[gut feeling]Did you overrate the Rockets coming into this season?

oops thanks!

 

I banked on 47 wins, which is a marginal improvement over last season, so I guess not. I saw them as a fringe playoff team before the season started, and they still look like one now. They're not as terrible as the board makes them out to be; they have all the issues a slightly above mediocre, 6-8 seeded playoff team has.

 

No. I didnt overate them because I was not one of those that thought we were rivals for the Western Conference Championship. No. Im one of those that feels the Rockets are in the 6-9 seeds somewhere. Despite their start, im sticking to that still.

 

there's no doubt in my mind that this team will win 50 games. but we're not a contender, that's for sure.

 

i dont think that means anything really

if anyone told you that the Warriors and Hornets would have a combined record of 7-1 after 4 games each i think most people would have not believed you at all.


i havent overrated them just yet i didnt think they would look as bad and sloppy as they are though I thought we would be 2-2 at best after 4 games and 1-3 most likely (I have believe they'd beat the hornets and possibly beat the lakers opening night but thought they'd lose to the warriors and nuggets)

i did have them at 3-4 after 7 games if they arent 3-4 by then well then maybe I did overrate them too.

 

So you're saying we shouldn't judge the Rockets by just their record. But we SHOULD judge the teams they've played by their records.

Wait....I'm confused.

 

You know, this type of thing has followed Rick Adelman at a lot of his coaching stops, DD.

The thing where his "players coach" reputation starts to work a little bit against him.

Adelman firmly believes in letting the players on the floor decide the game. He isn't, nor has he ever been, a pretentious or overbearing coaching personality. I find that a little strange, personally, considering that he studied under Dr. Jack Ramsey, who was nothing if not animated as a head coach.

When he coached in Portland, Terry Porter was a great floor general for those great Blazers teams of the late '80s and early '90s. Those more recent teams in Sacramento had talented and heady players like Chris Webber, Vlade Divac and Mike Bibby. But whenever he hasn't had those types of players (who could essentially lead by example), he hasn't done as well.

That's still almost exclusively player-related, I know, but consider Jerry Sloan in Utah. Sloan's run the same exact offense every year for his 20-some-odd years as coach there. He has certain expectations, and he is very much hands-on. It's the stuff of legend how John Stockton, one of the greatest point guard ever, would ALWAYS look over to Sloan before he ran anything in the closing moments of the game.

Stockton knew just about what to do as well as Sloan did. But he made sure that it was what his coach wanted. They were both on the same page. So the team all read from the same book.

Adelman wants very much to let his players figure out things about themselves and the game. He expects them to use his system to do that. I even believe he would rather give the praise to them than garner any for himself.

That's why, at the end of the day, it was a mistake to bring back Yao if he wasn't ready to go. Adelman will do the work in practice, but a team as young (and with "talent" as unassuming) as the Rockets have, Adelman does have to be a bit more assertive in his direction.

Case in point: having to "remind" his team to make the most of Yao's minutes speaks to him expecting a young team that had to play one way just a season ago, to learn an entirely different approach with Yao.

...a Yao that's still knocking off the rust. 24 minutes at a time.

Ugh.

He may play (and quite possibly, does play) veteran players like Shane Battier and Chuck Hayes longer than we think he should because he's looking for that on-court leadership from somebody.

But you know where I stand, DD. You can't shorten a rotation you haven't set yet because you're trying to work your franchise player back into the fold, and see what's left of him. It's a little worse situation than last season, oddly enough.

The Rockets will eventually right the ship, I believe. Season's still WAY too early to jump ship, and the Rockets are notoriously slow starters anyway, regardless of who's playing.

But whether he likes it or not, I believe Rick Adelman has to be the leader this team currently needs.....

 

no, i knew they wouldnt be that great... felt like i was the only one... like i was taking crazy pills! (free internets for the person that knows where this is from)

 

I thought I was underrating the Rockets this year, but apparently I was overrating them.

 

I can has internets now?

 

LMAO. I knew the Rockets weren't gonna be that good this year (still early though). Everybody on here was placing them in the top 5. Lol righttttt. Yall are always overrating and overreacting everything associated with this team.

 

No, I learned my lesson maybe 2 seasons ago. Every year fans would prop us up, complain that sports writers' didn't respect us with their underwhelming predictions, etc. Then each season had their own plot twist that would end our run. The next year we always proclaimed 'this will be different, no seriously, this is it!' only to see history repeat. I didn't feel like chiming in much during the pre-season between the homers and the pessimists who almost root for us to fail just to say 'told you so'.

So now I just try to enjoy the show, game by game. I thought the Vegas line (47.5?) was a great number, and I think it still holds.

But I don't think anyone, homers or haters, thought we'd go 0-4. I might excuse the first 2 games - on the road, west coast, back to back, home openers for the opposing team, with a ring ceremony to boot. But going 0-2 at home is rough.

I believe our first win will get the monkey off our back and get things on track.

 

I thought they would be fighting for the 7th or 8th playoff spot, so that would mean about 47-50 wins in the western conference. The way they're playing I'm not sure they can do that.

 

Given as much change as this team has gone through in 48 months, I am willing to reserve judgment until the All-Star Break, or slightly thereafter.

 

i always do.

 

Me too, guilty as charged...

DD

 

four games?

really?

and we have a 'yao is done', 'rebuild' and a separate thread for every negative chron article?

 

yes. I thought they had the potential to win 48 games. Now it is looking like they are going to win 38 games at best.

 

Admittedly, yes. I still have hopes and still think this team could win 45-50, but I'm beginning to lose confidence quickly. The offensive droughts and general lack of defense in second halves is very disheartening, and I don't really see any immediate improvement that could act as a panacea.

Kyle Lowry has been the biggest disappointment for me. He was my favorite player last season, but has just looked out of sorts this year. I don't know if it's because he's not quite healthy, if he's slacking now that he has a contract, or if it's just his displeasure of still being a back-up manifesting on the court, but he's a lot better than he's played. That could be indicative of the entire team, too.