Memphis Grizzlies

Oklahoma City Twitter Thugs Go In On Patrick Beverley After Thunder Season Ends (LOTS of NSFW)

It must hurt to go into a season with the highest of hopes, dreams of a championship, go through the grind of an 82 game regular season to secure a one seed, and then have it all go up in smoke in a matter of about a week. It's been so long since I had a team I was emotionally invested in head int ... More >>

Clearing Up the Western Conference Playoff Picture

I always find it amazing that after an entire season, spots in the playoffs and seeding can come down to the final few games. This year in the Western Conference it is no different. The east has been settled for over a week and there is only limited jockeying for position. But the west is deeper and ... More >>

Top Five Things to Do in Houston Sports This Weekend: The Upper Crusty Edition

The above image is exactly what we imagine you say when you see the weekly headline announcing the best things to do in sports this weekend. You're all, "FUCK YEAH, MOTHER EFFER! IT'S TIME FOR SPORTS! WOO!" Then you read about the things we have to offer and you're all, "YEAH...wait, what?" That's ... More >>

The Rockets Are Back In The NBA Playoffs! Their Complete Rebuilding Anthology

With four games to go in the 2011-2012 season, the Rockets were coming off a 117-110 loss to Dallas, a loss in which Dirk Nowitzki provided a stark reminder to last season's Rockets team that they were devoid of a superstar caliber player by dropping 21 points on them in the fourth quarter. To call ... More >>

Rockets Edge Closer to the Playoffs with 2-1 West Road Trip

The Rockets loss to Denver on Saturday night was almost a given. Very few teams who faced the Nuggets in Denver on the second half of a back-to-back travel game in the last couple seasons have won. It's tough to travel and play a game at altitude against a team that likes to run. Plus, the Nuggets a ... More >>

March Madness Final Four: Championship Game Prediction and Prop Bets!

So, here we are. Championship Monday. A lot of you had Louisville in the finals, almost none of you had Michigan in the finals, and you sure as shit didn't have then knocking off Wichita State (barely) and Syracuse (barely, again), respectively, to get there. So let's establish that right out of th ... More >>

No Beard? No Problem. Rockets Beat Clippers for 40th W of the Season

At the beginning of this season, I was talking to my friend David Hardisty over at ClutchFans.net. At the beginning of every season, we'll usually talk about what we expect from the season. The team had just traded for James Harden, but neither of us were optimistic. I pegged the Rockets' win total ... More >>

Rockets Close Out Home Stand with Loss to Pacers

If at the beginning of this seven-game homestand someone would ask the average Rocket fan what a good record would be given the teams on the schedule, most would likely want 7-0, but they would certainly settle for 5-2, which is exactly what they got after the Rockets went down to the NBA's league-l ... More >>

Rockets Make Winning Plays Late, Beat Spurs 96-95 on Harden's Late Jumper

It's been a while since Rockets fans have experienced something like this. For those of us who have followed the Rockets for 20 or 30 years, we can remember plenty of times they rose up to make big shots against the rival San Antonio Spurs...and quite a few that went the other direction. But, Sunday ... More >>

The Good News-Bad News for the Rockets as They Drive for the Playoffs

Last night was a frustrating night for the young Rockets squad. They had their worst offensive output of the season, scoring just 78 points (10 in the first quarter) and getting it handed to them in the most lopsided loss of the season against the team directly ahead of them in the playoff chase, Go ... More >>

Rockets 120, Bulls 97: Offensive Juggernaut Routs Another Defensive Powerhouse

Don't look now, but the team no one can see on Houston TV is looking pretty damn good right about now. Winning their fourth game in a row, which included routs over the Knicks and the Grizzlies, the Rockets beat one of the best defensive teams in the league, the Chicago Bulls, by 23, at one point le ... More >>

Daryl Morey Fires Off A Kurkjian Style Stat Dork Tweet To Defend Jeremy Lin

By any real measurement, the first season for Jeremy Lin as a Houston Rocket has been fairly pedestrian. Statistically, he has struggled shooting the basketball (.399 field goal percentage) and seen his minutes scaled back in recent weeks. Purely to the human eye, Lin has had trouble meshing with ba ... More >>

