In this post people seem to be leaving out the JVG factor. Posey did not likely fit into the offensive scheme. It seems they are looking to play and inside-out game and Posey is not a 3pt threat. Losing Posey(IMO) is really not that big a hit because of who our coach is, no other reason. Please tell me ya'll are pretty excited about seeing a new Brand of basketball.
You can't have your cake and eat it too. The organization can't be chastised for the bad contracts we have and then get mad at them for not resigning Posey. Do I wanty Posey back? Hell yeah. He's athletic can run and D up but do I want to pay him 6mil a year (actually 8 b/c of the luxury tax)? Definietly not. I am excited about the Rox b/c I'm a Rox fan! I'm always excited before the season as fans should be. And like it has been posted by myself and many others, this team right here w/ JVG is better than the Jazz, Warriors, Sonics, and Clips so the playoffs are a STRONG possibility and for this yera thats all we need. If its like this in 3yrs...thats a different story.
Nope, just realistic. I'd love them to win more, but don't see them doing better than 43 wins max, and possibly quite a bit worse.
More interesting to watch because of JVG, but the West is just too tough, we didn't keep pace = lottery. We are little tougher than an open date for the Western elite, but I don't think anyone will be terrified to come to Houston this year. As presently configured, our front line is going to get pushed around and torched. And we don't have the outside sharpshooters to help out. I am very disappointed, but still hopeful of a blockbuster trade.
I can at least understand your concerns, regarding everything else in your post, but... Wow. Either you don't think too much of the shooting ability of Piatkowski, or you put a lot of stress on "sharpshooters" being plural... In which case you don't think much of the shooting ability of Glen Rice.
Glen Rice USED TO BE one of the best players in the league. Are you impressed with his tenure as a Rocket? If so, why? Pike will help. Besides Ming, CONSISTENT shooting has been a problem for several years. Taylor started to get is hook working at the end of last season and Griffin had a sweet midrange jumper in college. I think dope smoking may have flattened his shot! Pure shooters can destroy a colapsing zone in a hurry. I look for the inside to be very crowded.
This team stinks. I spit on the 8th seed. All or nothing at all. They need to drop a bomb on the whole thing. Give me Sheed, 'cause we're going to need the whole 16mil in cap room next season. All 4 forwards need a trip to the dumpster. The guards play like they're on crack. Yao only plays 1/2 a season. Cato plays with oven mitts. Van Gundy can't spell excitement; he puts the game in molasses. And we have Patrick and his fake glasses to "teach" the ragtag bunch. Yeah, I'm just giddy. I'm dying without basketball, but there is no reason to be hopeful. There's every reason to stock up on Pepto. There's got to be a trade. Just has to. They can't keep this up - it'll kill the franchise. I'd rather watch Utah play for lotto balls than this group stink it up. Destroy them all. It's an abortion.
How do you figure the Rockets weren't a lottery team? I know we didn't have a pick, but we still missed the playoff, which by definition makes us a lottery team. As for my expectations for this season, we have lowered the overall talent level of the team by signing Pike and letting Posey go. However, we may be better due to improvement of our young players, Ming and Griffin.
I'm in the undefined: "Absolutely! We're going to make the playoffs!" camp. And it's all about Jeff Van Gundy. Think back to how rabid we all were just one month ago. When it looked like we might lose Larry Brown, Van Gundy, and Paul Silas. Remember MacBeth's post about "Pros and Cons?" We all dreaded the worst, that "melba toast" Dunleavy would be our coach. Then there was that nerve-wracking weekend when we all checked the site every five minutes to see if Van Gundy had signed. Would he like the city of Houston? Would his wife find a good school? And then he signed. I don't know about the rest of you, but I was ecstatic. Literally jumping with joy. The more I read about Van Gundy the more I like him. I live in New York, and all my Knick-fan friends are oozing jealousy. They miss Van Gundy and they all predict the Rockets to surprise everyone in the West. Since then, some time has passed and our mouths have begun to sour. The top guns in the West have re-loaded. We lost Posey and replaced him with a guy who's five years older and plays suspect D. No other trades seem likely. When this line of thinking gets me down, I remember two things: 1) The teams that have upgraded in the West weren't really our competition. Not this year. LA's dream team is nearly irrelevant. There was little chance of us running with the big dogs of LA, Sacramento, Dallas, or San Antonio. Our immediate rivals are Phoenix, Golden State, and Seattle. All of whom did nothing to improve. 2) Our immediate rivals didn't improve. But we did. We signed one of the top 5 coaches in the game. What would you rather have: Posey with some mediocre coach (Dunleavy), or no Posey and Van Gundy? Easy call. Posey's a nice player, and I'll miss him, but his departure is only a sidebar. The headline is Van Gundy. Sorry for the long post. I'm just so frikkin' excited I can't contain it. Oh, and new unis! This is the most pumped I've been since before that cruel night when Barkley came crashing down in Philly.
