Where? You talked about the Lakers and how you think they are deeper now. I disagree as they seem like a very unbalanced team hoping a young, injury prone center can be their Rudy Gobert. Tell me about the Wolves..... they also seem super unbalanced now. So Homerism is now thinking we can get to the second round? Yes? That's where you set the bar? Remember you initially replied to me. You scared, go to church.
I've already explained it to you, I'm not sure why you think I'm obliged to continue inane back and forths with a homer?
So you’ve set the homer bar at the second round? Yes? You initially replied to me. You scared, go to church.
I've already explained it to you, I'm not sure why you think I'm obliged to continue inane back and forths with a homer?
I totally disagree as someone who has watched from the early 90s, unless you mean PG as in you actually believe Patrick Beverley was the Rockets PG during the Harden days, or you believed Kenny Smith/Matt Maloney were the PGs when Clyde was around. If tomorrow the Rockets somehow get Ant or Luka, I'm not gonna say the Rockets still have a PG problem or even a shooting problem for that matter.
This is fun! So you’ve set the homer bar at the second round? Yes? You initially replied to me. You scared, go to church.
I've already explained it to you, I'm not sure why you think I'm obliged to continue inane back and forths with a homer? (Wonder when he'll realise I haven't read any of his posts since the first time I replied with this?)
I've already explained it to you, I'm not sure why you think I'm obliged to continue inane back and forths with a homer?
I like what the Wolves did, they have a squad. Lamelo is obviously polorizing but entering his mid 20s with Rudy Gobert behind him, I could see it. They may have more difficulty with the regular season wins but they’ll be a better playoff team. Only one of Gobert, Randle, Naz could close a tight game against a good team anyway and they want McDaniels at the 4 to match the speed and skill. We should do the same thing and trade some power forward depth for skilled guard play imo.
Why do they need to be healthy? This is pass or fail the thread title is "Rockets cooked next year" and not "Adams will play 82 games next year". This season Rockets will get to the 2nd round and face either OKC or SAS presuming those teams are healthy. 100 usd, deal or no deal?
After some time thinking away from the bbs, I think I will wait until around end of December to first week of January before I pass judgment on the team. To be fair, lots of young guys on our team that could probably make the jump to the next level in the next few months. Although, same can be asked with our vets if injuries and age will finally take its toll. either way, there's no use comparing against other teams that made tons of moves. Hopefully we have enough ammunition by trade deadline if we really need to make a meaningful change
Lamelo makes Minnesota more exciting to watch, but not necessarily better. Minnesota wants to take playmaking pressure off Ant, but a ball dominant PG may take the ball out of his hands too much. And as flawed a player as Randle is he is a much more efficient scorer in volume than Ball. Ball's shot diet is horrendous even with an improved supporting cast last season. I personally think the fit is good, but saying they're a better playoff team now is a bit too far. They made the WCF twice already and beat Denver last year despite devastating injuries. Lamelo is completely untested in the playoffs. Is his fit really that good that he still elevates their ceiling beyond what they've already done?
There's also LaMelo's injury history to think about. Plenty of chances this blows up in their faces moreso than it actually helps them. Could go either way.
It's been a running joke, which is what I meant it as. I mean the Rockets have been looking for a PG, the actual position, more often than not, since the early 80's when they had the great Robert Reid hopping around backwards at 6'8" bringing the ball up the court (as Murphy was sunsetted), the PG position has been a somewhat mediocre position for us requiring someone else to actually do PG duties. One of the few exceptions was Harden who played it because he was that good. McGrady wasn't a PG - he was just that good a basketball player, but we had him bringing the ball up, scoring, and playmaking with a knee that was about to blow. No. I want a competent PG who is good enough that he's not "some dude standing in the corner" all game and somebody we have to cover for 50% of the game, or a dude that just brings the ball up and collects his paycheck. Obviously we've had great playmakers in those years, but the joke was that you could go back to the 80's (I've been watching since the late 70's) and people were saying "we need shooting" or "we need a PG" which is why we drafted players like Steve Harris, Doug Lee, Conner Henry, picked up people like Andre Turner, Rafer Alston, etc. Most of the ones we drafted (and there were quite a few) were busts as shooters or playmakers. Or they had major flaws. As for shooters, the list of "hopefuls" is probably even longer. There's an on-going joke that guys that could shoot in college or on their last pro team come here to watch their shot die. One of the few who has kicked that "curse" and stayed elite has been Durant. In all actuality, I'd rather have 5 players out there that are able to shoot and handle the ball and aren't major liabilities that need to be covered for. This is now an era of wings dominating, so you're going to have SFs and SGs commanding the ball for most of the playclock, and the PG position/play is spread across multiple positions. We can't even do that for an entire game against good teams with our roster.
While I have been critical of Lamelo for years I did happen to watch several key games of his both in person and on TV last year and I think he did show some real growth on that team last year - people are sleeping on how good he is. The injury history is real and a VERY legit ongoing concern. The likely outcomes here are: - Minnesota gets both a newly matured Lamelo who is healthy enough - they become a significantly more dangerous team with him - Minnesota bought "high" on a Melo back to his knucklehead game but hey - he can take some pressure off ANT and vice versa - Lamelo gets significantly easier shots on a team with another alpha so his efficiency likely goes up if nothing else and maybe he is still the same careless with the ball PG he has been. - whether they got "good Melo" or "bad Melo", they still got "injured Melo" and he's not healthy enough to contribute so the team is effectively last year's team but adding Divencenzo back from a year ending injury, and McDaniel is trying to take a leap as a scorer to offset the loss of Randle. Regardless of the outcome above - they weren't necessarily getting significantly better just bringing back Donte so I think they made a shrewd move that doesn't necessarily make them significantly worse, but gives them an opportunity at a higher ceiling. I think they made the right type of risk move here - the rumbling of "Ant wants out" was only going to get louder if they didn't do anything.
