[Salt Lake Tribune] Ask the Expert: Could Utah make it past Houston in a first-round

I think some of things he said were correct. The Jazz are good but I have a feeling that this year someone is going to be traded from the Jazz. They are looking to save money and there is a good chance Boozer will be the guy. You have to remember this....come next summer, three of their guys will be free agents. Okur, Korver, and Boozer will be on the market. I don't think they'll be able to hold all three of those guys for next year. I feel that they'll make a change sooner or later.

The bench for the Rockets is going to be real important this year. We saw last year what Boston and LA were able to do with a deep bench. Teams like San Antonio, Phoenix, New Orleans faded out due to not having a deep bench.

The Rockets can get by having Rafer as the point guard. The problem I have is that we don't have a back up. Barry will some minutes but how good can go for us? T-Mac doesn't need to be playing the point.

We gotta hope this year that every great point guard in this league doesn't kill us like last year. Williams, Paul, Parker, and Nash killed us last year. Artest isn't going to be guarding them all the time.

 

The potential 'chemistry problems' Artest could cause are overblown. Remember what Daryl Morey had to say:

The only thing to be concerned about is him not running up in the stands, destroying cameras, etc. Remember this was a guy that 5 years ago, was the 2nd best player on a team that won 61 games, and turned around the Kings in half a season to take from lottery-bound into the postseason where they gave the Spurs a fight. He makes teams better. Period.

 

salt lake tribune guy saying jazz would win in 7 grueling games is the equivalent of a neutral guy saying the rockets would win in 6 games. he couldn't have given us more props than that without getting fired.

 

Haha. I always get amused when I read comments on other boards like 'Artest brings Houston just a notch below the West's true elite'...forgetting that Houston was just a notch below the West's true elite last year. I'm not guaranteeing Houston will become an elite team next year, it just isn't logical to predict that adding Artest will make Houston what they already were...unless they're implying adding him was a lateral move, which usually isn't the case.

 

Sorry to disagree but they will need to be 8th seed to play the Rockets in the first round!

 

they will tank to get that 7th seed if needed...

 

yep...

EXACTLY.

 

rockets in 4, artest on deron in clutch time and its over

 

With both battier and Artest on the court to end games it completely negates the X factor that usually will win it for the other team.

If Battier was guarding Korver b/c Artest was covering Millsap do you think Korver would be able to launch open threes at will anymore?

The rockets D at the end of games should just be amazing.

 

even with Artest we would struggle to beat Utah because we still can't do anything with Yao.... he still can't guard boozer inside, or okur out at the 3pt line. i know you guys don't like to admit it but its true. yao is a major liability against the jazz (no yao bash), especially if hes going to struggle on the offensive end as well and be turnover machine.

 

c'mon, don't bash that guy so hardly.
At least he is trying REAL hard to be objective.

 

How can anyone hate on an article that was that well written and that complimentary toward the Rockets? Blind homerism if you ask me.

Of course, I disagree with a couple of his points. Namely the 50-55 wins (I think it's more like 60, give or take a couple, and the fact that he picked the Jazz in 7 games. Of course, that's what he's supposed to do. Every year the Rockets get better on paper, and every year they still come up short. There's no reason for this guy to write an article before the season starts saying that the Rockets would beat the Jazz in a series. There's no on-court evidence to support that.

 

Cant see why rox cant play zone against jazz.

With yao in the middle, and the other 4 players covering the perimeter. Negate the shooting of the 3p shooters, and a big presence in the middle to discourage them from penetrating.

Even with yao not playing, or playing limited minutes, rox still can beat them flat.

 

The Utah expert saying the Utah in 7 means the rockets will win in 5 or 6.

 

The difference this time around is that Boozer now has to guard somebody. In that series he was up against the likes of Chuck Hayes and Juwan Howard, no threats to do anything offensively, and had easy rest on D to save up for offense. You saw how lame he came up when he had to guard Scola and Landry, then Odom and Gasol.

 

ugh I love the rockets but its more like:

rafer <<< deron
tmac >>> brewer
artest > ak
scola < boozer
Yao >> okur


the problem arises is for Yao to guard either boozer or okur. Yao defender boozer great in game 1 of the 07 series but after that boozer figured out how to beat yao (didnt he have like 40 in game 2?) okur is a mobile 7 footer that will give yao problems as well as play on the perimeter more.

the one huge plus is that rafer is by far the weakest link on the team offensively and the jazz historically have double with boozer or AK on the post against yao and they can no longer do that with artest and scola there.

if they try to double with williams he is too small to really create the pressure of a secondary defender against yao and Rafer isnt a horrible 3pt shooter (he has made strides, not a good 3pt shooter but not horrible) to spot up and knock down a few shots. Also rafers confidence in his offense has risen a lot last year and should pay dividends this year.


IMO? If both teams are healthy as this writer speculates I dont see how the jazz can beat us this year. Two years ago the Jazz had a better offensive system and more talent than the rockets and we took them to 7 games and lost game 7 which was very winnable for us if not for a few plays. Last season we increased our talent, changed our offensive system while the Jazz remained the same (losing fisher adding korver) in both talent and system. We were plagued by injuries last year which did us in. This season we further added talent ---while not losing any significant talent-- while the jazz so far have stayed put with their roster.

deron williams is an amazing player but he really torched bobby jackson and aaron brooks last year, rafer is a smart defender..williams will light up rafer as well but rafer does a much better job guarding him.

i dont see how this series (if they play again) will go to a game 7 if both teams are healthy

 

I dunno, considering we lost in 6 with no Rafer (for 2.5 games, no Yao and essentially no Artest (an artest in that series would've been nice), Battier and Tmac both with injuries they were playing through. Thats basically what would have to happen for Utah to win a series against us now. We would need to basically have our entire starting lineup either out with an injury or playing injured. I mean, maybe we can pencil in Yao or Tmac with some kind of lingering injury that might make them less effective, maybe pencil in Artest for a 1 game suspension in the playoffs, but the rest of the guys don't have a good enough history of injury for you to just assume they will be hurt in the 1st round.

 

exactly just because they should be ( ARE ) better from artest and scola/landry/brooks getting out of there first year. they still have lost 2 years in a row. and the jazz are still the same probably a little better because there younger players are the ones that win the games for them.

 

I hate to agree with him, but I find myself on his side. Look, until we get some kind of indication of how this team gels we can't really say anything has really changed. Ron-Ron should have a positive impact it doesn't mean he will. Look at Bonzi two years ago, he skipped out on the team at the most important time. I'm not saying Ron-Ron will, but it's still all in the air.

 

I don't care if they beat us 5 times in a row. We aren't the same team as the team that got beat in the playoffs. You add in a healthy Alston, Battier, Tmac and Yao (Yao and Alston actually missed games but Battier and Tmac were playing injured). Throw in Artest and Barry... its a completely different team.

If we play Utah again, I'd put my money on Houston right now to win the series.