Neither Yao Ming, Tracy McGrady, Rafer Alston or Steve Francis suited up for Wednesday’s game in Memphis, which the Rockets lost 96-90. After losing to Memphis on Tuesday night, I thought it would be a good opportunity for the Rockets to get used to the grind of playing back-to-back games again, but apparently Rick Adelman agreed with my original thought when I saw the game in the schedule — this game was a waste.

Adelman didn’t even play Shane Battier (11 minutes), Chuck Hayes, (23) or Luis Scola (23) that many minutes, opting to spread the love around to 13 players. Rookie Aaron Brooks got the most number of minutes (35) and made only 3-of-16 shots for 10 points.

Kirk Snyder finally got some decent minutes (28), but unfortunately if the Rockets only look at this game to decide if they will keep him, he probably won’t stick around. Snyder made 4-of-11 shots, including only 1-of-5 three-pointers, turned the ball over 4 times, and picked up 5 personals.

I like Snyder. He’s an articulate guy, as you might remember from this interview I had with him during Austin training camp, starting off with my question regarding how Yao was disappointed that former coach Jeff Van Gundy didn’t play him during last year’s Utah series loss.

In this game, I was surprised Snyder attempted 5 three-pointers in this game when his mid-range game and going to the basket are more the strength of his game. At least you can say he’s fearless, opting to take the open shot rather than try to force a lower percentage shot in traffic.

Rookie power forward Carl Landry played well for the second consecutive game, this time hitting 5-of-6 shots, scoring 10 points and grabbing 7 boards. Luis Scola was solid as always, getting similar stats as Landry: 10 points on 4-of-8 shots, and 7 boards.

Overall, though, you have to throw this game out as an indicator of how the Rockets are really doing. I wish the NBA would just shorten the preseason by at least one game, get rid of back-to-backs against the same team, and take the extra time they would save and putting it into the long and grueling regular season where the players could use the rest.

This entry was posted on Thursday, October 25th, 2007 at 8:40 am and is filed under NBA preseason. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.