It seems a lot of fans want the Rockets to somehow tank but look good while doing it. Losing is often times ugly basketball to watch. To expect the Rockets to separate losing from playing ugly basketball is a bit of an oxymoron. I get the want to see developmental growth from your draft prospects and at least incremental improvements in certain facets of gameplay that give hope for a brighter future that this is the way to long term success instead of being caught in a perpetual tank mode for the next 10 to 15 years, but that's something that will only unfold as time goes on and the uncertainty of future drafts has already happened. I actually feel pretty confident the Rockets will at least be playoff bound within the next three years. I don't know that the product developed for a rebuild will have been greater than the championship bound team dismantled to avoid the luxury tax and should the Rockets ever just be "one piece" away from lifting the Larry O'Brien trophy again, I'm not confident TF would be willing to pull the trigger and go over the luxury tax to make it happen. He's already demonstrated he wasn't willing to do that for Ariza or any serviceable backup that could have played his role instead with a pre-assembled championship bound team when he purchased the Rockets. Why would he ever go over the LT for a potentially worse product he helped cultivate through years and years of tanking? He's already shown who he is.
No I just want them to be slightly less bad in year 3 and 4 and have a legit franchise cornerstone player given the high draft picks, and be somewhat interesting to watch But, it's pretty much a fail on all 3 fronts
As a Brazillian i tell you, if this was about football - I mean the real sport that you play with the feet - , fans would be rioting, trying to break in practices...Trying punching away coach and players from the team until they are long gone.
Valid question, I touched on it. I think he gave Chris Paul this immense deal and then just decided it burned him and he did not want it again for a lengthier period. (It seemed Tilman was somehow forced into it because the Rox and CP3 were bound by a promise to give him that deal.) If you tank without a plan, you get a talented team full of players demanding minutes but no leadership.
You don't need to ask the hard questions when you know the hard answers? *Why is Eric Gordon getting so many minutes? Building trade value, duh *Why aren't Green and KPj minutes being staggered more? Wembanyama, duh *Why isn't the offense being run through Sengun? Wembanyama, duh *Why is the defense so bad? Wembanyama, duh *Why is the offense so bad? Wembanyama, duh *Why is the transition defense so bad? Wembanyama, duh *Why is Silas the coach? Wembanyama, duh *Why so many losses? Wembanyama, duh
I'm not sure why so many on the board seem to think that because we are tanking this gives the organisation immunity from any sort of questions regarding decision making. Sure it's the biggest picture thing which can explain lots, but the idea that there is absolutely no other decision making going on that can be judged or questioned is obviously silly. If you want an example of a question, how about a reporter asking Silas if he has full control of his rotation decisions. Because there's rumours either way, and I think many would like to know the answer.
I think for Rockets fans to keep their sanity the best thing to do is take the rest of the season off. Do anything else but watch the Rockets. Let the season go and scheck back in in the summer when the Draft comes around. It's a good time to reset since that is what the Rockets are doing anyway.
This season isn't about wins and loses, the problem is that there hasn't been strong enough growth and development from young players. There is always going to be some improvement from players that are teenagers, but the question is whether there is enough.
Scoot Henderson in particular is an awesome consolation prize. He plays a position of need, his strengths fit the Rockets weaknesses and his competitive attitude fits well with Jabari Smith and he is a young leader. There are another 4-5 guys that have the tools to be difference makers if things go their way as well. Who would I rather have between Cade and Jalen? That is hard to say, my gut is Cunningham because of his size, passing and rebounding and ability to lead an offense. However, I need to know what his physical issues are. Before Cunningham got hurt, he started to go off.
This. There is also a difference between wins and player development and growth. I don't really want the Rockets to win a lot of games the rest of this season. I want the best draft pick possible. I want a nearly 30% chance to get either Wemby or Henderson. I want to have the worst record, and a top 5 pick guaranteed so I can at worst be picking between Nick Smith and Cam Whitmore or Brandon Miller, and knowing I have a shot at another key piece. The problem is that I haven't seen sufficient improvement from some of the key young players. I haven't seen improvement in court awareness or discipline. I haven't seen a head coach make the game plan fit his players strengths. I haven't seen the GM do especially well at trading players when they should be traded. I like Stephen Silas as a person, but I do not believe that he is right coach for the Rockets going forward. I think that the lack of clear-cut responsibilities for rotations or philosophical decisions, like having the offense run through Porter- is on purpose so that it can be blames on whoever the fall guy shall end up being (Silas). These are all valid concerns, and they will impact the Rockets going forward.
Waiting for Jonathan Feigen’s “B+” grade. https://theathletic.com/4084795/2023/01/13/nba-midseason-grades-celtics-nuggets/ Houston Rockets: C- At the halfway mark, the Rockets are the league’s best offensive rebounding unit and are just outside the top 10 in opponent rim rate. Unfortunately for Houston, the cons of the season outweigh the pros — which shouldn’t be the case in Year 3 of a rebuild. They’re in free fall, in the midst of an eight-game losing streak and having lost 13 out of their last 14 games entering Friday. It’s largely been a mess on both ends of the ball, the frustrations have risen and their schedule doesn’t lighten up. — Kelly Iko
There's also no reason to tank in international futbol as there are zero incentives to do so. In fact you are highly unincentivized as the worst teams get relegated to the minors.
The problem is that we are doing that for the third straight year... But deep down I just don't care anymore. Like I said before in other posts, I never believed this year we would be good. The team is cashing in assets until the cap space from John wall is cleared, so even before the season started I knew we would still be running experiments, like damn KPJ playing point. But even though my expectations were almost none, if you ask me are you frustrated? I answer yes. The list of wrong things is long. So as a fan there is no way I do not get frustrated by thr kids playing a less disciplined basketball than the Globetrotters.
