National Basketball Association

You Don't Wanna Buy Fake NBA Gear, Right?

It sucks to get faked out on the court, mostly because it makes you look silly. It sucks even more to get faked out off the court, mostly because it makes you look foolish and naive. With NBA All-Star festivities starting this Friday and leading up to the 2013 NBA All-Star Game on Sunday, hustlers w ... More >>

The Five Greatest Houston Rockets Who Played In The All-Star Game: A List That Might Surprise You

The Houston Rockets have only sent 14 different players to the NBA All Star game. The team's most celebrated All Stars have routinely been big men and the playground atmosphere of the game does not lend itself to players who need help getting the ball leading to some forgettable performances. Still ... More >>

Rockets at Midseason: The Grades Are In

With the All-Star break on us, it seems logical to talk about where our local NBA team stands at the season's figurative midpoint. I say "figurative" because the Rockets passed their actual midpoint in January at which point they were 21-20 coming off the last game of a season-long seven-game losing ... More >>

For Valentine's: The Five Best Recent Rockets Bromances

Over the years, the NBA went from a league where practically every player hated each other, to a league where they Tweet to tell how much they miss one another. Since NBA All-Star Weekend is coming to Houston, some former and present Houston Rockets may get to rekindle the flame of the bromance the ... More >>

Rockets World: Tough Loss, Royce White a Viper, Jeremy Lin Does ESPN (with Videos)

It's been a strange week for the Rockets. They obliterated two Western Conference playoff contenders, tying an NBA record for three-pointers in one of the games, lost to the NBA champs and a really bad team on the road even if Jeremy Lin did drop a posterizing dunk during the game, saw the return of ... More >>

All the Rappers Who Will Be Here All-Star Weekend, Part 1

Two days ago, a complete stranger calmly approached me at the airport. Her demeanor was kind, she didn't have any noticeable body odor and gave off a friendly vibe. I smirked before she started the painstaking task of carrying out small talk. "Hey, are you from here?" she asked. My brain wanted my ... More >>

Rain of Threes: Rockets Bury Warriors, Bogut Drops C-Bomb on Twitter

When it rains, it pours. The Rockets took on the surprising Golden State Warriors Tuesday night in Toyota Center without three-point specialist Carlos Delfino who was out with a sore elbow. Clearly, it didn't matter. The Rockets absolutely poured it on the Warriors in the form of a three-point barra ... More >>

Not Buzzworthy? Rockets Winning Games, but Not Hearts and Minds

Tuesday morning, a friend of mine asked a question on Facebook: "Which championship do you most want to see next in Houston, football, basketball or baseball?" Not surprisingly, for most the answer was simple: football. The Houston Rockets are a young, dynamic, offensive-minded team. They have one ... More >>

Houston's Not The Only City Having Problems With Comcast SportsNet

The Portland Trail Blazers are in the middle of a 10-year contract with Comcast SportsNet Northwest. And so far, the only people in the CSN Northwest viewing area who can see the Trail Blazers are those people who have Comcast. Not people with Direct TV. Not people with Dish Network. Not those who m ... More >>

Houston YouTube History: The Houston Rockets

For this edition of Houston YouTube History, I dived into the Houston Rockets' YouTube stamp. There are tons of random clips of games, which are pretty recent, but those are boring rips from cable TV. I wanted weird stuff that you may have forgotten about. Not that you would have forgotten their f ... More >>

Rockets Blocked Out

Sources say Astros Stopped a deal to bring CSN Houston, Rockets Games to DirecTV.

Royce White Close To Returning To The Houston Rockets

After a standoff that's lasted since virtually the beginning of the 2012-2013 NBA season, and on the heels of a piece that ran on HBO's Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel on Tuesday night, it appears that Houston Rockets rookie forward Royce White will soon return to work under parameters contained in a ... More >>

Turnovers, Inconsistency, Lack of Defense Hurt the Rockets During Losing Streak

Sometimes, as the saying goes, you can't hit the ocean from the beach. During the Rockets' seven-game losing streak, which mercifully came to an end at Charlotte on Monday afternoon with a 100-96 Martin Luther King Day matinee win, the Rockets have been awful from the floor. James Harden has been sh ... More >>

Six Examples of How James Harden Follows in the Tradition of Great Rockets Hair

When the Houston Rockets acquired James Harden in late October, general manager Daryl Morey finally found the superstar that he longed for. Houston would go on to post billboards around the city featuring Harden with the caption, "The Beard Has Landed!" So far, Harden has delivered, as he is one of ... More >>

Good, Not Great: Why Texans Need A Daryl Morey Approach To QB Position

If good is the enemy of great, the Texans are in a lot of trouble as they map out a plan to break through their second-round ceiling. Owner Bob McNair and head coach Gary Kubiak are publically saying the happy, feel-good things. "We're very close," McNair said after the loss in New England, while K ... More >>

From Five Straight Wins to Four Straight Losses, the Young Rockets Continue to Confound

I've mentioned in this space on numerous occasions that you have to take the good and bad with youth. It's exciting and fast-paced and fun, but it's also exceedingly frustrating. On a weekend that saw the Texans go out more with a whimper than a bang, it would have been nice for the other halfway de ... More >>

