Rockets 109 Celtics 85

Rockets are now winners of 3 in a row and have now won 2 games back to back winning wire to wire. The Rockets on Tuesday night defeated the Celtics 109 to 85, the Rockets seized the win with a 40 point 1^st quarter. The Rockets only allowed the Celtics to shoot a paltry 32% on 99 shots while the Rockets shot a red hot 60% on 72 shots. For the 1^st time in the past few games, Rockets disgruntled Center Omer Asik saw action with 7 minutes left in the game. 

The big news of the game was the emergence of a power forward. Terrence Jones had his break out game of the season and his career with 24 points in the 1^st half Jones was ON FIRE going 8 for 8 in shots for 17 points. Jones on the defensive end also grabbed 9 rebounds and blocked 2 shots. Post-game head coach Kevin McHale talked about Jones “He’s playing really well, I think he’s play well every chance he’s got” since coming in to the line up a few games ago the team as seemed to have played better. The team on Wednesday will head north to face the Mavericks and they will look to stretch the winning streak to 4 in a row. 

Rockets Defensive as told by a NBA Scout

The Rockets have ran in to many problems early in this young season the offensive spacing early was off due to having both Dwight Howard and Omer Asik operating in the same space.  Defensively the Rockets at times were having trouble stopping 3 year olds from scoring.

In talking with a NBA scout he mentioned when you have a Dwight Howard you should be better defensively “you can certainly be more aggressive on the ball when you have Howard protecting the rim”. I can personally remember before the start of the season Jeremy Lin joked, the defensive was something the coaching staff stressed last season, and last season they just didn’t listen very much…. The scout I spoke to with mentioned “you should always have consistency at the defensive end, although there's let downs in some capacity during a long season.  That's why you need a consistent philosophy”. Really does anyone know what the defensive philosophy on this team is….. Anyone?

The team has defensive players and has players that have the talent to play defensive on high level, James Harden? The scout went on to say “He (Kevin McHale) has some defensive talent but they have to embrace their philosophy.” Which leads me to believe in what Jeremy Lin said, we just didn’t listen….  

Rockets Greg Smith Injures Right Knee

Greg Smith while playing in only his 5th game of the season injured his Right Knee while jumping up to defend a drive by Knicks Carmelo Anthony. Smith jumped and while coming down laded awkwardly on his leg and seemed to twist is knee badly. It was learned via TNT he was not able to put any weight on his leg and had to use crutches to get his X ray taken. Per Ken Berger, Smith's X-Ray was negative and but an MRI will be taking to find out the severeness of his injury, but it is being described as Right LCL sprain. Similar LCL injuries have taken others 4 to 6 weeks to come back from this injury.

Rockets 110 Raptors 104

Terrence Jones joined the Rockets rotation and join he did. Jones was a key member in the Rockets double overtime win over the Raptors 110 to 104. Before the game a flu bug was going through the team it affected James Harden and it sidelined Francisco Garcia for the night. The Rockets started off like normal and went with twin towers lineup, 6 minutes in to the game Head Coach Kevin McHale had seen enough and scrapped the lineup and inserted Omri Casspi for some spacing.

2 minutes left in the 1^st quarter Terrence Jones entered the game and Jones ended up playing 32 minutes, Jones played more minutes tonight than he played in the 1^st 8 games combined. While Jones may not have had a perfect night, he played the robin to Dwight Howard’s batman very well. Jones on the night finished with 7 points, 10 rebounds, and 4 blocks. Totally out playing Omer Asik who finished with 18 minutes despite no injury, or no foul trouble. In big spots it was Jones not Asik in the game. The Twin Towers lineup is neat and can cause problems for teams, but it seems Coach Kevin McHale might be wavering on that lineup “you have the big lineup to start off and I’m 50/50 on it”.

So if McHale does scrap the “BIG” lineup with 2 true centers, you would have Dwight Howard starting with Omer Asik providing the relief. It looks like Terrence Jones would be the favorite to start opposite Howard, coach has complained about spacing from day 1 and while Jones is by no means a 3 point shooting specialists he provides more room for the offense to operate.

