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Skip Bayless Gives Houston Rockets 50/50 Chance to Win the West

Discussion in 'Houston Rockets: Game Action & Roster Moves' started by Shaq2Yao, Feb 27, 2020.

  1. Shaq2Yao

    Shaq2Yao Member

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  2. BigBum

    BigBum Member

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    JVG asked,

    can rockets defend and rebound in the playoffs?

    I like the idea of 60/40, not 50/50.
     
    #2 BigBum, Feb 27, 2020
    Last edited: Feb 27, 2020
  3. rockbox

    rockbox Around before clutchcity.com

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    I think 50/50 is fair. I'm going to assume that we will have the 2 or 3 seed and the LA teams will meet in the second round unless LA can overtake Denver. We will meet one of the LA teams in the WCF and it will be 50/50 once we get there.
     
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  4. smoothie_king

    smoothie_king Member

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    If harden gonna do this shiet, rockets got 0% chAnce to win!
    [/QUOTE]
     
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  5. likestohypeguy

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    And let them beat the crap out of each other for 7 games (or five games?), and Hou. sweeps into rested.
     
    D-rock likes this.
  6. BigBum

    BigBum Member

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    lit lakers rest lebron groin and Davis shoulder 2games against clippers, Tilman can file lawsuit against Lakers?
     
  7. topfive

    topfive CF OG

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    [​IMG]
     
  8. Sweet Lou 4 2

    Sweet Lou 4 2 Contributing Member
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    50-50 is generous. Lakers have two MVP's of their own who are good on both ends of the court. Lakers can play small ball, they can defend, they have great 3 point shooting in Pope/Green/Lebron/Daniels and the emerging Caruso and now Morris. Small ball they have size and can still play Davis/Lebron/Caruso/Green/Pope/Kuzma/Bradley/Daniels/Cook/Morris/Rondo - that's 10 legit rotations guys who can play small ball yet are big, and you don't even need Howard/McGee as there are plenty of guys to soak up those minutes.

    Take in consideration that Lebron teams have historically underperformed in the regular season and cranked it up in the playoffs, this is a very scary team.

    The Lakers are the best team in the league, followed by the Bucks.

    The Rockets have been impressive, but this is still an experiment. Teams are still adjusting to how to play against this small ball line-up. No one yet really knows how to defend what the Rockets are doing. It's early.

    The one thing the Rockets have that the Lakers (and no other team) has is the crazy penetration of Westbrook and Harden - not one but two insane offensive threat. What Lebron, AD, Leonard, PG, and Giannis can do is beat guys off the dribble the way BOTH Harden and WB do.

    What it comes down - does the talents of Harden & WB exceed the sacrifice of defending the rim and rebounding. I can agree with rebounding as rebounding hasn't been the strongest indicator of a championship team. You don't have to be a great rebounding team, just a good one, and you don't need height to be a solid rebounding team in the playoffs as it's more about hustle and stamina than anything else. The defensive is a bigger question mark.

    So to sum up, I'm still not yet convinced that teams have figured out to fully exploit the size of Rockets interior when you have big men and best defend the Rockets. Question is that when you have a player like Davis who should be an absolute beast inside and destroy the Rockets, will that be enough to balance that Wreckingball called Westbrook.

    I don't think it will take until the playoffs to figure it out either though. That milwaukee game will be huge. You know they will want to beat the Rockets, and will have a game plan they will want to test.
     
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  9. cmoak1982

    cmoak1982 Member
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    AD has won an MVP?
     
  10. Sweet Lou 4 2

    Sweet Lou 4 2 Contributing Member
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    He's an MVP level player.
     
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  11. cmoak1982

    cmoak1982 Member
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    I knew what you meant, just giving you a hard time
     
  12. YOLO

    YOLO Member

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    this is what the media wanted the world to believe for years. but all he did was put up numbers and lost continuously in new orleans. that's no mvp
     
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  13. Loneyroy7

    Loneyroy7 Member

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    Not really IMO. He's put up big numbers in the past, but he's never been the kind of player to impose his will offensively.

    He's a great number 2 option, who can work off the primary ballhandler very well...but he's never been a number 1, take over the game himself, kind of guy.
     
  14. DrNuegebauer

    DrNuegebauer Member

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    He has seriously been in the conversation 1 time.
    At that level of handing out MVP accolades, Harden is like 5 time MVP!
    Then again, technically any team with Derick Rose on it has an MVP...

    I see what you are saying and you are right. Lakers are a tough tough tough out. LeBron found some kind of magic revitalization drug for this season...
     
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  15. tmoney1101

    tmoney1101 Contributing Member

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    This is correct. AD is a cuck that couldn’t handle being the man so he forced a trade to play with his daddy in LA. Pelicans are a better team with a rookie Zion leading them.
     
  16. Sweet Lou 4 2

    Sweet Lou 4 2 Contributing Member
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    He's not a ball dominant player but that shouldn't exclude him from the MVP conversation. He has taken games over by the way. And he is a defensive monster. He was recently a finalist for the MVP award in recent years so clearly a lot of people think he is an MVP level player. It's ridiculous to say he is not a perennial MVP candidate. When you think of the top 5 players in the NBA, he is in that conversation.

    This board is comical at times. AD is not an MVP level player? He's one of the best players at both ends of the court. He's filling the stat sheet on the Lakers with the 2nd best record - he's the freaking leading scorer of that team! Give the man some credit.
     
    #16 Sweet Lou 4 2, Feb 27, 2020
    Last edited: Feb 27, 2020
    Jake Tower likes this.
  17. DVauthrin

    DVauthrin Contributing Member

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    The Bucks are a better team than the Lakers, and the Rockets have a chance to beat both in a seven-game series. The win over the Lakers in Los Angeles in Covington’s first game as a Rocket was not a fluke. The Lakers big men dominated, Bradley, Danny Green and Caldwell-Pope guarded the perimeter well, and Covington was still learning D’Antoni’s system, yet, the Rockets won. Since then, the Lakers have added Markieff Morris, but the Rockets have added Jeff Green and DeMarre Carroll.

    Also, it’s going to be really hard for any coach to come up with a defense to stop the Rockets from scoring. Zones worked against Giannis and the Bucks last year because they didn’t have a secondary playmaker and scorer that could render those defenses ineffective. If teams try a similar tactic to slow down Westbrook, the Rockets can counter with the NBA’s best zone buster in James Harden.
     
  18. YOLO

    YOLO Member

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    Yup. He isn’t a current mvp caliber player. He might have some of the talent to be but his current resume doesn’t support it. Legitimate mvp players don’t exist on consistently losing teams


    The media’s been desperate for years to blow him up as much as they could. It can easily fool the casuals though
     
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  19. SamFisher

    SamFisher Contributing Member

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    538's RAPTOR projections have been overrating us all year, though their projections seemed to mostly be premised on Harden & Westy both operating as some version of their most devastating selves.

    Now that that seems to have been realized it seems more accurate. Anyway they have them at 27% to win the West, which seems about right and is not much different from the two LA teams.
     
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  20. D-rock

    D-rock Member

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    Lacks a penis, I'm sure it frustrates him very much.
     
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