I have urgent and horrifying news!

... I will be attending tonight's Rockets game!

Oh, yeah, once again in the good seats! So if you see a tall skinny guy near center court proudly wearing a replica Luis Scola #4 jersey - that's me.

Go Rockets! We're winning 14 in a row!!!

Carl Landry: ROY?

I knew Carl Landry was like good and stuff, but...

Wow.

and Holy Shit Wow!

Note to self - do not try to dunk or shoot on Carl Landry. He will hurt you. Even if you are an All Star. Ask David West.

Mr. Landry (for all intents and purposes) was introduced to the NBA on January 11th. The Rockets beat down the Minnesota Timberwolves bad. And I mean really, really bad. Like we were Secretariat and Minnesota was everyone else at Belmont. So, Ricky decided to give Landry some run.

In those 20 minutes of action, all Carl did was score 15 points - without missing a shot - grab 11 rebounds (6 offensive) and serve notice to Chuck Hayes that his days are numbered and that Chuck might want to re-read the terms of his soon-to-expire Chinese shoe contract. Landry was here to stay.

(and, consequently, "Luis Landry" was born.)

Since that fateful day, the Rockets have lost exactly three games. Two because Landry didn't play enough, including the Philly debacle. And the third to Utah, which just so happened to be Carl's only "bad" game so far.

Wages for Wins says that Landry is the best shooting, scoring and rebounding rookie forward (per 48 minutes). Landry also leads in WinScore and WP48. And while I do have a degree in applied mathematics (surprise, surprise), I'm too lazy to break down the formulas today. Just go here.

While Kevin Durant is giving us consistent 7-21 performances (in losing efforts), Mr. Landry is giving a workmanlike 62% FG shooting, a PER of 22.71 - which leads all rookies. He's also Gorilla Dunking on anyone who gets in his way. [edit: Here we go!] Ask Cleveland for verification. For some reason his dunk isn't on YouTube yet. Durant will win the ROY probably, but he'll be watching Luis Landry play in May and hopefully June.

Now, if only I/we/someone could get Scola and Landry to actually make free throws, we'd be absolutely unstoppable. Two non-first round rookies. Having more of an impact than anyone taken in this year's 1st round? Daryl Morey is like a genius or something.

Yes, it was a win. No, I am not happy with it.

Memorandum

To: Members of the Houston Rockets (except you, Mike James)

From: Management
Re: Last night's game against Minnesota

Hey, what the hell happened last night? You let the Minnesota Timberwolves stick around and actually take a lead for a little while in the 4th quarter? Look, we know that Al Jefferson is kinda good. But he's not an all-star (yet). Sebastian Telfair is the poster child for bad point guard play. The idiot Minnesota coach only gave Corey Brewer 8 minutes of run, too! And yet you let Minnesota think they were actually "in" the game with you?!? Even Antoine Walker was playing hard - we haven't seen that in many a year!

Also, Carl Landry, we love ya here, but beating Minnesota is not exactly cause for a big celebration. Calm down rook, and just keep playin' hard like you have been.


Anyway, Rockets, the last time you won by 31 and the game was over in the 2nd quarter. This time you almost made me have to retract an entire "scrimmage" based post from yesterday. Not cool. I was not impressed.

Put it another way: if you play like this on Thursday, the LeBrons will have a field day.

Tonight's scrimmage vs. Minnesota

Wait -- what? You're telling me it's a real game tonight? No way. When did the NBA start a cross-promotion of having its teams start playing real games against NBDL teams? What's that? Minnesota has not been relegated to the NBDL? Coulda fooled me!

Last time the Rockets faced the T-Wolves (also known as the Grand Entrance of Carl Landry to the NBA) we won by 31 points. And we played awful. I should know. I was there in person witnessing the event. The Rockets didn't even have - or need - the services of one Tracy McGrady. And the scrubs received by the Wolves when they traded KG offered no resistance. Scola and Bonzi and Yao abused Minny. We could have won by 50.

(neither of these guys were in the last game. McGrady probably plays tonight, but, as usual, it's unlikely we'll see him actually driving it to the basket.) Carl Landry had 15 points and 11 rebounds the last time in his first game that wasn't merely a cameo appearance. He hasn't had a DNP-CD since. It only took two months for Ricky to wake-up, I guess.

I don't see much different this time around. The Wolves still suck [ed. note -- badly!], and the Rockets are once again playing well and winning games. This could be the lineup in the 4th Q:

C: Landry
PF: Scola
SF: Novak
SG: Mike James
PG: Brooks

translation: we probably won't need Yao after the first 36 minutes. And now that I've properly jinxed the team - Go Rockets!