Sources: Astros Blocked a Potential Deal That Would Have Brought CSN Houston, Rockets Games to DirecTV

According to sources with knowledge of the situation, the Houston Astros, who are part owners of Comcast SportsNet Houston along with the Houston Rockets and NBC, nixed an 11th-hour deal with DirecTV that could have put CSN Houston on the provider and delivered Rockets games to its subscribers at th ... More >>

Beat LA: Rockets Take Out Injury-Riddled Lakers to Run Streak to Five

The Rockets faced a depleted Lakers squad missing three key players including Pau Gasol and Dwight Howard Tuesday night at Toyota Center in a classic trap game. The first game of yet another five-games-in-four-nights stretch for the Rockets against a very short-handed team makes for situation Coach ... More >>

The Royce White Twitter Feed Continues Unabated After Suspension from Rockets

On the court this season, the young Houston Rockets have been a pleasant surprise. They've gone 4-0 in their last four games and are 8-2 in the last 10. They continue to dominate the eastern conference (too bad they reside in the west) and at or near the top of the NBA in several offensive categorie ... More >>

Rockets Crash Back to Earth With Losses to Division Rivals

Check out our slideshow from the Thunder game! This was not the best weekend ever for Houston sports fans. The Texans...well, let's just leave them to their misery and inevitable playoff floundering and talk about the other team that went from boom to bust, the Houston Rockets. Of course, there wer ... 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 >>

NBA Season Jump Starts with Spate of Christmas Day Games Including the Rockets

In 2011, Christmas Day was the literal start to the NBA season thanks to a lockout that kept the season from starting for nearly two full months. Most every other year, the season starts in October, but for the casual fan, it doesn't really get going until Christmas Day. With the NFL taking the day ... More >>

Dear Santa, All I Want for Christmas in Houston Sports Is...

It's Christmas Eve, which means there are just a few hours left to submit your Christmas wish list to Santa Claus. I want to think that I've been good this year, and that Santa will get me everything that I want. So Santa, here's my list. I'll see you tonight. 15. Some of my fellow UH alums might d ... More >>

MyPlates.com Releases Fan Selected Rockets-Themed Plate; If Only They Had an Alternate Uniform Like It

For years since the re-design of the Rockets logo and uniforms, fans on message boards like ClutchFans.net have been clamoring for an alternate uniform design with a red and black color scheme. They've had throwback jerseys (ah, ketchup and mustard), but no alternates. Even the Texans have a Battle ... 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 >>

Ten Gifts for the Houston Sports Fan They are Bound to Love

When you have a sports fan in your life, I mean a serious, hard core fan, it can be tough to buy for them. Some of them seem to spend entire paychecks on sports gear and stuff related to their teams. Most have tickets games and probably have a lot of memorabilia that will sell great on Ebay someday. ... More >>

Linsanity Finally Shows Up, Rockets Lose Anyway

Jeremy Lin reminds me of an NFL quarterback. He probably didn't deserve the mounds of praise heaped on him during his transcendant run last year in New York and he hasn't deserved the beating he's taken on message boards and radio call in shows during his struggles in Houston. He didn't get signed t ... More >>

Rockets' Ups and Downs Continue Despite Coach's Return

Check out pics from Saturday's close game against the Mavs in our slideshow. Kevin McHale was emotional at times when he met with the media upon his return to the team on Saturday night after an extended absence due to the illness and tragic death of his daughter. He kept in touch with the players ... More >>

Hornets to Become the Pelicans? Dear NOLA, Blame Utah

The city of New Orleans has been forced to suffer many indignities when it comes to sports. Whether it was the long period of disastrous play by the "Ain'ts", so bad that fans came to games at the Super Dome with paper bags over their heads; or the fact that the team currently known as the Hornets e ... More >>

Next Five Games Will Test Young Rockets Starting Tonight Against the Lakers

With a serious tragedy behind them and injured players starting to return to the line up, the Rockets dive into a string of games against contenders and Texas rivals this week that will add yet another test to the young team's season. First up is the LA Lakers, in town tonight at Toyota Center. Des ... More >>

Phil Jackson Words Ring True for Underground Houston Rap

Context: That's The Fury God doing one of those radio-station freestyles that radio stations like to ask rappers to do. It happened right before he performed at The Box's recent Los Magnificos Custom Car Show, alongside four other underground acts. Why It's Important: Because it might maybe possib ... More >>

Royce White's Twitter Rant: 10 Ignorant Replies

"Is he worth it?" In the sports world, it's the answer to that one simple question that ultimately determines the length of a player's shelf life in whatever league he plays in. Extrapolated in more detail and reworded, is the combination of a player's skill set, salary, and performance worth whate ... More >>

Royce White Versus The Ignorant Mob

Can someone please explain to me why so many people are so pissed off at Royce White? I know why the Rockets are upset - I don't necessarily agree with the Rockets being angry with him, but I get it - but I don't get why my twitter timeline and sports radio and comment sections to stories on White w ... More >>

Airsanity: Lin and the Rockets Struggle with More Than Airballs

I once interviewed MLB writer and former Astro social media maven Alyson Footer for a story about sports radio and she gave me a fantastic quote about the media in general. "The news cycle used to be 24 hours and now it's 24 seconds," she told me. The impact that has on sports coverage means that on ... More >>

Twin Towers: A Fascinating Tale of the '80s Rockets and What Never Was

On June 5, 1986, I was barely 17 years old and on my way home from a music lesson. While cutting through a nearby neighborhood, my car, an amazingly awful pumpkin orange Datsun B-210 I bought from a friend for 500 bucks, broke down...again. Fortunately, I was only about two blocks from a schoolmate' ... More >>

James Harden Is A Houston Rocket: So, Now What?

