A look at the Houston Rockets’ schedule for the week of February 9 through February 16

Rahat Huq   | February 9, 2014 at 6:48 am
Houston Rockets schedule

image courtesy of nba.com

After disposing of the Milwaukee Bucks, the Houston Rockets travel to Minnesota to take on the Wolves in a showdown against a team that should be much better than its current record.  Houston fans will get another up-and-close look at the object of their consensus desire in power forward Kevin Love; after looking at their own team on the court, they most likely will just be happy with what they have.

The good guys then come back to Toyota Center to take on John Wall, former Rocket Trevor Ariza, and former almost-Rocket Nene.  As an aside, kind of interesting looking at the last few drafts dating back to Harden’s rookie class where, if asked this question last season, you would have ranked Harden at the head of the table among all guys that have come out, in retrospect.  But now, John Wall and Kyrie Irving have switched places, The Brow is probably your first pick, and there is a strong case to be made for Blake Griffin above Harden with the young power forward coming on in CP3′s absence.  These things fluctuate remarkably though.

West standings

via nba.com

And here are the standings: Houston enters the week as the hottest team out West, having won 5 games in a row and 8 of their last 10.  The Rockets have now put some comfortable distance between themselves and the Phoenix/Golden State/Dallas tier and I expect that gap to widen if the team stays healthy.  While Houston is a better team than the Spurs, I don’t see catching San Antonio as a foregone conclusion.  Portland, on the other hand, is a different story as I expect that paper tiger to freefall as the second half ensues.  If good health prevails, the good guys should be fighting it out for the second and third seeds.  But that is only if good health prevails.

 

Posted in from the editor | Tagged | Sharethis | Permalink

Houston Rockets 101, Milwaukee Bucks 95 – Shaking the rust off

Forrest Walker   | February 8, 2014 at 10:39 pm

The Milwaukee Bucks aren’t a very good basketball team. At 9-40 heading into tonight’s matchup with the Houston Rockets, they laid claim to the worst record in the NBA, and in the anemic Eastern Conference, no less. It’s possible that there’s a worse team in the league, and that’s a fairly charitable thing to say. With Ömer Aşık returning to action in Milwaukee, with the Rockets on a four game winning streak, with the team playing better than it has in a long while, it should come as no surprise that the Rockets very nearly lost the game. When inconsistency is the only constant, sometimes a win is just a win. After week-long period in which the Rockets only played one game, sometimes there’s some rust. And after a two-month-long injury, sometimes a player like Ömer Aşık has some rust of his own.

So, what of Ömer? How did he fare in his first game back? The answer is largely that he barely played. He saw the floor for eleven minutes, matching the time when Dwight Howard rested. He attempted no shots in that time, grabbed five boards and picked up two assists. He also changed a few shots, but that was mostly during his second six-minute stint. He looked a little slow and a little ungainly, even by his standards. Aşık seemed to get more comfortable as he played, but is clearly not exactly in game shape and will take a little while to get back up to twenty or so minutes per game. It was far from his best performance, but it was also a surprisingly hard job with the aggression of Zaza Pachulia and Nate Wolters. It wasn’t perfect, but it’s worthy of a sigh of relief. There’s a backup center again.

Read More »

Posted in game coverage | Tagged | 16 Comments | Sharethis | Permalink

Player Power Rankings: Week 15

Michael Pina   | February 7, 2014 at 8:01 am

Every Friday, I rank every active Rocket (who sees the floor) based on his performance from the previous week. If you missed the most recent installment, here you go.

9) Robert Covington (Last week: 10)

27 seconds of action towards the end of Wednesday night’s victory over Phoenix. That’s Robert Covington’s badge for entry on this week’s list, though it’d be nice to mention he was named a D-League All-Star on Monday.

8) Omri Casspi (Last week: 9)

Casspi can be really fun, particularly when he’s moving up the floor with a live dribble, flanked by two teammates. He generally makes the right decision in these situations, and most of the time that decision is to pass. He’s so unselfish, even his perfectly-timed cuts into the paint feel more like assists than baskets after he bails out a teammate who either lost his dribble or is about to be double-teamed.

Unfortunately, he can’t be counted on for more than six or seven points a game at this point, and defenses are starting to smile whenever he launches a three. But the Rockets generally play better on both ends when he’s out there. He seems like such a pleasure to have as a teammate.

7) Donatas Motiejunas (Last week: 7)

I really don’t enjoy writing about a player’s “confidence” because who the hell knows what a guy’s thinking except the guy, and even then, sometimes, the answers aren’t easily identifiable. But Donatas Motiejunas had several post-touches midway through the shot clock against Phoenix and instead of making the move he’s capable of in single coverage, he opted to pass out and force Houston to scramble for a good look elsewhere.

Motiejunas post-ups aren’t the most desirable shot in the world, but it’d be nice to see him take what the defense is giving. And when Alex Len is guarding him 10-feet from the basket, it’s a sign that the defense is giving him an opportunity to score. Read More »

Posted in columns | Tagged | 9 Comments | Sharethis | Permalink

The Rockets Daily – February 7, 2014

Mitchell Felker   | February 7, 2014 at 6:43 am

Sorry about my absence yesterday, dear reader.  To make it up to you, I doubled down on today’s Daily to get you through all the “work” you’re going to do today in anticipation of the weekend.  Enjoy.

Shooting Supreme - Ricky O’Donnell over at The Dream Shake has a pretty good breakdown of the crop of young shooting guards to come into the league in the last few years, finally bridging the gap from elder statesmen like Kobe Bryant, Dwyane Wade, Manu Ginobili and Ray Allen. The conversation started with the head-of-the class: The Beard.

James Harden, still just 24, is the household name here. So much attention was focused on what initially looked like a paltry return for Oklahoma City in the trade that sent him to Houston, but the real lesson of Harden’s situation lies in the benefit of added opportunity for young players. Harden showcased a full offensive arsenal as a member of the Thunder, but he wasn’t going to get the touches required to be a superstar with Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook sharing the floor. In his first game with the Rockets, Harden dropped 37 points, 12 assists, six rebounds and four steals. He’s held the belt as the best shooting guard alive ever since.

As the likes of Bryant and Wade entered the golden years of their respective careers, 2-guards began to rival centers as the position with the least marquee talent in the Association.  Once upon a time OJ Mayo, Eric Gordon and Brandon Roy were considered the future of the position.  And while Roy was robbed of his chance at supplanting Kobe as the next great thing, the rest all fell short of expectations, leaving the position barren of anything resembling a young star at the position He created.   Read More »

Posted in columns | Tagged | 14 Comments | Sharethis | Permalink

The Red94 Podcast: Episode 34

By | February 6, 2014 at 11:44 pm

In today’s episode, Rahat discusses Dwight Howard’s dominance against the Phoenix Suns, and also revisits the Goran Dragic free agency decision.


Listen to this episode
Download this episode (right click and save)

Subscribe to The Red94 Podcast on iTunes

Posted in multimedia | Tagged | 7 Comments | Sharethis | Permalink