I haven't been impressed by Glen Rice as a Rocket, he plays no defense and he's too slow. But there's no way I could question his shooting ability - he shot 101 - 254 (39.8%) from the arc last year. Pike shot 80 - 201 (39.8%) last year. In other words, Rice is still a great sharpshooter. Just not a great player.
Neither will get enough playing time to make a significant difference. Only 254 or 201 shots in 80 games? That is about 3 three pointer attempts per game with one made on average. What was Rice's shooting % inside the arc?
As I see it, we have an old man and someone who can't even play well in the summer league at Small Forward, Griffin still hasn't shown any flashes at all to be excited at the Power Forward, Yao is spending all his off season time in China which smells to me of very little improvement from him, we lose our only legitamite defensive player in Posey and your thinking playoffs??? You have 5 teams in the west that were much better than us that just improved greatly, 2 teams in Phoenix and Portland that will probably stay ahead of us because none of them are wasting their time in China. Our only hope is no-one else sneaks up on us and knocks us out of an 8 seed. Unless they pull off something no-one is expecting this has been a COMPLETE BUMMER OF AN OFFSEASON. The only good I see coming is another lottery pick and some spare change to spend next offseason on hopefully someone who can actually make a difference and play.
Neither played a full 82 games. Rice played in 62, with his adjusted FG% being 46.8%. Pike also only played in 62 games, with his adjusted FG% being 53.1%.
How can we make any predictions about our upcoming season when the Team is incomplete at this time? The Roster is still short of two key positions, Back up Point Guard, please dont suggest Moochie, he is our third string ! Starting Small Forward, Piatowski is our back up Shooting Guard, Nachbar lacks experience, Glen Rice should be kept in preservative till the playoffs, Hawkins will play third string defencive Guard. We need to sign two more players Francis.......... Norris Mobley Piatowski Hawkins ........ Nachbar Rice Griffin Taylor Yao Ming Cato
sure I'm excited about the team as it is. But with me there is just something about the start of basketball season that gets me in a different kind of mood, its a whole 'nother routine, and I like it. maybe its the first cold fronts that start to blow through around that time and the early sunsets that come with it that make the start of Rocket ball feel so exciting. I think all that helps. But no new additions to the team - yeah I am cool with that; that new fresh stoke every new Rocket season brings will still be there.
This team as it stands is a playoff team, but looking at how loaded the west is won't be close to a contender for at least 5 yrs minimum. Shaq is back and is at about 300lbs along with the rest of the crew. Sac is back with a better team with a 27 yr old solid center in Miller. Sa is Sa and will be a force and now Minny has ran away and hid from the Rockets for a few yr with Cassell,Spree and Kandi. Its just really disapponting to see a team like the Rockets not being involved in none of the deals over the past few weeks. Watching guys like Ferry getting traded with a 4.5m salary, but seeing the Rockets still holding on to a 8m per yr taylor is weird. I know that with the right deal, the Rockets can get propelled into the upper tier of really good teams. A team like ATL,Port, and even GSW could become a working partnership in a trade proposal. One thing i don't want the rockets to give up is the rice contract unless they can really get a player of some kind of impact. Personally, i still think a ATL trade would work best for this team, but it looks more and more like we'll have this team in camp as it stands.
i don't see how anyone can be excited about what the rockets have done. the roster will continue to be plagued with the same problems as last year and without posey, we've lost more defense and whatever transition game we had. i would only be excited if a trade happens, because our roster is full of players that will need a lot of work to cut it. two bright spots. jeff van gundy completely changing the mentality of this team and the potential for a huge break out by cato, mot, griffin or badiane (although it seems that wont happen)
