don't even start a sentence off with thi sany more.nobody cared when the rockets barley misssed the play off every year cause they where in a tough west.they just said they they wasn't winners,even though they would have been in the east.
Would you prefer to score 100ppg and lose or score 80ppg and win? Obviously we would all prefer to see uptempo, flowing offense that scores loads of points and blows every other team away but at the end of the day, I wanna WIN! All this pre-season scare mongering and second guessing is simply unnecessary. I don't want the Rockets to peak in October, I want them to peak in MAY/JUNE! GO ROX!!!!!! 11/6
Heh...but you see? That's exactly what happened last year. The first part of last season (10 games, or so) Francis was averaging 29PPG and 45% FG, 6APG, 6RPG.....and many Francis worshipers came out anointing him the next "Jerry West." They say thing like, and I paraphrase... "He's the first guard to score above 29PPG, 6RPG, and 6APG since Jerry West and Michael Jordan! And that player has won the championship everytime since the NBA was created....blah,blah,blah..." I'll say the same thing now as I said then....lets wait until the season ends. Even if OUR team starts slowly THIS year, I'm willing to wait until the end of the season to assess our progress. It's also would be interesting to see how Francis's fantasy stats would be in Orlando if Yao was there. Oh, wait. We tried that already.
But you would be the first to say that Francis got the Rockets to the play-offs on his own without giving credit to Yao or JVG. Rudy had Yao and Francis and we didn't make it to the play-offs. Why? Well, Yao wasn't very good that first season (rookie growing pains), and he improved the 2nd year under JVG. Rudy also featured Francis more so during Yao first year. So, it's logical to say this... The improvement of Yao gave the Rockets the extra edge to get into the play-offs. Also, this was under a JVG system, whose offense featured Yao MORE (compared to Rudy), and whose system did NOT feature Francis as much.
The thing that Johnny Davis did better than JVG is let his starters get some chemistry going. The Rockets look a few games away from that point. But, as it has be correctly pointed out, it is only preseason. I hope Steve, Cat and Cato have a good season in Orlando, and that McGrady lights the world on fire for the Rockets. DD
Ok, I just went through the first 10 games of last season and Francis averaged 18.3 pts. Can you in any way verify that more than one person was calling him the next Jerry West?
PXZ, You do know that averaging 7 games is quite different than averaging out 82 games? I think that McGrady's "average" will be fine. Figure out what a *few* 30, 35, 25 and 40 point games will do to his pre-season average (lower point games).
Game log.... http://www.basketballreference.com/players/playerlog.htm?yr=2002&ilkid=FRANCST01 Check the year before. It was one of Francis "good" years. As far as verify. I would If I could. Search doesn't work. It was on of those "Francis is of the same caliber of Jordan, Oscar, Magic, West" threads.... And there are many of those old threads around. This one had a mention of the 29ppg at the start of the 02-03 season (that's where the Jerry West comparison came from). Some were making a big deal about it.
The only comparison he gets is the 15 5 and 5 his first X years with players like Magic, the Big O, and Grant Hill.
Try his 20/6/6 stat. Think about how one can blow that out of proportion. By the way, did you see the game log for 2002-2003?
I looked this up a few months ago and actually Magic, O, and Hill all had at least 20/7/8 their first X years. I guess some stat guys decided to lower the standard to 15/5/5 to make room for Steve. Do you realize that 20+ other players could be in the category too if they lowered it to 15/4/4?
Well, I'm not the one making the comparison, I'm just repeating what is said on tv. I'm also trying to make a point that I think DavdS is blowing this "steve worshippers" thing out of proportion. I've never seen multiple people try and compare him to West or Jordan. I'm pretty confidant that if that did happen, it's been no more than 2 or 3 people. Of course there are at least 2 or 3 people to every crazy idea and theory. It's kind of easy to discredit people's opinions when you put forth an argument for them that makes them look crazy and uninformed.
I hear ya man. I just put this up there because that 15/5/5 stat is so misleading. There are a lot of guys that had 20+/10+/3-4 in there first years but for some reason steve is in some elite group because he just made some statistical 'hump'. Steve is a very versatile player, but he deserves to be put in to the magic, o, and hill class like Yao deserves to be put with Chamberlain and Russell.
Sorry. I shoudln't have said "many Francis worshipers." I should have said, *Those that chose to worship Francis joined in on the thread.* It was probably 2 or 3 die hards. And they did blow the 15/5/5 out of proportion (as well as the 29PPG West comparison). Those threads did get a lot more traction than this one.
nope. . . never It was a team Effort. . .but Francis DID come up big down the stretch You may not like him but please be fair give him SOME props Rocket River
It was the 15/5/5 that was used to compare him to Magic and company. The 'at least' 20/6/6 was a stat he and KG were the only ones to accomplish in a particular year. Of course KG had 23/13/6.
