Rockets are going nowhere with Harden as no defense leader. Rockets best ever is Patterson Lowry combo, cheaper smarter friendlier player. Lowry better d better player. Raptors nba champion. Amirite?!
Talking about the playoffs 6 games into the season is like someone talking about their wedding 6 dates into a relationship. Sad and desperate....
If the playoff started today, the 3rd seed Rockets would be facing the 6th seed Clippers at home. http://www.nba.com/standings/playoff_picture.html Of course we are far from the playoffs, but we can be fairly certain that whoever the team faces in the playoffs won't be easy to handle. Clippers seems to be a particularly bad matchup, but there really are no easy teams in the Western playoff picture. It would not be much of a shocker if any of these teams beat the other one in a series. What do you think the Rockets' odds are against each of the projected playoff team (including OKC) assuming reasonable health for both HOU and the opponent? What does the team need to add by the trade deadline to make the odds more favorable to the Rockets?
I think we are capable of beating Portland Golden State Dallas San Antonio in a seven game series with HCA. I do not think we can beat OKC, Clippers or Grizzles.
Hopefully the Grizzlies get OKC in the first round somehow. OKC and the Clippers are the only two teams where I think we'd lose every time. OKC especially because Harden has problems and Ibaka is always lurking around long enough to block his stuff. Although with the emergence of DMo maybe Ibaka would have other things to worry about. Also OKC has Perkins, the Dwight stopper. The other teams I feel confident against.
the playoff teams in the West are practically decided, same teams as last year we need to focus on health and limiting Harden's minutes
Would like to see how they play the Clippers now with DMo stepping it up and the improved defense overall. I think he could make it hard for Griffin but Crawford still scares me.
Teams we obviously match up well against: Spurs Mavs I'd take any of these teams in the first round. Spurs will bring it come playoff time though. Teams we obviously match up badly against: OKC LAC Do not want to go anywhere near them. Teams that are clearly not good enough in general to win the in the first round: Pelicans Nuggets Suns Kings I have no problem facing any of them. The questions marks???? GSW: I just really don't know what to make of them. Even though they currently are sweeping us, they never played us at full strength. It is especially telling in the first game when Howard was first out and we ALMOST won. It gives me confidence we can beat them in a 7-game series, but it's really hard to tell. Bogut can defend Dwight, and the Dubs can rotate any of Draymond, Iggy or Barnes to defend Harden. Still Harden is too good on offense, but just saying they have their share of defensive players. Blazers: Last year's 1st round exit leaves a sour taste in my mouth. I worry that LMA will just turn it on come playoff time, and Lillard is always a threat, even if not consistent. In the same time, we improved in the exact areas we needed to, to counter the issues we had against them last year. Also, D-Mo's defensive emergence could make him the perfect LMA stopper.
If the playoffs started today, the Rockets would've already made trades in preparation before today. Morey made many roster decisions based on the assumption that the Rockets can improve at the deadline. Not matching Parsons, instead giving money to Papanikalaou, Terry (and his contract), Lin's TE (about to turn into an expiring), getting the Pelicans pick, etc. So if the playoffs started today, Morey's plans would kind of make no sense.
You still wanna trade Harden for Kevin Love? You argued us down about it all summer while you concluded Harden would never play defense and I haven't heard anything from you about it recently. Please share your current thoughts. I'll hang up and listen.
I never said Harden had zero chance of playing D, what I said is that the available info (the fact that his defense got worse in an important season, and remained bad in tight playoff games) showed that there was a substantial risk that Harden would not improve on D. So far, he is showing effort on D, which has been key to the team's defensive improvement. You can't have a team leader not playing D while the rest of the team was trying to improve on that end. This, plus his increased offensive responsibilities this year, is putting a lot on his body, though. I hope he can keep this up all season. Love is not playing all that well now, by his standard. He is still adjusting and CLE isn't exactly a perfect fit for him-- no rim protector, and not 1 but 2 great ball dominant scorers as teammates (plus Dion Waiters). Houston with Dwight would have been a better fit. But I cannot say he would have been better than the Harden that we have seen so far this season.
OKC is the only team that I don't think we have any shot against right now. I think if we can ever get healthy we are capable of beating any other team in 7 game series. Clips have our number but they're not as good as they were last season, they don't have as much depth while I think that we've gotten better in the depth department once Jones, Canaan and Papa come back. Grizzlies are tough but they are slow and unathletic, as long as we can dictate the tempo on them we can beat these guys. I do think that even with our improved defense we would want to avoid a slow, low scoring game because that will favor them. With added firepower in Canaan, Terry and Jones coming off the bench we have additional offense to throw at them that we didn't have last year. Portland would be a fun series, both teams have improved defensively, both teams have added more depth. I would expect a close series with them again this year should we meet up again, would probably go 6 or 7 with a few overtime games but the good guys coming out on top this time. Dallas is a strange team, while they haven't looked particularly strong yet something tells me this team will be fierce in the playoffs. Their roster changed quite a bit during the offseason, makes you think they are still trying to get the chemistry right. But when Monta is shooting lights out this team is scary. Dirk is still Dirk, he's probably saving his best for the postseason. Many posters probably think this would be an easy series for us but I don't share those beliefs. Dallas has good veteran depth too, Cuban will probably add more at some point before the deadline. As of today I think we could beat this team in a 7 game series, come playoff time my opinion may be different. Not sure why anyone would want to face San Antonio, no matter how many times we have beaten them recently, we know that they are a different team in the playoffs. More focused, more intense and Pop tends to rest his guys more during the regular season which may give teams like ours false hope. Good mix of vets, young stars, and solid roleplayers, they're still the most well rounded team in the NBA. If San Antonio plays their best I still don't think we're good enough to beat them in 7, unless Harden goes for 40+ in each game. Still, I'm a superstitious guy and I think we win just because we have their number in the postseason, Ghost of Akeem shows up to help Dwight out. Golden State? I want to see us play this team when both teams get healthy before I make any conclusions here. Right now they edge us out in firepower and while their defense isn't quite as good as ours they're still a top 10 defensive team. The big question mark with Golden State is their lack of experience and vets with championship experience, if there is one weakness to their team I think would be it. If we played them right now I think they beat us in 6 games, come playoff time (if we ever get healthy, and depending on deadline deals) this could easily change the opposite direction. Still, 21-2 is impressive and I don't care which teams you play or what players are out there. Golden State is the best team in the NBA as of today. TL;DR OKC is the only team that I think we would lose a series to 10/10 if both teams are healthy.
