Exactly my point, I will never look back and wonder what if? The Roxs pulled off the trade and got the best player available, this season has been rough so far but for God's sakes have a little patience!
this is all starting to make my head hurt. again...my opinion...the rockets played their best basketball against the Lakers in the playoffs. that's as good as i've seen them play on a consistent basis with that core of players. i don't think it was going to get much better than that, frankly. that's it. you can disagree if you like. it's fine. it's subjective. what are you, a lawyer?
That's fine, I just think that the underlined passage couldn't be further from the truth and the evidence shows it, as demonstrated by the previous games vs. the Lakers, and basically any game where YM established an inside presence, rebounded, games where JJ was a little more on target - etc. Now, back to some boring ass arbitration brief arguing points that I know/care a lot less about.
EXACTLY! They are struggling right now, Francis and the Magic are playing well, so the trade looks worse than it really was. The team is having a hard time finding themselves but it will 'click' one day and they will play better. If everyone wants to compare this team to the Lakers of the last few year, think of it this way. It took several years for them to become the best team in the league that they were. They had to have time to put the right pieces around them and time to have Kobe mature into one of the best players in the league. The Lakers traded to get an established superstar (Shaq), also got a budding superstar with tons of potential (Kobe), things just had to work it's course to get to where they envisioned it. The Rockets, this year, traded to get an established superstar (TMac) to play along side thier young, budding star with tons of potential (Yao) and had to scrap last year's team to do it. We are talking about only one month of the season, this team will find the chemistry and role players to get to where they envisioned when the made the trade. It may take a season or two, or even a different coach, but it will get done.
they never did that with any level of consistency. that's my point. taking any regular season game and saying, "oh yeah..they played better in that one game" doesn't properly address the issues that team was dealing with, i think.
I used to think of the trade as T-Mac for Francis, but taking a step back and realizing that we gave up 3 starters shows us why we are in the position we are in. Max mentioned that the team played it's best and didn't beat the Lakers, what? Francis played his best and it wasn't enough to beat the Lakers, if the rest of the team had shown up more consistently, we could have taken the 3 time champs a little deeper. ima says that the team we have now is not the finished product, well last years team wasn't finished either. We still could have added to the team, I mentioned this in another thread, Cato, Weatherspoon, and Cat's contracts are scheduled to end at the same time with Mo Taylor coming off the books the year after that. That's a load of cap space that could have made last year's team much better. The way I see it, last year's team could have become a championship contender in about 2 years. Now we have taken a huge leap back and have to wait like 5 years. PGs like Nash and Kidd don't grow on trees, where are we going to find a player like that? People have this optimism that after this season we'll just sign a great PG and a great PF and all our problems will be solved. Remember how long we waited for a good SF? It took like 4 years before Jim Jackson showed up last year and he wasn't even a real SF. Now he's fallen off in his 2nd season. I predict the same kind of wait to fill our other positions. I hope I'm wrong.
Only reason Francis is playing well is because Grant Hill is playing well... Wait till he gets hurt... Tracy didnt have Hill last year... and if he did itd be a different story.
It was more than one game, it was at least 4 out of 8, which is as good/better than most vs. the Lakers over that same span.
I wish I could give this post 5 stars. The big question is if these two main pieces can work well together...and there just hasn't been anywhere near enough time to figure that out. Not too mention we don't even have the supporting pieces to put in place to even enable us to figure it out...
You have no idea what would happen if that were true, what we do know is that the Magic's record with Tracy and Hill playing together was about as good as it was without Hill.
Oski, I don't disagree with a lot of what you are saying. My problem with it is that it's November, not March. If we are still sputtering around the .500 mark come the All Star break, you will have a very good point(s). It's just way too early to pass judgement on this trade. Besides, I don't think we need a Kidd or Nash for a PG. We just need a serviceable PG IMO. Who is to say Sura isn't that guy? He looked pretty good on Saturday. But I digress... Like I said before, I'm not defending JVG or making excuses for the teams lackluster play. Hell, I spent $55 (plus parking and beers) to go watch that debacle in person on Saturday night and I want my money back. I'm just saying it's still too early to judge this trade.
