Truly - It's time !

This team with James and Francis THIS season has looked really bad. I would venture to say when the team looks its worst is when James running the point and when Francis was the starting PG. Francis had it set up for him to be the starter permanently here, but all of the sudden we went cuckoo and tried to be the man again. Brooks, Head, and Alston are the best options at guard for this team right now. Mac and Bonzi if you want to count them in the guard group. James and Francis are the bottom of the long list.

THAT, my fellow fan, is the reality right now. At least James is still given chances and hasn't shown any improvement. Francis seems to have fallen off the planet. Our best PG/SG players seem to be the young Brooks and Head. Whether you find hope in that or not is up to you. But that's where it's going right now. Or so it seems.

 

I'm not as optimistic but I think all of the points DD made are things that could come to pass. As for my take; Brooks is really a nice little player and I still believe that Scola will end up as a solid 13/8 guy by season's end. If Head and Battier can shoot even close to their percentages from last year and the defense is at least consistently "pretty good" then this team can still turn it around and make some noise in April/May.

There are just too many good players on this team for at least 2 or 3 of them not to come out of their slump and start playing like they always have.

 

this is one of the biggest misconceptions among Rockets fans.. this is another thing that the r****ded NBA media put in our heads and we ran with it.. James isn't a ballhog, just because he is a good shooter and he knows what to do with the ball with time winding down doesn't mean that he doesn't pass.. James is a great passer actually, and he makes some sweet dishes when appropriate.. he just has the luxury to raise up and shoot over people when a certain pass/play isn't available.. This of course contrasts greatly with Rafer's inability to create in that case, which usually ends up in him passing the ball to Mac or Yao in a bad position to shoot with time winding down.. what do we get as a result? a low percentage shot from one of our superstars (you know, like a Tmac 3 from 30 feet, or a Yao turnaround from behind the backboard)..

Keep James, he is our backup PG.. start Francis, trade away Alston and Head for a full sized shooting guard/small forward that can shoot really well and defend/drive to the basket..

 

part of me wants to believe this, but I still haven't given up on Steve.. The way he played against Phoenix and in the preseason is standing in the way of me giving up on him.. I've seen how much he sucked when he started, and I acknowledge that, but I just don't think it was a fair presentation of what he can truly do for this team.. it's kinda like last year's Bonzi.. he absolutely sucked when he played and people were calling for his fat, Donut-loving a$$ to retire.. look at him this season; he has been given the opportunity and he is doing absolutely great, playing an integral part in the offense AND defense/rebounding..

let's give Steve one more chance, his back might have been bothering him after that push he took from Baron Davis, and I would like to believe that he was trying to play in spite of the injury, which resulted in his poor performance...

let a fella dream man, I really want to see him succeed and help this team..

 

Agree. But he's a good substitute whenever Tmac quits playing especially during playoffs.

 

Adelman's too passive for this team, as currently constructed, to ever amount to anything substantially better than mediocre.

When the team homers Worrell and Drexler repeatedly reiterate during multiple game broadcasts that roster changes are in order, it's pretty frickin obvious that this team will not compete at a high level in this league without some wholesale changes. Until that time comes, it's gonna be a b**** to be a Rockets fan. Even more of a b**** than usual.

 

Is their another Mike James you are describing cause I don't see that when I watch Rockets games...I'm judging by what I see, and what I see is him massaging the hell out of the ball while he tries to drive to the basket himself (ignoring open teammates) or jacks up a shot. Just because he is a talented player doesn't mean he's not a detriment to the team chemistry.

Start Francis?!? Are you kidding me? That's another guy who takes 20 seconds of the 24 second shot clock to dribble the ball up the court. He can't hit an open shot to save his life either.

Face it, Francis and James are old players who are set in their ways, Adelman's system is a big mental block for these guys who envision themselves doing (past) individual brilliance.

At least Head tries to play the system, even with his at least one guaranteed bonehead play per game.

 

tmac saying he bought in is far from him actually buying in. I'll believe it when I see it. My really negative thoughts about t-mac lead me to think he doesn't want to go to the playoffs since he can't take another first round exit. He will already have the " we weren't favored to win" card lined up since we won't finish in top 4. The Best case scenario would be that he's just now getting ready to play ball after the first couple months of the season as he typically gets off to a slow start.

 

I find it interesting you keep focusing on TMac. Yao also played like crap too...

One reason Bulls fired Skiles was the players all get tired of him. I wonder how the Rockets players feel right now?

 

I guess bashing Tmac is the new trend among Langhi/V-span homers..

you can't really blame them, the Rockets don't have a scrub for them to pull for this year, so they just shifted their efforts to something more constructive..

 

It's time to go to the draft lottery and hope for the best...

anyways...

It looks like it's time for the blazers...impressive winning streak

our biggest one was 5 for the past 4 years...

 

Look at how many seasons the Blazers had to be at or near the bottom of the NBA to just now go on a winning streak. Reserve judgement on them at the end of the year.

