I thought with the addition of Luis Scola, the fact that Bonzi Wells will be back, the drafting of Aaron Lewis, & the trade for Mike James that the Rockets had positioned themselves to be the favorites to win the West (regular season) and put themselves in a great position win it all next year.

However, with the signing of Francis I'm basically handing them the title next year.

What a lineup. Even with an injury to Tmac or Yao for some period of time they'll still have what I consider the deepest team (really close to the Bulls).

Seeing that T-mac is my favorite player (and the Rockets have always been my second favorite team) I'm loving this. The only thing I'm looking forward to more is the Bulls season. However, since I'm living in Texas I'm assuming I'll be getting a lot of Rockets games on TV.


Look how sick this lineup is:

Yao/Dikembe/Butler (C/F)/
Scola/Landry/Novak
Tmac/Battier/Wells
Francis/Wells/Head/Snyder
James/Alston (although he's likely to be traded)/Brooks/Lucas III

or Tmac might play the SG with would make changes to the lineup

Battier/Wells
Tmac/Francis/Head/Snyder
James/Alston/Lewis

Either way you slice it a second unit that possibly includes (Battier, Francis, Wells, Head, Alston, Brooks, & Dikembe is pretty ridiculous)

The lineup is rediculous. Although, Alston is likely to be traded for some future picks or something b/c there is no need for him when you have James/Brooks (the sleeper of this draft)/Lucas. I could even see Battier getting traded (although I think you need his defense and 3 pt shooting) but Rick Adelman got the most out of Bonzi Wells as his coach and could do it again.

This team got significantly better in the areas that they were week last year. They got the PF they sorely needed and they picked up some more perimeter shooting in James, Lewis, & they got better more explosive scoring options to draw the attention away from Tmac & Yao.

This lineup probably would never work with a Kobe but with an unselfish player like Tmac it's going to be rediculous. Who are you going to leave open on the floor? Too bad Yao is slow or this team would be like the Warriors in terms of how well it could get up and down the floor.

I don't know how much of an upgrade francis will be to Head. Im not impressed with the deal

Francis hasn't been a contributing factor on a good team since Maryland (okay, so he made the playoffs ONCE, just before he got traded). He's a turnover machine that shoots far more often than he should.

If the Rockets are a major factor (which they probably should be), it'll be because McGrady and Ming are healthy...

Agree completely. Them picking up Francis actually makes me think they'll be worse off. He's really not that good for a PG. He can score and that's it, which is the complete opposite of what they need with McGrady and Yao already there. I'd rather have Luther Head over Francis in my lineup any day of the week.

I will say that the Rockets have improved and if Tmac and Yao both can stay healthy all year, they'll be a team to be reckoned with.

Francis sucks.

How quickly people forget.

Paired with Yao, Stevie Franchise was one of the best guards in the league. Since then he has been in poor fits (Orlando with a young team not ready to win, and New York, which has been a circus of overpaid clowns with bad attitudes.)

Franchise, on the other hand, was not a bad attitude, and has gotten a bad rap. the kid can play, and the Rockets are going to be amazing this year.

Rockets fans must be dusting off all those jersies! I'd be pumped if I was a fan of the Rockets.

That is a pretty good point. Yeah he sucked in NY, but he was sucking in NY. The way that team is built, that's a pretty easy place to suck these days. Kinda like the opposite of Phoenix, where I think just about everyone who plays there suddenly looks 10x better right now.

I don't know how many of you watch many Rockets games or even watched their playoff series with Utah to know what the Rockets were missing but it was pretty easy to see. It really wasn't defense as they were one of the better defensive teams in the league.

Although the Rockets have Yao & Tmac they still were lacking other players offensively who could

A) Hit the 3 pointer when they were wide open b/c they had several looks with Tmac/Yao getting doubled often
Drive to the basket/take their man off the dribble to get the double teams off Tmac/Yao
C) They needed a real PF not Juwan Howard who sucked it up the last couple of years (if not most of his NBA career)

As much as I like Luther Head you all are giving him too much credit. He's always inconsistent. If it wasn't for his 6-23 (26.1%) performance from the arc in the playoffs the Rockets probably would have advanced to the second round. And that's 6-23 with most of the shots being wide open. I'm not saying he isn't a good shooter just saying they definately needed to get other people besides him and Battier to hit the 3. And Rafer Alston was almost as bad percentage wise but way worse b/c he shot 50 3's. 16-50? 32%. Why was he shooting so much? I'm not going to blame Tmac for his 25% 3pt shooting b/c unlike Alston/Head his shots weren't wide open most of the time.

So what did the Rockets do this offseason? They got players to fix all 3 problems. All 3. And they added a coach who would have been able to improve their offense without even adding this many weapons. Look what he used to do in Sacramento with Webber/Bibby/Divac. He's going to get a lot done for the Rockets with the talent they have.

They got the unselfish Scola who is going to be a pretty good power forward (maybe even better than we think) and who will bring the Nocioni type toughness and hustle which any team in the NBA can use. They got Mike James and drafted Aaron Lewis who will help fix their 3 point wows, & they got Francis and will get Bonzi Wells back on the court.

