NERDS AROUND TOWN

Nerds Around Town: Raptors, Lakers and Heroclix

Cory De La Guardia
Jun 17, 2019, 5:21 am
Art by Jesus Rodriguez

Born with a comic book in one hand and a remote control in the other, Cory DLG is the talent of Conroe's very own Nerd Thug Radio and Sports. Check out the podcast replay of the FM radio show at www.nerdthugradio.com!

Hey Nerds!

It's Monday, I'm still here and we have lots to do!

GOOD DEED OF THE DAY

This week we're going to focus on the AICF and Mark Clayton Scholarship Golf Tournament it's a scholarship fund and a golf tournament, which are things that everyone knows and loves. Let's get together, have a good time and help people go to college. #NerdsUnite

THE BIG TRADE

So the LA Lakers finally landed Davis. First congrats to LA for going and being aggressive and getting the guy they targeted this whole time. Secondly, everyone is talking about the great haul New Orleans got, I honestly don't think there's very much value to all of these pieces. Consider New Orleans missed the playoffs this year with AD playing the first two thirds of the season and LA fell out of the playoffs once LeBron wasn't available to carry the team.

Everyone is talking about the haul of players and picks, here's the dirty little secret about NBA draft picks that people don't tell you, there's a rule in the NBA that first rounders can't be traded away every year. So for LA to give New Orleans 3 first rounders will be over six years, going every other year. LA will have their own first rounder next year, and again two years later.

The other thing negotiated were a few swaps, New Orleans can pick which pick they use between theirs and LA's (presumably whichever is lower) . I bet New Orleans picks will be lower by the time those swaps come into play because New Orleans has made one good roster move in four years and that was resigning Davis to a max back then. I honestly think this is a steal for the Lakers.

THE DEATH OF WHATABURGER?

Whataburger sold a controlling interest of itself to a Chicago based firm for an undisclosed amount of money. People are upset and wondering why they sold at all and why not to a Texas based company? There's one simple reason for that, MONEY. You don't start a franchise to make people feel warm and fuzzy and you don't take money for goods and think, yeah I am not in this for a profit. I know it's cute and warm and fuzzy feeling to think that Whataburger is here for Texas and is "one of us" but which of us doesn't dream of cashing out on our hard work?

CONGRATS TORONTO

This one may be a little sports heavy but it's cool right? So a couple of things, first of all, shout out to Toronto Raptors for gambling on themselves and making the moves to get a couple pieces like Gasol and Leonard and going all in this year. The thing people will be talking about for a while though are the terrible injuries that have closed the book on the Golden State Warriors.

The torn Achilles of Kevin Durant won't keep him from opting out, and the blown knee of Klay Thompson won't stop Golden State from offering him the max, which means this time of Curry, Green, Iguodala, Livingston, and Looney will have to begin the process of rebuilding a team that will be relevant but never threatening. With the expected departure of Cousins and Durant and the extended absence of Thompson means by the time this team is ready for another run, Livingston and Iguodala will also likely be gone, this makes the team Curry, Green and Thompson with a new cast of characters and I don't think it will be enough.

NOT THAT YOU ASKED

This Friday, Joey Savage and I are going to get back to our Nerd Thug roots and playing Heroclix at Adventure Begins on 1488, come hang out with us and lets have a grand old time. I really love the game and it's a great fun thing to play, it's like chess with superpowers and who doesn't love superpowers?

I'm going to jump out and wish you guys a great Monday and remind everyone to be kind to each other and try a little harder to have a great day! I'm coming back Tuesday and we'll be bringing more good times your way.

Feel free to check out my digital short story The Wilson House or buy a shirt from Side Hustle Ts where some proceeds help people struggling with cancer or listen to Nerd Thug Radio. Thoughts, complaints, events and comments can be sent to corydlg@gmail.com.

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Big year ahead

2019-20 Houston Rockets season preview and predictions

The NBA season is 48 days away and the Houston Rockets are among the handful of teams that figure to be a part of the national conversation this year. Not only did swapping out Chris Paul for Russell Westbrook dramatically shake up Houston's on-court dynamics, it also ensured that the Rockets would be a big story this year. This was all but confirmed when the NBA released their schedule in August, revealing that the Rockets had been given 38 nationally televised games.

While there's no doubt that Houston will have a lot of eyeballs on them this season, how they perform with this shaken up team is really all anyone cares about.

Play Style

The Rockets with Chris Paul were slowly starting to form in James Harden's image as he took on more and more usage. This means Houston played at a slow, but deliberate pace that involved an unusually high amount of isolation. The fast-paced early Rockets teams with Mike D'Antoni were no longer and ushered in was this methodical, but effective play style that involved little ball or player movement.

