Unfortunatley I think that we will not make the playoffs till the year after next. Teams with *** are teams we can't beat out. There's 7 of them. Of these Portland is sort of disorganized, but too much talent to pass. Seattle is a young team with Payton in his prime, there getting better. The only possibility to fall is Utah. Unfortunately I think that Stockton and Malone can last one more year. They basically act like coaches on the floor and are guiding the new guys Kirilinko etc how to play. I give them one more year. As you can see Utah was 16 games better than us. I know injuries etc. If Utah falls then we have to worry about the Clippes who are on the rise (perhaps faster than us) and were 11 games better than us. Western Conference San Antonio 58 24 *** Dallas 57 25 *** Minnesota 50 32 *** Utah 44 38 ??? Houston 28 54 Denver 27 55 Memphis 23 59 Sacramento 61 21 *** L.A. Lakers 58 24 *** Portland 49 33 *** Seattle 45 37 *** L.A. Clippers 39 43 ??? Phoenix 36 46 Golden State 21 In conclusion, do not fire Rudy, Carrol or do anything drastic till the year after next. Also don't encourage them to sacrifice the future for next year. Being realistic will lead to a better future than unrealistically sacrificing the future because we are desperate to make the relatively longshot of making the 8 th seed.
I pretty much agree with glynch (we aren't in the Hangout anymore toto). I definitely wanna get some playoff action but if getting someone incredible like woods/butler/etc is possible and it means we are a fringe playoff team next year I would rather do that than get someone less skilled (ie someone less than lewis/odom/etc) just to make sure we get to the playoffs. that was the pure beauty of this tank job. taking a fringe team on the rise and adding a huge piece.
Here's a thought: maybe the Rockets should be able to play with and beat some of those playoff teams. When healthy, they have just as much talent as the bottom four playoff teams in the west.
glynch, my thoughts exactly. The Clippers will be better next year with two more lottery picks and whatever they get in return for Odom. Golden State most likely will be adding a franchise-type player, and a new coach, this team has talent. Memphis will be tough to beat, as well. Battier and Gasol will have more experience, Dickerson will be healthy. There is no way the Rockets can bump out any of the top 6 teams in the West, and if Seattle resigns Lewis they'll be beyound reach as well. What will the rockets have next year? If you take last year's team as a base: PG: Steve is not better than last year, he is near his ceiling at 25 yo. SG: Cuttino has improved a bit, but is also getting to his peak. C: Cato/??? vs Cato/Hakeem, big drop here. Hakeem was critical in the playoff surge last year SF: Rice/Griffin vs Shandon/Walt. No improvement here. Rice is done, Griffin is not ready. Shandon and Walt had there moments PF: MoTay/KT vs KT/MoTay, one improves the other slips, no net gain. Rookies 2002 vs rookies 2000: hopefully big improvement, but doubtefully big impact immediately. So you take a team that didin't make the playoffs, has no major improvements, how can you expect them to make it? Bottomline is: 1. payoff Memphis now with Toronto's pick. 2. If no franchise-type players are available in the draft, try to package the picks with our mistakes (Taylor, Rice, cato Moochie) for expiring contracts and shoot for a marquee FA in 2003.
The Warriors said that if they were healthy they would be a good team. Well, they were pretty healthy this year and managed to barely avoid being the worst team in the league. I don't think one more lotto pick is going to catapult them past a healthy Rockets team.
PG Stevie Franchise is nowhere near his ceiling. He may never reach his ceiling, but his nowhere near it right now. IMO, he was worse this year than last because of the migraines. SG Mobley has improved every year he has been with the team. What has he done to make you think that will stop now? And even if it does, he is pretty darn good. If this is a comparison to last year (the team that was one of the best ever to not make the playoffs), Mobley is a lot better than last year right now and has the whole offseason to work on his game some more. SF Griffin by himself is better than the combo of Shandon and Walt and his upside is immeasurable. Rice was, guess what, hurt! We have no idea whether he has anything left or not. At an absolute worst, Rice if healthy, will give you what Walt did last year. And that is pushing it. Comparing next year to last year, SF is a big up looking at it this way. and that is even with not having the #5 here. PF KT's game grew immensely this year. I think MoT is young enough to assume that if healthy, his game hasn't gotten any worse. So there is little doubt this position will be better than 2 years ago. And that isn't even taking into account the presence of Griffin. C Cato vs Cato/Hakeem I will agree with big drop, but Cato has gotten better so it is not as big. Depends on what we do here in the offseason. Rookies 2000 vs 2002 With where we are picking vs then, I have no doubt we will get rookies much better and more ready to contribute now than we did in 2000. And that is assuming we don't pull off a trade. Net, if we are healthy, we can be better than last year without too much problem, IMO. All depends on our health though. The talent is there.
