44-46. Can't believe so many people think we're actually going to win 51+ games... Maybe if Harden is focused and has another MVP year.
If this was our final roster, with such PG and C rotation and the usual health of Anderson Gordon and Nene...less than 40 wins.
I'm thinking 48 wins. our team is better than last year. but will go through some growing pains. Forsee a first round matchup versus the blazers.
Lucky to win 20 games.... Harden and the rest the scrubs that think they are underpaid will underperform or just play good enough to get by until their next contract.
ryan and eric are making alot of money now, im pretty sure they want to show up and play as much as they can.
This is a silly question given we dont even know what the final roster will be. Ask again at the beginning of training camp.
Regardless of roster changes MDA should be aiming to get the Rockets in a 2-4 seed. If not, he's garbage
Yep, that's what it looks like to me right now baring a trade (which I pray to God is coming). But truthfully I don't care about regular season record and I don't know why so many people do. It's not hard to make the playoffs; half the teams in each conference do. I want to win in the playoffs! So if you hold the team to a high standard, you can't be satisfied with the offseason thus far. Here's to hoping we don't sacrifice the long term for short term magical thinking.
54-28 in ultimate Rocket fashion (never meeting expectations and always overachieving or underachieving)
I think we're better than our record... because I predicted 56+ wins earlier in the thread. I have a few other reasons too. First, our winning pace is sustainable seeing we've mostly been on the road. Second, once the Texans go off air, Houston seems to start caring about basketball and will give us added home court advantage, and extra home games. Third, the team is learning the offense and defense and they're getting better at both(via eyeball test). Fourth, we're 5-1 with Beverly in the lineup and that's no accident. He completes us. He's the PG we need to make Gordon a successful SG who runs the show and he's the SG we need when Harden is on the floor. Fifth, we clearly have our rotation figured out. We play Harden, Beverly, Gordon, Capela, Anderson, Brewer, Naynay, Dekker, and Ariza every game they've been available. Knowing your rotation builds a chemistry that makes you a lot tougher to beat and defend. If healthy all year, we reach 56 wins with our resiliency we've found. That Portland game shows we've turned a corner. We're pretty tough mentally. Just like MDA's Phoenix teams that just pushed on the gas when things were looking bad, then they'd win by 15. We're playing that well at the moment and I think it will come and go during the season. And it will come a lot. Houston, we've found our stroke. Let's hope it's lasts a while, is a lot of fun, and we exude all over the streets when the season comes to a happy ending.
It's also the way GS has played the last 2 years. A lot of their fans would have you think they blow teams out early and then it's just a breez I the finish line. In reality most teams kept it fairly close or would make a comeback during the first 3 quarter. Then when that fourth quarter would hit that's when their supior fire power would really show and they would hit a 9-0 run being up 3-4 points and in a matter of a minute they would be up by 12-14 points. That's kind of how I see houston playing. It's really impressive to see and I actually think it's sustainable. This Rockets teams is really good. I keep thinking we need one more of something. But the more I keep watching them I start to think why can't this group get it done? It all comes down to focus on the defensive side of the ball. When we're playing aggressive D our ceiling is as high as any team in the league outside of the last two champs. I'm not going to go that far yet but I really do believe we can beat any team in the league besides them two in a 7 game series. Remember we're only getting better. We're 3 games away from being 20 games in to the season most of our have been on the road and after 20 games 13 will have been against teams currently in the playoffs, 14 of them on the road. Very impressive what this team is doing. We might actually be better than we all think. This might actually be a top 3 teams that can challenge the clips and Spurs for the seeding after the Warriors. It's not out of the question that's forsure.
I feel like our record is 'just right'. We've put away the lower-end teams better than last season. We split with the Spurs. We choked against the Thunder, hung tight with Cleveland, and got sliced and diced by Atlanta and Toronto. 50 wins sounds about right - a team that beats the non-playoff teams pretty handily and sputters against contenders. (This can improve, of course.) So far the team is out-performing majority opinion, and proving the doubters wrong more than the optimists. Hey, i'll take a positive moment when I can get it.
