Houston, we have a problem
Last year, Houston Rockets was one of the best teams in the NBA, finishing on the first spot in the Western Conference. They lost 17 games all year and they were very close to beating Golden State Warriors in the Western Conference Finals.
This season something is changed. Houston Rockets is playing much worse than last year and they already lost 13 games in just 24 played. So with this record, Mike D’Antoni’s team is located on the second-to-last place in the West – the 14th spot. At the beginning of the season, we expected Houston Rockets to be worse than last year, but we didn’t see it so low.
As I see it, the problem with Houston Rockets is not the lack of talent but the fact that they don’t want to accept their state. They still have James Harden, last season’s MVP, Chris Paul, one of the greatest point guards in the game, and Clint Capela, a promising young athlete. Also, this summer Carmelo Anthony agreed to sign with the Houston Rockets, hoping that he would finally get his long wished ring. So, offensively, Houston Rockets has a lot of talent, but they miss Trevor Ariza and Luc Mbah a Moute, who were great defensive players. Instead of recognizing this fact, the officials of this organization scapegoated Carmelo Anthony, saying that he was the problem. So, Anthony parted ways with Houston Rockets, but their situation didn’t get any better.
The team from Texas continued to lose a lot of games that were considered easy. For example, a couple of nights ago, they played against Utah Jazz, another big disappointment of this season. Rudy Gobert, one of the most important players from Utah Jazz’ roster was eliminated in the first 3 minutes of the game so it was hard to think that they would win against Houston Rockets. Surprisingly, Utah Jazz won the game by 27 points, showing again how big are Houston Rockets’ problems.
The season is still early so, Mike D’Antoni has time to turn this team around but it will be very hard. I guess time we’ll show us…
David Istrate, info@brainbasketball.net
