When next year comes around, can we afford Tim Duncan?

Not quite... He's from the U.S. Virgin Islands.

 

The Rox are over the cap...so the only way to do it is via trade. SA is NOT going to trade Duncan...PERIOD. You could offer them the whole team...lock, stock and Yao Ming...and they STILL wouldn't trade Duncan.

Even if we weren't over the cap, just remember that SA can pay Duncan whatever they want and go over the cap without penalty. Duncan will have Bird rights. No way the Rox will be able to top that offer.

It was a nice thought though. If we could get Duncan I'd be interested.

 

This will never happen. What the Rockets need to do is let Ming be a superstar and not bring another superstar into the mix that will take the ball and minutes away from him. Steve Francis and Ming are the cornerstones of this team now. We don't need Duncan. Ming is going to be better than Duncan. As it stands right now, he's probably as good or better than Duncan from a basketball skills perspective.

It's time to change the mentality about the Rockets. We don't have to be desperate for trades anymore. We just need to be patient while Ming develops. Give him two more years and we will be contenders. Trust me.

 

AGREE!!!!1

 

Thank you refman, no one on this board seems to understand cap rules, you can't just trade players around, its pretty damn hard to make a trade go through. Refman - voice of reason.

 

First of all, let's say if we do get Duncan, who's gonna get the shots? We'd have Yao, TD and maybe SF and cat all fighting for shots, in which case each of them ends up with less.

Secondly, how are we supposed to fit Duncan under our cap? With MoT and Moochie earning what they earn we'll never be able to afford them. Thank god Rice will be gone next season.

Finally, Duncan's not from the Dominican Republic, he's from Virgin Islands.

We do need a good 4 but getting Duncan is simply not realistic.

 

Hi guys, I'm an ambassador from a little planet called Earth. Greetings from the "real world."

There's no way in hell that we could get Duncan, not because he wouldn't want to come here, but because we can't afford him. It's already been explained. Also, even if we had Duncan, how would we pay Ming. 3 players under max contracts is ludicrous. At least some of you finally understand the value of Mobley when it comes to production and his small contract. Parker is over rated. He's averaging less assists than Francis. Damn, I mean what is with you guys, now, even when we win there are still people wanting to mess with what's already a good thing.

 

Yeah... imagine making a team with less than 25% of the remaining salary cap. Maybe I can get my shot as a the water boy's replacement (he's starting SG).

But these trade proposals are fun to think of...

 

I won't really see tons of value in Mobley until he shows me over the course of a season (not just a few weeks) that he can play TEAM basketball. Over time, Cat will have to shoot less and let Steve and Yao take over completely. Cat will have to accept being a role player. Very important...but doesn't look as cool in the boxscore.

 

I don't know why you think that Mobley cares more about his stats than winning. If he had that mentality and personality, wouldn't he have taken the bigger pay check from Toronto? When this team had guys like Mo and Dream still playing, Mobley didn't shoot as much. When All of those guys plus Francis were gone, of course he started shooting and scoring more, he had to pick up the slack. Thomas averaged more points last year too, more than he will average this year, because he had to. Mobley is shooting less, his assists are on the way up too.

Obviously, it will take an entire season to measure what Mobley has changed, but you can say that for anybody. If I followed your logic, I would say that even though Yao is getting better by the day, I still need an entire season to judge him and until then, I'll believe that he is a young inexperienced player who shouldn't be starting yet. Why can't you just ease up and say, "hey, Cat is doing a better job, shooting less, passing more, hope he does it all year," instead of "Cat is a ball hog and until the season is over, I'm still going to believe he is a ball hog." If Cat continues with what he's been doing, would you still call him a ball hog on the 2nd to last game of the season???

 

I totally agree. I understand what u guys are saying but do u really wanna trade ur ALL STAR point guard. That is just bull. The point guard is one of the hardest position to fill and you wanna trade Steve. Ahh come on...........this thread is making me sick. Correct me if I'm wrong but I remember people saying Eddie is out future. Can't u guys make up ur mind. I would never trade Steve Francis and Yao Ming. With a good sg in Cuttino Mobley and a pf just waiting to blossom in Eddie Griffin, y not just wait and see what the future holds for this young team. And if I was a rockets player or even Steve Francis and read this thread this would have been really discouraging.
Just my 2 cents.

 

Even if we gutted our team (which there is no way the Rockets would do this) and kept only Yao, Steve, Mobley plus the three untradeable contracts in Rice, Taylor and Cato, our payroll would be at 47.5 mil (aprox.). Even if the cap is at $50 mil next season, that would leave us WAY short of what we need left to sign Duncan (who will probably get $10 to $15 mil per season).

No way we can sign him and I can guarantee you, no way the Spurs are gonna trade him in the middle of the season, much less to someone in their own division.

 

For those of you who said Duncan and Yao will be on a same team (Spurs will trade him since he gonna walk anyway scenario), what kinda soybean milks ya drinking? Never happen, never will, cause Spurs would sheds out all the free money to sign someone like Kandi-man and continue to harass the Rockets for years to come, now that’s a more plausible scenario. It's likes a Spurs or a Lakers fan saying "why don't we trade for Yao so he can play with Duncan or Kobe/Shaq, since Yao will probably walk after his contract anyway and there's not a single thing the Rocks can do about it, so they'll most likey trade him for some scrubs anyway"....yada yada... If ya think that Duncan can just walk away from the Spurs ala Shaq from Orlando, then the same case scenario can be said for Yao, since he'll most likely will left for the Lakers scenario...It'll NOT happen, since both Duncan and Yao are loyal to their team "kinda guys", and their respective organization will do EVERYTHING to keep them...or maybe Spurs management come down with stinking tofu amnesia and trade Duncan to the Rocks afterall...ha...ha...dreams on, dream is good except when passing the point of hallucination

 

we might WANT him but we dont need him, we are doing just fine with who we have,,, just like all the Rox fans that wanted MJ, or wanted Darius miles, or wanted Chris Webber,,

 

I enjoyed reading your post for the most part.. until I saw this..
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Terrible. Then Tony Parker taking Steve's starting spot. *shudders*

 

Our PF's will carry us to the playoffs but not much further.

We still need a more consistent player to complement Yao on the low blocks to have any chance to contend. It doesn't have to be Duncan, but it has to be better than what we have - unless what we have improves dramatically. The only chance of that is for EG to significantly improve. A possibility that still exists.

 

Duncan is either in SA next year or in Florida...