Excellent posts... makes a lot of sense. You gotta keep your head up through thick and thin, don't let these fools drag you down.
You guys who are looking for excuses need to get a reality check. This team isn't as good as we thought they were. Plain and simple.
Lol love the optimism but no the Rockets are struggling and should be worried about how they have opened up the season thus far. Good teams take care of business against other good teams, the Rockets have not done that and will run out of time sooner than you would think. It's a tough schedule and they are missing Brooks, Ming, and Bud that's a lot of significant points in close games.
The problem is your facts point out exactly what this team is....broken down and limited on impact players. Anyone that thinks Yao will return to 19-9 again is just fooling themselves. Yao has too much mileage to make a significant impact in the league again. Brooks is good, but he's not a leader which is what this team needs. Lowry? An overpaid backup PG. My point is that Brooks, Lowry and Budinger, all guys you mentioned in another post, are not cornerstones of a successful NBA team. Yao was, but he's done being that guy. The Rockets will not be making a run at the playoff this season, let alone winning the division. It's time that the Rockets look to the next step of building the franchise.
The bolded parts are what lead me to believe (or hope...) the OP was being sarcastic. Not to mention him calling our win against Minnesota "lucky"... FYI, just because a post isn't riddled with annoying smilies doesn't necessarily mean it isn't sarcastic.
By the time Brooks get back, the rockets will be out of playoff contention. It's just to many good teams in the west for the rockets to make up ground.
Wow OP, this is one of the worst arguments I've ever heard. You say that our schedule is tough but contending teams don't complain about their schedule. They go out there and win games. Even in your descriptions of the Rockets wins, you say the Rockets got lucky to win because the opponents just played worse games. So I don't get how the Rockets are "just fine." The schedule isn't going to get any easier. It's time to quit making excuses. The team just isn't that good this year.
At no point during the offseason did I think we were true contenders. I thought the people delusional enough to think so would eventually only disappoint themselves. Eventually is now. However, we have since swung to the opposite end of the spectrum. There are legitimate reasons why we are underperforming right now, not just blind excuses. The wheels are finally starting to come off for some people here after a game(the first) where we were throughly beaten. When for once we really didn't have a shot at winning. Seems like it was the breaking point for guys looking to jump ship. Fortunately things are not always as it seems. Besides playing without 3 key rotational players, it was on the road at the tail end of a back to back. Right after a heart breaker where our starters were run into the ground because our bench wasn't good enough to stay on the court. Was it really that much of a shock? Never get too high when the going is good, and don't get too low when things seem the most bleak. In the end, it will always average out. I thought we were a playoff team capable of winning 50+ games before the season started. We've dug ourselves a hole because of some injuries and some bad luck, so it will take a little more to hit that original target. But by the end of the season I think we will still get there. The real problem is "there" really isn't where we need to be. To become a true contender we have much more work to do. Hopefully we can do something about that by the trade deadline. Anyways, it is always fun to watch the mood swings of Clutchfans. It's as simple as buy low sell high when you have an indicator as good as this. Time to buy the Rockets. EDIT: Will bump when we hit win #50.
Ya, but if that rhythm isn't found until we are 20 games below .500 we're going to have a hard time making anything out of this season...
No, we thought we were good if. Yao the team stay healthy. But the if, is not the reality. I don't think people say, yes we are good with no Yao, Brook and Chase, or Yao playing limited minutes with no Lowry, etc. This team is good with everybody healthy. the reality of Houston have always been for the past 6 year IF WE STAY HEALTHY. We just hope to get everybody healthy soon while stay close of the chase for the playoff. but "IF don't stay healthy there is no hope.
A championship contending team doesn't use schedule as a excuse for not doing well. We need to stop using our schedule as an excuse for the horrible record. Yes we have a tough schedule but so does the rest of the teams in NBA. We aren't actually that bad. We just don't execute well during 4th quarter for some odd reason. No more excuses. We just flat out suck at closing a game.
I think we're good enough - with this team, once we get Yao, Brooks, and Budinger back, and once Lowry's playing at 100% - to get into the playoffs and just MAYBE get out of the first round. But that should NEVER be the ultimate goal - which is Championship, OR BUST. I was one of the naive ones to think we have a chance to compete, but the way this season has started and watching some of the elite teams..even when we have a 100% healthy team - we cant compete with the 9-1 Spurs, 9-1 Hornets, 8-2 Mavs, 9-1 Lakers, etc. We may be able to split the season series with these teams, but to get to the championship, we have to go through those teams in a 7-game series. And this team, constructed as is, cannot do that. We need to start planning to break this team up and cash in on the "role players". Like all of the above teams, they're all 2 stars deep. We can all admit that Yao cannot be considered a "star" anymore. He's just another role player at this point who should not longer be "untouchable". I dont think ANYONE should be an untouchable at this point except for maybe Scola, who even at 30 is bringing it. DM should go ahead and begin to start wheeling and dealing and bring in a multi-tooled player who can score, and play defense. In an ideal world, i would love to see Melo and Iggy join this team.
Nice post, I totally agree. You've got to have (healthy) elite players to win in this league - not just a bunch of role players whose roles are rendered obsolete due to the fact that there are no (healthy) stars on this team. And no, Brooks and Scola aren't in that elite catagory, IMO. They are both very good, but not capable of carrying a team to a championship. If Yao Ming was totally healthy and at 100%, maybe we could talk about being a player in the West this year. Actually, I'm pretty sure we could. Problem is, he ISN'T healthy and most likely will never be back to 100% again. So now this franchise is really at a crossroads IMO. And no, it's not just because of the game last night. This storm has been brewing since Yao limped off the court in Game 3 against the lakers 2 years ago.
I like how this board went from WE'RE GOING TO THE CHAMPIONSHIP! to "All we have to do is win against sub 500 teams!