NBA Draft: Recent Stinkhole History To Enlighten Rocket Fans

Prior to Wednesday night's game between the Miami Heat and the Boston Celtics, the 27th annual NBA Draft Lottery took place, or as Rocket fans like to call it "a tradition like no other." For those Rocket fans, their 0.5 percent chance of coming away with the top pick gave the draft lottery a decide ... More >>

Jerry "The King" Lawler Piledrives Clipper Fan: Old School WWE Wrestlers for Each NBA Playoff Series (w/ VIDEO)

People laugh dismissively when I say it, but the more they can incorporate WWE performers and the general WWE "way" of entertainment, the more enjoyable other genres of sports will become. No, I'm not talking about the predetermined outcomes of matches (The NBA has already incorporated that aspect o ... More >>

Rockets Mascot Gets in the Ring

The man behind Clutch takes up the fight game on the side.

Cover Story: In the Clutch (Web Extra Video & Photos)

In the tunnel next to the lounge under the expensive seats at the Toyota Center this past March, Robert Boudwin ripped the head off of his costume and collapsed to the floor in exhaustion. Boudwin, the man behind the Clutch the Bear mascot costume for the last 17 years, had just performed the final ... More >>

Picking Rockets Team of the 2000s Not an Easy Task

Throughout the course of this frustrating season, the Houston Rockets have been allowing fans to pick their choices for the starting team of the decade beginning with the 1970s and continuing with the '80s, '90s and 2000s. They had all but one of their starting five for the 2000s on had for their wi ... More >>

Houston Rockets 2009 Draft Lottery Posse -- Final Scorecard

I've mentioned this in previous posts, but one of the most amazing and envy-inducing pictures I've ever seen is a picture on Rockets general manager Daryl Morey's Mobile Uploads page on his Facebook account. It's a shot of a blackjack hand, split three times (for four hands total), with a blackjack ... More >>

Against All Odds, the Rockets Keep Winning

"Scrappy, man. Just scrappy." I was talking with a buddy of mine the other day and that was the phrase that seemed to be uttered by one of us more than once about this current rabble of players assembled by the Houston Rockets. They just keep winning despite the fact they have no identifiable star a ... More >>

Team Transition: Rockets, Kevin Martin in NBA Purgatory

Tuesday night was the first time in Kevin Martin's career he went scoreless when starting. With an efficient and relatively prolific scorer like Martin, that's not only a rare occurrence, it's downright shocking. While Martin has had his ups and downs this season, the thought that he would see only ... More >>

Top 5 Musical NBA Players

The NBA All-Star Game is coming up in a couple of weeks. There may not be any Rockets on the roster - even ex-Rocket/Knicks sensation Jeremy Lin didn't blow up in time to be added as a reserve - but musical names such as Kanye West, Rihanna (the halftime entertainment), Lenny Kravitz, Josh Groban, ... More >>

One Man's NBA All-Star Reserve Selections

Go ahead and chalk up the NBA All-Star Game taking place in a few weeks (Sunday, February 26, to be exact) in Orlando's Amway Center as the next "feels weird" moment of the NBA season. It feels like the season just tipped off a few weeks ago and yet here we are, about 20 games in, deciding who the b ... More >>

NBA Purgatory

Neither the best nor the worst, the Rockets remain stuck in professional basketball's great midsection.

Rockets Announce 2011-2012 Schedule -- 6 Things You Need to Know

Kevin Martin: Not a big national-TV draw.​My excitement for the upcoming NBA season was moderately brimming before yesterday (due in large part to a $50 prop bet I placed a couple months ago on the season starting on or before Christmas -- CHA-CHING!), but two things happened yesterday. First ... More >>

NBA Draft Rewind -- 1986, The Worst Draft Ever

Plus the shorts sucked​As much as those who construct teams in sports would like to think that they have a formula and a blueprint that they can go execute with any team in any market and be successful, the fact of the matter is that even for the best personnel men in the best-run organization ... More >>

NBA Lottery -- Where Houston Rockets Point Guards Go to Die

I see disaster in your future.​"So you're saying there's a chance..." -- Lloyd Christmas Yes. 1.82 percent, to be exact. Those are the odds that the ping pong balls will fall the Houston Rockets' way tonight at the annual NBA Draft Lottery and they wind up with a top three pick. After finis ... More >>

