T-Mac "Anybody can win a championship, Everybody can't get in the hall of fame"

The strange thing about TMac hate on Clutchfans is it's always knowledgeable posters being disingenuous.

You know as well as I do what TMac "ran into"..... a starting lineup of Chuck Hayes and Rafer Alston, with a bench of Luther Head, 60 year old Dikembe, and the corpse of Juwan Howard. With a roster like that, who needs opponents?

In that infamous 2007 Jazz series, Yao had a matchup nightmare with the master flopper Mehmet Okur. Carlos Boozer just feasted. Deron Williams ate Rafer Alston alive, and then outside of Mac, the Rockets tried to find offense from Batter/Hayes/Head/Mutombo. Think about that! There was actually a game where only Yao-Mac-Alston-Battier scored in the entire game. 48 minutes.

2009 they had rookie Landry, Brooks, and Scola, and things started to look up. They were considerably better than the year before, but ran into that same matchup-nightmare Jazz team. OK, we thought, next year this is all coming together.

Finally in 2009 his career imploded when his knee problems became unmanageable.

2005 and 2009 were his two chances on rounded teams. 2005 was legitimately blown. (But I still say there was some Cuban-Ref shenanigans going on.)

 

I dun want to have a heated argument (you know how this ends with me- you got your reason for dislike of that guy which I do not share) - so I just say that Kirilenko never stopped McGrady in the Playoffs.... that is not true of a notion here.

The Utah j*zz team unfortunately stopped our entire team.

You can point your finger at McGrady and his faults but scoring he did against almost every team in the playoffs.

Pre-surgery McGrady.

 

Please provide evidence by comparing TMac's Houston rosters to any first-round opponent's roster.

These are the Game 6/7 rosters in terms of most minutes played. Does this not tell the story by itself? Only 2005 was a winnable matchup for the Rockets, and with prime Dirk, it was no sure thing.

2005:
Sura - Terry
Wesley - Finley
McGrady - Howard
Nowitski - Padgett
Yao - Dampier
-------
Barry - Stackhouse
James - Armstrong
Bowen - Daniels

2007:
Alston - Fisher
Battier - Williams
McGrady - Kirilenko
Hayes - Boozer
Yao - Okur
-----
Howard - Harpring
Head - Giricek
Mutombo - Millsap

2008:
Alston - Williams
McGrady - Kirilenko
Battier - Brewer
Scola - Boozer
Mutombo - Okur
--------
Jackson - Korver
Hayes - Millsap
Novak - Harpring
Landry - Price

 

Never forget

1. Mcgrady quit on your Houston Rockets
2. James Harden quit on your Houston Rockets.

 

Jus' member youngin's, if dey aints winninz the champinchips din dey iz LOOSER/QUITTERERS!! DEY IS TTERRIBLEZ!!!

 

I think it is only fair that fans were mad about the first round exits but pinning this on just one guy is absolutely not the way to go.

 

I point my finger at Tmac during game 6 of the 2008 series where Kirilenko clowned on him in the 4th quarter. Did you watch that game? Are you a Rockets fan?

I watched it. Kirilenko dismantled Tmac down the stretch of that game.

 

You are talking about one game, I do not re-watch one game that was a loss, and probably Tmac's end of a superstar..... 2007 was the beginning of the end.

https://www.basketball-reference.co...n-conference-first-round-jazz-vs-rockets.html

But from that box score McGrady had 40 pts and Scola 15 and no other Rocket got double figures lol

If 50% FG% is being clowned by Kirilenko then I think being clowned by Kirilenko should happen MORE OFTEN!

If you score that many points and carry your team, it happens that you lose your stamina at the end.....at least he did not quit that time.

It helps when your team is scoring too as the Jazz team did. 6 or 7 players in double figures.

Maybe YOU HAD ANOTHER GAME IN MIND?!

You are just talking about nothing again. Just acknowledge the Jazz had a more balanced team.

And Jerry Sloan is on par, if not a better overall coach than Adelman. Career wise.

 

I cant believe T-mac got to the hall of frame...wtf did he do? 13 in 35 seconds? That's the only crap the show on this hall of frame video. That award is trash now.

 

Are you talking about the game where T-Mac scored 40 POINTS on 50% FG (13-26 from the field) w/ 10 rebounds and 5 assists and only 1 TO??????

So the rest of the game doesn't matter besides the 4th quarter? 40 points wasn't good enough?


Lets also not forget that his All-Star center didn't even play in that game. This is beyond absurd.

 

TMac dropped 40 points shooting 50% from the field with 10 boards in the 20 point game 7 loss without Yao Ming in 2008. Whatchu gotta say about that?

NVM, I see the guy above me has this.... because a lot of us do indeed watch Rockets games!

Aside from this line of logic, Kirilenko was a lanky respected defender in his own right. And around TMac, the Rockets were getting exploited in massive C, PF and PG matchup problems all over the place. That's Mac's fault?

Contrast that with Harden who went 2-11 with two 2-point FG attempts, 6 turnovers, and 3 rebounds against the Spurs without Kawhi and Parker. OUCH! But I don't blame the whole series on one person, because why would you?

 

Corey Brewer. Exhibit #2.

 

You should be banned for calling Harden a quitter! Give the poor man a freaking break....he had a bad cold and had to save energy to go out clubbing after the final game with a famous rapper and Kylie Jenner. Steph, Kobe, and Michael would have done the exact same thing.

 

Did you watch the game when the aging Kirilenko who was also in poor health shut down Tmac in the 4th quarter? I did.

 

It's not about Harden or Tmac, I hope you understand that I have absolutely no agenda here. I just don't like it when my star player gets punked by Andre Kirilenko on a bad leg during crunch time. That's all.

 

A lot of scrubs do get rings...

but let's extrapolate shall we...

A lot of guys get into the HOF...

but far fewer can get an MVP or Finals MVPs...

and even fewer have ever gotten MVP, Finals MVP and DPOY...

 

Tmac has always been jealous of his peers
Wade, Kobe , Lebron , Duncan, Dirk etc

He's not a leader, he's a great talent who only played for himself

 

If you were so adamant about Kirilenko and that you would know that Morey in his younger days did not bring us anything valuable other than Scola and Carol Dawson was still the GM at that time.

The team consisted of essentially two injury prone stars and one way players mostly. And lots of Dleague or undrafted players. Or JVG's ex Knickerbockers. Old farts.

Fans were crying on here every day that besides Yao and Mac we absolutely had little talent and one dimensional ones at that.

We were happy about someone named Stromile Swift (Stromile IQ Swift?!) and McGrady proclaimed him as an Allstar candidate, and people tended to believe that.

Swift would have been trash or below average player today. Those were still dark times in terms of overall talent, overall makeup of a team.

 

That's fine. If Tmac can go up 3-1 or 2-0 in a series then he can't blame a poor supporting cast, but when he loses those series we can then blame all of the supporting cast.

Love your logic, and Clutchfans 10/10.

Dude loves you.

 

You can't convince me that the Jazz were a more talented team than the Rockets when they beat us in the first round. Did they play better as a team when it counted most? Obviously so.

But you can't tell me that to a man they had more talent. Unless you think Deron Williams was equal to or greater than T-Mac. And if you think that, then it sort of proves the point that T-Mac underachieved.