[OFFICIAL] 2024-25 NBA Power rankings

There is not a fan in the world who would have predicted the Rockets to be number 2 in the NBA’s power rankings more than halfway through the year.

The vocally dissatisfied player-only fans or player-only haters are just so weird and self-absorbed … same goes for the ‘sure but it won’t last’ Debbie downers. Yeah, we know - back-to-backs remaining, road games coming up, no playoff experience, yada yada yada.

But it has lasted longer than any of us expected and the style points are great also with plenty of great wins against very good teams — any real Rockets fan should be jumping through the roof, Amen-style.

 

Rockets are rising, and the scary thing is barring trades they still have a ton of potential left to be discovered considering:

1. Jabari injured still has to come back
2. Tari just recovering still getting his mojo back
3. Steven Adams the same
4. Cam Whitmore learning how to play winning basketball
5. Reed Sheppard yet to contribute

If everyone continue their stellar play Rox might end up no 1 when all is said and done.

 

When you consider Amen is the one replacing him and the defense still got worse you can see Jabari was way better on defense than people knew.

 

Agree that there’s likely plenty more growth this season alone, let alone going forward…

…but that OKC monster is #1. They’re ahead of us by a season or two and have an MVP level guy. Happy to take the #2 seed behind them though.

 

But I was told Amen is the closest thing to game-mode, God-level defense.

Can someone help explain these ?

DEC:(12/1-1/3 with FVV, Brooks, Green, Sengun, Bari) 9 games, 148M: 5-4, OFFRTG: 108, DEFRTG: 106.9, NETRTG: 1.1

JAN (1/4-1/26 with FVV, Brooks, Green, Sengun, Thompson) 8 games, 144M: 7-1, OFFRTG: 116.1, DEFRTG: 126.4, NETRTG: -10.3

Season (with FVV, Brooks, Green, Sengun, Bari) 28 games, 416M: 18-10, OFFRTG: 110.4, DEFRTG: 103.8, NETRTG: 6.6

Season (with FVV, Brooks, Green, Sengun, Thompson) 21 games, 180M: 15-6, OFFRTG: 111.1, DEFRTG: 120.6, NETRTG: -9.5

 

Surging Rockets beat the Celtics after knocking off the Cavaliers twice | AP News

BOSTON (AP) — The Houston Rockets have been one of the NBA’s more surprising teams this season. After their past three games, they shouldn’t shock anyone.

The Rockets beat the Eastern Conference-leading Cleveland Cavaliers twice last week before traveling to Boston and pulling out a 114-112 victory over the defending champion Celtics on Monday night.

“We’re over halfway through now and our record is what it is, so it’s not just a fluke or anything,” Houston coach Ime Udoka said. “People watch film and see the physicality and the way that we play, it’s a little different than the rest of the league, maybe that catches people off guard initially, but I wouldn’t say we’re sneaking up on anybody anymore at this point in the season.”

Houston (31-14), which is second in the Western Conference, posted its ninth win in 11 games on Monday. Its record is a few percentage points better than that of the defending NBA champion Celtics (32-15).

The Cavs and Celtics were a combined 104-28 (.788) entering their games against Houston. The Rockets became the first team in NBA history to win three straight games against teams with that high of a winning percentage, with a minimum of 40 games for each opponent, according to OptaSTATS.

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And Alpi isn't even playing anywhere near his offensive potential.

 

ESPN always the joke have us at 5 lol. Below Grizz who have a worse record and had the easiest schedule to date.

 

To be fair power rankings aren’t meant to be a copy/paste job of what the current standings are based solely on record.

Point differential has proven to be more indicative of quality during a season over the raw record. Currently the Rockets are 6th in the league in point differential.

Basketball reference has their SRS rating that takes into account point differential and strength of schedule. The Rockets are currently 4th in the league by that metric. Just barely ahead of Memphis.

At the same time “power rankings’, to me at least, is more about how a team is playing more recently than it is about the season as a whole. With the teams we have beaten recently hard to argue against Houston being any worse than 3rd.

 

No respect. But they’re in the business of sales and marketing the “Stars” the NBA wants to promote much like how the NFL promotes Patricia Mahomes and Travis Swift.

 

Gotta love it!

 

I agree. They are missing Chet though so we might have a chance.

The crazy thing is they will get a top 10 lotto pick next year thanks to Morey though so they will get even stronger.

 

Before we had Bari and Amen, now we just have Amen.

The other thing is we faced the toughest part of the schedule the last 2 mos. After the Grizz game I believe Rox will have one of the weakest schedules for the rest of the season so you will see those rating nos trend up.

 

Philly has won 4 straight. With a bunch of teams wanting to lose and them wanting to win i think it's pretty safe they make the playoffs.

 

And their lotto pick from the last draft is a very impressive player who has been out for this entire season (Nikola Topic). They are loaded.

 

Look at their next opponents lol. Winning 4 straight doesnt mean anything. Denver Boston Dallas Miami they can easily go on a 4 loss streak Maxey is just carrying them to wins he is running on fumes.

https://www.tankathon.com/76ers

 

I agree. If the Rox fail to win a ring in the Stone era its not that he is bad Presti is just too good.

 

Yeah I looked at their remaining strength of schedule for the entire season. It’s the 5th easiest out of 30 teams. After their next handful of games it will likely be the easiest in the NBA right along the time all of those teams will be tanking and some of which will have traded some players to lose more.


“lol”