Is this team over-acheiving? Are we about to come down to earth in these last 14 games? Would you accept a 7-7 or 6-8 finish? I'd be happy with a 7 or 8 seed actually. As a Houston Rocket fan I am proud. Proud of the 22 game streak. Proud of every player who is working on every possession. Proud of the chemistry. I want to point out seven things that shouldn't discourage us but help us appreciate what we have done so far- 1. Yao was a big part of the streak and he is essential to the team. Without Yao we lose too much low post scoring and we also give up our best mismatch. Alot of games are decided by match ups. Especially in the play-offs. 2. TMac is who he is. He is not a physical player at all. He is a great passer a very good shooter in rhythm at his spots and a good attacker when he has space. He is injury prone and loses focus at times, but when he is laying it all out there he is a force. He does not take over games consistently. 3. Landry gave this team alot of energy with his hops and explosiveness. Landry was the perfect bench player because he sparked the team and used dunks like daggers in the heart of the opponent. 4. Rafer is not an elite point guard but when he is hitting the three point shot and not turning over the ball he makes us a very hard team to defend. 5. Our defense rests solely on effort and execution. Two things that are very hard to maintain for long stretches of games, even a seven game series. 6. We do not have enough scoring threats right now with Yao and Landry out. If our offensive execution breaks down and/or shots aren't falling we will look bad. 7. Stopping TMac puts too much pressure on the rest of the team. We will struggle to adjust in any 7 game series if TMac is not a big factor. I love the way we played in that streak- I think all the stars were aligned especially on the points I listed for us to play really well. But we can all stay behind the team if we understand the realities of who we are and what we can do. To get out of the first round of the playoffs without Landry playing explosive and effective and without TMac getting his will be difficult. Let's stay with these guys, most of them bust tail every night. But are we an elite team talent wise yet? Not sure yet. Like our effort and chemistry but I am not expecting any more than their best effort in the playoffs. But we certainly may be overacheiving just a little, don't you think?
Yes they're overachieving. I think you can only ride your rookies for so long. Most of our veteran signings in the off season have been failures, and they're either out for the season, or have been traded. We're without our superstar center, and fatigue has taken over our other premiere player who has been battle tested for the duration of most 32-33 year olds since he came out of high school. That said the future is bright. Assuming Landry's knee injury is minor then it was a successful draft. If its serious then not drafting Glen Davis is look pretty bad. Brooks at least in glimpses has shown he can become our PG of the future and was hand picked by Adelman. Rafer has the hitch in his shot fixed but is asked to do too much right now. McGrady won't have to overexert himself when Yao comes back. Scola has been amazing again but he's asked to do more than he's capable of right now. Head is still a great shooter. Battier has at least made me not regret the Gay trade as much as I initially thought. This team has shown it has the potential to be a 55-60+ game team when its healthy, and will have its rookies have another year under their belt. As always the X-Factor is health. A healthy Landry, healthy McGrady, healthy Yao, and maybe even a healthy Francis will carry us deep in the playoffs assuming they can stay healthy. And thats all hoping everyone else on the team can stay healthy. If we stay healthy then we'll go deep in the playoffs. Just not right now. We know we can at least put faith in Morey to pick up a gem in the draft, and bring in talented players in the offseason that I think almost everyone thought would contribute but just weren't good fits. We have a competent GM, a great coach, and great players when healthy. The future is bright.
Labling the Rockets as overacheivers, indicates that you don't think they are that good. I hate that Jon Barry was badmouthing our streak. But last week he was asked why the Rockets don't get much respect. He said it was because we lack "starpower". With Yau out, we only have TMac. That doesn't match up with the name players of Boston, Detroit, LAL, Spurs, Mavs, Jazz and Suns. But this is a team game and 1 player can't win by himself. Just ask Kobe about that. I think the Rockets are a team that has learned to play as a team, even though they now have a 2 game loosing streak. Hopefully that will carry them past the 1st round.
Over-achieving? Not-really. It took the team sometimes to get adjust to the new systems and find themselves. If the Rockets will be relatively healthy next season (let's say T-Mac or Yao will not miss more than 12 games), I bet the Rockets will have 60+ wins.
Damn right we're over-achievers. One of the reasons we were able to sustain our streak is because we play pretty damn hard every night. The problem with this philosophy is that when other teams also play hard (and are fully healthy) like in the playoffs, this edge disappears. The future is indeed bright, but the same health concerns as always still remain. I am just not confident in Yao being able to play an entire season without injury. Same with T-mac. Shortening the season to 50 games would be golden for the Rockets. But there's really not much we can do about this injury bug except hope for the best. Given that our stars will get injured at some point in the season, we can only hope for a relatively minor injury that brings them back in time for the playoffs. The team should continually improve as the team becomes more capable of executing Adelman's read and react offense. Remember it took almost 2 years for the Kings to truly get it. We also have an expiring contract in B-Jackson that we could trade for a younger piece next year. Either way, I'm confident we will improve in the offseason.
Over-achieving is a good thing: it indicates determination. I like a gritty and spirited team. Rudy! Rudy! Rudy!
definte over achievers. we stayed with our streak because of fortunate injuries to opposing players. like someone said, we lose our edge come playoffs because every team plays hard.
i don't think we've overachieved. we just won 22 games in a row, which rarely rarely happens in the nba, to compensate the mistakes or slow adaptions earlier in the season. people are amazed at thestreak, but mathematically, it ain't any different from, say, a 10-wins-2-losses-12-wins sort of pattern. for example, compare us to the gsw, the #8 team right now. a team w/ 2 super stars only win a few more games than a team led by an allstar caliber pg w/ no real inside presence. how's that over-achieving? i know we've lost yao for some time now, but they're w/o jackson, their second best player, for multiple games at the beginning of the season. and the season is not over.
what happened to all the "oh, if ONLY JVG had this roster last season.." talk..? which is it? is the streak and our high seeding due to an improved roster, or simply a rag-tag bunch of hustle players over-achieving..? if it's both.. well then.. we're in a whole heap of trouble..
I don't think we're overachieving at all. Well, okay, 22 in a row might have included a bit of it. What I *do* think is that this team plays above its talent level, but I attribute that to good coaching and a good attitude. "Overachieving" makes it sound like we're doing it just by trying harder -- and while that might be part of the story, it's only one of several factors. From here to the end of the season, I expect us to go 10-4, but I wouldn't be at all surprised to see 11-3 or even 12-2.
We weren't overachieving ith Yao and Landry. After Yao wet dow, we were overachieving. With Landry out too, they were playing w/ such intensity it was unsustainable over the long run. This is why the Spurs always lay low in the pack until after the break when they turn it on and get ready for the playoffs. We needed the 22 game streak to even be in this race. I think we just need to stay somewhere in the middle and then turn on the intensity in the playoffs. It's a long ass season. Better to pace ourselves now.
It isn't overachieving imo. The rockets did what they were supposed to do. They beat teams they were supposed to beat. The good teams they played they were lucky that they lost a key player (From Dirk to West to Gasol). If anything the Rockets just didn't suffer the mental lapses that all teams would get once in a while and played to their abilities. That isn't overachieving, its called being able to focus all the time.
