The one thing I always hear from T-Mac bashers is how he has "no heart" or "no desire to win." This same time last year, everyone was saying the same things as he was missing nearly a month of action due to his injured knee. Then came the 22 game win streak and his 27/8/7 performance in a fairly competitive series with the Jazz, despite Yao and Alston being out. After that series, the bashing subsided. Now, with the discussions coming up again, here is the conclusion I have reached about T-Mac's "Heart"- T-Mac and his "heart" remain fairly consistent game-to-game, season-to-season. You can look at any point from about 2003-2004, and he always has a fairly lazy demenour with his arms at his side, walking down the court and not making too many off-ball cuts. He'll make his fair share of lazy plays. He won't always be the guy to try and take over with his team down, and we all know his love-affair with long jumpers. Against good teams, against bad teams, nationally televised games or local, Orlando or Houston...his will to win and court demenous don't change all that much (health permitting). What seperates the T-Mac that can still put up big numbers and be one of the elite players in the NBA (seriously...how many players can you name that can average 27/8/7 on one leg for a series? Kobe, Bron, Wade, MAYBE Johnson, Carter and CP3...it's a short list), and the T-Mac that struggles to score over 7pts is his CONFIDENCE. And no, not just confidence in his body and level of play, but the URGENCY to play like a superstar. Take a look at the 2006-2007 season. T-Mac missed the entire offseason because he felt his back needed the rest...came into the season out of shape, played horrible the first month, clamed he would retire at 30 and it was "Yao's team" and then missed 7 straight games due to back problems. When he came back, Yao had already gone down to injury, and T-Mac looked pretty crappy physically. Still, with Yao down, T-Mac averaged nearly 30PPG and 6APG as he led the Rockets to a 21-11 record. Similar thing happenned last year at the front-end of the last 10 games of the 22-game win streak, when T-Mac was on fire. After he hurt his shoulder, he shot the ball poorly until the playoffs, but he still raised his level of play and felt it was "his team." Right now, with so much hype about the "big 3" and how he no longer needs to score X amount of points to win, he simply doesn't have the urgency to shoot the ball much or take over. Unfortunately, when you give a volume scorer only 10 shots per game (one that is injured and is having consistency problems because of it), it is going to be very hard for him to ever get into a rythym. And without the sense of urgency to take over the reigns of this team and too much of a willingness to defer, T-Mac himself as well as the entire team is never going to reach expectations. It is essential that Adelman gives T-Mac the green-light to play how he wants to play, and tell him that this team is as much his as it is Yao's. That is the only way we will see the T-Mac we need to win a ring.
How so? You cannot look at things from the past. Yao Ming has been the best player for the past 2 years. 3 years if you don't include the injures he had. I remember even T-Mac had said we won 22 games without our best player playing every night and saying that was something special. T-Mac even knew that Yao Ming was the best player on the team then. I don't know why you are still denying it today, but you should end it before it gets worse.
Dude keep dreaming... Tmac is washed up I can care less what you said. Tmac is on the decline and i can care less if he puts another scores 30 the next game because we wont see that consistently and he will go back to his normal ways scoring 4 lousy points. Im tired of his lazy washed up ass. I even bet Artest is tired of his damn whiny excuses. No way in hell are we going to make it the Finals or win it all if tmac just plays every other game and misses the 2nd back to back game and NO way in hell will the Rockets build chemistry if he decides to play and not to play cause it will **** up the game plan. Ridiculous i tell you
T-Mac still played at a 20-25PPG/6APG/5RPG level those 3 years, and was our one constant the last 3 post seasons the Rockets have been in. When Yao has gone down to injury for his 30 games, T-Mac has led the Rockets to very high winning percentages. The Rockets' focal point has been Yao since 2005-2006, so if you blame T-Mac for the last 3 years, you have to do the same with Yao. The point of my post was to show that this T-Mac will get us nowhere. Where as a guy like Ray Allen could settle into a role where he doesn't need more than 10 shots per game to play well, T-Mac is a player who needs to get more than 10 shots up and needs to feel the URGENCY to play well in order to play to his potential. That is what I'm trying to say, not that he needs to be taking 30 shots per game or that he needs to take a ton of touches away from Yao. Yao should be the focal point of the offense, but having a T-Mac that can lead this team and play like a star when needed is essential.
I couldn't care less who is the better player...that is irrelevent. My point is that when T-Mac feels he needs to defer and doesn't have a sense of urgency to play like a star, you get the player you are seeing right now. Whenever he has been in a position where he has felt he needed to play well to win, he has done so. The outcome may not have resulted in a win, but he still elevates his play when he has to. Last year you saw that when he averaged 27/8/7 against the Jazz, or the year before when he averaged nearly 30PPG in the 32 games without Yao.
So how can we get the dude to play all out and heck even average 22-6-6 again? I agree with your post. I also believe his knee is really making him struggle..
Tell him to consider watching what Kobe Bryant did in his younger days. And Maybe then the Rockets will start winning again. The Problem with T-Mac is his motivation and that almost leads him to become a lot like Rasheed Wallace. He is no longer able to play night in and night out and have fun and actually like to play the game anymore.
