Why do you think Rockets potential three peat and dyntasy died?

What about a healthy starting lineup of:
Dream
Horry
Kevin Willis
Drexler
Cassell
I think if I were Rudy I would have given it one more season with a free agent pickup in Kevin Willis. Trading away their youth in Cassell and Horry was a real back breaker, both those guys to this day are playoff closers. Barkley brought so much to the table off the blocks and on the glass, but he was a real liability on the defensive end and the cause of some dissention. Defense wins championships.

 

Brilliant statements. This should shut up the people who thought the Barkley trade was bad.

 

If Barkley was the wrong guy, who should the Rockets have traded for then?

 

Dikembe Mutombo

 

barkley is not even close to the topic of discussion. the year after we won the championship, we didn't do well. WHY?

 

Look how close in 93-94 and 94-95 the Rockets came to NOT winning the championship. They were fighting from behind much of the time. It simply caught up with them the following year.

 

There are really two threads here: what happened to the Rockets in 95-96? And what was Rudy thinking when he traded away the future for Barkley?

Add me to the list of Barkley trade haters. Let's not keep refraining the tired mantra that this was "three backup PFs and a good PG for a HOF PF."

The truth is this: Horry got starter's minutes and was the starting SF for much of the season with Elie out. He was pretty much on his way to being the starting SF of the future and fit perfectly into Rudy's system (ie, he could do everything we all wished Pippen could).

Which brings us to Cassell: this guy was everyone's favorite Rock next to Dream (with the possible exception of Clyde). Seemed to have a genius for creating his own shot when nothing was there. As said before, was a stud, is a stud, and is still getting better. Arguably one of the top three PG's in the league today. I'd say a step or two above Matt Maloney.

I think others in this thread have summed up Barkley's contributions to the team. No doubt, a dominating low post presence and rebounder, but in my estimation a significant portion of his contribution came at the expense of Hakeem's. The drop-off in Hakeem's production is evident in the stats, when he should have still had one or two more MVP-calibre years in the tank. And who knows? Maybe absent Barkley, Dream plays through injuries a bit more over the next couple of seasons.

And the idea of gutting your lineup because of matchup problems with one team is ridiculous. It's not like the Sonics put that team together with the express purpose of clubbing the Rocks in the playoffs. Wasn't it soon after that Seattle starting dismantling their own team by dealing Kemp anyways?

I agree with others who say the championship Rocks should have been given another year to make a run before being dismantled. Worst case is that we would have kept two young, exciting players and gotten to watch them through their prime.

 

only two words can describe the demise of the rockets chance at a 3-peat: Michael Jordan

 

First things first.

The reason the Rockets didn't repeat in 1995-1996 is two reasons.

1)Injuries: Sam Cassell had an injured elbow that limited his effectiveness. Clyde Drexler had the stiff neck( although that was still a poor excuse for him missing a fast break layup with under 2 minutes to go that would have given the Rockets the lead. Absolute turning point in the series)

2)The decline of Hakeem Olajuwon: Absolutely the biggest reason we did not repeat. Seattle had virtually the same talent and played the same defense on Hakeem in the 1993 playoffs. Hakeem was able to dominate back then. He was an absolute monster in that series. If he would have been able to duplicate his performance from the 1993 playoffs, we would have at least made the NBA Finals that year.

But by the time the 1995-1996 season came around, Hakeem was facing a noticeable decline in his athleticism. It was obvious that when he struggled for the first 2 months of the season with a paltry scoring average of 24 ppg with under 50% FG. Something was wrong. He did end up picking it up during the course of the season to get his average to 26 a game. But he wasn't the same player that he was the previous year. He lacked the explosivness that he had in the 94-95 season. Even though some of his athleticism started to decline in the second championship season, the drop off the 3rd championship run was substantial. And that's why we lost. If you are not convinced, the biggest statistical indicator of his drop in athleticism was his shot blocking. He blocked less than 3 bpg, first time since the 1988-1989 season if I'm not mistaken. During the 2nd championship run, he blocked fewer than 4 bpg, which was the first time the 1988-1989 season once again.

