apples to oranges. We cannot copy someone else's blueprint and map it, it's not the way it goes. Getting to the Finals takes also something called luck, and there's way too many variables in the equation. The best way we can go about it is to have these areas covered 1) Cohesive Starpower(not just talent jumbled, but something that fits) 2) Role players who fit the star players(shooters, defenders) 3) Depth to cover different match ups(playing the Clippers is different than the Grizzlies, Pacers are different than Miami....all this matters) 4) Health 5) Luck This list is in no order, it takes all of this. And then when you multiply it by time, you get experience, and you increase your odds of landing a ring. Getting Dwight was arguably the biggest piece of the pie, but health can derail that in one shot. So we must hope for the best, but actually give ourselves a fair chance. In all honesty, we really do have the pieces. Do we have 3 superstars like Miami? No, but we do have two absolute studs, and plenty of intangible pieces(Omer, Bev, Garcia, Parsons) that work seamlessly. We also have the key areas covered(paint protector in Dwight) and highly efficient offense generate(3 or Drive Harden, and post play Dwight).
Harden is better than Rashard obviously. Hedo was way better than Parsons' last year. His stats are good (http://www.basketball-reference.com/playoffs/NBA_2009_totals.html) but doesn't show everything. He was primary ball handler and playmaker.
i'm not sure dwight can reproduce his own production from that season. that's the biggest difference. orlando didn't have a dynamic wing player / scorer like harden. so +1 for us. a determining factor i see is that everyone in their starting lineup outside of dwight was a knockdown 3 point shooter. lin and our PF's are not even close. i think beverly could be with a little improvement, and lin would be a good backup. that will never happen as moray wouldn't want to damage lin's trade value.even then we would need a stretch 4 AND keep asik to play the gortat role so we can have 48 minutes or rim protection that orlando had.
