The Houston Rockets Thread

Nifty pass from Smith there.

Out of all the young players looking to make the Rockets team, Smith's got the best chance. Sure hope Morey goes through with signing him.

Highlights of Saturday's game, long video though:

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2:30, good old hustle basketball right there.

Ishmael Smith is good. He's got Aaron Brooks and Kyle Lowry worried. Morey should sign him though. The Rockets suffered last season when Brooks or Lowry got injured and there was no backup pointguard. Sign Ishmael and have him play with the Vipers. When Lowry or Brooks gets injured call him up.

Seriously Courtney Lee?

Wow

Loving the fact that Yao just laugh even though they lose

Ouch, what a blunder.

Lee's half asleep. Stepped out of bounds then losing Marion on that alley-oop. Ugly, but I'll take him over Ariza any day.

Yeah, at least he can create his own shot, and not brick it, right?

Yep. I had enough pain watching Ariza bricking it from beyond the arc and everywhere else last season.

This is still my favourite line by the way.

Ariza: Stop driving it in with 3 defenders on you!
Brooks: Stop bricking it with no defenders on you!

Sums it up best.

Hmm...after watching the preseason, I am a little worried on how we can keep Yao for at least half a season.
Do you guys think we should extend a contract to Yao close to $10m+ like an all star player or give a close to $7mil contract.

I really want the Rockets to do well or even possibly contend for the championship sometimes in the future, but I don't think we can get even close to that goal with Yao taking a big chunk of the budget and play 20min max. I think we may also need to trade away Brooks, or even package him to get another pg that is strong defensively, create his own shots, and distribute the ball well (perfect pg ). This way the pg can complement our great shooters and add toughness to our back court. If we lose Yao in the future, we really need to get a legit Center that can defend and block shots for us, which we are lacking right now.

I think we may also need to trade away Brooks, or even package him

Trading away one of the best player on the team certainly isn't the way to go in my opinion. Not even if we have Martin who can also score. Brooks and Martin together makes one of the highest scoring back court in the league. Not to even mention how hard they are to guard when both of them can light it up for 20+ points a night.

to get another pg that is strong defensively

Kyle Lowry. Not that he's really good defensively but don't you think he's decent enough?

create his own shots

We already have Kevin Martin and Courtney Lee. Brooks can also create his own shots pretty well.

distribute the ball well

Ishmael Smith is really good at distributing the ball but I'm pretty sure he'll be playing for the Vipers once the season started. Brooks has the potential to develop into a better passer now with Kevin Martin in the starting five though. Let's hope that happens.

Yeah Smith surprised me while I was watching preseason games on Atdhe, but most likely going to D League since we have so many guards. Wth happen to Jermaine Taylor?? I always thought he has the body of Dwayne Wade. I see where you are going with the guards, and I agree all of our guards are good in their area, what's why Morey is our GM. But I rather get a PG that can run the team and defend against other elite guards (Almost all of top teams have elite guards). Someone who can give us 15.0 ppg 3.0 reb and 8 ast and 1.6 stl+ would be the ideal guard for us (John Wall) . I know Brooks and Martin can score, but neither showed they can defend well, that can cause some trouble in playoff if we actually make it there.

PS: Isn't Brooks in his contract yr or is near his contract yr?? we can run out of cash soon if his asking price is too high considering he avged almost 20ppg last yr. I personally like Ty Lawson but his height is a big disadvantage.

Brooks will be a RFA, the Rockets are not out of cash, they will match for him unless a team goes mental.

We're assuming the new CBA doesn't completely negate the current model of course.

I personally like Ty Lawson but his height is a big disadvantage.

And he'll be a Nugget for the next decade if they know what's good for them.

I think we may also need to trade away Brooks, or even package him to get another pg that is strong defensively, create his own shots, and distribute the ball well (perfect pg ).

Wait a year, Chris Paul will be available. There's no other PGs available better than Brooks, sorry.

Especially if we take your desire for a player who is:

Someone who can give us 15.0 ppg 3.0 reb and 8 ast and 1.6 stl+ would be the ideal guard for us

The number of players who have put up those per game numbers in the last three years are two: LeBron James and Chris Paul.

Even per 36, you just add Baron Davis to that, and based on how he's shot and dominated the ball he's the last thing you'd want on your team.

Brooks/Lowry is a fine PG rotation, it's what you're going to have to work with. The good news is more scoring point guards have won titles in the modern era than distributor point guards have so there's that to comfort you.

Yeah, I'm personally fine with a Brooks-Martin backcourt. Like Modi said, they are probably the hardest backcourt to guard when they put up 40 points combined. In the backcourt, I'm not too worried about our players, disregarding injuries.

Season Preview

Let's talk about Budinger's ceiling. How good do you guys think he can be? He shoots the ball well, move without the ball well, catch and shoot well, but he really needs to improve at driving the lane and drawing fouls. He's instant offense, but needs to get better on the defensive end. He's got mad hops, but needs to improve his court vision. Since he has all the tools, (height, athleticism, body, etc.) he can turn into something special. Thoughts?