As for the Charles Barkley trade, one of the greatest moves the Rockets franchise has ever made. The playoff run we had that year to me felt like our championship runs. It was that intense, that emotional, and at times that satisfying. The entire season was tremendous. We actually had a team that was dominanat not just in the playoffs, but in the regular season. The two years prior to Barkley we couldn't even crack the 50 win barrier. Watching the regular season was like pulling teeth with those team. With Barkley, we got out of the gates like a mighty fine race horse. We were creating a kind of national buzz that Houston had never had before. 24 games into the season, there was talk of us challenging Chicago 72 win record. Even though we tailed off at the end due to injuries, 57 wins felt really good. The entire season was much more enjoyeable to watch than our 2nd championship season when we played some pretty crappy basketball for a good portion of the season.

Even though our playoffs ended in disappointment, it really was like watching our championship runs. We absolutely dominated the T'Wolves the first round. But the 2nd round series was one for the ages. Beating the Seattle Supersonics that year brought a different kind of joy to me that was comparable to winning a championship. It was such satisfaction to extract that kind of revenge.

An up and down, drama filled series. Seattle comes back to tie up the series in game two. We go down to Seattle and our Big 3 imposed their will on them. With game 3 ending with big time buckets from Hakeem, Barkley, and Clyde the Glyde finishing them off with a spin move baseline fadeaway on Detlef. Game 4 Matt "Fat" Maloney goes ballistic on the Glove, even crossing him over on a dribble drive.

Then Seattle starts mounting a Clutch City-like comeback tying the series 3 all after being down 3-1. That game 7 was absolutely scintillating. The Sonics were truly the Rockets biggest rivals for over a decade. We lost to them in 88, 90, 92, and 96 in the playoffs. After watching all of those defeats, a true Rockets fan knows how much it meant to beat that Seattle team. And Barkley was the only reason and the only way that we would have beaten them. Having two respectable post players kept that Seattle team from just collapsing on Olajuwon. In the end, Barkley helped produce one of the greatest moments in Rockets history.

Even though we lost to the Jazz in the Western Conference finals, there were some memories to be had from that series. All I have to say is EJ. Games 3 and 4. He simply turned back time. Who doesn't remember Matt Maloney getting trapped on the baseline, and finding Eddie for the 3 at the top of the key. Right up there with Kenny Smith nailing the game tying 3 in game 1 of the 95 finals. Without Barkely, that entire season would have never happened. I wouldn't trade those memories from that season for the world.

 

The two years prior to Barkley we couldn't even crack the 50 win barrier. Watching the regular season was like pulling teeth with those team. With Barkley, we got out of the gates like a mighty fine race horse. We were creating a kind of national buzz that Houston had never had before. 24 games into the season, there was talk of us challenging Chicago 72 win record. Even though we tailed off at the end due to injuries, 57 wins felt really good.

Short memory, eh? We had a BETTER start during the first championship season: 22-1. Set records in the process, and created plenty of national buzz. And finished with a better record (58 wins). As for the playoff run, it was alot of fun. But it ended in defeat, so it was a failure in that respect. And it was the last run we had - the team went downhill quickly after that season.

 

Michael Jordan and the Bulls eliminated the Rockets? Really?

 

The bulls eliminated us 2 out of 10 times with Jordan.

 

Losing in the Conf Finals in 6 games wasn't bad. People will talk about the Barkley trade, but it was a good trade cosidering the only player really worth anything was Cassell. Horry sucked at Phoe and eventually was sent to heaven to play with Shaq ala a young dominant version of Hakeem. What has Bryant or Chucky Brown done since the trade? In case anyone forgot, Seattle had beaten us everytim since the 93 semifinal game 6 was the last win. Lets see,1 in 93,4 times in 94,95, and 96 plus a sweep in the playoffs equal 17 straight times 1 team beat you. It was time for a change and try to get another ring while Hakeem,and Clyde were still very productive. We just lost to a great player on a great shot. After that, injuries and age caught up with us like most teams.

