As of now (4 July 2009) the rosters for the opening night for the 09/10 Season will be: Hayes/Dorsey Scola/Landry Battier/White Ariza/Taylor/Budinger Brooks/Lowry IR: Yao and T-mac. This is not a bashing thread but just a look at the Rockets' chances in the new season. If the rosters remained as above, the Rockets can barely beat the teams like Thunders and Kings. With MLE fully used on Ariza, looks like the only Morey can improve the roster is via trade. Good thing is we still have months before the new season and i will keep updating the rosters once a signing or trade has been made!
Mutumbo - didn't play much, just a short stretch in the playoffs TMac - didn't really play Wafer - we will miss but Ariza can pick up his scoring Yao - sad but lets see what happens Ariza - will be an upgrade to Artest ( can score better and younger) The only thing I see worse is Yao. Either we trade T Mac or he comes back later in the year playing his ass of for a contract Yao comes back healed and able to make it thru the playoffs I think things look good and will get better.
I'd rather us be a young, hard-working team that lands in the lottery than an average team that squeaks into the playoffs. Unless some great deal comes along, I see no reason to fret. Yes, that is kind of defeatist attitude but I'm not saying we should try to lose games. As a fan, I'd just rather see us back in the lottery with the chance to nab a top 10 pick if we aren't a legit contender.
Can we please wait 2 or 3 months before discussing opening day lineups? We have roughly a little less than 4 months until opening night. If you don't think the roster is going to change in that time then I don't know what to tell you.
For those who looked at the lineups and were disheartened, I have some wonderful news for you. That lineup isn't so bad considering 56% of our salary is tied up on the IR.
I hear you but I actually see this thread as fairly harmless. As moves are made, we can update the status. What I don't want to see if 5 more threads about this same topic. That jacks up GARM quality as much as anything else.
God injuries are just so FRUSTRATING! Just add yao to that lineup and it's a legit team if everyone plays their part and the young players keep improving.
Ariza does not make up for the combo of Ron AND Von. You could argue 1 although I would disagree, but no way he makes up for both of them
Just looking at last season's stats, if Von leaves that means 5 of our top 7 scorers from last year are either gone or injured long-term. Not only that, our big money free agent signing Ariza scored fewer PPG last year than our 8th leading scorer (Landry), even though Ariza played more minutes per game. Now I know that's an oversimplification of things, but still...
Time and available FAs are running out. What do you propose we do to become a legit threat to SA and LA? I'm not saying I want to be in the lottery, in general. What I said was, purely from a fan perspective, that I'd rather end up getting a lotto pick than squeaking into the playoffs with a severely undertalented team. I also pointed out in my last post that my opinion is based on us not making any big moves this summer which is a real possibility. If we do end up pulling off a blockbuster deal for any of the few remaining names floating around out there, that would cause me to change my stance. I'm just not that scared of having a bad team for a season or two while we rebuild. Every team goes through it at some point or another. It's a necessary evil that is occasionally followed by landing a franchise player and a resurgence to contention.
Ariza a better scorer than Artest? Some of you guys are really sipping the kool-aid right now. Wafer is a better scorer than Ariza is.
Ariza is a better threat off the ball. He can make cuts and runs the fastbreak real well. He's perfect for Adelman's offense. I think James White can come in and be the new Wafer, too.