Isn't this the first time in a long time a really healthy Hill has been playing? I think you are seriously undervaluing him. In fact, he is a great compliment to Francis. Personally, I think pairing the two of them together is a much bigger factor than a lot of people are giving credit to.
Count me in on the sky ain't falling, but it looks pretty low crowd. Yao does not have to dominate for the Rockets to be a Championship quality team. But, it will take a few years and a lot of extra pieces for that to happen. Tracy *will* have to play at a superstar level, though. The Rockets cannot use the Lakers model since neither Yao, or Tracy give you as much as Shaq and Kobe did. I don't see the intensity in either of the Rockets players. If Yao's upside is Rik Smits (and, let's face it...it's looking that way), then we will have to get some strong forwards and let him play the high post. I am concerned that Van Gundy is such a "my way, or the highway" kind of coach that he will not design a scheme that fits the talents of his team. That's where Rudy is a better coach. There is no reason to panic right now, but there are some issues about this team at every level that concern me.
Even I gotta admit that people giving up on the Rockets is annoying. Now you all know that I'm a Francis fan/supporter/defender, but I really do feel like the trade, in the long run, will make both teams happy for years to come. The Magic got the passion and heart that they craved all of last year, when the team gave up like halfway through December. The Rockets, on the other hand, got a superstar who says he doesn't want to be the man (though that remains to be seen) and wants to play with a dominant Center. What you guys don't seem to realize is you're fans of the Rockets. That doesn't mean you support them when they win. When they win they don't need support. It means you support them when they lose, when they look like $hit, when they actually need fans to boost them up. The way some of you cheer for the Rockets is like giving money to the rich (only supporting them when they're already doing good). Now I'm not much of a Rockets fan anymore since Francis left town, but I'm still a fan of the NBA, and I still believe that any true fan has to stick with their team.
You are right, it is too early to condemn the team. Still, getting the frustration out somehow is healthy. You aren't getting your money back, you might as well trash the team til you feel a little batter.
I'm not undervaluing him at all, I just don't think the combo of Hill and Tracy was all that and I don't think Hill would be playing like he is right now with Tracy instead of Francis. Of course it's a big factor, they're playing great together. Great on the fast break alternating who starts and finishes the break, and pretty good in the half court with Francis giving Hill open shots and Hill giving Francis the space to go one on one.
I totally agree with Oski's earlier post. I agree that they need more time before we condemn this team but I am bothered by the "look give it time we're rebuilding" view. We were rebuilding the last two years and since then we've changed coaches and gutted the previous team. Last years team had made progress over the year before, not much but it was an important step, and until the trade came up the feeling was that this year's team would make more progress as Yao, Francis, Mobley and crew got more comfortable with each other and JVG. Instead We've almost started back at square one. I hear what MadMax is saying that last year's playoffs might've been the best that the Francis-Yao Rox could do but I find that hard to swallow considering that with one or two breaks the series could've easily swung to the Rox. I don't think it was this was the best and that's it, it was more a matter of a cagey veteran team that have been there many times vs a young team coming to the dance the first time. I'm trying to not be such a nattering nabov of negatism but this team has yet show me any upside yet. Hopefully I'm wrong. I really hope I'm proved wrong.
San Antonio and Minnesota played their best ball against the Lakers and lost, should they have been broken up?
It's only November, too early to do all this. In the long run, the Rockets are gonna win championships. Go Rockets!
I though we already had a foundation with Francis, Mobes, JJ and Yao. I thought our goal last year was to MAKE it to the playoffs. We did that, then we trade our playoff team for T-MAC and some scrubs. I was hoping that the Rockets would BIULD on what they accomplished last season but it was completly distroyed with the trade. Remember, the same thing happened a few years ago when we traded or championship team for Barkley. Rockets made the playoffs last season in the WEST. T-Mac couldn't win 22 games in the EAST. We trade that team for him and now everyone is suprised that the Rockets aren't that great. While we point fingers at Gundy, T-MAC or Yao or whoever... the fact is, the Rockets took a step foward by making the playoffs last season, and 3 steps back by trading that same team. ~raww~