I haven't used a Sopranos analogy in a long time, and frankly, since the series has been defunct for more than five years, I have no idea how much longer the Relevancy Police are going to allow me to do so, so if I may: Remember in the first half of Season 6 of The Sopranos, when Tony got shot in t ... More >>

The Young Ones: Rockets Season Will Be Infused With, Complicated By Youth

Back in the late '90s, when the Rockets had real championship aspirations, the team was consistently one of the oldest in the NBA. They routinely filled the end of the roster with guys like Charles Jones, who Rockets TV play-by-play man Bill Worrell affectionately called "Old Man River." By contrast ... More >>

Texans-Ravens: The 10 Best Rapper Tweets From Sunday's Game

Houston has a professional football team. They are called the Houston Texans. A lot of people like them. Some of those people are rappers. The Internet has several forms of social media. One of them is called Twitter. A lot of people use it. Some of those people are rappers. We perused Twitter dur ... More >>

Houston Sports Stories That Need Their Own ESPN #30For30 Episodes

Red-Blooded American Man's newest obsession -- behind Kate Upton -- has to be ESPN's 30 For 30 series. The sports documentary series takes on notable and not-so-notable events in sports history and gives them the 360-degree treatment. Since 30 For 30 debuted in late 2009, the directors have tackle ... More >>

Rockets Rookie Royce White Battles Anxiety in the Brutal Spotlight of Pro Sports

Imagine waking up in the middle of the night unable to breathe, feeling like you are suffering a heart attack. Your first instinct is to dial 911, but your hand is paralyzed, unable to move out of fear. You lay there, completely still, struggling with every breath without the power to speak. It's da ... More >>

Toyota Center's Gigantic New Video Board Lets You Watch All The Omer Asik You Can Take

Now we know what the problem has been for Houston Rocket fans -- they just have not been able to get a clear view of the mediocrity on the court. Problem solved. The Rockets are unveiling a massive new scoreboard/video thingamajig which they claim "will be the largest indoor center-hung scoreboard ... More >>

Rockets Make Very Tiny, Almost Inaudible Splash with Asik Signing

My friends over on the ClutchFans.net bulletin board are fond of the phrase "making a splash" when discussing the team's moves in free agency and when they make trades. When a trade or signing is of a more minor variety, that phrase becomes a joke, often posted on the board in an almost unreadably s ... More >>

The Best Ever Houston Free Agent Signings

So the Houston Rockets have signed turnover machine/point guard/free agent Jeremy Lin to a contract, and apparently, the city of Houston is going nuts. I'm not quite ready to buy into the hype, and I'm not going to be doing any stupid puns on his name. That said, good luck to the kid and the Rockets ... More >>

Alleged Teen Rape Caught on Video

CongraduLINtions, Houston: It's a Point Guard!

Over the last few weeks -- and, frankly, for quite sometime before that -- the name Jeremy Lin has been twisted to fit any number of ridiculous puns (check out HPBasketball's Twitter feed on Tuesday for some hilarious examples), Linsanity chief among them as the young phenom brought crowds at storie ... More >>

The Knicks Play Hide-and-Seek in Order to Keep the Rockets from Signing Jeremy Lin

For every weird little occurrence in life, there seems to be an episode of Seinfeld to which you can circle back for an analogous situation. Even for something as innocuous as the Rockets' pursuit of Knicks restricted free agent guard Jeremy Lin. So here goes: Remember that episode of Seinfeld whe ... More >>

It's CompLINcated: The Continuing Saga of the Rockets Pursuit of Jeremy Lin

Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the Garden (or GAH-den if you are a New Yorker), it appears the New York Knicks, who appeared to have finally re-captured the imagination of basketball fans, are close to letting point guard Jeremy Lin go and join the Houston Rockets. I'm not going to ... More >>

Eight is Enough: Rockets Logjam at Power Forward Dissected

As the Rockets head into summer league play with their ultra-young roster, a question has arisen among fans: what exactly are they going to do with eight power forwards? It's a valid question. They currently have eight guys who play the position -- some can split time at other spots, but more on tha ... More >>

Rockets Invent a New Type of Draft Pick Lottery Protection, So That's Something, Right?

The Rockets finished the 2011-12 NBA season with perhaps the top point guard combination in the entire league. Kyle Lowry was a borderline All-Star at midseason and one of the top all-around players at the position, not to mention a massive bargain at $5.75 million per year. When Lowry went down w ... More >>