I dont know if most people care but Wallace apparently doesn't have any fractures according to the Charlotte Observer and he has been taken to a local hospital in speculation of a collapsed lung. I cringe everytime a player gets hit hard, as someone who plays sports, its very scary when things like that happen.
The Lakers have a lot of inconsistency off their bench as well. This is the way I see it: Farmar >> Brooks Wafer/Barry >>> Vujacic (we have two types of SGs: a playmaking, pure shooter and a slasher/shooter/freak athlete, Barry alone is roughly Vujacic) Ariza/Odom > Artest (only because Artest has been injured and has played poorly this season, I'd say this matchup is a draw if Artest was playing like his norm as a strong two-way player) Landry/Hayes >> Radmanovic/Powell (Radmanovic is just a shooter and Powell lacks experience, we own this category defensively because of Hayes and Landry owns the paint in this matchup) Mihm > Deke (as A_3P0 said, this is sort of a non-factor since neither guy gets used currently but if they were both getting 10/15 mpg, Mihm would get a slight advantage because of his youth and greater offensive abilities, Deke is such a rebounding/shotblocking stud that it's somewhat close) So, the only matchup they have a big advantage in is at backup PG. We are far better at SG and PF while the SF has the potential to be a wash. They may have a slight advantage at C if both guys are in the rotation. Sure, teams don't play a combination of reserves all at once very often but in a comparison of non-starters, I'm not so sure the Lakers are that much better than the Rockets, if at all.
It really doesn't matter if the lakers bench is worse or better than the Rockets, the Rockets just aren't even close to being on the same level as the Lakers,sadly.
There are only two reasons for that big difference as far as I see it: 1. Kobe 2. Health Those are real factors so I'm not trying to minmize them. I'm just not so sure their reserves are any better than ours. The only chance we have to beat a team like the Lakers in a 7-game series is for our secondary players to outplay their secondary players. We can't stop Kobe even while having some of the better defensive players in the league. McGrady can't cancel out Kobe either. He may match him in a game or two if we're lucky.
Seriously I like to think like a fan too, but the reality is that the Rockets will probably never be at full strength, the offense is atrocious, absolutely stagnant, Horrible PG play, lack of Athleticism and propensity to create havoc on the defensive end, this team has no chance. On paper this team looks great, but in reality they're at best a 1st round victory team, it will be the story of what could have happened, The Lakers will win the west.
But Pj knows what he's doing. He has nine rings and several more finals appearances in the playoffs to prove it. I remember a blog post Kelly Dwyer wrote regarding PJ's habit of using substitutes in crunchtime-basically he's saying PJ puts the scrubs in there to gain experience, and it'll definitely bear fruit in the playoffs much later. On the other hand we have the exact opposite with RA. Our starters were stinking it up yet he pulled the lineup that got the lead and played Tmac, Artest and Alston until they lost us the game. What the heck can the rationale be behind that? Unless RA happened to be driving home a point(and I doubt it seems RA seems as soft as Gasol and Radmanovich combined), that seemed to me like plain old loyalty to the starters. We have the depth to rival any team in the league, but unfortunately our coach refuses to put it to good use.
He becomes stubborn and he inserts wrong players at the wrong time to send a point across. He's been doing that for years and it has really frustrated us in the 2004 and 2008 finals.
I'd also like to add Yao Ming factor (injured, playing great vs. average). As much as people down play this, I think if he has really good series, we definitely have a chance to beat the Lakers. The Lakers do have Bynum and Gasol, but they don't command the same type of attention Yao does. If the games are called fairly, he is going to have them foul trouble, often. The Lakers don't really front him a whole lot, nor do they have defender than can make things tough for him, like Kwame did for some reason.
Adelman has been extremely successful as a coach while never having the best player in the game at the time on any of his teams. I like Adelman. I don't have a lot of reasoning for it but I like him. I actually liked JVG, too. I think both were great coaches in their own ways. JVG is probably one of the best ever at taking average teams and helping them overachieve. I'm not saying Jackson is a bad coach but every team he has ever coached has had one or two of the best players in the world on it. Do you think Jackson could do any better with the Rockets than JVG or Adelman did? Would we have gotten past the 1st round by plunking the Zenmaster on the sidelines? Personally, I don't think so. I think the players determine 90% or more of what happens on the court at this level.
Lol, I'd take Derek Fisher any day over Rafer. lets see Derek fisher shoots 41% FG, 44% 3PT, 88% FT, 4asts and 1.4 stls in 30 minutes a game as opposed to Rafer who shoots 37% field, 34% three (I should just stop there) there is a reason why rockets rank amongst hte worst in offensive efficiency and it starts with the fact that its must easier to double Yao than it is to double other post players with good perimeter shooters. Rafer is a reason why this team is so futile on the offensive end, Rafer is arguably the worst starting PG in the NBA.
so Rafer's poor shooting obviously has no effect on this team? I'd take Fisher a Good Shooter instead of a chucker in Alston, this team needs someone who can create spacing for yao, and I've seen opportunities when Yao's kick out can lead to threes but instead it turns out to be bricks.
I want to see Artest rough up Kobe but since they are friends I wonder if he'll do it. Play some mind games with him like what Raja Bell did. CLOTHESLINE! Battier is too much of a gentlemen to guard Kobe. He relies on taking clean charges.
They got into it during the 1st Rockets-Lakers game this season, too. I remember Kobe trying to fight Artest for space and picking up a couple of quick fouls. Artest got under his skin even though the Lakers had the last laugh. We started that game out so well, too.
the thing about the lakers is that Gasol is their back up Center so because of that lakers bench > rockets bench
