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Everybody is counting us to drop out of the playoffs this year. Do we suck that much to have everybody think we are going to drop out of the playoffs? I mean come on, Suns without Amare. Dallas without Jason Terry, Portland with a young team, Jazz playing up to 41 home games.

I just don't understand these people, I mean is it because of T-mac injury that most people are saying we are good as gone? T-mac numbers were average not good, not great this season, if anything the whole team has pretty much picked up thier numbers when T-mac is out.

I am just amazed that nobody thinks Rockets can make it and just about everybody thinks Yao can't lead us to the playoffs or out of it. This Roster is the best Roster we have seen for years. Its not like its

Yao+Tmac
Wesely, Luther Head, Glen Rice, Eric Pike, Jon Barry
Charlie Ward, Rod Strickland, Mike James, lue, Mike Wilks
Juan Howard, Maurice Taylor, Kelvin Cato, Scott Badgett, Ryan Bowen

Yao and T-mac had to play with the above Roster. Our Roster today is far younger and quicker (still slow vs other teams) than the past. I agree if we lost T-mac back than, we were fked.

But i swear nobody watches the Rockets. We get comments about how weak our bench is, Yao can't lead a team (how the fk can he lead one when you have a Roster like above), our PG are horrible, Scola can't defend, who is Landry, Von Wafer (the D-league). Just amazes me the type of things I read.

I hope Rockets rip through the rest of the season, end up top 4 in seedings in the west and proceed to whip some azz in the playoffs, win the championship and than flag the middle finger to everybody who doubted they can even make it to the playoffs.

I am so tired of the monkey on our back, I want these Rockets to prove something now. I wish Ric can give them a speech about how everybody is doubting the Rockets, some motivational speech that will get the Rockets' to play with even better chemistry on Defense and Offense till next season.

I know the Rockets will do well, just sick of reading countless articles about us failing and most of all, sick of seeing our own Rocket fans bashing this current Roster without T-mac or the whatif we had a healthy T-mac. T-mac is gone this season and most likely no longer a Rocket, unless by some miracle he gets a Clone who is 24 years old.

Just a Rant, i had to let it out.

Like you said, they do not watch our team... Being under the radar is GOOD.

That is to be expected when you lose the guy who has pretty much carried the team on his back for years. Couple that with yearly first round exits and you have people counting on this team to do what they routinely do which is get a key player injured and then get knocked out early in the playoffs.

Key Injury = Check
First Round Exit = TBD

Plus, many are second guessing the logic in turning over a veteran team to two extremely young and unproven point guards.

If you were analyst and had to choose one team...it'd either be us, suns, or Portland (due to their experience). Utah is getting boozer back and Dallas is playing well despite our win over them. There's no doubt that I think we'll make it, but if it was your job to talk about teams that won't make it....there's no way you couldn't mention us.

I guess the odds are further stacked by us according to our schedule from hell.

26 games

13 Home Games

13 Road Games

16 games against .500 or above teams.
2 Portland
2 Utah
2 Phoenix
1 Denver
2 Lakers
2 Spurs
1 Magic
2 New Orleans
1 Cleveland
1 Detriot

Of course 1 game against memphis......kryptonite

If are going to make it to the playoffs, Rockets are going to have to grow some big balls. I didn't realize out of those 26 games, we basically play 16 games against playoff bound teams.

hahaha i can only laugh now.

If we win tonight, the respect part will look bigger on our part, but if we beat the Cavs on Thursday, the talk will be buzzing. This same exact team minus Rafer (Brooks in the 4th) beat the Celtics, and without Artest, they almost beat the Lakers (Who I consider the best team in the league). It's alright, people don't know yet that statistically we've played better without T-Mac, but just wait a little.

PocketRockets wrote:If you were analyst and had to choose one team...it'd either be us, suns, or Portland (due to their experience). Utah is getting boozer back and Dallas is playing well despite our win over them. There's no doubt that I think we'll make it, but if it was your job to talk about teams that won't make it....there's no way you couldn't mention us.

Its not the mentioning parts.... Its actually saying we won't make it out of them. Its not only analyst its other NBA fans (majority of them)

I don't really see much people say we're not going to make the playoffs. It's never really been a problem for the team to make the playoffs, it's winning in the playoffs that people doubt (and rightfully so). There's only 1 team that is going to barely miss out in the West and I do not think it's going to be us.

we don't deserve any respect

Thing is that as bad as we see our team playing, we are still in 5th in the Western Conference and 1 game behind Home Court Advantage. Let them keep thinking we suck until we show them how we play the best in the league.

HTown_TMac wrote:Thing is that as bad as we see our team playing, we are still in 5th in the Western Conference and 1 game behind Home Court Advantage. Let them keep thinking we suck until we show them how we play the best in the league.

We are not going to get far without T-Mac. In a close game down the stretch situation, there's more isolation game than half court set. We need T-Mac, unless Brooks suddenly just revolve into Iverson. We are also really bad keeping our lead.

I know we traded our 1st round pick to Sacramento in Artest trade. I'm not sure if it's lottery protected or top 3 protected. Some websites just listed as protected, there's no more details.

why wouldnt we be considered the west champions this year? as i know, we are a cancer survivor, our hair is long and pretty, our heart was never this big for a real battle

Amel wrote:why wouldnt we be considered the west champions this year? as i know, we are a cancer survivor, our hair is long and pretty, our heart was never this big for a real battle

You'll see when we play those tougher team next month.

Maybe I missed something but most people still think we'll get into the playoffs b/c its not just Yao...its Artest as well. I think the lack of respect is from people not thinking we'll do anything once we get in. And chances are...we won't.

Who cares what they think? I know this team is good. I know the chemistry is there. I know our players play hard night in and night out. I know they are not afraid of anybody in the league.
That's all I need to know. That's all I need to cheer for this team. That's all I need to be optimistic about the rest of the season.

Turn this team in the '94 Rockets, just feed it down low to the big man! He's obviously got the skill and advantage in the low post, but it's just about mental toughness.

Baller 24 wrote:Turn this team in the '94 Rockets, just feed it down low to the big man! He's obviously got the skill and advantage in the low post, but it's just about mental toughness.

With that statement you have sinned. You should repent before people actually think you were trying to say that Yao is as good as Hakeem.

Yao is nowhere near as dominant as Hakeem was. I do wonder how he would have fared though had they not changed the way you're allowed to play defense. I think he would have thrived more with the old rules. It would have been much easier to just throw the ball into the post and let the shooters spot up than it is now with the way teams are allowed to zone things up.

Vator wrote:Yao is nowhere near as dominant as Hakeem was. I do wonder how he would have fared though had they not changed the way you're allowed to play defense. I think he would have thrived more with the old rules. It would have been much easier to just throw the ball into the post and let the shooters spot up than it is now with the way teams are allowed to zone things up.

That's the key thing right there. The illegal defense on zones no longer applies. How tremendous is it? Jordan? Hakeem? It almost strips some respect because the game was way easier for them in that sense..