National Media don't seem to be buying into the hype....

I don't give a rats A $ $ what the media thinks. As long you win you shut all of them up. Leave it on the court, win a championship and enjoy it.

Even if you did win one there will always be haters looking for an excuse on how you got lucky to win.

 

The tv network attached media don't write what they think, they write what they're told their narrative is meant to be.

 

i swear to god hes just a character. Like stephen Colbert alternate persona type. surprisingly not everything he says is trash

 

I think there's a solid argument to be made for the Rockets to be a solid top 10 team again this year. As for the Rockets being "elite", the problem is the team has a *lot* to prove.

1. It takes time to build chemistry. It is very, very rare for a team to be formed and come out of the gate in year 1 or year 2 as a top 5 team. Yes, a good chunk of the roster is here for the 2nd year, however Dwight is a HUGE part of this team's success. It's going to take time both for him to get acclimated and for the team to get acclimated to him. This is on top of questions regarding his ability to play with Asik in a meaningful and effective way on both sides of the ball against the top tier teams. Even McHale doesn't know who our PF is going to be. That's 20% of the starting line up that still falls under "TBD".

2. Dwight is basically a big unknown right now. Will he be last year's Dwight? Injured/injury recovering Dwight? Pre-Dwightmare Dwight? His last 2 years haven't been spectacular, and he's in a running system this year (he didn't exactly blow the doors out in LA). He says he's happy, but he's had some attitude issues for 3 years running now (3 years of Dwightmare). Granted, 2 were related to the mess of getting out of Orlando, and 1 to the hot mess that is the Lakers, however, 3 years is a BIG chunk of a player's career. We may *believe* that Prime Dwight is here, but let's be honest, none of us know how this will play out for an 82 game season.

Do the Rockets have the potential to be an Elite team? No doubt. Would I bet the house on it? Let's just say there's still a few too many unknowns for many people to be convinced at this point in the season.

There's a difference between not being sold, and not being sold yet.

 

55 games is easily within reach. We won 45 games last year and the team starting five never played within each other before the first game last year. Accoring to Morey the stats indicate that teams in this posision usually increase their wins by 5 games without any changes.

 

I found that Kenny Smith is on he ball. He not emotional and his analysis is on point.

 

Houston was undoutable the most enjoyable team to watch last year because of their fast pace and abilty to surprise at anytime. However, I only heard one announcer say they were exciting to watch. The media delled on the negative last year, it gets more attention.

 

After watching the first pre-season game it is clear to me Howard is the most valuable player on the court. Yes he is more valuable than Harden and it's not even that close.

The question then becomes if Harden is considered a top five NBA player (at least top 6)what does make Howard. He's the second best player behind Lebron. Yes better than Durant. He impacts the game that much. He impacts the game in ways that Durant just can't. The only thing that would drop him below Durant is if he can't keep his ft shooting above 55%. That's my two cents.

 

I think a poster here called it over the summer -- Houston this year makes a good villain. They stole Harden from the beloved Thunder, and then used bench thug Beverley to injure Westbrook and spoil their contention. Morey used his sleight of hand tricks to steal Asik from Chicago and Lin from New York. Then Howard spurned the Lakers to come join us. Parsons is making everyone jealous when girlfriends suddenly decide to watch the game with them. Moreyball riles all the anti-intellectual jocks. And, at the end of it all, it'll be a better team than whatever team these fans are fans of.

So the Rockets are probably a good team for fans to love to hate. And even if journalists themselves don't hate the Rockets, their readership does. So, they throw them some red meat by riding us down -- "don't worry, the Rockets won't be as good as we all fear, and when they fail we'll all laugh and dance on their graves." Lin is overrated, Beverley's a thug, Howard is dumb and over-the-hill, Howard won't play the pnr, the twin towers won't work, Asik is malcontent, they have a hole at power forward, etc and whatever. Except the Rockets will be good. So just as we've had to grudgingly accept that the Miami Heat were going to be successful, they'll have to accept that the Rockets will be.

 

LOL!!! Is it opposite day in Oz.

 

True, that's why their rankings have to reflect such narratives, which are ingrained in people's minds. And the biggest narrative this offseason is Howard cowardly going to Houston, while Chris Paul the true professional(never mind he whined and got the coaching change he wanted) stayed in LA. Hence, Clippers massively hyped and Rockets massively underplayed. Even though if you just look at their rosters objectively, you can't say the Clippers are definitively better.