For Rockets, Dalembert Element Raises Exciting Questions

If these first games are anything of an indication, everything is possible this season – and the teams with the right amounts of youth and experience are not that many.

on the irrational hopeful fan bandwagon. Generally, I am a bit skeptical of high expectations.
However, this season, is a crap shoot. All sorts of teams are in funks for all sorts of reasons and the nature of the season is just amplifying that.
Youth and enthusiasm count more this year than they have in many years.
Age is more of a mixed blessing, sometimes good, often bad than it ever is.
We need alot of things to keep going as they are and improve surprisingly.
But, if they do, I say our ceiling is a loss in a hard fought second round series.
In any event, it promises to be a really fun season to watch.

Not because he is a better player but I thought he was a better fit. Even at arounf 10mil that it looked like early verses a max on Nene. Morey getting him for what we did is really great because it makes us better now and still allows us flexality for the future. The biggest plus for the future is allowing better development for Hill and Thabeet. Too bad the shorter season will limit the practice time.

It’s obvious with Dalembert gives the Rockets legitimate rim protection. This can all for the perimeter defense to play more aggressive and can even help cover up some of the weaknesses on perimeter defense such as Budinger and Martin. I will say though, Marin’s defense hasn’t been awful so far this year. That’s how Dalembert helps defensively. Offensively, Dalembert can provide a presence on the offensive boards and play above the rim at times. Dalembert definitely makes the rockets better and I believe helps Louis Scola play even better. I don’t think the sky is the limit necessarily, I do believe this team has a ceiling. But I do believe we can be a legitimate playoff team who could pull of an upset or two. I could see us being sort of like Memphis last year in the playoffs. I will say though, I believe some of our youth “assets” are beginning to mature into solid NBA players. Just my two cents.

Rim protection. We definitely have our man if that is what defines legitimate for us.

There is a lot to like about these guys. If we are going to put on the rose colored glasses (why not?), the ideal scenario might be 1) Adelman taught them a quality offense, 2) McHale comes in and drills defense into them, 3) the botched trade prickles everyone’s pride, 4) we get a short scrambled up season where anything goes, and 5) we make some significant progress with what most of us believe is a group with some upside. Perfect storm anyone?

Then, for the grand finale, we add a new defensive coordinator and two significant players to the defensive secondary, and go from shitty to one of the best defenses in the NFL…..switched gears on you there, but the analogy is sound. We pick up what we really needed; a big, shot blocking center with a nasty attitude who can defend the post, and a coach who spends 80% of practice on defense.

OK, time to take off the glasses and go for another McHale pale ale.

I was comparing his defense to some of his defensive efforts of last year. His defense in the Orlando game was bad at times, so I will have to agree with you somewhat. I thought he played decent last night though. So, I guess I am classifying bad in terms as from last year. Bad defense from someone like Lowry is considered good defense for Martin. My point being, I have low expectations from Martin on the defensive end and so far this year I haven’t found him to be completely awful like last year. I do agree with you in that he is still a bad defender but my point is that I do see some improvement.

can you imagine the scariness with dalembert starting for that team? that would give them four legit shot-blockers—sammy, lebron, wade and bosh. they’d get even more points on fast-breaks.