It was just my first reaction. I really thought we could compete for a championship this year. I know there were teams with more talent but we just seem to play with so much heart. I thoughtt if we could make it close to 500 this year and Yao and Brook are back than we would be ready to make 7th or 8th seed and watchout because we have shown we are fearless against SA and the Lakers. When Yao went down all my hopes went down too. But this team hasn't lost hope and the GM hasn't lost hope and the Coach hasn't lost hope. ANd I agree with Battier while the end result will hurt, no Yao, the immediate benefit is not having to worry about 24 minutes here and no minutes on back to backs and when he is really coming back or not. That train has crossed and over now. So I am hopeful for this year and no longer want to dump Scola to get under the cap. Yeah it's a longshot. But with a little bit of luck and 1 more good deal we might just make the playoffs and if we make it out of the first round I wouldn't put anything past this team. I still think we need a defensive upgrade at the center spot. And I don't know how we get it without giving up a lot. But Morey didn't get suckered into Martin for Gortat and I do believe in him to find a deal that works for us. We will have to give up something but Martin is our star scorer and losing him might make us worse off in the end.
or if we make he playoffs we would be one of the bottom seeds about to get our azzes whooped to the Lakers, Mavs or Spurs
the funny thing with dwight is he doesn't really click with any of the other stars, probably because even orlando is too glamorous for his liking.
I think the important words in your post are "nothing tangible". I've seen you put this in quite a few threads, and there isn't the tiniest shred of evidence, so I don't understand why you keep implying you know something. Adelman is the best thing this team has going for it right now. We should consider ourselves lucky to have one of the best coaches in the league, and I don't know of any time in his coaching career where he quit on a team.
In an interview with Adelman when he first took the coaching job, one of the things that appealed to him about coaching houston was that he would not need to "rebuild." He's an old guy, and I think he's tired of rebuilding teams and wants to get a ring while he still can. If he becomes a free agent after this year, plenty of stacked teams will be wanting him. On the flip-side, this team already knows his system and he has veterans who he trusts to carry out his game plan.
Hill's problem, and what's keeping him from getting more minutes, is his lack of focus on defense. Hopefully at some point it clicks for him.
Good point. Adelman finally gets a team that is playing his game. It takes a long time to shape a team like that. I'd doubt he'd give up now. The only thing that might make him want to leave is when he loses motivation with a dysfunctional team playing poorly, sort of like his GS stint.
Could you expound on Hill's lack of focus on defense? What I noticed is that he significantly improved his man-to-man defense, specifically that he holds his ground pretty well (e.g. Hill v. Gasol, Duncan, etc) and doesn't bite on the fakes he used to last year. What is Hill missing that would dramatically improve his defense play?
How great would it be to have gundyball with Kmart, Brooks and Scola instead of Rafer, Juwon Howard and Wesley? If DM can manage to sign a good center and then get JVG back in the fold we'll be set.
