'97 Hakeem, Drexler, Barkley or '08 KG, Pierce and Ray Allen

[Storm Surge]

yep..Seattle was the team Houston could not beat due to matchups, they simply favored Seattle.

[Baller 24]

yep..Seattle was the team Houston could not beat due to matchups, they simply favored Seattle.

Actually I think it was in 1997 the Rockets finally beat the Sonics, and that was because of the help of Barkley. Until 1997 the Rockets never beat the Sonics in the playoffs, and in the championship years the Rockets never faced the Sonics.

[guy1]

The Bulls vs. Rockets in the 97 Finals would've been very entertaining, and was probably what the NBA was hoping for. And goes to show that their was no way the NBA was rigged at least back then, cause on Stockton's game-winning 3, there was clearly an offensive foul by Malone on Drexler.

I wanted that matchup so badly man. I even wanted to play Houston in '96 but they got handled by Seattle easily.

That would of been such an interesting matchup in 1997 and 1996. 1996 Hakeem was still in his prime to, 1997 would have been big just because of the big named stars.

Yea no doubt. So much drama with that matchup. There would've been Hakeem vs. Jordan with first the whole 84 draft thing, where you know Hakeem would've wanted to justify the Rockets picking him over Jordan, and Hakeem would've also wanted to prove that the Rockets winning those two titles had nothing to do with Jordan being gone, while Jordan would've wanted to prove that the Rockets would've never won with Jordan around. You also have Drexler and Barkley, two players that led teams to the Finals only to lose to Jordan and the Bulls, trying to get some revenge this time teaming up together and with the most dominant player after Jordan in Hakeem. Then of course who wouldn't have loved the matchup of Barkley vs. Rodman? People thought Malone vs. Rodman was entertaining, but this would've blown that out the water. And just the fact that this would've been the first Finals matchup between the two teams after both combined for the previous 6 championships would've been a huge deal. Unfortunately, Stockton wasn't a choker like Malone and had to ruin the dream matchup.