For a Harden and Westbrook pairing to be successful, Houston can no longer play to these extremes. The reason those Rockets teams were so effective was because there were usually three or more shooters surrounding Harden at all times. They will no longer have this luxury, and will therefore have to tweak the offense.

To truly utilize Westbrook, the Rockets will have to up their pace a decent amount and run on every missed shot. They won't be as fast as the Warriors, but they should be at least middle of the pack as compared to dead last. They also have to do at least some player movement to create artificial floor spacing when there aren't multiple capable three-point shooters on the floor - which will happen.

It'll be interesting if Houston decides to change up their defense too, as half of the coaching staff was completely overhauled this summer. Former Rockets coach Elston Turner was brought in as an associate head coach and will now be taking over the defense. Although they tweaked their scheme when things got rough, the Rockets still did a ton of switching defensively last season. It led them to the 17th ranked defense after finishing 7th the year before and one of the poorer defensive rebounding teams.

Houston did a lot of their switching because the Warriors were their chief opponent in the Western Conference for the last several years. There's a possibility they adopt a more conservative defensive scheme under Turner and the Warriors potentially being a shell of themselves next season.

Westbrook should help clean things up for Houston on the rebounding side of the ball, but that will only go so far. The Rockets will have to recommit to whatever style they choose to adopt next season, because the West got better. Houston won't make it past the second round in this revamped conference playing the kind of defense they did last season.

Continuity

Despite the major shakeup at starting point guard, the Rockets will be bringing back 77.1% of their total minutes from last season. Houston re-signed Danuel House, Austin Rivers, and Gerald Green in the first few days of free agency on nice value deals. Nene Hilario was also recently brought back. For some context, the Rockets won at a 60-win rate once Danuel House returned to the team from his contract dispute. Aside from obviously Chris Paul, Houston's roster at that point of the season is nearly identical to the one the one they will play next season.

This familiarity should serve them very well in the regular season as they get acclimated to Westbrook.

Load management

'Load management' became a popular (and mocked) term in the NBA last season, but for the Rockets, the concept of a system to keep players healthy and rested has a lot of value. Houston will have one of the NBA's oldest rosters going into training camp. For some context, aside from Clint Capela and Danuel House, every significant Rockets rotation player next year will be over the age of 30. To compound the matter, both James Harden and Russell Westbrook have logged significant minutes in their career as the lead horse on their respective teams.

In a recent interview on the Rich Eisen show, Daryl Morey brought up the idea of a flexible rest program for Houston's key players.


Resting Harden and Westbrook sporadically throughout the season makes a ton of sense and it's something the Rockets can do since they each have a counterpart that can shoulder some of the burden for a game or two. Seeding is obviously important and Houston has made it clear that it values homecourt advantage in the playoffs, but the long game has to be played if they want to reach their desired heights.

Possible midseason additions

The possibility for midseason improvement is always on the table for a team like the Rockets. GM Daryl Morey has shown time and time again that he's willing to put future assets on the table even if it means given the team a slightly better edge over the field. However, this year, it seems more likely that the Rockets add someone via the buyout market than the trade deadline.

With Houston leveraged several years out for draft picks because of the Westbrook trade, giving up even more picks doesn't sound like something they would do right now. The Rockets are also on the very edge of the luxury tax, so taking on any additional salary in a trade seems unlikely.

A name to watch on the buyout market is Andre Iguodala. Given his championship pedigree, several teams will be competing for Iguodala's services. However, the Rockets have tried to sign Iguodala in the past and should be considered as good a destination as any. For what it's worth, Iguodala was reportedly impressed with Houston's presentation in 2017 and nearly left the Warriors to sign with Houston.

How will they perform?

Record prediction: 54-28

James Harden sets the floor of this Rockets team so high year after year. Under Harden, the Rockets have had a top seven offense in 6 out of the 7 years he's been in Houston. With Harden and a decent amount of floor spacing, the Rockets are a virtual lock for a top five offense, which should be enough to guarantee 50 wins. Defensively, the Rockets should be a slight step better than they were last year (17th in the NBA) given that they have better personal to start the season than they did last year.

Where they finish defensively is what will ultimately dictate how accurate this prediction is. It's hard to see Houston being elite, but anywhere from a fifteenth to tenth place finish on that end of the floor is very much in play. If they exceed that, this number is admittedly too low. However, given how they performed last year and how much the rest of the Western Conference got better, this feels like a reasonable number for now.

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