Hard to believe, but true. For the fourth straight season, the Rockets are holding training camp in Austin, TX at St. Stephen's Episcopal School and though practices are closed to the public, I was fortunately given access by the Rockets to attend.

Rudy did us right this time around, letting the media in quite early and we got to watch about 30-40 minutes of practice. That usually is not the case -- most of the time we're allowed in when practice is over or ending and the players are preparing to leave.

When I went in, Rudy had the entire squad divided into 3 groups, with each group running drills in a different place on the court. Jim Boylen, Larry Smith and some other coach were each running the drills, with Rudy T walking around and supervising.

The first thing I noticed was Steve Francis was matched up against Tito Maddox in the low block. Steve, as usual, looked to be in terrific shape. He was posting up on Tito, who was doing a petty admirable job of banging with him about 10 feet from the basket, just shy of the baseline.

You could see right away both players are exceptionally quick, but when Steve broke free for a long jumper, you knew there was a difference.

After watching that matchup briefly, I focused in on Bostjan Nachbar. Boki was guarding Glen Rice and I was hoping to catch some Nachbar highlights.

There weren't any.

Not that he tried and failed, but I don't think I saw Nachbar put up a single shot the entire time I was there. He was guarding Rice almost the entire time, and even later when there was a 3-team scrimmage, Nachbar would break free out on the wing and call for the ball, but simply didn't get any passes.

Glen Rice, however, did have highlights. Without a doubt, Rice was the player that jumped out at me in this practice. He looks to be in better shape. He looks very happy. Laughing, smiling. He is vocal, he was pushing players verbally, he was running (well I might add) and he was draining triples. He threw down a monster jam in a drill. On one play in a scrimmage, Rice took a pass coming off a screen and bolted hard to the hoop, straight through the heart of the defense, and put a floater in.

By the time I could say, "wow", he was already gliding back on defense.

"I would say right now I feel 100%," said Rice after practice. "My only concern is down the road to feel pain of some kind, but right now I'm going 100%."

The "power forward trio" was an interesting one to see. Maurice Taylor looks strong, but seems to have lost some definition -- but I've seen photos of him from 4-5 months ago and he's lost a bunch of weight, no doubt. He had some nice moves in the paint, finishing with layins every time. Kenny Thomas looks slim, slim, slim ... but strong. To think when KT came in to the league, his weight and ability to keep his weight down was what scared off some GMs. The guy looks to be in amazing shape. He swiped the ball out of Mo Taylor's hands on more than one occasion.

Eddie Griffin was quiet ... I don't think I heard a word from him the entire practice. He hit a 16-foot jumper just off the free throw line that bounced around the rim a while, and he nearly had a gorgeous tip-in over Jason Collier, but this first practice wasn't his. Nothing really jumped out.

In fact, the team has a lot of work to do. Bad passes, bad shots... you can see it happening, but at the same time it's Day 1. When they did run a scrimmage, Rudy T broke his troops in to three teams (red, grey, blue). How it was set up: As grey would go against blue for example, blue would defend and as soon as they got the ball back, they would head up the other end of the court to face a waiting red team. Red would then go against grey, etc.

Right after Rudy called the teams, it was funny to see Steve Francis sprint and jump in to Mo Taylor's arms as both laughed. Rudy had just put them both on Team Blue. I refuse to think Stevie was just happy to be on Mo's squad -- something more had to be going on.

Team Red, with Cuttino Mobley, Griffin, Terence Morris and Tito Maddox among others, had some problems. Cuttino ran some of the offense, and the passing just wasn't there. One time he had Eddie wide open calling for the ball beyond the arc, but Cat opted instead to to back in three defenders (resulting in a foul). Another time Cuttino pulled up for a wide open 14-footer, but in mid-shot, fired a bullet of a pass to Steve Goodrich down low, who was looking at the hoop for the rebound.

Team Grey, which included Rice, KT, Moochie Norris and Kelvin Cato, ended up the ultimate winner, meaning Teams Red and Blue ended up running laps after the session. Grey was aided as well by Pete Mickeal, who looked like a solid defender taking on Steve Francis a couple of times. Regardless, Mickeal is a long shot to make the squad.

After practice, the media swarmed Steve Francis and Rudy T, as well as Mo Taylor, Cuttino and Moochie. I was stunned to see Nachbar by himself over in one of the bench seats. So I walked over, sat beside him, asked if I could ask him a few questions and he was happy to answer.

This is a quality kid -- seems very well-spoken and he'll look you right in the eyes when answering your questions. You can check out his comments from our conversation here. He also stayed later than just about every player, doing stretching exercises for his groin to help recover from the hernia that he suffered from this offseason.

The question you're left with after Day 1: What will this team truly be like with Yao Ming? It's a legitimate question as the type of ping-pong, iso basketball the Rockets ran today just doesn't seem to be the logical fit for Yao's style. How will Yao fit in, or completely alter, what we're seeing now?

Things Noticed

• Terence Morris stayed after practice and got instructions from one of the coaches as they ran through shooting drills. The coach would hold Morris' left elbow closer to the front of his chest while he shot, trying to get him to improve or tweak his form.
• Moochie Norris was filming a semi-comical "intro to the sports news" for one of the news channels in Houston. That will probably be on the air tonight.
• The entire team headed out to an Austin restaurant together after practice, but no idea which all-you-can-eat buffet got pillaged.
• I thought I had something when I noticed that Bostjan Nachbar was clearly an inch or two taller than Glen Rice when they were standing side-by-side... but Rice is 6-foot-8, not the 6-foot-9 that first came to mind, so it's still anyone's guess if Nachbar is a legit 6-foot-10 or not (I was told he measured at 6-foot-10 at his Rocket draft workout)
• The chemistry of this team is superb. Everyone seems to know each other well, even on Day One. Maddox and Francis high-fiving, Nachbar and Rice laughing together, Moochie helping Pete Mickeal... everyone seems to be friends.