Francis is still a pretty good player. He might not be "The Franchise" but I bet he can still blow by most of the players in this league and get to the basket at will. That's something that once Tmac was doubled the Rockets just didn't have last year or for the past couple years. That is important if you want to break defenses down. You can also say that James provides that to a lesser extent.

Bonzi Wells is underestimated. He'll provide a great low post game (and rebound) that will either compliment Yao's game or will give the Rockets a great low post threat for the second unit.

So all in all the Rockets added

Scola/Wells/Francis/Lewis/Landry/Butler(who's only 22 and may turn out to be a decent backup center). How could this team not be the favorite to win this year? Who else added nearly that much to an already good team. I will go out on a limb and say that even if Tmac or Yao goes down for 20 games this year they'll still be a top 3 team in the West if not the best. That's how deep this team is.

The Rockets and the Spurs will play for the Western Conference Championship.

Do you really believe Steve Francis will be happy as a third option? That was his problem in NYC.

Francis' numbers dropped a fair amount as soon as Yao started to get good. From 02/03 to 03/04, when Yao's scoring went from 13.5 to 17.5, there was a definitive drop in Francis' numbers. He went from a guy that gave you 21-6.2-6.2 to 16.6-5.5-6.2, which isn't exactly bad except his turnovers stayed up at 3.7 and his field goal percentage dropped the 40.3%. Then he got back to his old self for a year in Orlando before Dwight Howard's emergence hurt his numbers again and he got dealt to that mess in New York, where things got considerably worse.

The reason for this is very simple: Francis is at his best when he can dominate the ball and not worry about setting up his teammates, especially in the post since basically his entire game is drive and kick. Any time he's had another player of note on the team he's been decent at best, and that's even back when his skills weren't in question. He was at his best when he was racking up 16+ shots per game with over 7 FT attempts in around 40 minutes per game. That means he had the ball in his hands A LOT. Now he's going to a team where his minutes aren't likely going to increase much that already has two established stars on the team. That's just a bad combo.

If/when Yao or T-Mac gets hurt again, he can fill the scoring gap for a while. However, as long as they are healthy, you can't expect much more than his low percentage/high turnover/not much else but scoring form that you saw on the Knicks.

I assume you mean Aaron Brooks from the draft. I wouldn't expect to see much of him at all, not when you already have James, Francis, and Alston in front of him. Even if Alston gets traded, that's a good number of minutes eaten up. He'll be at best the 3rd PG off the bench this year unless they clear out a few bodies. He's basically the same player as John Lucas, though probably a bit quicker. Landry is about the same, an undersized PF off the bench that won't have much of an impact.

Head is easily one of their best outside shooters, arguably #1 given his production last year. He hit 44.1% of his 3's and hit over 2 3's per game. That's hard to do. So what if he had a bad series, he's still a very good option from out there, his stroke from outside was right on par with Battier. And if they trade Alston they lose another fairly capable outside shooter, Alston hit 2.3 per game at 36.3% (though James fills that in a bit, not as many made 3's but a good percentage and less shot-happy). Francis and Wells (not really an addition, he was there last year) aren't really shooters, so if they trade Alston you're basically looking at a push in that department. Actually, if anything McGrady should stop shooting so many 3's, he hasn't cracked 34% from the arc in 4 years, at that kind of conversion rate he needs to focus on driving and his mid-range game more. Obviously some are late in the shot clock forced attempts, but he doesn't really need to force the attempts as much as he did in Orlando (where he actually hit a better percentage).

Scola and James will definitely help, both of those guys are capable options that can fill in as role players. Wells will also probably be more of a factor this year, though you never know with those nagging injuries. Francis, and to a lesser extent Alston, are two guys that can really screw things up though, both guys are shot-happy lead guards on a team that doesn't really need that. Plus with the wing positions getting fairly crowded, Wells also might not get enough opportunities (T-Mac/Battier/Head eat up a lot of those minutes, and Francis could see time at the 2 as well), and he's often been a problem when that happens. Those guys all have the potential to take a potentially loaded team and screw up the chemistry. I'd honestly feel better about their chances if all 3 were off the roster (well, certainly the first two, Wells can potentially be a big asset when he's healthy and happy, like he appears to be now).

Don't get me wrong, they have definitely improved and should be a big factor in the west. I'm just not ready to hand them the trophy just yet, especially not with San Antonio and Phoenix being major threats and some potential chemistry issues that I just mentioned.

Yes I did mean Brooks. I thought I fixed that. Anyway, I got it right in the first post. Although you may disagree, Brooks is way better than Lucas. Brooks is going to be the sleeper of this draft. Nobody had him going higher than 24 and it's b/c of his height. However, what he lacks in height, he'll make up with his playmaking ability, his quickness, & his outside shot. He's going to be a very good player. I know summer league is just summer league but I think the numbers he posted up speak for themselves. The only thing he'll need to really improve on is his turnovers and that is usually the case with most young pg's.

