No KD? No Fred VanVleet? DFS looking like CFS? No problem!
Tonight the Rockets took the court for the first competition of the 2025-26 NBA season, or rather for preseason. There will be only 3 more of these tune up games for the Rockets, one nice thing about starting the NBA season earlier than Halloween night.
An Atlanta Hawks team bolstered by the return of Jalen Johnson, and the addition of Kristaps Porzingis, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, and former Rocket, N’Faly Dante were in town. This Hawks team looks like it could go a long way in the Achilles Riddled, or Riddled Achilles, L’Eastern Conference. It’s a good team, with less being asked of Trae Young, besides facilitating, at which he excels. He should have more time to work on his flopping, without having to score as much thanks to Porzingis, NAW and perhaps a better Zaccharie Risacher.
But enough about the Hawks. How did the Rockets look? In a word: good. This game was so choppy, due to preseason rust, and weird linups and player combos we might never see again, I think it best to just describe some player performances.
Alperen Sengun continued to show the form he displayed in Turkey’s undefeated run to the EuroBasket final, a form that if it holds, and he gets enough minutes, should at least put him on the fringes of the MVP conversation and into 2nd team All NBA. Alpie scored an easy looking 19pts in 17 minutes, and threw in 6 rebounds and 6 assists, on 5-7 shooting, including 2-2 from three, with an easy looking shooting form. He also managed 2 blocks. He truly looked like the best player on the court the whole time he played. In general he looks not only stronger, but faster and more fluid.
Reed Sheppard looked like an NBA point guard. A young one, maybe, but a real one. He only went 2-6 shooting, but also spent a lot of time off ball, and trying to create on secondary actions. The Rockets seemed to focus on Amen running point to a real extent, to mixed results. The offense looked better with Reed at the helm, and it looked best with Point Sengun running the show as he did for Turkey.
Amen Thompson’s attempt at point guarding wasn’t entirely successful, in fact he tried to force a number of passes off his drives that would have been better as shot attempts, but largely ended up part of his 3 turnovers to 3 assists. The rest of his offense looked great, though.
Jabari Smith started, and looked much, much, better on his drives. He attacked with force, and authority, rather than the drives to nowhere. Perhaps playing with his boyhood idol, Kevin Durant, is already paying dividends? Jabari shot a somewhat unlucky 3-8, but 2-4 from three point range, and he grabbed 6 rebounds.
Tari Eason also looked good, though some of his 5-8 shooting came on some unlikely makes. He went 5-8 and had six rebounds and two assists and 10 in only 11 minutes.
Beyond the starters, with Tari or Jabari starting in place of KD, we did see some new and new/old additions, even without Dorian Finney-Smith. Josh Okogie scored 8 points on 0-1 official shot attempts, as he attacked aggressively and drew fouls. He went 8-10 from the free throw line, and also showed why he’s considered a top one on one defender. He contributed 3 boards, 2 blocks and a steal in his odd 17 minutes.
We also saw our grown up Baby Deer, Clint Capela, the Rampant Stag. He remains a very effective player around the basket, going 4-5, with 5rbs and a block in his 18 minutes.
Steven Adams did Steven Adams things, set screens, had as many offensive as defensive rebounds, two nice assists, and oh, yeah, a thunderous dunk.
JD Davison looked good in his minutes, and if he plays close to like he did tonight 17pts on 6-9 shooting, 5-7 from three point range, and 3 rebounds and 4 assists in 22 minutes perhaps he’ll take the backup guard job from…
Aaron Holiday, who, ah, didn’t shoot it well, going 2-12 in 20 minutes, so he was getting shots up. He had 3 assists and 3 turnovers and it was generally an unconvincing night from Ime’s third favorite security blanket. As we have previously observed, if he’s making shots, he’s playable, if he isn’t, he’s really not.
I’m not really going to describe the two-way guys, though I liked what I saw from Crawford, because aside from Davison it’s hard to see them getting anything more than sporadic garbage minutes. Jae’Sean Tate sat tonight, presumably to give some of these guys a chance at minutes.
That’s about all I can say about this one. Hoping to see Kevin Durant next game, on Wednesday.
No. Poll.
I’m sorry.