 

You know what really really really bothered me about the 95-96 team? They were by far my least favorite Rockets squad to date. Absolutely drove me crazy.

They were the worse possible combination of whiney and arrogant. They always got whiney talking about how no one respected them, and all that whatnot, but what I really couldn't stand was how they didn't seem to mind losing.

They would always say things like, "Oh, well we know we can turn it on when we want to," or "We know how to perform in the playoffs, that's all that matters," or Mario Elie's statement prior to game 3 against the Sonics, "We know we can beat this team. We don't want to be the first team to come back from an 0-3 deficit, but we'll do that if we have to."

Whatever talk of the heart of a champion, they just didn't bring in the third year.

 

damn, you guys are making me all nostalgic.
it was so great being a rockets fan back then....
..these days it seems like more pain then pleasure...

 

Agreed.

 

But the only player worth anything we received in that trade was Charles Barkley. Between Cassell and Barkley, who's the better player? Barkley. Which would you rather have in an offensive scheme based on Olajuwon's low-post play? Cassell.

We may have profited in a calculation of the sum of talent (though I think you unduly discount Robert Horry (who was never as well utilized in Phoenix of LA as he was in Houston)), but in terms of putting the parts together to make a single cohesive unit, we obviously lost out.

 

Originally posted by TheFreak
Injuries, specifically the Elie injury in '95-'96, are what ended the run. I believe the Rockets were 23-5 when Elie went down. They ended up 48-34. Had the Rockets been healthy all year, they could've beaten Seattle. They should've had Game 2 of that series as it is, which would've completely turned the series around, but Seattle got lucky on the 3s.

Definitely a huge injury. I still remember that Jalen Rose undercut crap. Damn I was pissed!

As far as subsequent years, in '96-'97 the problem was no D and atrocious point guard play. Utah out-classed the Rockets because they were better (64 wins). The Rockets couldn't get any big stops that year. Again, point guard play was terrible -- a Derek Harper would've put them over the hump.

As obscure as it sounds the injury to Emanuel Davis was huge I thought. He was the only point guard we had who could play defense and had some athleticism. I thought it was big when he went down that year cause it left us Maloney and Price who were basically the same type of player.

Another big reason we had trouble in the last years I thought was the inability to match up with Bryon Russell. We owned the Jazz until this guy became a quality player. Russell's emergence really hurt us against Utah.

 

Agreed..they were a whiny team that year. And they got rolled by the Sonics.

So in the offseason, it was clear we needed to tweak the team to beat the Sonics...we did just that by acquiring Barkley. He ate Seattle alive and the Rockets beat them to advance to the WCF...problem was, nobody knew the Jazz were going to have their best year ever...and we no longer matched up with them as well as we once did...the NBA is all about matchups. We were fortunate enough to avoid Seattle during the two championship drives..

 

I guess now's as good a time as any to bring this up.....the Seattle team that Barkley supposedly beat in '97 was nowhere near the team the Rockets got swept by in '96. That much is obvious when you compare the records of the two Seattle teams (64 wins in '96 to 57 in '97), but there are a couple of other facts to bring up -- Shawn Kemp was a far inferior player in '97. In '96, he was clearly the second-best player in the league I thought, but in '97, his game suffered big time -- remember he had the contract dispute, and the drinking accusations. He just was not near the player he was the previous year. Also, Rocket-killer Nate McMillan didn't even play in '97 -- he tore the Rockets up in '96. All in all the Seattle team in '97 was just not that great -- when it took the Rockets 7 games to beat them, I became seriously worried about their chances in the conference finals against a tough 64-win Utah team.