What they need to do is package Lucas and Alston either together or seperately for future picks or to someone like Atlanta to try and get something decent player like Marvin Williams or a big man like Sheldon Williams or Solomon Jones. The 3 point shooting that you mentioned is a little off. First of all, Brooks will play a bigger role than you think and his 3 point shooting is better than Alston's. Alston shoots way to many 3's and can't even make the open ones most of the time. I agree that Head is a good 3 point shooter but he really choked in their playoff series. I'm not saying to get rid of him, I just think that what the Rockets did to improve their 3 point shooting was excellent. They brought in James who is a better % shooter and knows when and when not to shoot and they drafted Brooks who is a good outside shooter. I'll take those 2 over Alston any day. Getting rid of Alston is going to be addition by subtraction. You'll then have good outside shooters in Head/James/Battier/Brooks & although you don't want to hear it T-mac. And yes I do agree that he shouldn't shoot so many 3's but like you mentioned about half of them come when the shot clock is running out and his teammates rely on him to shoot the ball.

As for the whole Steve Francis thing. I would have picked the Rockets as favorites without him so if he doesn't work the Rockets will simply cut him. However, I think you and everyone else underestimate what type of value he could potentially bring to the Rockets. Like you said, he is great at driving to the basket and creating his own offense. That is something that besides T-mac last year, the Rockets simply did not have.

As for Bonzi Wells he is definately an addition since he really wasn't "there" last year if you know what I mean. You were smart to acknowledge that you know he could be a very valuable player for the Rockets if his head is in the right place. For a SG I would say that Bonzi probably has the best post game at his position in the NBA. Now that is assuming that he actually plays. He's also a good/great rebounder for a SG. However, I really believe that being reunited with his former coach will help correct the problems he had with the Rockets last season.

So in short, the Rockets should trade Lucas/Alston and try to get another backup C/PF. It would be a very smart move and like you said, it would clear up some of the congestion at PG. You would then be left with James/Francis/Brooks (that is assuming Francis can beat Brooks out for the 2nd spot). I really think we'll see the Rockets use the smaller backcourt this year with Francis playing the 2 occasionally. In the end if Francis doesn't work out that just means more minutes for Brooks which will be more of a good thing.


The Spurs are the Spurs but they are a year older as well. The fact that they let Scola go to the Rockets is going to come back to bite them in the ass. As for the Suns, besides Grant Hill (who is just as if not more injury prone than Bonzi Wells) what have the Suns done this offseason to improve their team. And I don't call trading Kurt Thomas who was your best Tim Duncan defender away and giving up 2 future 1st round picks a great decision. They couldn't win last year with everything they had and I doubt now just b/c they added Grant Hill that they'll be winning a title this year. It is definately possible but both Grant and Nash are 1 year older and more injury prone at this stage of their career.

Just kind of a few comments here and there since you do make some good points...

I still wouldn't count on Brooks a whole lot. Plenty of guys have dominated in the Summer League and then not done a whole lot in the regular season, just look at Novak last year. He's basically their Jameson Curry, a guy on the bottom of the bench that comes in and hits a shot here or there. He's undersized and doesn't really run the offense. I'd be very surprised if he is any more than a 3rd PG, and right now he's the 4th. If he pans out it'll almost certainly be down the road.

The Suns were in a dogfight of a series with San Antonio (which was basically the Finals if you ask me) up until the Horry incident, which resulted in the suspension of Stoudemire and Diaw for game 5. Phoenix still nearly won that game without those two, I don't think it's a stretch to say they win it if they're both there. They were really only 6 deep for that game and were missing two key parts, including really their only post scorer, and still only lost by 3. That means even assuming they still lose game 6, which you never know with the momentum change, it'd go to a game 7.

Yes, I know rules are rules, but that incident still tilted things fairly strongly in San Antonio's favor. They still have basically the same personnel, only now Stoudemire is a year removed from surgery, so he might actually get better. Plus maybe they don't get that ridiculous draw with San Antonio in the second this time around. As for the Spurs, until I see a slide I gotta make them the favorite, they have too much playoff experience, and as long as nothing happens to one of their big 3 they have the talent. Plus the Mavs still bring back everyone from a 67-win team, and Utah can be a major threat if Boozer stays healthy again (obviously a question mark).

I do think they will finish 3rd, though I've never really been a huge fan of the Mavericks team ( I still wonder how they won 67, they were good but not THAT good). They've got the talent to do win the conference (which is essentially the title), they still have to prove that they can hang with the big guns in that conference though, especially in the playoffs.

Other noteworthy points; first, let's also not forget the work of the referee's in game 3. Or, in particular perhaps, one specific ref.

Second, in terms of next year, to get cap space Kerr also just had to move the guy the Suns had who guarded Duncan in that series, Kurt Thomas. So now their interior defense takes a decent step back, which could relaly hurt the Suns against the Spurs next year.

I know my last post was long so I don't blame you for not reading it all, but I already pointed out the Kurt Thomas thing. They are going to be looking down the road 3-5 years from now and be wondering why the hell they gave up 2 1st round picks as part of that deal.

no phoenix?