You don't have to post, but please exercise your right to vote in the poll! We are approximately 3weeks away from starting the 2020-2021 NBA preseason and the offseason player/personnel movement appears to be coming to a slow dramatic end. I know there have been rumors of trading some key players, mainly one of, or any combination of Harden/Westbrook/Gordon in the future, but we are going to focus on the present roster in this thread and not indulge ourselves in any hypothetical future trades, so all three will be thought of as being on our roster the whole season. For a team that still has its two main alphas on the team, the Rockets have gone through a decent overhaul of main personnel so far... 1.) Daryl Morey 2.) Mike D'Antoni 3.) Robert Covington 4.) Jeff Green 5.) Austin Rivers And replaced with... 1.) Rafael Stone 2.) Stephen Silas 3.) Christian Wood 4.) Boogie Cousins 5.) David Nwaba*** (***) was on the team but didn't play for us last year. There have also been some roster fillers (Tate, Martin Jr., Howard, Jones & Wooten) that will most likely ride the bench and therefore shouldn't be expected to contribute much if anything at all this upcoming season. Our current playing roster as I see it consists of... Westbrook/Gordon Harden/McLemore House/Nwaba/Brown Tucker/Coboclo/Wooten/Martin Wood/Cousins I don't think this is a championship team the way it's currently set up. I also think that our biggest acquisition/question mark is the addition of Cousins to the team! The loss of Covington and the additions of Wood/Nwaba to the rotation is a wash for me! If Boogie can somehow get back to 80-90% of his dominant former self this team is going to be a legitimate threat to the title, but if he plays below 70% we are going to be 6th seed at best. Wood was a FANTASCTIC get, and one could argue that he was our biggest acquisition (debatable/probable), but if Boogie gets his groove back (pun intended) then we will be a force to be reckoned with!! Most of the NBA executives think that he's done as far as being an elite player...I'M HOPING THEY'RE WRONG!!! Once again, I digress... This is obviously my opinion, feel free to comment and please vote, I'm interested to see what CF's thinks of our roster so far! Go Rockets!!! ....... ....... .......
Pretty much a wash as of now, if they can dump Westbrook, then I'd say they were better. Till that happens, it doesn't matter what they do.
If Cousins gets back to 70 percent of what he used to be the Rockets have a nightmarish front court between him and Woods. Woods probably makes the offense a little less predictable since now Harden has vertical spacing again .
I think Covington is the better fit/player bewteen those six players so, i think there's a chance we might end up being worse, also cause the core is still getting older, but in the end it'll also depend on how legit Wood really is, and what Boogie will eventually bring on the table (assuming he'll be able to fit of course) so, hard to tell now. Regardless, i'm really curious to see the team play, between the new guys and the coach there's something new to see which is always exciting.
My head tells me that he's not going to be anywhere near his former dominant self, but my heart...my Rockets heart is hoping for a Rocky moment and that Boogie will be singing... Spoiler ....... ....... .......
Im not gonna talk about our change in GMs because its a clear loss. But roster wise.....we are pretty much the same.
I am going to be positive here and assume Silias Cousins and Wood are all homeruns, and that RW and JH mend fences. Wait, thats a lot of assumptions. I'm changing my vote.
I think the squad is a lot more balanced than last years, but still needs some tweaking. Losing Covington is enormous. The only softening of the loss is that we have Tucker and House who can play the same position. Adding Wood/ Cousins at the C spot is huge. We didn't have a C at the end of last season, and Wood has the potential to play the role of "Capela with a jump shot". Anything Boogie can produce greater than zero is big. Nwaba was a savvy addition last season. A passable backup at the 2/3 spot, young, athletic defender and if he shoots 43% from 3 again, could be addition of the year! I like the other roster moves - bringing in athletic youth is a positive, even if most won't play.
I hope Nwaba will fill the role of roco. We seriously need to fill his spot. So is our pg situation and big man depth
Offensively its better but, it really shapes on how the new players fit in. If Wood can be this new uprising player that can be a inside presence as well. Lets trash small ball. Rockets also have a question mark with Cousins. If he turns out like being productive, i think it would be a great if he could help Gordon Run the 2nd unit with Mclemore, Bruno, and Brown.
The answer is it depends, as there are a lot things that need to play out. But it has a higher ceiling and could be better to much better. One major key is improving our defensive rebounding by getting bigger, on the 65 win team our DRB% was elite (3rd in the league), we were nearly a top 5 defense and then defensive rebounding fell off years after. https://www.basketball-reference.com/teams/HOU/2018.html I hope they have a really good training camp and practices, buy in and gel as a team to improve.
really depends on cousins..... if he plays at all star level, then yes we are better. if he cant stay on the floor because of trash defense then no.
I think we'll be a bit worse. The roster is a wash, probably about the same, unless Cousins is magically good/healthy again. I think that Silas as a first time head coach won't be as effective as D'antoni. I know MDA had his problems, and I have faith and confidence that Silas can be good, but it'll take him some time to learn and get into the role of HC. I'd be pretty surprised if he's a top head coach right out of the gate.
If LBJ and Kawhi are injured come playoff time then yes it’s a championship roster. Otherwise no it’s not. The roster is about the same except Tucker and WB are older. I really hate losing Roco but I will optimistically believe Woods makes it a wash. I think Cousins puts up stats but like Melo you wonder if it’s actually making you better.
I think this is one of those situations where we shuffle the deck and end up with the same talent. But at least now with the new additions there’s unknowns, X factors we are willing to discover. Which makes it at least better moving forward in terms of curiosity/hope. Last years roster was depressing to watch once we played the Lakers.
Old core gets older, lost all of our depth but added maybe 2 players with potential. So probably a lot worse but with a very slight chance they are better
