J O'Neal put up 20 pts 10 rbs as the 1st option Yao put up 17.5 pts 9 rbs as the 2nd or 3rd option Case closed.
My question is will we ever be better than Miller, Smits, Dale Davis, a young Jalen Rose and Mark Jackson with Larry Bird as coach? Your 2000 Indiana Pacers built a team similiar to this with a less talented fulcrum but far more talented role players (so far). We will be a great team, but will our incarnation of the 2000 Pacers formula work? It might because we won't have the 2000 Lakers to deal with.
No need to guess except for fun. That's why they play the games to find out who is best. That is something you always have to discover and you cannot predict it. Who thought Detroit was the best team in the league one year ago? Are we the best? Who knows. To me Detroit still is until proven different next June.
Nope. I feel Yao is slightly overrated. Second best center in the league? So what? Can he dominate Rasho like Duncan dominates our PF? Still remember the Denver game in which he was totally outplayed by Camby? Does he have significant advantages when facing Dampier, Ben Wallace and big Z? Remember Shawn Bradley, Najera, Jerome James and Potapenko can still give him big headache? Can he improve his stamina enough to give us 38+ quality playing time? There are too many question marks about him. This trade definitely improves the Rox, but we won’t be a championship contender until Yao becomes an aggressor, a rebounding beast, a steady scorer and tough-minded consistent player.
Until Someone dethrones them, then the Pistons are rightfully the #1 ranked team in my books. Offense wins games, DEFENSE WINS CHAMPIONS!
Well actually, I think the reason people are counting out the Lakers is because it isn't gaurunteed they'll have Kobe. And I don't know how they're going to trade Shaq. Webber might be possible, but that's yet another reason to give up on the Lakers. Webber is a cripple. Same for the kings. If they gain Shaq, then I'll give you that they're still a top team. If they stay pat, they're going to be a good regular season team and crippled in the play offs. "If Webbers stays, and he's healthy, they're still a dangerous, dangerous team." When has Webber been healthy? And honestly, I've come to think that the Kings are a better team when Webber isn't healthy. The window for the Kings has closed. Vlade is 36, Christie is 33, Webber is pretty much done. He hasn't had a healthy season in how many years now? He's only 30 years old but he's been injured for much of the season for what? three years now? In his 11 seasons in the NBA he's only broken the 70 game mark 5 times and the most games he's ever played in was 76. That was his rookie year. Barring a major trade like Webber for Shaq, this team is washed up. And even adding Shaq only gives them one or two more seasons of being a top tier team.
Great post. T-mac might be Kobe-like, but Yao is light-years from dominating like shaq and we have no roles players and bench. This team is going to suprise a lot of people in the wrong way.
This assumes that to be successful, we need Yao to be Shaq. I'm not sure that's true. The fact remains that 90% of the nights he touches an NBA court, he's the best center on the floor. That's pretty damn good.
I can't believe people actually argue that the Kings are better without Webber. They were robbed by the refs from going to the NBA Finals with Webber, the next year without Webber they lost to Dallas, and were almost swept. They got off to a nice start without Webber this past year, but Brad Miller wasn't as effective against the better 4s in the west.
No way the Rockets are the best team in the league right now. After the FA signing period, maybe. Even if we don't land Barry and have to start Lue at PG, I think we will match up very well with the best in the league. Detroit: They have it all. Anyone who thinks last year was a fluke is dreaming. They have the long, fast defenders to choke off Yao in the middle (like Seattle against Hakeem) and still cover the perimeter. We do have a size advantage and we play much better D that LA, so this would be an interesting matchup. Edge Detroit. Minnesota: We have no answer to Garnett, but they have no answer to McGrady. Slight edge to them because of their experience. Dallas: See above, substituting Nowitzki for Garnett. These guys didn't lose 4-1 in the first round because they're tough or play defense. Edge Houston. Indiana: Weak in the middle, we can exploit that. They're deeper but have an unfortunate mix of age (Miller) and youth (Harrington). Slight edge Houston. LA: If they keep Kobe, sign Rudy T (who then convinces Shaq to stay and play hard), land a decent FA like Barry, keep either Malone or Medvedenko, and Payton is rejuvenated under a new coach and plays like an NBA guard instead of an NBDL guard, they can contend again ... but then again, that's a lot of ifs. Even if they manage all that, we match up pretty well with them at their two best positions and it's a toss up. If their offseason is anything less than brilliant, we have a solid edge. San Antonio: Did anyone watch the LA series? Just pack the middle and let them shoot themselves out of the game! Unfortunately, they seem to shoot well against us. Slight edge Houston. Sacramento: They had their window and blew it. Still an excellent team, but no longer a premiere one. Edge Houston. I think if we sign Barry and a rugged rebounder (Etan Thomas?) to back up Yao, we will be an elite team and one of the favorites to win it all. Even if all we do is sign a marginal backup center (maybe Tsakalidis to speak Greek with Spanoulis ), start Lue, and let the TE expire mad: ) we will be significantly better than last year and a possible WC finalist. We won't really know till May. But it'll be fun finding out!
I think there's another thread about this, but, wow, I don't see this comparison at all. Miller - McGrady? Very little comparison...totally different players. Smits - Yao? Even less of a comparison.
That would also allow Christie's nutball wife to fill the Brenda Warner role, currently held by Vanessa Bryant.
Lakers -- agreed, if they lose Kobe, end of discussion, they stink. But he'll probably stay with the Lakers. (At least that's the general consensus around the league). If Shaq leaves, they'll probably get an all-star in return. Kobe + [Mystery All-Star Big Man] will be a competitive team, a team that's not automatically worse than T-Mac + Yao. Plus they'll have a great coach. I'm not penciling the Lakers in the Finals, mind you, but I think it's a mistake to think they'll drop off the map. Kings -- Yes, Webber is injury-prone. True, that holds for his entire career. But he's only one year removed from an MVP-caliber season. (Wasn't he 3rd or 4th in balloting, the year before last? I could be mistaken). Last year he played on one leg. If he returns to 95%, he makes the Kings a scary team. Yeah, they're a little older then they were two years ago, but they've still got some big guns in Peja and Miller. If Webber's healthy--again, a big IF--these guys aren't going anywhere. Can the Rockets compete with them? Yes. But it's not a given.
Please list 20 plays in this league that are better than Yao. You may assume Jermaine O'Neal and Lebron are outright better as well.
If we get Barry or Fisher. If we get a good backup center. Then we will be in the Top 4 in the West. The TE, the MLE, and Juwan Howard's contract can make this possible. And "if" is the longest two-letter word in the dictionary.
it's kind of hard to say with a straight face that Yao isn't one of the top 20 players in the league when his efficiency rating (according to NBA.com) is 17th in the league.
