A lot of young Rockets fans are trying to compare James to Tracy, but they have never ever saw how huge the gap between them actually was in athletic department. We are often saying that T-Mac wasn't at the same page as an entartainer in Houston, but it's amazing to believe what injuries did to him after his first year as a Rocket. And that vid shows it all <object width="560" height="315"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/UDMzEHD9AQ8?hl=ru_RU&version=3"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><param name="allowscriptaccess" value="always"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/UDMzEHD9AQ8?hl=ru_RU&version=3" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="560" height="315" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true"></embed></object> T-Mac at 23 was much better than Harden at this age because he was able to use that athleticism as an advantage in up-tempo Orlando offence and he have never played fast in Houston, in the system that Harden is playing right now. McGrady with that scary stuff would be a ton more productive, as he actually was in Magic uni when he was just one of seven guys all-time, who have reached 30 in PER for the season.
Well, you can argue that Harden will never excel Tracy in skill and athleticism. That's not the point, we want him to excel in things such as leadership health not quitting on the team being truthful that's all i ask of Harden. He doesn't need 13 in 33 or dunking on Shawn Bradley. He just needs to put the Rockets above himself.
And in 2 years I wouldn't doubt if he's the only one left of we don't get Howard. Morey will get him the pieces.
he shot above 45% in his last season as a Raptor then the next 3 years as a Magic (while leading the league in scoring 2 of those years)
wasn't meant to be...which is a bummer. in 05, got some bad breaks with refs, and yao hadn't entered his absolute prime yet. not to mention an old and beat up backcourt entering playoffs. juwan was also sidelined (tho maybe we were better matched up v. dirk). 06, the entire team got injured. 07, no excuses this year. we had a game 4 where only 4 ppl scored tho. the supporting cast definitely wasn't good enough (i mean luther head and rafer alston were guys we supremely relied on). hayes wasn't that great either. and utah was a bad matchup. but overall, mcgrady and yao disappointed this year. yao was a turnover machine that couldn't guard boozer or okur, and tmac kept settling for jumpers even tho it was broken. 08, finally get some nice pieces around. then yao goes down in the post season. we also lose alston for 2-3 games. in 09, we have the best team in the nba imo (paper wise). but tmac basically falls off the face of the planet as a player due to injury. then deke gets hurt in the first round. and then yao in the 2nd round.
Are we really doing this again? The anti-TMac crew is doing damage control like crazy in this thread.
Careful. Most people on this forum will admit that basketball requires a good team to win... until you bring up TMac.