Steve Francis: "There's nothing wrong with me. I can still play"

this is how i feel about the steve francis years

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To be fair, we saw some horrible offensive basketball during the Francis/Cat years too. Dribble, dribble, dribble, (repeat incessantly for 21 seconds of the shot clock), drive directly into a bunch of forwards and centers who were each 8" to a foot taller, lob a low percentage shot, and pray for the foul (which only came 1 time out 10 bad drives or so).

However, I agree with you about not being a big fan of the JVG years either.

 

Cat was the highlight of the Yao/Cat/Steve era.

 

It's funny to hear people say how terrible a player Steve Francis was. He's actually #120 most efficient player to EVER play the game*.

NBA & ABA Career Leaders and Records for Player Efficiency Rating

Also, you don't avg. 6 apg over your entire career by dribbling the ball in place. Number's don't lie.

*according to PER stats

 

Lakers should sign him to shore up their deficient back court.

 

so many 99ers on this thread!:grin:

 

I love Stevie for giving us someone to cheer for through the lean times and I greatly dislike T-Mac for his lack of heart and giving up in the Toronto game but I would do the trade for T-Mac 10 out of 10 times. Orlando T-Mac was better than the great Kobe Bryant those 2-3 years. Just an unbelievable talent. He was taller, longer, more efficient, had better court vision, he was a better scorer and defender than Stevie. Some people have mentioned it already but I would have loved to see Rudy T have a few more years with Stevie and I would have definitely loved to see him coach T-Mac and Yao in their primes. Rudy’s strength was not great defenses like JVG or beautiful basketball movement like Adelman his greatest strength was that he was a player’s coach. He could manage egos (Dream/MadMax/Clyde/Barkley/Stevie) and get the best out of his players because they loved him and listened to him. I think it would have ended differently with T-Mac had he been here. I think he could have gotten more out of T-Mac than JVG and Adelman.

Back to Stevie though, I loved his passion but it was a dark time in NBA basketball… If you younger guys think Moreyball with 3’s/layups/charity stripe is ugly basketball go back and watch the ISO era of the late 90’s and early 00’s. To me, that’s ugly basketball. It was a product of a lack of back-to-the-basket big men who should get ISO’s and an abundance of athletic guards with playground skills, Marbury, Baron, Iverson, Stevie, Kobe, VC, etc. using what they had in ISO situations. It was also an era of big contracts where ISOing got you more money than winning because ISO got you more limelight than team ball. UGH! Stevie kept us relevant in those days and at the time I thought he was going to take us back to the Promise Land but now looking back I can tell you, IMHO, we were never going to win a ring with Stevie and Cat. Just my $.02.

 

Stevie certainly does look better than he did at the time he was getting drunk to Beyonce and looking like crap in China. Hopefully he cleaned up his act but it can only last so long when his lifestyle as a Music product with some lameass company like Mazerati just surrounds him with opportunities to fall right back into crap.

I really wish he could've ended his career on his own terms rather than have it cut short, but that's really his own fault. He said so himself in interviews that getting traded and passed around so much really soured him on the NBA so he probably stopped caring.

The Rockets trading him for TMAC really hurt him because he was very loyal to the organization. And he has that whole "I built the toyota center" mentality. Say what you will but the man wears his heart on his sleeve.

He was rejuvenated when the Rockets signed him again after those horrible career-killing years in New York but he seemed rejuvenated to come back to Houston in 07-08. He passed on more money with the Heat/Clippers/Nuggets to come back to where he made a name for himself and where he was respected and had history. Unfortunately, his nagging knee injury hampered him. And when he was on his way back, the Rockets moved him again to the Grizzlies on Christmas Day in '08 which pissed him off even further. I think after that, he lost the passion for basketball. Francis was all heart, and when you kill his heart with the "business side" of basketball, you kill his love for the game.

Speaking of which that friggin 08-09 team would've been fire had things gone better. A combo of healthy Francis/Tmac/Artest/Scola/Yao wouldve dominated the league I would imagine. Key word : healthy.

 

How about how many turnovers he had trying to run a fast break with Cuttino? Just turrible..

 

under the definition of clown...is a picture of stevie franchise.

 

Steve Francis led our team in points, assists and REBOUNDS.]


Criminally underrated at this point. Ask Cat how dominant Steve was. Carried an ass roster to .500 on the usual...

 

Jesus Christ man we all get it. You don't like Josh Smith or Dwight Howard and get a sick thrill when they do poorly despite calling yourself a Rockets fan.

 

LOL

I just realized that your post was so annoying that I have previously addressed it.

I have mistakenly fed the troll a second helping.

 

From what I remember Yao was pretty injury free until Kurt Thomas cannonballed into his knee causing the tibial plateau fracture.

The added weight Jvg made him pack on probably didn't help his feet age well. However the increased strength he had made him into a dominant force before the knee injury.

 

Great post!

 

Francis gets chain snatched at the House of Blues.

http://m.tmz.com/#Article/2015/03/0...-snatching-sauce-twinz-houston-rap-show-video

 

This type of thing would have never happened at a death metal concert.

 

At House of Blues?! Wow

 

If we can get this Francis and pair him up with Harden???? WATCH OUT, NBA FINALS HERE WE COME!!!!


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