I think that is a reasonable standings. I think Rockets can easliy be no.2 if they get one more piece.
I agree that it is entirely too early for this kind of speculation but, since "everyone else is doing it," I'll go ahead and through my opinion in the hat too. Keep in mind that this is only my opinion. As long as Yao and Mcgrady are the "backbone" of this team they will not succeed. There will be injuries. Yao and Mcgrady both seem to be made of glass. They will not get out of the first round. They will, however, disappoint everyone everyone (myself included, because in the back of my mind, I don't want to believe what I'm saying).
How in the world are we under the Trailblazers? If I was a Blazers homer I still wouldn't put them over the Rockets.
I know the Blazers are full of young talent and have a good head coach, but lets see them prove something first before we put them in the same class as LA, SAS, HOU, NOH, and UTAH. And lets not forget PHX and DAL, who have veteran players and a lot of playoff experience. I'm fine with ppl putting them above the Nuggets, Clippers, or Warriors, because those teams don't commit to defense or have a bad mix of talent. I'm not saying Portland can't be a top 5 team in the West, because Roy is a proven all around all star guard, Aldridge is a nice scoring power forward with touch, Outlaw is a freak of an athlete, and Bayless has potential to be a nice guard, and everybody says nothing but good things about Rudy Fernandez (I think thats his name), and of course Greg Oden if he didn't lose much athletecism should be a beast at the very least defensively and on the boards. I just want to see a team that young suddenly overtake a conference that had 8 50 win teams and another with 49 wins. But a couple of veteran players and this team could be title contenders, but just extremely young and inexperienced right now.
Perhaps I was over-estimating Portland this upcoming year but I think that all of you sort of make that a moot point by over-estimating the Rockets year in and year out. The Rockets have always been my team. Always. However, I've given up on the belief in the team's "core" of Mcgrady and Yao. ... I think its a little interesting that, while many of you were quick to point out the mistakes in my reasoning, that nobody disputed my assertion that Yao and Mcgrady are both made of glass and thus will not be injury-free.