Rockets beat Trailblazers: Game 5 (4-1)

Tonight the Rockets came back following a really tough loss to the Clippers 137 to 118 and tonight the Rockets beat the Trailblazers 116 to 101. The road trip ends 2-1 and the team heads back to Toyota center 4-1. Patrick Beverley gave it a go after suffering an injury against vs. the Bobcats in game 1, but did not start.


The Rockets started tonight's game just a little bit better than they did against the Clippers only giving up 31 points instead of the insanely high 42 1st quarter points they allowed. After the 1st quarter the Rockets pulled away scoring 86 points over the final 3 periods and limiting the Trailblazers to 70 points.

The Rockets got a HUGE effort from stars Dwight Howard (29) and James Harden (33) getting 62 points from the 2. Harden went 9-11 on shots inside the arc, Howard used monster slams to get his buckets and also manged to pull down 13 rebounds 4 of which were offensive rebounds. The Trailblazers made it close a few times, due to the fact the Rockets turned the ball over ALOT 20 to be exact.

Rockets lose a nail bitter with Clippers

Ok so it wasn't a nail bitter and more of a good ole fashioned butt kicking! The Rockets lost the middle game of their Western conference trip, 137 to 118 was the final score as the Clips handed the unbeaten Rockets the 1st loss of the early season.

For the 1st time in 3 games the Rockets defensively did not show up to the game, during the 1st three games the Rockets would lock it down in either the 1st or 2nd half but not tonight.  The Rockets never really had a chance tonight, from the tip off the Clippers went on a 23-8 run totally taking the wind out of the Rockets sails. The Rockets made it close and cut it to 9 at one point during the 3rd quarter but the Clippers put the pedal back to the metal and with 5 minutes left in the game Head coach Kevin McHale waived the white flag.

Clippers tonight out Rockets the Rockets tonight the Clippers had 15 3's while the Rockets had only 7 including 0 from James Harden who went 0-7. Omri Casspi who missed the last game came back with vengeance to lead the Rockets in scoring with 19 points going 6-12 from the field and 3-6 on 3's. Coach McHale and James Harden both post game made mention of early foul troubles that lead to bad defense.  

Rockets beat Jazz

Rockets in 3 straight games have yet to play a full 48 minutes and so far that has not really mattered, tonight the Rockets defeat the Jazz 104 to 93. Rockets were blown out in the first half and where outscored 40 to 56 but in heckle and jackal style the Rockets outscored the Jazz 64 to 37.

In the first half the Jazz’s combo of Gordon Hayward, Enes Kanter and Richard Jefferson powered them to the lead with 36 points between the three. The Rockets if not for Chandler Parsons 17 points in the 1^st half would have been ran out the building.

When the teams came back to the court in the 2^nd half the Rockets outscored the Jazz 15 to 2 to pull the Rockets within 3 after trailing for so long. The Jazz seemed to crumple as the Rockets drew nearer, the Jazz loss and go 0-3 for the 1^st time since the late 70’s the Rockets start the season of 3-0 and will play the Clippers on Monday. 

Rockets not able to escape the injury bug

Game 1 went to the Rockets as the Bobcats lost 96 to 83, as sweet as the win was there was a few nervous moments for Rockets fans, as the team was not to escape game 1 with out injures. Patrick Beverly and James Harden both left during the game but only Harden returned to the game. James Harden left with stiff back but ended up checking back in to the game, he was able to finish shooting 7-16 for 21 points and finished the game in the floor. Post game Harden said it started this morning and hoped it’d be good at game time, but it got bad again during the game.

Beverly unlike Harden did not return to the game after taking a hit to the ribs, his 1^st ever start during the regular season may have ended early but he brought his full court pressure style to the game and in 10 minutes he went 2-4 for 5 points. Post game Beverly tweeted that he will be back for the Mavericks game this Friday at home.  Even Jeremy Lin had to have stiches on his chin during the game but was able to finish the game and did not seem to affect him.  

