Didn't see this posted anywhere. <blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">#3 in Summer Forecast, West Standings is <a href="https://twitter.com/HoustonRockets">@HoustonRockets</a>, projected to have same record as last season. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/ESPNForecast?src=hash">#ESPNForecast</a> <a href="http://t.co/uiTAob9hWz">pic.twitter.com/uiTAob9hWz</a></p>— NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) <a href="https://twitter.com/ESPNNBA/status/633732409607852032">August 18, 2015</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script> I think it's a (surprisingly) fair ranking from the big heads at ESPN. I mean, Warriors will be number 1 because of their dominance from last season and that they are the champs. Though I do think we are a slightly better overall team than the Spurs, everyone at ESPN thinks they won the offseason with the LMA signing, even though they lost much of their bench. Number 3 is definitely not a bad place to be in the West. Thoughts?
Just remember that last offseason a lot of the "experts" were picking us to finish at the bottom of, or even missing altogether, the playoffs.
Makes sense to me. Lawson plus health could propel this team to a historic season. On paper this might be the most talented Rockets team ever. But injuries, chemistry, alcohol, Khloe K could derail so who knows.
We won the toughest division in the NBA with a ton of key players missing a bunch of games. Same key players returning minus Smith but added Lawson. Lawson will have more of an impact than Smith made. Last year several "experts" had us out of the play-offs and hardly anyone had us higher than 5th. Most had us 6th- 8th. We could have easily finished 5th. #3 is pretty fair I'd say.
Harden starts dating a Kardashian and he wins the Drew League Championship, signs a $200 million deal with Adidas, wins Player's Choice MVP, Ty Lawson traded to the Rockets, ESPN respects the Rockets and ranks them 3rd in the west. Coincidence?
Good luck trying to doouble/triple team Harden this year is all I gotta say. Harden will know what it feels like to play more freely like Curry this year HA!
This is why I am making the sacrifice of taking Khloe away from the beard. Will take one for the team.
grab ya balls espn hacks ... this team is more talented than the spurs and gonna give the W's a run at that #1 seed
Remember the Three J's in Dallas 20 years ago? Toni Braxton helped break up that trio. Anyway, it's a fair rating by ESPN. It probably will be a crapshoot with 5 or 6 teams bunched together right up until the end of the season.
It baffles me, as well. Are people thinking Harden will be the next Odom? HAHAHA I've said this before and I'll say this now, James Harden is totally different from Lamar Odom. Two totally different players, in terms of mental make up. Lamar, while given the gifts to be a superstar in this league, never wanted to be more than just good. His drive was extremely weak. It took Kobe being on his butt 24/7 for him to be a great player somewhat consistently. Harden has always wanted to be great. From day one. He wants to be one of the best ever and will not let some off the court stuff affect his goals to achieve that. If Harden wasn't so driven, I would be worried but I am not.
i think they are just concerned that she's a toxic person and the kardashians don't bring out the best in the men they are with, they make them worse.
They really are sleeping big time on OKC. When they're all healthy they are the best team in the league IMO. No team in the NBA when healthy scares me more than a healthy OKC team. So much offensive firepower in Durant, Westbrook, Kanter, Ibaka can now stretch the floor, they have young talrnt on their bench in Cameron Payne, Steven Adams, that one PF they drafted last year was impressive, etc. People are going to laugh off at Enes Kanters defensive ineptitude, but they have an elite defender next to him to mask that defense. But since getting him, their offense has a legit pick an pop option and a very good post scorer. He's also a very good rebounder. Besides that, I'm not too worried about the Spurs or Clippers as much. Clippers usually do so well because they used to be able to get away with overloading onto Harden, Lawson will help big time with that. We are a mismatch again for the Spurs. We swept them 2 years ago because Lin was able to attack the rim vs them and generally abuse Parker. LAwson is even better at that. Duncan is going to get into a lot of foul trouble vs Dwight. Thunder and Warriors are the biggest threat to us this upcoming season
I read online that said harden would drop her no problem if it starts to effect his play. Said he values his career more than her and she was upset about that. Honestly I can't see her being a big distraction for harden one thing about kloe of all the sisters is she prob has the least going for her and seems to want harden to be the best baller in the league. If she keeps him focused and at home after games who knows it might make him even better. Remember last year when Amber rose was sitting court side at a home game harden dropped like 45 points. Hope for the best fellas, as long as harden isn't on that freaking show of theirs I'm okay.