What was so special about the 04-05 Rockets??? Guys dont get me wrong we had a great great great season, i mean winning 22 in a row i mean thats just unbelievable and finishing with the 4th best record in the west despite losing yao for 2months, im really proud of this team but i just wanted to know what u guys found special about the 04-05 rockets??? For me 1.Bob Sura 2.Jon Barry and his unique style 3.Mike James coming off the bench 4.Ryan bowen the dirk stopper!! 5.The hand gesture for threes AND OBVIOUSLY TMAC AT HIS BEST
The chemistry. not the most talented bunch, but yu wouldve never known that by what happened on tha court. they just kids having fun out htere. even tmac.
We had guards. The team as a whole played good defense, but they had guards who could hit threes on any given night. Sura, Wesley, Barry and James were a ragtag group but helped turn an ugly early season around in a radical way. That team had no power forward at all ... Juwan Howard was lost in March or April and they started Clarence Weatherspoon and/or Ryan Bowen in the postseason. Unfortunately age got to Sura, Wesley and Barry and James was traded. Adding today's Battier, Scola and Landry to that team would be pretty nice though.
Yao was great that season too. He was a force in the 4th quarter. Since Rafer took the PG duty, that team was history.
What was so special about them? How about the fact that they closed the season 45-20 after a 6-11 start? Or that they had T-Mac in his prime? You remember, the guy who went off for 13 points in 35 seconds against the Spurs? Unfortunately they'll also be remembered as the team that pissed away a 2-0 lead to the Mavs coming home. They probably would've lost to the Suns in Round 2 anyway, but imagine what getting that monkey off of T-Mac's back would've done for him and this organization.
T-Mac was at his best. Yao was improving and both he and T-Mac were so dominant when on the floor together , Yao just couldn't stay out of foul trouble. It was exciting the possibility if having both Yao and T-Mac in their prime together , too bad we will never be able to see that probably.
well I could send this into the D&D, but i will say they were fun to watch but so was this team, and this team was more MUCH MORE impressive with the changes they went through to end up where they wer.
Thank you!! I've been dying to make this thread myself. I see on this board all the time where people are comparing so-and-so to Bobby Sura or Jon Barry or whoever else from the 04-05 Rockets like they were a championship team. It was another first round exit for us to a WCF contender. They had great chemistry, but were nothing special.
Not to mention the sheer heart and passion the guys had, despite their lack of talent. I'll never forget that beautiful scene of Sura just owning Josh Howard in the playoffs. Brings a tear to my eye. I miss Sura so much.
That team was sort of like this season's team. A bunch of guys that played above their heads...you could really get behind them. The difference is that team actually had potential to go far. T-Mac was at a physical peak, and Yao was a first or second-tier player as well, so every night it felt like we were going to win. Not could win like this season's team, but would win. Alas, we pulled a bad matchup and had severe injuries.
unfortunately, we had MIDGET guards. whoever tmac or bowen were not on, the mavs' guards KILLED us defensively (stack/howard/jet). that was our undoing. sura was too slow. wesley, barry, and james were too small.
Yao couldn't stay out of foul trouble (talk about calling severe ticky tack fouls). We had no PF because Juwan was hurt. Our guards could make 3s but noone could create their own shot (sound familiar?). Plus that team as constructed was really old. We are better off today to be honest.
easily tmac playing at the level he was at the time he was unstoppable especially in the dallas series
Yao starting to dominate TMac in his prime athletically Bob Sura Jon Barry nailing 3's and always making the right pass The trio of Wesley, Sura, Barry and how well they played as a unit Mike James hitting tons of 3 pointers and pushing the tempo Hard nosed defense and hard nose players. Once again, Bob Sura...definitely one of my favorite all time players in Rockets history (though it was extremely brief). Hard nosed, athletic player who always gave 110% out there. If we had a healthy Sura on this team, we would have rolled... Too bad we had Juwan to taint that team, though EDIT: it was also the first year in a long time that we felt we had a real shot in the playoffs
I had one of my best memories as a Rockets fan that year. Because I went to school in Austin I was surrounded by Spurs and Mavs fans, in 04-05 I lived with 2 Spurs fans. We are all watching the Rockets Spurs game, and my friend from Houston is talking smack to my roommate with about 3 minutes left. My roomate (Spurs fan) tells my Houston friend he will bet him anything the Rockets wont win, my friend agrees. My roomie says he will shave his head if the Rockets win, and my friend wont have to do anything if they loose, so of course he takes the bet. 13 pts in 35 seconds happens and my roomate wimped out and bought him a case of beer instead. Not only was that 35 seconds one of the greatest events I've seen in basketball, it was one of the funniest memories of college.
