Why the Rockets Can't Lose: The McGrady Trade and the Myth of Team Building

Great timing of the thread, people sorta lose the original goal of this season which was to find out what we have, judge our own talent, and develop our players, thus giving Morey ideas of our weaknesses and who to target via FAs and trades. Winning would be gravy. So far the Rockets have exceeded our expectations which has spoiled us. Now after losing 3 in a row, we're pointing fingers when realistically we should've seen these struggles much earlier in the season. Its to RA's credit that we've somehow managed to do all of this experimenting <i>while </i> winning. But I see this year as the OP: If we make the playoffs and maybe even pull an upset its all gravy, but if we dont, its not the end of the world.

 

Holy hell, how did you have time to write all that? Thanks though.

On a different note, post number 1,000.

 

Thanks for advice. I'll pick it up now.

 

It was a great read. Very logical when you think about it.

I think people should move past who should/shouldn't be on the franchise players list and focus on the main idea.

 

To solidy OP's point - I'd like to mention the Nuggets - they already drafted their franchise player (Melo), but until acquiring Billups last season, always lost in the first round of the playoffs. Billups is that player who put them over the top. However, they lost in the WCF to a duo that collectively had more competitive fire and experience than them - Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol.

This season Billups is regressing fast though, so any championship potential the Nuggets had were sadly shortlived. But he did introduce some sort of competitive fire into Melo, and he seems to be taking defense and basketball in general more seriously ever since Billups came on board.

There are great differences between true franchise players and fakes ones - the true franchise players play with utmost zeal on both ends of the court and have ultra competitive personalities. Their insatiable hunger for dominance and victory drives them to be perfect and drives them to winning championships.

 

Great Post!
Good enough to get me to post for the first time in years actually.

I like your assertion that in the NBA it's all about the dominant player on the court.
I have always felt this way.
Haven't read Simmons' book, and didn't see it in yours (ha just kidding), but I also think a key element of this theory is the rules of basketball compared to football and baseball.

Having the best player on the floor in basketball is MUCH more valuable than any other sport, and WAY more correlative to winning big in that sport, simply because of how much impact one player can have.

If you have Hakeem or Jordan or Kobe, you can keep feeding them the ball in crunch time over and over.
LeBron proved this in the playoffs against Detroit, as he (the best player on the court) single-handedly lifted his team to victory over a deeper team of very good players (Billups/Sheed/Prince/Rip) by scoring the last 27 points of that game.
His teammates basically stood around and watched the magic of a franchise player taking over.

Likewise, as you also mentioned, if you are excellent on the other end, you can single-handedly lift your team through individual greatness on defense too.
We all saw this with Hakeem as his domination of Ewing in cruchtime, on both ends, was undoubtedly the deciding factor in that slugfest.
Team defense is still more important, of course, but every great team defense is built around 1 or 2 franchise-level defenders that can make an impact on every single defensive play.

Only in basketball is this even possible.
The influence of individual greatness on winning is way smaller with basketball and football, where the collective talent of the team is usually the deciding factor, and thus with both sports you see a much greater diversity among teams/players/franchises that win rings.

In football, quarterback is the only position where greatness is defined mostly by winning.
This is because the QB has a direct hand in every offensive snap.
He is the only player on the field who decides where the ball is going, so he has, by far, the most individual influence on the outcome.
But even then, he has no influence whatsoever when his defense is on the field, or on special teams, so at best he can control only 35-45% of the critical plays in the 4th quarter of a close game.
The rest of the time he is watching and helpless to do anything.

Nobody denies Barry Sanders as a franchise RB, and maybe the greatest ever, because he didn't lift the Lions to greatness.
Nobody blames Andre Johnson for the Texans post-season donut, because even as the best WR of his generation, he depends on his teammates to have any impact at all.
That's because you can't ride a franchise anything, other than occasionally a red-hot QB, to victory.
If you are pounding the ball in the 4th quarter on the way to victory, it has just as much to do with the O-line as the RB.
If the passing game is clicking, it still takes the QB, O-line and WRs all working in-sync to get results.
On defense, no player can make every tackle or defend every pass.
No one player in football can take every snap in the 4th quarter, then turn around and shut down the opponent on each of their snaps.
So individual greatness helps, but really only the QB even compares to a franchise basketball player in determining success for his team.

In baseball it's even more pronounced.
A great hitter, no matter how good, only gets to take 1/9th of his team's at-bats.
If Pujols could take every at-bat in the 9th inning, like Jordan or Kobe can in the 4th quarter, I'm sure you would see the same correlation between individual greatness and winning with baseball, but you don't.
Everyone knows pitching is the key to post-season success, but even Randy or Pedro in their prime can play in only, at best, 1 of every 4 or 5 games.
And even when they start, they usually don't throw a single pitch in the final 2 innings, relying on their teammates in the bullpen to close out the victory.
So in a playoff series, even the undisputed best pitcher in baseball can only throw 20-25% of his team's pitches.
Again, no one player in baseball can even attempt to do what a great NBA player can when the game is on the line.

So yes, in summary, I think everyone agrees that everything the Rockets do from here on out should be focused on acquiring one of the top 10 or 15 players in the NBA.
Without one, chances are every year they will have to watch Kobe or Durant or Roy close out those victories for the other side.

The last 15 years have shown us what it's like trying to ride an Almost-Franchise-Level player (I'm looking at you Steve and McLady) to victory.

 

What book?

Edit: Nevermind, I saw your answer in a later post.

This is something I've often guessed to be the case. I'm not sure about the PF part of it but I've definitely felt that way about PGs. I've posted this thought several times over the years when people freak out about our need for a better PG. There are more important things.