Usually we overestimate our team, this time many of you are underestimating them. This year we had an enourmous amount of bad luck with Mo gone for the year, Rice and Walt almost gone for the year, and Franchise and Cats numerous missed or health hampered games. The year before with a younger and less talented (but healthier) team we finished with the same record with this year's Sonics and better than this year's Jazz--and that was in a year with an even thicker WC because Phx was still good then. In a nutshell, we probably are not quite as good as we showed two years ago (the 45-37 record perhaps inflated by the amazing East run) nor near as bad as this year. However, given 1) the youth of our team should progress, 2) we can't expect to have as bad of a health year; 3) our 2 good first round picks coming to upgrade with rookies/trades--the 7th seed is very attainable in the West next year. Now if you said we should gun for having homecourt in the first playoff series next year I would say that is unrealistic, but there is no question we should gun for the playoffs next year.
The thing is we lost our 2 best defenders in Anderson and Hakeem and replace them with 2 subpar defenders. Old as hakeem last yr avg 2blks in limited minutes and shandon played good on ball defense. It wasn't as much as the loss of Rice and Taylor as opposed to losing your 2 best defenders and then lead the league in opp fg% and fewest in steals and blks also. Thats where the drop was. Getting Rice and Taylor back doesn't improve these 2 areas.
Our OFG% was 46% this year, 45% last year. Our blocks went up .2 to 5.1PG (probably EG compensated for Hakeem in this) and our steals down .4 to 7.0PG. I think the main point of this story is not what we lost Hakeem and Shandon defensively, but that our defense has been sucky (among the worst in the league) the last few years. Those 2 guys didn't exactly tear it up defensively for the teams they went to either. I do agree getting Rice and MoTay back won't help much here. But an improving EG plus adding 1-2 players who can play defense with our low #1 picks or via trade could improve our team defense. Ideally we get a C (Ming with our "lucky" first, or Bordchart/Ely with our second 1st rounder) who can play D immediately plus and another forward who potentially is good on both ends (Bulter/Gooden/Wilcox). Likewise if we could come out with something in this offseason like Bordchart and Odom/Lewis (at least they are long 3s) with our picks/KT that could improve our defense. With having KT as trade bait and these 2 good first round draft picks we are in as good of position as any to address our weakenness.
Desert Scar- I agree with you on the stats, but defense isn't always measured in blks and steals either. As a team we were probably about the same, but how many layups and drives to the basket does Cato give up? What about Rice and Walt? Even though Griffin provided good weak side shot blocking, what about the position defense where teams got easy low post position?
WHAT?!?!? Don't you realize the guy played through a season never knowing when the next migraine was going to rock his world! Using thing season as a foresight to the rest of Steve's career has no validity whatsoever.
Exactly. I was extremely dissapointed by Steve this year, but some people are too harsh on him. Steve's first major injury combined with painful migranes definitely lowered his play. I expect him to come out strong next season, as long as he figures out what's behind the migranes. If he could learn how to play some defense over the offseason, then that would lift his game.
I don't think the Rockets can wait until they open the new arena to make the playoffs. IMHO, next season is a "do or die" season in Les Alexanders' mind.
gore lost and you know it get over it sore loser bush wont last anyways,so chill out,gore will be elected in 2004,I just hope he picks odom as his vice president(unless hes a rocket)
Gore is damaged goods, he could not even win his own state. I doubt he would win his parties nomination. They might feed on him being the victim now, but come 2004 - His party will be begging for him to drop out (eventhough he wont).
