Gamethread: Suns vs. Rockets

Injury report: Bledsoe, Knight, Price and Warren are out for the Suns. Dekker, Harrell, Jones and Motiejunas are out for the Rockets. Capela is listed as available to play with a left hip flexor strain.

Pregame: I asked Earl Watson about his first experience playing against one of the greats at his position with Devin Booker playing against James Harden tonight. He told a funny story involving Gary Payton and John Stockton.

"This is a funny story. I was in Seattle, Gary Payton was my veteran. You know, Gary Payton he was notorious for not talking to other point guards on his team. Somehow he and I bonded, we got this relationship. So we go to Utah and when Gary Payton played against any point guard he trash talked the entire game. So we sitting in shoot around, shoot around ends I'm getting my bag. He never called me by my name, it was either 'little bro' or 'baby bro.' He was like 'baby bro,' I'm like 'wassup? wassup big bro?' he was like 'this boy you playing tonight? Oooh! This is an awesome opportunity. You better respect him and do not take this opportunity for granted.' He was in love with John Stockton,  I mean in love with him. And it shocked me because every other point guard we play Gary thought he was just trash. The guy can have 40 and he was like 'he got lucky tonight he's trash.' That was just Gary Payton's mentality. So when we got into the game... I've always been a John Stockton fan. Jerry Sloan, Utah Jazz, I just loved their tradition their culture. They were running UCLA high post so of course I was a fan coming from UCLA. And I couldn't believe how short his shorts were in person. This is a true story, I picked him up full court and my style of play was I had to fight in order to get playing time so I had to do the things that NBA players didn't want to do: pick up full court, play aggressive, turn them, create deflections and almost be that take a charge, hit a open shot, create havoc type of point guard. So I'm picking him up full court, I'm jamming him, I'm pressuring him, I'm bumping him, we get to about the free throw line because John Stockton was the only point guard I seen in the past 20 years run offense from the free throw line. It's amazing how he got so deep to make the plays. So as he threw the ball, it went directly, I could feel the wind go past my face. I had to duck and move to the side and look behind me. There was no one behind me. And he looked at me and said 'back up.' He threw it at my face! So that was my first experience with someone who I admired and to me was the best at my position. He and Gary Payton."

Once we get injury news I'll tweet that out (my twitter is up there ^^^^)  and update this post.