I'm still in shock over the pathetic effort we displayed in the second half and over Finley's buzzer-beater 3. I can't believe we laid down like that. I'll post the full recap after the Blazers-Nuggets. Hopefully the Nuggets will take them down so we have home court, but I'm not counting on it. At least my wife and I can try to make it down to Portland to see them play, but this was a very disappointing night.
That will be after we get out of the first round. With the second half performance tonight, I don't know if we will get the chance to face the Lakers.
Gonna go ahead and repost this from a few weeks ago because it feels very appropriate right now. A simple fronting defense tonight and our entire offensive scheme is completely destroyed. This is where we miss McGrady. "This isnt on Adelman. JVG worked tirelessly to make sure Yao got the ball every single play. There were numerous plays and tricks using McGrady to get Yao re-established. It worked well, but then JVG got fired, and McGrady was ostracised after no playoff success. Someday people need to realize, it doesn't matter what coach, or star you pair with Yao. His inability to establish position is a serious hindrance to the team. I am not saying to trade him or whatever but the Yao-ism on this board is seriously mind boggling. The offense runs around for 20 seconds working and waiting for Yao to get open or in a good spot so he can get the ball, sometimes it happens, sometimes it doesn't. But when it doesn't, Brooks or Artest or McGrady have to jack up a shot, or salvage the play to avoid a 24sec violation. Its ugly and all the hate from this board tries to blame them or the coach, but it isn't thier fault. Bottom line is, this is what you asked for. Everyone wanted McGrady gone and the offense centered around Yao and here it is. This is what happens when you are a one trick pony. We are the most predictable team in the league now and defenses know this. Jackson, Sloan, Rivers, Pop all know what play we were going to run 90% of the time and they are ready for it. They clog up the lane, either making it impossible to get an entry pass, or send a weak side defender once Yao starts dribbling. We have very few other plays and when we play good teams our offense looks like a train wreck. Without someone to draw double teams or put pressure on the offense, ala McGrady, this is what you will see in the playoffs against good teams. Everyone clamored for ball movement and the Adelman system, well here it is. What is the excuse now? If not McGrady, if not Artest, then WHO NEEDS TO BE ON THIS ROSTER to make it work."
this is the best post i've read the entire night. actually the entire season. great post man. clutch should sticky this.
The Rockets would have been the 2 seed with a win, but are now a 5 seed with the loss. What a huge game it was.
"Oh what could have been..." Get over it, we gotta fight with the bodies we have, and T-Mac is not one of them. I still like our chances against Portland.
<B> Games H2H Div Con Overall Magic </B> <B> Team W/L L10 H2H Left TB Div TB Conf TB TieBreak Number Diff</B> 1 Lakers 65-17 7-3 0-4 None L 44-8 L No*<B> 13</B> 2 Nuggets 54-28 9-1 3-1 None W 35-17 T Yes*<B> 1</B> (-1) 3 Spurs 54-28 6-4 2-2 None T 10-6 L 36-16 L No<B> 2</B> 4 Blazers 54-28 9-1 2-1 None W 32-20 W Yes*<B> 1</B> 5 Rockets 53-29 6-4 9-7 35-17 6 Mavericks 50-32 7-3 2-2 None T 7-9 W 29-23 W Yes*<B> Bridled</B> 7 Hornets 49-33 4-6 3-1 None W 9-7 T 30-22 W Yes*<B> Exterminated</B> 8 Jazz 48-34 3-7 2-2 None T 33-19 W Yes*<B> Silenced</B> * Indicates the Tie Break is final <B>We are the #5 seed</B> Here is the final batch of Magic Numbers after all games were played on <B>April 15</B>. This is really a post I’d rather not have written, but I might as well finish it on out. There’s no way to describe tonight as anything but disappointing. The Rockets threw away a golden opportunity for a clear path to the WCF. Yes, we get the Blazers now, and we have played them well this season. We’ll see how we do without home court advantage. Maybe we get to the second round now, which would be a huge monkey off this franchise’s back. But that is slight comfort now. The second round was a minimum benchmark for this season. I was hoping for a bit more than that, and it was right within our grasp. We put all of our ugly flaws on full display: untimely poor defensive rebounding, poor free throw shooing, an inability to get Yao the ball when he’s hot, and Ron Artest going off the range. Hopefully we can airbrush these bugaboos aside when we travel to Portland, but they will cost us dearly against the Lakers if we advance. I want to be glass half full with our situation, but I’m not going to lie. This was a Game 7 situation for us, and the Rockets failed the test this evening. That’s a wrap on this year’s Magic Number thread. Thanks to everyone who participated. I still can’t believe we got over 113,000 views on this thread. I had a lot of fun writing up these nightly recaps and chronicling our run. We got to delve into advance tie break theory, debate the merits of tanking (there are no merits as our current situation shows!), and discuss all the possible seeding arrangements over the past few months. I’ll fire up a new thread some time next season after the All-Star break, and I’ll probably post the Magic Number Chart (sans writeups) in the post-game threads after the Rockets play. While it was exhausting putting these up every night, it did get me back in a writing groove. I had gotten a bit off track on my novel, but this thread has definitely bulked up my writing chops. I’ve been getting some good work on my second novel in lately, and I plan to keep spending time each evening working on the book. At least I won’t be obsessing over the schedule and will have a lot more time on my hands. Clutch, Dr of Dunk, you can unsticky this now. If you enjoyed this thread and all of the other conversation about this exciting Playoff Race, please contribute to the Tip Jar so we can continue to have a top-notch forum where we can indulge our Rocket obsession. Go Rockets!
Thanks for all the hard work and dedication, ScriboErgoSum... You're an awesome asset to this BBS and the Rockets fanbase. Let's go Rockets!
Thanks Scribo. This thread is the first thing I come to see each day when I get online. Your work is greatly appreciated. The loss dissappointed us, but your writings did not. I'm looking forward to seeing your writings in the future.
Thanks Scribo. I'm already looking forward to next year, which I hope will be a boring thread after we lock down a top seed by the end of Feb.
Scribo, this was amazing. Thanks for all the hard work. It's weird, but I'm actually feeling a little nostalgic knowing that it's gonna be a whole year before we get another one of these threads going.
Thanks again Scribo for all of your work. Your thread was the first I visit when I get on the BBS before going to bed. Good luck with your novel!
Scribo, much thanks man...we wished this could have ended much much better, but nonetheless, thanks a ton!
Scribo, This was one of the best additions to this forum in I don't know how long. I seriously hope you get involved in more posts in this forum (statistically or otherwise). What you did was something different and really added positively to the forum. The rep points you've gotten are well-deserved and I seriously hope you figure out other ways to make people think (or help them from having to... lol). I'm going to unsticky this thread as you requested.
Scibo, my hat off for your great effort put in this thread. If you don't mind, tell us the titles of your published books. I would be very much interested in reading them.