Rockets Playing Well Under the Radar

Photo by Jeff BalkeFinally, the Red Rowdies have something to actually cheer about.​Houston's three major sports franchises have spent the last few seasons in the equivalent of purgatory. None have been good enough to contend for a title, but none have been horrid enough to elicit the types of ... More >>

Houston Rockets -- Screwed City

Daniel KramerDaryl Morey needs to go big time​It's no surprise that Rockets General Manager Daryl Morey has a Facebook page. And it's not one of those aloof "Fan" pages, either, where all you can do is click "Like." Morey has one of those "regular guy" Facebook pages where you can send him me ... More >>

Rockets Trade -- Hasheem Thabeet Scouting Report (It's Not Good)

Your newest Rocket is tall​The NBA trade deadline came and went today and the Rockets managed to muster up some activity. The good news is (stop me if you've heard this before) General Manager Daryl Morey appears to have gotten the best of both deals. The bad news is the Rockets are no closer ... More >>

NBA 2010-2011 Preview -- Reconstructing LeBron

Please, no more operations on Yao Ming​"What should I do?" -- LeBron James, over and over and over again his new Nike spot The fact that LeBron James is posing the question in his new Nike spot perhaps tells us that he is not completely devoid of self-awareness, as he appeared to be last summer. ... More >>

NFL, College Football and Brett Favre's Wiener -- 5 Winners, 5 Losers

Brett Favre can't get out of the headlines​I hope everybody had a lovely Texans bye weekend (insert lame joke about "Texans giving up fewer than 300 yards passing to BYE" here), and that you're refreshed, rejuvenated and ready for the back half of the football season. I'm on vacation this week vis ... More >>

Randy Moss Gets Traded For Magic Beans

Randy Moss trades Brady for Favre​"I'm still in awe that I'm a part of this organization. I think that he's the kind of coach that can motivate me. He has a proven track record." -- Randy Moss on Bill Belichick the day he was acquired by the Patriots in 2007 Randy Moss and the Patriots were the ... More >>

Game Time: NBA DRAFT -- Worst Lottery Picks Of The Last 15 Years

cutline​As "must see" events on the sporting calendar go, the annual NBA Draft is highly underrated. If you ask the average sports fan his or her five most watchable sports nights of the year you'll probably get canned answers like the Super Bowl, a Game 7 in the MLB or NBA playoffs, and any inte ... More >>

Game Time: For Sale -- NBA Two Guard, 30 Y/O, Excellent Condition, Trades Accepted

​First, I want to thank everyone for their reaction, positive or otherwise, to my post yesterday which chronicled the high points of the era of Tracy McGrady's Expiring Contract I seem to learn something with every new post that I generate here on Hair Balls, and yesterday I learned that there are ... More >>

One-Fifth of the Way In, Whither the Rockets?

With about 20 percent of the season concluded, the Rockets' 11-7 record appears at first blush to be maddeningly inconsistent. But I think it's a lot easier to explain than it may seem. One way to measure the future success of the team based on its current record is to look at "bad losses" - ... More >>

The Five Worst Basketball Movies of All Time

Burning the Midnight Oil with Daryl Morey

Rockets vs. Grizzlies: Just a Little Patience…

Rockets-Spurs from Press Row: Now with 75 Percent Less Jumping to Conclusions!

Shane Battier by the Numbers

Beyond stats, there's stats

Rocket Science: Daryl Morey Brings Hard-Core Statistical Analysis to the NBA

Houston's pro basketball team pins (at least a part of ) its hopes on a brainiac GM

Jason Friedman's NBA Predictions: Mavs Beat the Jazz, the Suns, the Rockets and the Pistons, Take the Championship in '08

Your Lucky Night

Where to celebrate New Year's Eve 2006

Your Lucky Night

Where to celebrate New Year's Eve 2006

This Week's Day-by-Day Picks

This Week's Day-by-Day Picks

Stadia Watch

Hoopla. Will the Rockets relocate? Don't bet on it.

News Hostage

Dead Man Walking

,,, And Don't Talk to Barkley

Pinched for fat. Put in their place. The Rockets Power Dancers don't care, just as long as they're given a chance to make their moves.