Chase Budinger went 44th in the 2009 NBA Draft to the Detroit Pistons. Hey, things are looking good. They need some outside shooting. In the flash of an eye, Chase Budinger was a Houston Rocket. Hey, things…hey, there are not any starting spots on this team. But wait, maybe there are, at least for a while, because Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming are nursing the usual injuries and that might just open the door.

Chase put on an exhibition in the art of shooting in his second game in the summer league.

“I think the up and down pace of the game helped me,” Budinger told HOOPSWORLD after pouring in a team-high 25 points on 9-10 shooting in a 98-95 win. “That’s been my style all my life, so any time we’re running it’s to my advantage.”

It wasn’t unheard of for Budinger to fill the nets at Arizona, where he averaged 15.6 points as a freshman, 17.1 as a sophomore and 18.0 as a junior. His weakness was always the defensive end of the floor, which is what the Rockets want to see him improve on while competing in the Las Vegas Summer League.

“The biggest thing the coaches have told me to do is to play hard, play tight on my man defensively all the way up the floor, and value every minute I get out on the court.”
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Ok, that was summer league and the defense is usually sparse and loaded with mismatches as coaches try to put young players into situations.

The real problem for Chase Budinger will be at the other end of the floor. Late in the game my Grandmother drove past Chase for a slam dunk and she was using a walker. No, really it was my grandmother.

Rick Adelman coaches the Rockets and preaches a complete game by every player. No D and no playing time. Better hunker down, Chase, or it will be a long regular season.

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Think of Yao and LeBron on the court together for the rest of their careers and your first thought is why would LeBron want to sign with Houston?

But that is not the source of this discussion. The source is from Hoopsworld reporting that a Chinese group is interested in investing in the Cavaliers.

Not when the New World Development Company, representing a group of Chinese investors, is set to buy a 15 percent ownership interest in the Cleveland Cavaliers.

The Hong Kong-based group is led by Kenny Huang, a Chinese-born investor who has in the past brokered marketing deals with the Houston Rockets
and New York Yankees.

On the surface, it may be merely the next most logical step in the growing relationship between the NBA and China, where basketball is wildly popular.
source

Now that would mean they would be very interested in prying Yao Ming from the Rockets and getting him paired up with LeBron in Cleveland.

Yao Ming is holding his breath for a title

Would it be a good fit? Maybe not, because Yao would have to move away from the basket to open up driving lanes for LeBron and that just does not make sense to me. But marketingwise it is a no brainer. It would create tremendous Chinese interest and don’t think for a minute that the NBA would not love that.

The NBA plans for world domination!
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A team posing as the Houston Rockets showed up at the Forum for a game 7. It was a testament to fortitude that the Rockets were still in this series at all. Just who were these Rockets, anyway? They were led by Scola and Brooks in scoring.

Who?

You know, Scola and Brooks. Oh, you were probably wondering about that Yao guy and the one named McGrady. Those two were not seen at the scene. It was more up to Battier and Artest. My thoughts exactly, do you want to trust your playoff fortunes to Battier and Artest?

Pau Gasol in the 3 man jumping drill

It did not matter as Pau Gasol and half of Hollywood led the Lakers to a huge 51 – 31 advantage at half and then just coasted to victory. Pau had 21 points and 18 rebounds. Kobe had a slightly off day with 14 points.

With Gasol scoring 21 points and grabbing 18 rebounds, the Lakers looked like the conference’s top-seeded team, not the maddeningly inconsistent one that was pushed to the decisive final game by the undermanned Rockets.

The Lakers dominated the paint on both ends, forcing the Rockets into turnovers and bad shots, and owning the backboards. They had an 8-0 lead a few minutes in and widened it to 25 points on Gasol’s jump hook shortly before halftime.

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Now the Nuggets and Chauncey Billups come into tinsel town on Tuesday. Stay tuned.
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The Houston Rockets took a half game lead in the Southwest Division and a two game lead in the win column over the San Antonio Spurs.

Houston 87 San Antonio 85

Ok, tell the truth, when asked about the Spurs, Rockets, Hornets, and Mavericks going into this season, just how much time did you spend bragging up the Rockets? Tell the truth.

Yao Ming wills the Rockets to victory over the Spurs

There might not have been a better way to move past the Spurs and into first place in the division, than the Rockets found on Sunday, running two plays in the last half minute to layups and stopping Tony Parker’s attempt for the lead in the final seconds to shock the Spurs, 87-85, Sunday at AT&T Center.

With the Spurs leading in the last minute, the Rockets twice ran high screens with Yao Ming, forcing the Spurs to rotate so that Yao could fire passes inside to Luis Scola for layups, the second with 11.2 seconds left for a one-point Houston lead.

“I just cut down the lane,” Scola, who had 19 points and 17 rebounds. “I was wide open both times.”

source

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