We needed him to come up big tonight. Got tossed. He is second in the league in T's to Wallace. We all know Wallace get's tech's just cause he Wallace. If you look at the tech leaders it includes great names like Malone, Miller, Wallace, Bradly(huh), etc. I like the fire, but hope Steve doesn't fall into this habit. Steve is young and is just now developing a relationship with the refs. This is not the way to start. I saw him get horrible calls in Dallas, don't let this be habit forming. He needs to figure out a way to keep the fire and the refs. We all know the refs loved JM. ------------------ "Chucky who? I thought we were talking about basketball?" Charles Barkley
How could you blame Francis for this atrocity? ------------------ Hakeem "The Dream" Olajuwon is the greatest player in the history of basketball. If you disagree, you are not a Rocket fan.
Dream was the same way his first few years in the league. I fully expect Steve to get at least some respect after he "pays his dues." That said, I agree. Tossed on a T for "hanging on the rim?" Terrible call. As a matter of fact, I didn't think there was much reason for Franchise's first T tonight. ------------------
Colby is partly right. Reputation has alot to do with the calls a players gets or doesn't get. A guy with a bad rep (like Sheed) will get T'd up for more things than other guys who have reps as fan favorites (like VC). I don't know how Stevie can fix his bad rep but we obviously saw him gert tossed becasue of his bad rep, even though it was a bad call.
Well, I hope that he takes this lesson to heart. Given the rules of the game (and the referees *bleagh*), he obviously can't afford to take the first technical. We need Steve on the court - and he needs to act in a manner that assures that. It's clear that somehow the referees in the league feel that it's ok to T up Steve anytime that he dunks or gets excited. I'm sure that next year when he (and maybe Cat) join the All-Star team, they'll get more respect from the league, but for now he just needs to play under control. I'd rather not have lost this game, but hopefully Steve acts like a man and sees how he could have avoided this situation. That could be a larger benefit to the Rockets in the long run. On a side note, does anyone else think that the timing of his two technicals were just bizarre? We all know about the second one - the Rockets were coming back and had momentum after beating the Kings in the second quarter. After a big dunk to get to single digits......*technical*??????? I don't remember the score on the first one, but it feels like the Rox were on a bit of a run, Francis gets a break and dunks. The ref calls travel (never saw the replay) and then T's him up. Sacramento goes on to make the T and score on the next play, killing the mini-rally. `Enter the conspiracy theorist` Anyone else feel like the ref saw the Rockets coming back and thought they shouldn't win the way Sacramento was shooting? Easy way to kill momentum...give them a technical or two. Anyway, I don't *really* believe it, but the timing sure was odd. ------------------ BELIEVE!!!
