Can someone Post the Espn Insider article on the Rox

There's still one week left in the 1999-2000 regular season, but you will have to forgive Houston Rockets coach Rudy Tomjanovich if he can't wait until the start of the 2000-2001 season.

Once Rudy T has finished coaching the latest version of USA Basketball's Dream Team to the Olympic gold medal, he will be anxious to get back to a young Rockets team about which he is very excited.

The Rockets won't be going to the playoffs, missing the postseason for the first time since Tomjanovich took over as head coach. But you may have noticed them becoming something of a factor in playoff positioning races down the stretch. They went into Tuesday's game at Denver having won seven of their previous 10 games, including wins over Seattle on the road and vs. Utah.

Tomjanovich has known for a couple of years the day of reckoning was coming for the team that won the 1994 and 1995 NBA championships while Hakeem Olajuwon was at the very peak of his career. Olajuwon's game has been in decline for two seasons as a result of a series of illnesses and injuries. It would not be a shock if he decided not to come back next season.

Charles Barkley announced early in the season it would be his last in the NBA, then suffered a season-ending injury on Dec. 8 that ended his career prematurely.
Thus did the Rockets enter their rebuilding stage before Tomjanovich was ready for it.

"All we can deal with is what's reality," Tomjanovich said of the reality that smacked him right between the eyes when both Barkley and Olajuwon suffered major injuries. "We can't talk about what if. It's gone.

"I knew, somewhere down the line, we were going to have to go through 'OK, young guys, it's your deal.' And I knew that was going to take time, but now we're something like 60 games ahead of schedule."

As difficult as it has been for a coach so accustomed to winning to deal with long dry spells, Tomjanovich has been sustained by the Rockets' youth, most characterized by rookie sensation Steve Francis.

"I love this team," Tomjanovich said. "First of all, it's a change of style, a more penetrating, open-court style. Then the guys themselves, with their energy and still being at the development stages of their careers, are fun to coach.

"That's one of the benefits of coaching that I've enjoyed, when you see someone who is trying to get it, and they work on something, and all of a sudden they start applying the stuff to the game. That's a great feeling."
And it is clear Tomjanovich's youngsters are starting to get it.

"Yeah," Tomjanovich said, launching into an analogy every parent of teenagers will appreciate. "We've been close, but it's just like in life. We all want to be grown-ups; we all want to be men. But until you go through all the stuff, all the lessons, all the pain of adolescence, it's just not going to happen. If you didn't go through all those things in your teens, you're going to go through it in your 20s. You're going to act like a kid and go through all the suffering.
"We've still got a lot of that ahead of us, but we also got a lot behind us."

In other words, some of the pimples that were so evident on the Rockets' face this season will be gone by the start of next season.
For sure, the early-season struggles that plagued Francis won't pop up next season.

"If we weren't really young; if we weren't growing; if I thought we had gotten all we could and taught these guys all we've got, the losing would be very tough to take," Tomjanovich said. "But I just see the growth of this team. Steve is a fantastic player right now and he's just starting to put the whole thing together. There is no limit to what this kid can do.

"Cuttino Mobley played only half his rookie year, so he's just a little bit more than a rookie and he's doing some things on the court that I don't see some of the All-Stars doing, some of the moves he makes to the basket.

"And Kenny Thomas has had flashes. He does some things at his position I don't see a lot of guys do, which is his passing and his creativity with the passing.

"So it's just like you've planted some seeds and all of a sudden you see these things coming up and it's better than expected."
Tomjanovich knows his team needs to massage its lineup, and the question of whether or not Olajuwon will be able to play at all next season remains. But in Francis Tomjanovich knows he can replace one superstar in decline with one on the way up, even if they do play vastly different positions.

Francis, Tomjanovich believes, can be every bit as good as his position as Olajuwon was
at his.

"You'd have to go back a ways to find a point guard who had the kin of impact he did his rookie season," Tomjanovich said. "I think he's going to be an elite player in this league. He stays late working on his game; spends extra time watching tape; he's got the ball and can do whatever he wants; and he will pass the ball.

"He had a chance for a triple-double the other night, which could have been a big deal in this Rookie of the Year race and all that, and he gave it a little shot and then came over and said, 'Hey, let somebody else play.'
"That's the sign of a special guy. He's truly going to be one of the best players ever to play the game, I think."

Tomjanovich knows what to do when you have a player like that: Give him the ball as often as you can and ride him for all he is worth.
And next season can't arrive too soon for Rudy T.

Wandering the West

Denver coach Dan Issel attained a dubious distinction when he got tossed out of the Nuggets' Sunday game at Golden State. He became the first coach since 1971 to be ejected from six games in one season. That is according to Harvey Pollack, whose official title is Philadelphia 76ers director of statistical information, but whose unofficial title is "NBA Master of Minutiae." Pollack began tracking both player and coach ejections in 1971, so it is possible a coach other than Issel got tossed as often, or more, from 1947 to 1971, but Issel is the only one so documented. Referee Steve Javie, with whom Issel has some negative history, did the tossing Sunday, the third time this season he gave the Denver coach the heave-ho.

It may be a huge bluff, but Mike Dunleavy says he thinks the Blazers can beat the Lakers in a series. Dunleavy last week acknowledged the Lakers as "the most dominant team," but told the Portland Oregonian "I feel confident we can beat them in a series."
Dunleavy also opined that Shaquille O'Neal has benefited too much from the league's new rules, and the league ought to tighten things up a bit. You don't think he's looking for a potential playoff edge, do you?

Now here's a player who truly gives back to his community: Warriors' Donyell Marshall was scheduled to sign autographs last week at a Bay Area service station, so he decided to buy 1,500 gallons of gasoline for the customers who showed up. At today's gas prices, that's a very nice gesture. "With the prices being so high, it's something to do for the community," Marshall said. "With this crazy season it's a way to give back. You can't give back to anybody but it's
something."

Kings assistant coach Byron Scott wants Chris Webber to be extra cautious with his sore left hamstring. Scott remembers popping his hammy in the Lakers' final practice before the 1989 Finals. "One thing your body does is tell you what you need to know, if you listen," Scott said. "A couple of weeks before that, the Lakers went to Santa Barbara for two-a-day practices. And two days before we went to Detroit, I told trainer Gary Vitti that my hamstring was sore. He thought maybe I should relax a little bit, but I said I didn't think I would need to do that."
Scott missed the entire Finals.

Mike Monroe, who covers the NBA for the Denver Post, writes a Western Conference column for ESPN.com. You can e-mail him at monroe128@go.com

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[This message has been edited by The Cat (edited April 13, 2000).]

 

in the immortal words of Adam Sandler (oh, 8 years ago or something)

clam chowder!

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