Rockets vs. Bobcats starting lineups

Its here game 1 of the NBA season for the Home team Houston Rockets and the traveling Charlotte Bobcats. Below is the starting line up for each team.

Rockets                                                                                              Bobcats
F - Chandler Parsons (25)                                                                  F - Michael Kidd Gilchrist (14)
F - Dwight Howard (12)                                                                    F - Josh McRoberts (11)
C - Omer Asik (3)                                                                             C - Al Jefferson (25)
G - James Harden (13)                                                                      G - Gerald Henderson (9)
G - Patrick Beverley (2)                                                                     G - Kemba Walker (15)

Comcast vs. Astros vs. Rockets Update

Comcast vs. Astros vs. Rockets went WWE hell in a cell style as they entered Judge Marvin Isgur bankruptcy court on Monday. While I did not attend the whole court case I did come away with some new knowledge and here are the things I learned. Since I am not a legal EE’s expert my opinion is strictly as a 3 year old…..

Things I learned today…..

CSN Bay area was owed 43,000 plus and became a key competent in this Bankruptcy hearing all because of “dual feeds” now what is a dual feed. It was explained that Dual feeds is TV lingo for the home team sharing their large and small production van with the away team to help save money. So since they were not paid they were able to become a part of the Bankruptcy petition.        

The media rights fees were also learned, 45 million to the Rockets and 55 million to the Astros. I don’t know but I can assume the Rockets were paid all last season but apparently Comcast ran out of money and did not pay the Astros for the months of July and August. It was also learned that from John Ruth a CSN board member that Direct TV is a “Wild card” in terms of will they or won’t they want the channel. It was also learned most other TV providers had no interest in the RSN (Regional Sports Network).

The more interesting part of the night was towards the tail end of the night Judge Isgur asked John Ruth point blank could the Astros find better out there and he said and his response was no…. The judge also followed what about Fox? Ruth replied I am not sure, which leads to maybe the judge could be thinking about breaking this all up and letting them all go their own way.

After Ruth was finished with his questioning the next witness was brought up Margaret Barradas, who is the managing director for Crane Capital. During her questioning it was learned that Comcast would lose 200 million over the next 10 years.

Collusion was the word I took away from court during the mere 2 and hours I spent listening to testimony back and forth and even the judge used the same word, making it seem more and more likely this marriage could be heading to divorce court sooner rather than later.    

Court will resume today and while I am not sure I will be make sure to follow David Barron as he will be there covering all the minute by minute baby momma drama that is, will we ever see the Astros OR Rockets on TV? 

Rockets waive Daniels

Rockets days away from the regular are trying to get down to the 15 player regular season roster limit. Today Rockets announced undrafted guard Troy Daniels has been waived, Daniels has not been used during the preseason. Daniels was brought in on the 13^th and almost 2 weeks later he is now leaving the Rockets. Rockets.com still shows the team sits at 18 players, but really now sit at 17 players 2 players above league requirements. Issiah Canaan, Robert Covington are likely to spend the season with the Rio Grand Vipers.

Rockets Next Great Superpower?

Jalen Rose on Grantland said when Kevin Durant becomes a free agent he will leave the Oklahoma City Thunder and join the Houston Rockets. If this does become a possibility, it would make the Houston Rockets the new Los Angeles Lakers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-_K3gWqaBk

This season the Rockets added a seemingly rejuvenated Dwight Howard to a team of budding stars. James Harden was voted by NBA General Mangers to be the best shooting guard in the league, one of many signs of the surging growth of this young talented team. Of course this is just speculation by Rose, but if true it "could" turn out to be the best collection of NBA talent the NBA has ever seen in my opinion. If the Rockets are able to keep the core group of Dwight Howard, James Harden, Chandler Parsons and add Kevin Durant to the mix, it would be a near unstoppable force, easily better then the Miami Heat's collection of current stars.