First, the PG is the smallest guy on the court. That simple and basic physical limitation puts him at a fundamental disadvantage no matter how gifted he may be in other areas.

Secondly, if you are paying max (or near max) dollars to an elite PG, you are unlikely going to be able to pay max dollars to both a dominant wing and a dominant big man, which is almost always the winning combination.

It seems like the best PGs in the game are always trumped in the postseason by teams that have a dominant wing (SF or SG) along with a dominant big man (PF or C).

Kidd was always trumped by teams with those combinations.

Nash couldn't even get to the finals.

Paul is young but he hasn't gotten close yet. The Nuggets wiped them off the court last season led by their dominant wing. Billups was a big part of it, too. He had a huge series but Carmelo was that biggest mismatch. Billups also did most of his damage as a scorer as opposed to traditional, ball-dominating PG play. He was also playing a team led by the non-winning formula of a dominant PG + whatever else the Hornets had. The Nuggets also came up short in the end, losing to a team with a dominant wing + a dominant PF/C.

Even the Pistons in 2004 had to pull off a monumental upset against a HOF-stacked team. The Lakers almost had too much talent and couldn't find enough chemistry. Meanwhile, the Pistons had unusual chemistry and phenomenal defense. I still think they got pretty lucky. I'd take that Lakers team to win more often than not if they played 100 games against each other. The Lakers were far more talented and probably lost that series more than the Pistons took it from them. Either way, it was a huge and unexpected upset that hasn't been matched in recent history.

Even though Parker was a big part of the Spurs' recent championships, those teams were nothing without Duncan and Ginobili was just as important as Parker. Parker is also a very unusual PG in that he's really a scoring guard who scores with unusual efficiency for his size. He did win that Finals MVP but they never would have gotten there to give him the opportunity to play so well without Duncan as the anchor and Ginobili doing his thing over the course of the season and into the playoffs.

Having said all that, I'm not saying guys like Paul, Nash, Kidd and Williams can't get to the promised land.

I'm just saying more often than not, the combination of a dominant wing + a dominant big man will trump the combination of a dominant PG + anything else.

 

everything i more or less agree with from the thread except one: the pg not being a star theme. isaiah thomas was a dominant pg in the 80's and he won two championships. he had a guy in vinnie johnson that could come off the bench and flat out score, but he was not a superstar. the rest of his line up was bill lambeer, john sally, joe dumars, dennis rodman and rick mahorn. their coack was chuck daly (r.i.p.). but none of these were superstars. none of these players were go-to guys. they just played with an intense team mentality and hard defense/rebounding. kind of like the modern day rockets minus the superstar pg. thomas was the only dominant player on this roster. IMO i think that you can have a dominant pg and win a championship but the rest of the cast HAS to be at least at par on offense and above par on defense. since then, however, the rest of the teams that had an franchise pg but never won a championship either lacked offense or defense from the rest of their cast. nash had superb talent around him on offense, but absolutely no defense. payton had all kinds of defense on his team, but offensively they couldn't keep up with the rockets/bulls. stockton had molone, and no one else. anyways what i'm saying is the pg theory that is being thrown out is not true, or at least i don't agree with it. it just so happens that in the last 30 years the best of the best in the nba have been sg's and centers. and the teams that have won multiple championships have had either one or both of those positions locked and loaded. and the best pg's of their times never had anyone on their team to contend with the jordans/kobes or hakeems/shaqs. not their fault the organizations couldn't bring in the other talent needed to take the teams to the next level. that's all i'm saying.

 

I thought these were some great points to highlight out of your conclusion.

 

High school vs college athlete

 

Dork Elvis is that you?

 

Horrible. How can you say guys like Ewing, Robinson, Barkley, Malone, Tmac are not franchise players but then you say freaking Paul Pierce is?

Paul Pierce essentially had to go out and have 2 more stars on his team to win and these were players already great before playing with him. In fact his teammate was the one who was in the discussion for mvp not him.

Put Tmac with a good coach like Phil Jackson and have Gasol and company on his team and have every team have a star player out and let's see what he can do?

 

You referenced the player being 6"6. Was that just an example or do you have someone in mind?

 

Great post and I've said a lot of this for years.

One thing though:

I don't think it's the actual position that matters, more the player. I don't think the Lakers and Pistons were too disappointed by their point guards in the 80s. I do think that the kinds of points that most people here pine for (Nash, Paul, for example) are not the type that win championships.

Also like the part about McGrady not showing up in the 4th Q of Game 7 against Utah. Very true and surprised you haven't been attacked by McGrady fans yet for it.

 

A well thought out post props to you.

But how do you suggest we go about getting a "GREAT" player sense that happens so rarely?

Also, are you saying Detroit is the example that proves the rule?

Personally, I think there are more factors than just having the best player, I think it is actually more about having MULTIPLE options rather than just one great player.

All of those teams had multiple options.....

DD

 

Great post. I found it extremely entertaining.

I will try to summarise your premises in one line though... here we go:

To win a championship, you have to be lucky.

Enough said

 

I enjoyed it. My only complaint is that you're just a little inconsistent in what makes a franchise player. You count Ewing as a franchise player, but not David Robinson. Neither of them ever won a championship. Both played respectable defense. You count Dwight Howard as a franchise player, but discount Kevin Garnett. Kevin Garnett played both ends of the court, and had twice the offensive game that Dwight Howard has. And you contrast between Brand and Howard in year 3? Howard is in year six averaging 17 points a game. And talk about not being able to close a game - he may be the worst closing "superstar" in NBA history. Howard looks like a superstar - but I'd take Shawn Kemp or Elton Brand over him any day.

 

Great post. Exactly the reasons TMac never could be a real franchise player, despite his awesome athetic gifts. The fire was never lit for him.