The real question is, can this board endure that much losing? They can't even handle 20 games of .500 play. I shudder at the thought of what will happen to the GARM if we have to go through years and years of being really bad. The last time I remember them being anything close to good was when Cylde was there. My memory does suck though.

 

You keep francis and james. It's always good to have an insurance policy, and you never know when a particular playoff match-up might make one them more useful.

It's clear to me though that brooks is clearly emerging as the most talented pg on the team and deserves the back-up spot behind rafer.

 

i think you're forgetting about the Blazers, circa 2000-2001?, when they had Arvydas Sabonis, Rasheed Wallace, Scottie Pippen, Bonzi Wells, Detlef Schrempf, Damon Stoudamire, and Dale Davis, among others. they were pretty damn good. they were one 4th quarter away from getting to the NBA Finals.

 

I agree with everything you wrote between first and last paragraph But I strongly disagree with first and last paragraphs! This season so far I have seen francis play at PG, I have seen James play at PG, I have seen Alston play at PG, I have seen Head play at PG and I have seen Brooks play at PG with that said our offense runs SMOOTH when Alston is at PG believe it or not and YES I know that he flat out SUCKS at putting the ball in the hole whether its a jumper or a layup BUT he is ONE of the few players in the team who does not look lost and makes some great plays which is why he is STILL in the starting spot!! NOW... I would like someone to replace Rafer who is a threat at offense and is consistent offensively to compliment Yao and Tmac and guess What?!!! I recently saw that in Aaron Brooks! Yes thats right! Brooks!!! Based on the games he has played in so far he runs the offense just as well as Rafer and he can also SHOOT!!! and finish at the other end on fastbreaks and layups! BUT its just our luck that he is "just a rookie" though we may win games with him running the offense I really do not see a inexperienced rookie doing that in the playoffs therefore he is not our longterm solution... not now at least. About Francis and James I do agree that francis can be a offensive threat and we NEED his penetration badly I just don't see him starting alongside Tmac and yao and still be affective in offense and play his fullest but he may be able to do that coming off of bench, and oh yeah another reason why Rafer is starting and that cuz our offense does not run smooth with francis at PG and we all have seen that. About James not much to say really he was brought in as a shooter and boost our offense but he is in a really bad shooting mode right now which I think he will grow out of eventually unlike Rafer but I difinitely do not think he is our answer at PG, like francis our team does not function well, our offense does not run smooth with James running the offense.

Yes we are definitey lacking chemistry and we can see that on the court, our coaching staff needs to do what EVER they can to fix it but I think we already have the pieces we need it just has to come together in the right starting lineup and right rotations! and one way to do that is bench hayes and start Luis it will take time to get used to since our starting lineup has been the same for 4 season but it will add another offense to Yao and Tmac and I think Luis compliments Yao just as much as Hayes.

 

I agree with DD. I think we are on the verge of taking off. Our second unit looked really, really good out there.

I'd like to see Scola get more minutes, but let's face it, on defense right now he is a straight up foul machine. If he could stop that (remember Hayes used to get a bunch of ticky-tack crap too but that has lessened, so there is hope), he could definitely give us those garbage buckets/easy baskets that we need so bad at times.

I love how Hayes plays. Love his defense and his energy. But realistically he is just too much of an offensive liability. If we had a legit 3rd scorer in the starting lineup, then I'd say let him keep starting because we get so many 2nd opportunities with him. But we don't...I still see him getting a good number of minutes, at least until Scola starts playing NBA defense (i.e., stop using your hands, and move your damn feet!)

 

as blinebury (http://blogs.chron.com/franblinebury/) mentioned: And I heard them exclaim, ere they drove out of sight, "If you still think 'It's Time!" maybe your underwear's too tight."

 

basketball is a funny game - well not really it's like any other sport at the top level. in terms of ability, the differences between NBA players are pretty small. Small changes make tremendous differences. It's like how every 1/10 of a second is make it or break it in the 100 meter dash.

And it's that kind of margin.

You have to have enough talent to be sure....but I don't think anyone really knows if we have enough talent stockpiled or not. It sure seems that with Tmac, Yao, Wells, Battier, and upstart brooks and scola, we do have enough talent to at least look like a contender....but we're not.

So that's the good news. This season is far from a bust. Everyone, including Rockets managment knows that. And improvement is occuring. You can't just look at box scores or highlights to see that.

The most interesting thing in the box score by the way is the number of players scoring in double digits. That along with assists helps you see how much passing and how effective Rick's offense is running. In the begining of the season, when we started 6-1 - it was all yao and tmac

Now you're seeing far more balanced scoring and higher assist numbers. So even though we're struggling, i think we're running a better offense.

So I say, instead of saying "It's time", how about, let's give these guys a bit more time before we judge them.

 

Over/under on two weeks before the "PLAY NOVAK" thread is officially launched. Or should it be just one week?