Admittedly, I'm not a big Tmac fan...that said, our best option next season is to keep him and allow his considerable talents to make us even more dangerous next season. To think he would destroy our team chemistry (as many have suggested) trivializes the growth and maturity of our guys. While Tmac may not have the heart of a champion, we have several guys who do...Yao, Battier, Scola...these 3 are our leaders. Tmac re-joining the squad will not make this team fight any less fierce, compete any less hard. As long as everyone feels they are contributing and nobody is monopolizing the ball, we'll be just fine. Tmac needs to come back in the mold of a significant role player...a la Grant Hill, Ray Allen...a veteran guy who can be dangerous if you sleep on him, but not someone who needs the ball all the time. Defenses will have to respect his ability to score, which will open things up for teammates. Also, having Tmac as another wing option will make Artest more efficient...something we badly need especially when he goes into one of his volume shooting funks. In short, we're not going to get another star for Tmac, and IMO, he's not going to hurt our chemistry....so our best bet is to bring him back into the fold in a role player capacity...a key role player, but a role player nonetheless.
I put Tmac in the same basket as Iverson. Needs the ball to be effective. Needs to the star in the offense. Whether it be for ego reasons or just their style of play, these guys can only thrive as the centrepiece, not as complementary players.
I disagree, we know we can get something for his contract, whether it be cause of the economy or just 2010 free agency. Morey has already stated he will be movin pieces to bring a real player. What we don't know is when he will be back. He could never come back but we will be lookin to unload for the best deal out there. Wedo.
I thought that at the end of the 07/08 season, we showed his ability to play within a system. He rarely scored over 30 points a game, even when Yao was out. The problem with Tracy this past season was his injury affected him mentally. He pressure of winning and the frustration of being hurt stuffed him up mentally. The fact is, he can. I still maintain it is worth trying for one last season with Artest, Yao and Tracy. If it fails we can re-sign Yao, and have plenty of money left to replace Tracy through Free Agency. I think it is a much better idea than trying to get a Marcus Camby or other left-overs for the sake of it.
That's not true T-mac has the height and talent to make great passes, drive to the rim, and more develop a post game if he puts the time in.
I have no problem keeping Mac as long as he puts in the works and shows some damn commitment to the team
In my mind, TMAC could still be a great player if he is in healthy , the most problem of him is his attitude. I don't think he so bad as the newspapers reported, he would come back, and Rockets can go further in the playoffs.
This. The issue with McGrady last year wasn't that he was hurt and couldn't put up 20-6-6 on 45% shooting. It was that he couldn't adjust his game to the fact that he couldn't put up 20-6-6 on 45% shooting. People keep saying he could become more of a facilitator, or focus on rebounding and defense. I don't why this was so easy to forget, but McGrady openly abandoned all of those extra things last year in futile attempts to remain our top shot taker. Chris Webber did the same thing after his microfracture surgery. Casual fans thought he was "back" because he managed to put up 20 most games, but he was killing his teams because that was all he cared about. He quit passing, couldn't jump, played cigar store indian defense, and shot a horrifying percentage most nights. Post '99 lockout Ewing was just as bad. He was the 4th best option on that Knicks team, but REFUSED to give up his place as primary option. They excelled as soon as he went down for the season. Jordan's Wizard comeback was a failure partly because he couldn't accept the fact that Jerry Stackhouse was a better option on offense than he was anymore. Had Jordan been the #2 on that team, they could have been slightly more relevant. Hate to say it, but even Dream refused to take a step back in his last years as a Rocket. It took his embarrassing stint as a Rocket to convince Pippen to take a step back and become a complimentary player in Portland. I'm not holding my breath that McGrady will "look to fit in" next season any better than he did this past one.
I can't agree with you anymore! As a former "super star", it's not easy to take the role as an non-#1 player.
If we let him walk, we get a crap load of salary relief. If we trade him, which any team trading with us will not want to just unload a bunch of talent to us for him, then we will probably end up with something far less than we would if we just stayed patient and let his contract run out. After it runs out there will be a ton of free agents worth waiting for and we will be able to get the contract we can negotiate on with them.
You don't read this BBS much, do you? The Rockets will have minimal salary cap room next year when McGrady's contract expires, unless they decide not to bring back Artest and Wafer this summer. $4-5M tops.
I think one more year to evaluate would be good. I want to see all healthy and playing, if that's possible. We all can't disagree that even an injured t-mac can be our best passer and facilitator in the game. His passing skills are much higher than Kobe and Lebron. He can get 'heart' and not 'hurt' anytime.
Not sure about this one. It was Steve and Cat who made Dream take a back seat by not passing into the post. During one game, even Karl Malone was beside himself when the young guards were waiving Dream off the block.
It's not that our guys have the inability to play with T-mac it's that T-mac has the inability to adapt to our current style of play.. Remember he is a VOLUME shooter. He needs the balls in his hands in order to be affective and he needs to shoot a lot in order to get into a rhythm. For the past 3 years I have been stating this fact along with the obvious in that he is a horrible, horrible, HORRIBLE fg% shooter. The only reason why the stats doesn't do more to support this fact is because they include the shots made at the basket. (Dunks,layup,etc.) His defense is average at best and is unable to move without the ball. What do you expect him to become? If anything the only reason why I want him to come back is to become a ball hog (lol) and shoot like he did back in the days so his trade value can go up.
but you can argue that tmac is not your typical "superstar" in the sense that he really cant handle, nor does he desire, the responsibility of being the sole option anymore. he needs help, and he WANTS it as well
