At 8:00 a.m. Beijing time on January 1, the Rockets will face the Heat at home, and the previous game, the Heat were absent due to a large number of player injuries or triggered an agreement, resulting in their game with the Spurs being postponed. This game against the Rockets may only be decided at the last minute before the game to decide whether it should be normal or not. However, NBA expert Ben Dubos still made his own predictions for this game.
Let's take a look at the latest situation of the two teams. With the comeback of Martin Jr., Tate, and the re-appearance of Jaylen Green and Porter Jr. in the game, the only players the Rockets can't play now are Wall, Jarrow, Matthews and Brooks.
After the Rockets lost to the Lakers before, Silas's team has lost 5 consecutive games, and if the Home Team loses to the Heat, the Rockets really can't say it. Although Silas's coaching position is worry-free, for the young coach, the face is definitely not hanging, after all, the Heat have nearly half of the players missing, if the Rockets can not use this opportunity and home advantage to win the opponent, it is really a disgrace to Silas's face.
The Heat currently have four straight wins and are in fourth place in the East with a record of 22 wins and 13 losses, and although many key players are absent, it does not seem to be a problem to win the weak Rockets. It's just that the Heat are missing too many players, so let's take a look at the specific injury situation. The Heat's injury absences are significantly more complicated than the Rockets' absences, with players missing out for triggering health and safety agreements: Chick, Garrett, Haslem, Lowry, Dunroe, Strus, PJ Tucker and Vincent.
The Heat's players who have missed due to injuries are: Adebayor, Maurice Grande, Okpala and Oladipo. Jimmy Butler is now in a state where he is in doubt, and it is only before the game that he decides whether he will play on the road.
Ben Dubos also gave the starting lineup predictions for the two teams for this game, the Rockets' starting lineup should be similar to the previous game: Porter Jr., Jaylen Green, Gordon, Nouaba and Wood; the Heat's starting lineup can be much colder, Chalmers, Taylor Hiero, Jimmy Butler, Galle Martin and Jurt Cevenn are expected to start, of course, butler can play is not clear, but the NBA expert still put him in the Heat's starting lineup.
For the Rockets, this game has a lot of advantages in hand, first, the Rockets are at home and rest for two days, second, the average age of the Rockets is much smaller than the Heat, after all, the Heat's Butler, Chalmers and other players are veterans, third, in the lineup comparison, the Rockets can play more players, and many major rotation players have comeback, which is the biggest positive for the Rockets.
If the Rockets can play normally in this game, the victory over the "super remnant" Heat at home should be a high probability event. Can the Rockets seize the heat's remnants to end a 5-game losing streak? We'll see.