damn shame what happened to this dude...he got worse every year in Houston it got to the point he could barely shoot 70% from the line...all he wanted to do was shoot outside jumpers with a jumpshot that got worse every year 02-03 T-Mac is my favorite player of all time it’s too bad he’s a 2nd round virgin (I don’t count him handing out towels, warming the bench, and filling up the water bottles while in San Antonio)
I remember talking major smack to Mavs fans after game 1. Thanks Tmac for never having our backs. The hype train was insane. No other Rocket will have so much hype joining the Rockets ever. That includes Harden. Rockets fans thought we were penciled in the finals. More like scan trons with like 99 questions left blank when time runs out
The bad back probably got in his head and made him try and be a jump shooter to save his body. Rockets need to bring back those throwback jerseys I found my T-Mac jersey going through some old clothes last week.
all that talent, skill, and athleticism just to be washed before 30 after that 02-03 season, I really thought the league was his...averaging 32 and looking unstoppable at age 23, but in typical T-Mac fashion, the next year he leads a 21 win team and plays much worse than he did the previous season every training camp his face would look fatter and his body more sloppy like he’d been eating burritos all summer...always signaling to me he was about to be worse than he was the previous year and continue his decline even tho he’s supposed to be in his prime
i probably watched every minute of every game during that era of Rockets basketball but even now looking at his stats it’s surprising how many games he missed and how freaking young he was when the suckage started. Obviously injuries played a part but he was lazy. Like you said he got fatter and fatter and tried to play it off with that **** beard.
a lot of people I know refused to see it back then and would be like “nah, he’s not getting fatter, he’s bulking...that’s increased muscle mass” ...with the rate he was gaining weight, it was only a matter of time before he showed up to training camp with chins I thought he was gonna do great things in Houston...unfortunately, not even close it’s like after 02-03, he stopped seriously working on his game and decided to coast
This is another knock of players going from high school to the NBA. The top college programs teach their players proper diet and training and T-Mac could have used that discipline based on his body constantly breaking down.
For all that **** Harden gets for allegedly being fat, he actually upped his game literally every season to the best player in the league. TMAC declined every year he was in Houston
Don't forget the 22-0 win streak. Yao Ming clogged the lane. Aaron Brooks was more of liability than winnable asset. Mcgrady got a easy thirty points.
I think if you moved his Rockets teams to the East there would have been multiple finals appearances. Certainly if Yao could have been healthy at the same time. The West was up and down the line brutal in that era. I won’t put all the blame on Tmac but obviously as the best player with a noticeable amount of laziness, he deserves the reputation he has. First round virgin.
