Great interview with Dream in the chronical today. It will be super if he keeps talking and can provide some leadership for this team. http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/story.hts/sports/bk/bkn/409004 I also agree with Dream that the Rockets can make the playoffs and be a pretty good team this year. Don't count them out yet. They have had a lot to deal with, have a lot of new players, and have a lot of young players. So they made mistakes, lost a bunch of close games and didn't look very good. However, they also have a lot of talent and depth. If Dream can back up his words with action, then they can be a tough team to deal with. The 8th spot in the West is clearly up for grabs. Denver has that spot right now and are around .500. Also, remember that this will be the first time in a while that Dream has had to step forward with leadership. Barkley pretty much had taken the vocal leadership role - would you expect anything else? But this interview shows that Dream has heard the critism about him being too passive and wants to change that. Yes, I know the Rockets are young and it's a good point that the Knicks had a lot of veteran players last year. So making a run like that would be pretty tough. However, they can still improve an awful lot this year. Cato, Mobley, Rogers and Anderson could make some big strides this year and are not rookies. Francis gets better every week and he is clearly has more confidence and game than your normal rookie. These are the main players. Bullard and others can be an effective bench. I don't think any team in the West would he happy to see Dream and this group in the first round. Hell, when Denver knocked off the Sonics as an 8th seed, that Denver team was nowhere as good as these Rockets.
When Dream gets back... I think we'll see a little Old Dream for a while - someone needs to put these boys in their place. Dream can lead this team to the playoffs. And NO, I don't think that's overly optimistic... I think it will happen. No lottery...
i'm starting to think that dream w/o cb will be a very, very good thing. he can show that he's the leader of the team w/o posting up 50 times trying to beat cb's score every game. now the big question: will dream quit looking like a baby bird down in the post the entire game... "feed me, feed me"
I read that article in the paper. Man I was so happy! One of the specific quotes was, "I don't want to stand in anybody's way. I don't want to impose myself on a generation of players that thinks my times is done. I don't want to stand in the way of coaches or ownership." This probably means that Hakeem is willing to adapt to a lesser role on this team and not be "the man". Plus Hakeem said that the last couple of years, he was playing with bad knees. Now, he is close to 100%. So, that means he will be playing much betta. Now, I'm actually lookin forward to his return.
Ohh man.. That was good. Hakeem is serious and i have a feeling he will go wild when he gets back. This is good. I cant wait till he comes back!!!!!!
I think Hakeems can definitely improve this team once he gets back and gets a few games under his belt. But, I'm just afraid that by the time he does get back we'll be so far under .500 that no one could get us back into the playoffs. Currently, we are 8 - 17, 9 games under .500. This means even if we play .500 ball until Hakeem returns (which we haven't shown we can), that we'd have to play 9 games over .500 to get to .500 and have a possibility to reach the playoffs. I haven't looked at the schedule, and I don't know how many more games Hakeem is due to miss, but right now I don't see enough improvement in the rest of the team to be able to hang around .500 long enough to get the Dream back. Not to mention our lack of depth with injuries to Massenburg, Bullard, and Walt Williams (of course his is a mental injury). ------------------ I have a dream.........his name's Hakeem.
With all due respect, I think you guys overlooked the most newsworthy part of that article. The fact that Hakeem and the Rockets broached the subject of a buyout of his contract was far more interesting than the happy talk of his return. The fact that Hakeem notified Rudy DURING the Knicks game about his future plans is, shall we say, surprising. How in the world are the Rockets supposed to make any personnel decisions without knowing Hakeem's plans? A cynic could also come to the conclusion that the only reason that Hakeem is indeed going to play out his contract is because he and the club couldn't agree on the buyout terms. To me, this buyout revelation makes the rumor that Hakeem blew up the Toronto trade by asking for an extension much more believable.
Remember--Olajuwon in Nigerian means "always being on top". In my book, Hakeem is still the key to this season and maintaing our winning attitude. I was very happy to see that article when I woke up. One thing I did notice is he doesn't seem to be remarking about his role in a motion offense (like what we saw Saturday). His constant remarks about giving his knees a chance, was great to here, but lends me to believe he still has that "giv me da ball" attitude about the rest of the team. The keys to Dream are to take his attitude to practice, learn the new system, improve his passing (requires the former keys), play some tough D and block-out on the boards...his low post play will be his individual contributions as the role-playing go-to-guy...all the other keys are his team contributions.
What an encouraging article about Hakeem talking about his future with the Rox! Dream, are you gonna walk the talk? If so, making the playoffs is not an impossible mission. In Dream we believe!!!
The Rockets schedule isn't as tough as everyone else believes. The next 5 of 6 games are at home and in January when things get a little tougher the Rockets will hopefully get Hakeem back.
Dream will come back and do some damage, but I don't think he can be the leader anymore. He might be the leader in defense, but Steve will continue to lead this team! ------------------ Suggestion for New Name once the Rockets move to Louisiana: The Opossums!
