Leave it to Blinebury to find the negatives

Could the guy lets us enjoy two of the best back to back wins in years???


With recent wins come expectations that aren't met on road
By FRAN BLINEBURY
Copyright 2003 Houston Chronicle
THESE are the games when the Rockets are at their most frustrating.

When they take the floor with the kind of momentum that makes you think they were shot out of cannons.

When they follow the game plan as if they were reading architectural blueprints.

When they pass the ball with the precision of knife jugglers, make cuts within the offense like surgeons, swat at shots as if they were bothersome mosquitoes.

In other words, act is if they have a clue. Or care.

What's frustrating about the Rockets on an afternoon when they follow up a 20-point bruising of the Timberwolves with a 105-89 spanking of the Kings is it proves they can do it.

But, of course, we knew that, didn't we? Otherwise, what was thumping Shaq, Kobe and the Lakers on coast-to-coast cable TV all about?

This isn't a team with a deficit in terms of raw talent at the assorted positions. Only a shortage of the stuff that turns any old NBA club into a playoff team and then, eventually, into a contender.

Poise, focus, concentration ... any of those words out of The Official Book of Coaching Mumbo Jumbo.

"It's all about execution," Rudy Tomjanovich said.

See?

Begging to differ with the head coach, in the case of these Rockets it's usually all about whether they have their heads and hearts in the game.

When the Rockets aren't strutting around the court with their chests puffed out, telling us how great their potential is, they can be quite good.

When Steve Francis and Cuttino Mobley are playing under control and within the system, they can pick apart a team as good as Sacramento like vultures working over roadkill.

Yes, the Kings were playing without Chris Webber. But they have other weapons and can still be dangerous.

What we saw from the Rockets on Sunday is what we have seen throughout the first half of a wildly inconsistent season. Yao Ming connecting on an impressive array of shots and acting as the launching pad for the offense in the middle of it all. Francis looking to set up his teammates for easy baskets. Mobley taking only the shots that came to him in the flow. Eddie Griffin playing at both ends with confidence.

"This is who we are," Francis said.

No, this is who the Rockets should be far more often.

Putting aside -- if you can -- the consecutive 20-point whippings by Detroit and Dallas -- this is who the Rockets have been almost exclusively at home this season.

Now they go away for a little back-to-back tester at Minnesota and Cleveland prior to the All-Star break, which might be revealing about what to expect from the next three months.

"The good teams take it on the road," Mo Taylor said.

And no so-called "good" team in the NBA this season has more of a disparity between its total of home and road wins than the Rockets. They have 19 wins at home, seven away. Only Chicago (15 and two) has a greater gap, and nobody is talking up the Bulls for the playoffs.

"The home and road thing is a big one and always has been through the years," Rudy T said. "I've tried to explain to our guys that you can't let the balance get too far out of whack; otherwise, you're nothing but a .500 team."

"It's mental more than anything," Moochie Norris said. "It's a matter of us taking the same energy, the same aggressiveness onto the road."

It's being a professional. It is not merely being voted onto the All-Star team in a popularity poll, but earning your stripes by carrying more than your weight in less-than-friendly environments.

It is knowing the job will be more difficult on the road, the opposing crowd will be louder, more hostile, but using all of that negative energy working against you to forge an identity.

For the Rockets to pile up home wins is pure lip service. To start winning on the road would be a real sign of progress.

"It's pretty obvious we play one way at home and another way on the road," Taylor said. "If we're at home and we get down in a game, we stay with the plan; we get back in it. On the road, we lose our poise; we come apart."

Like porcelain getting hit by a sledgehammer.

"Until we start showing up this way on the road, people will always question us, and they'll have a right to do it," Taylor said. "We have veterans, players who have been around the league. We talk all the time about being a playoff team. But if we can't start doing this on the road, it's a lost season.

"So what if you slip in as the No. 8 seed? If you can't win on the road, you'll be out as soon as it gets started."

We have seen Stevie Franchise jump practically over the moon to throw down dunks. We have seen enough to convince us Yao is something big. We have seen what Griffin can do when he's on his game, what Mobley can do when he stays under control.

We have seen them whack Shaq, beat Indiana, throttle San Antonio and take the Kings twice -- all good teams, all at home.

So what does it take to make the next step forward?

"I don't know," Francis said.

Frustrating.