Oh and to Axel for calling me a disgrace to Rockets fans in Jao's milestone thread.

Loving the fact that Yao just laugh even though they lose

It's just the pre-season.

Season Preview

Had already read the preview. The starters in the preview is really the Rockets' starting 5, right?

PUT THE "D" BACK IN DEFENSE

Is Battier not enough for the perimeter D?

Let's talk about Budinger's ceiling. How good do you guys think he can be? He shoots the ball well, move without the ball well, catch and shoot well, but he really needs to improve at driving the lane and drawing fouls. He's instant offense, but needs to get better on the defensive end. He's got mad hops, but needs to improve his court vision. Since he has all the tools, (height, athleticism, body, etc.) he can turn into something special. Thoughts?

Oh and to Axel for calling me a disgrace to Rockets fans in Jao's milestone thread.

Yeah, he can really be a special player. He's really a good addition for the Rockets. Maybe put him in the starting roster and then look if he can bloom into a solid scorer.

PUT THE "D" BACK IN DEFENSE

Is Battier not enough for the perimeter D?

No. Battier usually guards the best scorer of the team. If he's guarding Kobe Bryant, there's still Artest/Fisher/Odom to pass off to. Perimeter D doesn't rely on 1 person.

Let's talk about Budinger's ceiling. How good do you guys think he can be? He shoots the ball well, move without the ball well, catch and shoot well, but he really needs to improve at driving the lane and drawing fouls. He's instant offense, but needs to get better on the defensive end. He's got mad hops, but needs to improve his court vision. Since he has all the tools, (height, athleticism, body, etc.) he can turn into something special. Thoughts?

Oh and to Axel for calling me a disgrace to Rockets fans in Jao's milestone thread.

Yeah, hence why I added jk.

I think Bud can become a great player in this league, as long as he improves in the areas you mentioned. Morey is the man for stealing him out of Detroit.

Perimeter defense starts with Battier, but for the whole team to be effective, Brooks and Martin will have to pick up a thing or two from Battier. We have Courtney Lee coming off the bench, so if he and Battier play together, they can maybe stop the teams who have more than just one great scorer.

Let's talk about Budinger's ceiling. How good do you guys think he can be? He shoots the ball well, move without the ball well, catch and shoot well, but he really needs to improve at driving the lane and drawing fouls. He's instant offense, but needs to get better on the defensive end. He's got mad hops, but needs to improve his court vision. Since he has all the tools, (height, athleticism, body, etc.) he can turn into something special. Thoughts?

Oh and to Axel for calling me a disgrace to Rockets fans in Jao's milestone thread.

Budinger's atheleticism reminds me of watching Blake Griffin catching the alley oop one hand slam dunk in preseason. But his footwork and quickness is not as good as Griffin's. I would like him to get stronger and be better defensively to guard other SFs. Also I like him to be better at coming off screens and shoot. Unless he can improve on those areas, he wouldn't be our starting SF.

ALmost forgot: CONSISTENCY and draw fouls. I think I saw Maggette shot only 2 or 3 shots and had 20+ free throws.

ALmost forgot: CONSISTENCY and draw fouls. I think I saw Maggette shot only 2 or 3 shots and had 20+ free throws.

Great point. Budinger should learn how to play like Maggette. That dude can rack up 30 points on 5 shots attempt.

ALmost forgot: CONSISTENCY and draw fouls. I think I saw Maggette shot only 2 or 3 shots and had 20+ free throws.

Great point. Budinger should learn how to play like Maggette. That dude can rack up 30 points on 5 shots attempt.

He has the speed and athleticism.

So did Darius Miles, Stromile Swift, Kwame Brown, Gerald Green,...

So did Darius Miles, Stromile Swift, Kwame Brown, Gerald Green,...

Well I do not know why their careers got lost.

So did Darius Miles, Stromile Swift, Kwame Brown, Gerald Green,...

three out of these four have the athleticism but are not polished at all. Swift was too focused on doing the tomahawk dunk every game that he forgot he had to rebound and defend also. Green wasn't projected to be good, so his fall is more due to his lack of everything else besides dunking. Maybe it's me, but Brown stopped learning once he got out of High School.

Darius Miles on the other hand just simply derailed by that grueling injury, still have hard time watching that replay.

Budinger has athleticism and speed like all of them did, but he has a deadly baseline jumper and work ethic. If you can shoot the hell of that ball, you are going to be in the NBA for a while. He also accepts his role on the team and understands that he has to improve in order to be a starter.

Tough loss today to the Lakers. The Rockets played really well and gave the Lakers headache though. This Kevin Martin - Aaron brooks backcourt combination is going to be really exciting and fun to watch this season. Maybe they'll both average 20 points per game. And Brad Miller is just a pleasure to watch. He fits in with Adelman's system so well. He had three beautiful baseline passes this game. Yao looks good also, just has to get his timings right.