Oh and the fact that T-Mac HIMSELF said Yao was a better player 2-3 years ago is part of the reason why this team has never reached potential. Most other superstars have the mentality of, "I am the best player on the court and I'm going to do my thing." That is the reason why for the past 3 years T-Mac has only played like a superstar when Yao has gone down, while Yao's production generally remains consistent with or without T-Mac.
Well, one thing you can definitely argue is that Tmac definitely has a 'heart'. Otherwise, he wouldn't be alive and playing.....
So your saying IF someone for example like Rick Adelman tells him he is the best on the team, he will start dominating games as he once did?
I agree. But where as most people think that his motivation to win is the culprit...I disagree. I think it's his motivation to go out there and play to his potential is the problem. Even on one leg, he is still one of the most physically gifted and talented players in the league, and has one of the highest BBall IQ's out there. If he can register a triple double, go for 30/8/7 and have 14pts in 4min (1st Washington game), all on one leg, he still has the tools to be far more effective than he currently is. That is where his sense of urgency comes into play.
McGrady just needs to be a player that can a hit a jump shot and be able to run a pick and roll and that's it. He's lost all of his athletic ability pretty much this season. I think Artest needs to start having more of an offensive job now. Nobody knows when T-mac will be out there and even if he is out there, nobody knows what's he's going to do.
He will NEVER be the 2002-2003 T-Mac ever again. He will NEVER average 25PPG over the course of an 82 game season against, nor should he have to. But, he has shown way too many times over the last 2 years that when his team has its back to the wall (whether it be injuries or whatever else) and they need him to take the reigns and play like a star, he generally has delivered. No, he is not Kobe Bryant or LeBron James, but he can still do things on the basketball court and give the kind of production few others can match. Right now, he is too content on being a role player. This team will go nowhere with him taking 10 shots per game, passing up wide open shots and nor having the mentality that he is still a star in this league (whether you agree with that sentiment is irrelevent).
I see what you're saying. McGrady is good for fantasy basketball when his confidence is high, and he is getting a volume of touches. The other players that you listed tend to have high production, but one difference is that McGrady is less reliable and predictable in terms of what you're gonna get - it could be an insane night or he could also be a no-show. Granted this could be true of anyone, but it tends to fluctuate more wildly for T-Mac. Secondly, the problem with confidence and volume of shots is that it removes the rest of the team from being to operate in any other way. Emphasizing individual statistics like 27/8/7 is not appropriate because games are not decided on 27/8/7, but on who has the most points at the end of 4 (or conversely, who prevented the other team from scoring more at the end of 4, depending on whose your coach). When the streak happened last year, I attribute it to several things - relatively weak strength of schedule, greater team chemistry, and a little bit of luck. The team had to learn to play without McGrady for a little while and when he was ready to come back, he admittedly saw that the guys were steady ballin' without him and he wanted to contribute without disrupting. This was a GREAT formula. I'm not sure but if the theory is that McGrady has to have the ball all the time and get a lot of shots off in order to be individually successful, and that he can't get it done in a team setting, then he is the penultimate "good player on a bad team." The Houston Rockets experiment would have confirmed this. Hopefully though, time will prove otherwise, and this talent filled (albeit somewhat unathletic) roster will get it going, each playing its right role. Really though, my take on this season so far - (1) McGrady's knee IS bothering him (whether it is a true condition, or a psychological one - history says the latter is quite possible), and (2) our stars clearly have their strengths and flaws, and if they can't find what it looks like to augment and enhance one another's strengths instead of exposing each other's liabilities, then we're done. I respected JVG and I give all the benefit of the doubt to RA as well, I think they're both top tier coaches in the league. This is not an easy task, and there are no guarantees. But, I look again to last year's streak as a hopeful sign that it could come together.
past is past...u have to look ahead.....i would never doubt tmac has a championship-winning heart,, he wants to win so badly. however, he is washed up, he is not longer that offsensive like he used to be.. yeah, he still wants to compete,,,the thing is he is phsically incapable of doing what he supposed to do....all i want, is a 60% or 70% old tmac to reinforce us in the playoffs. and i believe he can do it.
1) I am not saying that he has to take 25 shots per game, or that he has to score X amount of points. What I am saying is that if he is only taking 10 shots in games and is content on being a role player, this team will go nowhere. They need him to be more aggressive in looking for his shot. Last night, the offense was flowing very nicely, but the OVER-passing led to TO's and ultimately rushed shots, which resulted in only 85pts. In the 22-game win streak last year, specifically around the 11-20th win stretch, T-Mac intergrated himself while also having the mentality that the team needed all of his abilities to win those games. If he was content during that win-streak of being a spot-up shooter and just being a role player like he is now, we wouldn't have had half as much luck. 2) I used his series vs. the Jazz, as well as some of his stats this year to prove that T-Mac is NOT finished, and that even with a bum knee he can play like a star.
