nothing is easy. But the Rockets are good enough to methodically beat any team in a playoff series IMO.
Sadly the solution to the fronting defense was through McGrady. As bad as he has been, you can't deny that he was the best at getting Yao the ball where he was most effective with it.
spurs, jazz, and rox are very close. it's tough to say who is going to win head to head in a 7-game series. then you can put denver, portland, and hornets at next level, not much below the first group. suns and mavs are in the last group. i don't they can compete with any team in the first group. of coz, fakers are on the top but any team in the first group should be able to challenge fakers.
I'll take the Jazz all day over playing against the Spurs. If the rockets can stay healthy this will be a completely different team in the playoffs without T-Mac. T-Mac threw up huge #s but it never equated to playoff success and without him this team is ten times tougher mentally than with him.
you think the nuggets, trailblazers, and hornets are all decidedly better than rockets as well as the spurs and jazz? really?
We didn't win last year's series because of Rafer? That may be true; but, it's more because we just didn't have any other serviceable point guard than Rafer actually being a good basketball player.
I disagree. rafer was on fire around that time of year. he played VERY well during the series. if he had played, we would have probably won the first two games.
No doubt the Rockets would have won games 1 and 2 and perhaps the series if Rafer had played. Simple as that. But I do like this Lowry kid. He's looking good...
no argument here, I love lowry. to be frank, I think he may be the starter in the near future. his jumper will improve.
The Jazz pulled a team-wide Shaq this year by sitting most of their best players through significant portions of the season with questionable and at worst non-season-threatening injuries. What that has done is hide the fact that, in the absence of Bynum, they are now the best team in the West. We could theoretically have a good shot against Utah in a playoff series. But you really want to avoid that as far as a first round matchup is concerned.
yep. But I just love how he seems to always play under control. By the way, did you notice yesterday he was the ONLY Rocket to my knowledge who actually lobbed an entry pass to Yao when he was being fronted? I saw that on 2 occasions.....
sorry, i confused you. if read carefully, you should be able to understand that i put fakers on top of all western teams. other than that, the 1st group has jazz, spurs, and rox. the 2nd group includes nuggets, hornets, and jailblazers. mavs and suns will be in the last group.
The fact of the matter is we ARE the 5th best team in the NBA right now as long as our opponents aren't fronting Yao. If Chicago had fronted Yao all 4 quarters of that game, we would have lost by 30. It's a pathetic problem to have, but it's still a problem, and it needs to be addressed NOW. I'm glad that we lost that game if it means that the coaching staff is going to urgently take care of that problem. We have guards who can penetrate now, and I think that's a very viable option when a team fronts Yao. Penetrate up the middle, and if they collapse, kick it out to Scola/Yao for a mid-range jumper.
I don't pay attention to these power rankings. The race in the West is too close, anybody has a slump and loses a few games and you're in the 9th seed.
I hope we see utah...in the conference finals, screw revenge for the past 2 years, i still want revenge for that stockton 3
