HOW FUTURE POWER RATING IS DETERMINED
PLAYERS (0 to 600 points): Current players and their potential for the future, factoring in expected departures MANAGEMENT (0 to 200 points): Quality and stability of front office, ownership, coaching MONEY (0 to 200 points): Projected salary-cap situation; ability and willingness to exceed cap and pay luxury tax MARKET (0 to 100 points): Appeal to future acquisitions based on team quality, franchise reputation, city's desirability as a destination, market size, taxes, business and entertainment opportunities, arena quality, fans DRAFT (0 to 100 points): Future draft picks; draft positioning CATEGORY RANKINGS: See how each team ranked in each category
Consider this a convenient way to see the direction in which your favorite team is headed.
Each of the NBA's 30 teams received an overall Future Power Rating of 0 to 1,200, based on how well we expect each team to perform in the three seasons after this season.
To determine the Future Power Rating, we rated each team in five categories (see table at right).
As you can see, we determined that the most important category is a team's current roster and the future potential of those players -- that category accounts for 50 percent of each team's overall Future Power Rating.
At the same time, we looked at many other factors, such as management, ownership, coaching, a team's spending habits, its cap situation, the reputation of the city and the franchise and what kind of draft picks we expected the team to have in the future.
Here are our latest rankings, from 1 to 30:
13. Houston Rockets | Future Power Rating: 652
PLAYERS MANAGEMENT MONEY MARKET DRAFT 193 (24th) 152 (7th) 170 (4th) 57 (10th) 80 (6th)
On the heels of one of the most interesting offseasons in NBA annals, you might be surprised to see our overall ranking of the Rockets hasn't changed that much. They've moved players and draft picks hither and yon, including jettisoning both of their point guards after each had a career year, and amazingly the one guy they haven't moved is perennial trade rumoree Kevin Martin.
Houston's master plan was to get a star to succeed Yao Ming, and so far it hasn't borne fruit. Nonetheless, the Rockets are in a pretty strong position going forward, even if their current roster is nothing to write home about. With several decent young players -- including four recent first-round picks, another in his second season, 2011 second-rounderChandler Parsons and undrafted third-year pro Jeremy Lin -- the Rockets should have a quality core. They've solved their big-man riddle, too, with defensive ace Omer Asik.
Alas, a lack of star talent still plagues them. The Rockets' bids for Pau Gasol and Dwight Howard failed, but they've put themselves in a great position by having max cap room for each of the next three offseasons. They also have a strong, tax-free market that's popular with players, an ownership willing to spend both on payers and ancillary assets such as draft picks, and a strong management team that we ranked seventh.
Houston's draft position is the other potential path to a star -- it may have high picks the next two years, and will have a near-certain lottery pick from Toronto as well; only five teams rated higher in our draft category.
Thus, while 2012-13 may not be much fun, we're still optimistic on Houston's prospects for the three following seasons. It has three paths to getting its star -- trade, free agency and draft -- and at some point one of them will deliver.
(Previous rank: 10)
This came from ESPN Insider
Link: http://insider.espn....-3-120815/11-15
So, Chad Ford and John Hollinger say we're in 13th best position moving forward. Although I slightly disagree, it's hard to find flaw with their ranking of us. I guess the biggest thing I disagree with is their ranking of our current roster. Then again, most are rookies or YOUNG players without much time to have shown what they can do. A good season or two from our rookies this year and we could EASILY jump several positions in the ranks. Also to mention, is although they take in the fact that we have huge cap space we haven't been able to use it on anyone special(a true superstar).
Note: These are NOT power rankings for THIS year, as we will likely finish much worse than 13th....So it is possible with a high draft pick we can move up in next year's future power rankings.
