SI for Kids predicts Pacers over Spurs in Finals. i'd say this is closer to being accurate than being total crap.
Without being a complete homer, how can anyone say that this is complete crap? Rockets will not beat the spurs Heat or pacers are a toss up Also the Nuggets might beat Suns but still another toss up Cleveland cant beat detroit The only thing that I can see that most likely will not happen is that Minnesota and LA will probably be a couple spots higher. Thats about it.
I don't like the fact that Spurs vs. Suns in the Conference Finals. Suns suck ass. I don't know what the guy is thinking with JJ, Amare, and Quentin gone.
The Sun's rank was made before Amare's surgery right? The Spurs haven't ever made it to two NBA Finals in a row, Amare won't be the same this season, Dirk will come up short again, leaving the Rockets as the clear favorites.
Looks like as good a guess as anybody else. Focusing on the Western Conference, I'd flip flop the Kings and the Suns. The Kings are flying under the radar now, but Shareef, Bonzi...good pickups. And I don't know about Memphis...they seemed to lose a fair amount of talent that they didn't really replace. Utah, or some other team, may sneak in. In the East, I can see the Celtics being better (or being worse, really...they are so young) and maybe flip-flopping the Cavs/Pistons - sounds strange, but who knows what Larry's loss will do, plus I think the Cavs really added some talent there (Damon Jones, Larry Hughes, Donyell Marshall...Mike Wilks ). Don't know much about Mike Brown and the coaching situation, though, after last year's merry-go-round.
Yes, I doubt the Nuggets can take us in the playoffs. With a squad like we do, in a seven game shootout, we can play with the best of them. I don't understand people's love affair with the Miami Heat this season. Sure they had a great breakout season with Shaq last year but they also had awsome team chemistry. Now that they've completely rebuilt the team around Wade and Shaq, who knows how things will turn out. The same goes for Phoenix. Why would any analyst think that Phoenix is still able to pull off the type of run-and-gun style offense like they did last season w/o Richardson, Hunter, and Johnson is beyond me. Rather than building on what they already have, they took away a chunk of their talent just to add interior defense?? This doesn't make much sense and will probably come back to haunt them come playoffs. I'd say Rockets is 2nd in the West behind the Spurs. And Miami is 2nd in the East right behind Indiana.
They're not necessarily saying the Nuggets will have a better record than Houston(although that wouldn't exactly shock me). We're destined for 4th place no matter what we do unless we win the Southwest Division. As far as the overall picks, they're better than SI's normal projections. I'll give them the benefit of the doubt with the Suns in the Conference Finals and assume they made that pick before Amare went down.
houston being the 4 seed is very realistic because if we don't win the division that's the highest seed we can get. i believe we'll have the 2nd best record in the conference, but not be the 2 seed because of how it's laid out for playoff seeding.
If we're second to the Spurs, it won't matter how good our record is. We'll be the 4th seed. That means we play them in the second round. Picking the Spurs to beat us in a 7 game series isn't exactly a stretch.
Nuggets over us is a big stretch. Lakers over Warriors is also very questionable. I don't know why the Nuggets are such a sexy pick. Andre Miller and Kenyon Martin are better than Alston and Swift, but not by much. After that, we're signficantly better at SG, SF, and C. I'd even rate our bench as being slightly ahead of theirs.
Just because we're the second best team doesn't mean we should have the second best record in the regular season Plenty of teams in the past have gone on to win the championships without holding the best regular season record. Talent wise, I think we're up there with tops teams. Because Spurs have wons a few rings with most of the current squad, I think they have the edge for now.
Yes you are right. I take back what I said. Thanks. I was just too upset when I saw the Nuggets is #2 and we are #4.
I say the Spurs will be #4 this year and the Rockets #1. The Spurs were "barely" over 50% on the road last year.. and only because of a sick home record.. they were #1. I think the Rockets have upgraded enough to be able to beat them at home for once, and that's "with" NVE and Finley added to their roster. Rox will do better at home after the players getting a year under their belt to get accustomed to the Toyota Center. We just can't afford to lose to the crappy teams. Call me crazy if you want... but the Spurs are going to be this years Patriots. Looks unbeatable.. until someone stomps them. I would also swap Memphis and Dallas.
I could care less what some writer at SI thinks of our Rockets. These projections are largely based upon last season's results. In addition, the people who come up with these rankings have no in-depth knowledge about any particular team. Because SA won the title last year, they are this year's media darlings (deservedly so). I honestly believe that the Rockets will win the SW division. How am I basing this on you ask? By the preseaon play and my own expectations for this team. I could be right and I could be wrong. We'll just have to wait and see. Consider this: We played SA pretty tight last year. If you can recall, there was one game against SA last season where Rod Strickland was the starting PG. Remember that game? The game where we couldn't get the ball past mid court. Now picture Rafer. I'll leave the rest to your imaginations. There was another game against them. No Juwan Howard. PF time was spilt between Spoon and Padgett. Now picture both Swift and Howard. Now picture those 2 blocks swift had on Duncan the other night. Nuf said. Also the biggest SA homer of them all, Steve Kerr, in his lastest SW projections, touches upon the possibility of the Rocket's winning the division.
I honestly believe that SA will have the best record in the West. They're just too dominate at home. Think about it: they won 59 games last year despite Duncan's pretty major ankle injury. Now they've deepened their bench. If the injury bug doesn't hit expect SA to win about 62 games.
I don't have a huge problem with where the Rockets are... though I do think they're #2 in the West. My real problem is where the Suns are.
