I became a fan of the rockets shortly after Yao's arrival. Ever since then, i joined clutchcity and followed articles in the Chronic. But I live in Orlando and being a magic fan last year gave me more reason to want to watch somebody just win a game. It was great to watch as Yao developed into a more dominant center. He's only going to get better. I really never liked Tmac's personaility too much but always admired his TALENT. He truly is one of the best ballers in the league. His shooting ability is probably in the range of Ray Allen but with a 6'8 frame and the ability to outjump any defender. he also shoots incredible shooting in the air. He rarely shoots flatfooted wide open shots. His driving ability is beyond words. But his mouth, courage, and leadership are another matter. Just look at his last few seasons and watch every game as i did, and you'll know what i mean. Tmac desires to be Scotty Pippen. He wants to be the best #2 in the world. To be the best next option who is only #2 because #1 is a legend. He's in the right place right now. Just don't make him a PG. My problem with the rockets is the Crap the magic sent with him. Gaines is AWFUL, trust me, he sucks, sucks, and well sucks bad. Juwan Howard gets statistics but look closely. Half his rebounds are from missed free throws (he'll box out Yao to get them). He will score 15+ points, but they'll be useless. You just have to see it to believe. Most of his points come via mismatches or non-essential plays. His shot usually is a fade away where he leaves himself out of position for a board. So even if he shoots 50%, that means 50% fo the time the ball is boarded by the opposing team. Yao is still not a great rebounder, so expect to be outrebounded nightly. Lue is crap. probably the worst guard in the league. The more minutes he gets on the floor, the more turnovers and stupid plays the rockets will get. He's an idiot. So i hope Van Gund sees this and trades Juwan, Lue, and Gaines and Mo soft taylor for a quality #4 that can rebound. Truth is, the rockets shoudl have kept Cato and ditched Mo Soft. Anyhow, i still love the rockets, but fear the worse. I think outside of trade to ditch those 3 stiffs (lue, howard, gaines), the rockets will hurt with this trade.
Well I pretty much disagree with everything you said. TMAC will come out with something to prove this year. JHoward is a solid NBA four, Lue a soldi if not great b/u point and Gaines is potential waiting to be tapped. You will see how winning will change a few players attitudes instead of always losing like most of these players have done for their careers. JVG will get the most out of this team and we will surely make it out of the first round of the playoffs and maybe even further. Go Rox!
I disagree with everything, everything, well everything you said. I supposed I kinda understand since you had to watch a team who had the worst record in the league last year. I'm sure the whole city of orlando agrees with you though.
I tend to agree w/ clove. I assume it must have been tough to watch a team just give it up in the middle of the season. The blame for that must fall squarely on Tmac's back since he was the leader (even if he didnt want to be) . Im hoping this season w/ Van Grumpy and Yao it will be a different story for these guys. Someone stated winning games changes attitudes and builds chemistry. I think this team will win alot of games on pure talent and once they start to gel could become unstoppable. Alot of this depends on Yao and if he becomes a more dominant force. Its like watching the Clippers players lose games all the time but flourish once they get out of LA. J
I also disagree with everything you said, except for the part about us trading Mo Taylor instead of Cato. But given what we know now (as opposed to what we knew THEN), I'm happier with Yao/Mutumbo and Howard/Taylor than I would have been with Yao/Cato and Howard/???.
To be honest. I hope you are all right. I would love to see Tmac blow up and more importantly, see the others prosper. JHoward was our savior last season. the prize free agent who would get us past the 1st round. Gaines was one of the PG's in the deepest PG draft in NBA history. with a solid collegiate career and a door in the NBA with the magic needing a PG, the table was set. Lue was another "great" free agent aquisition, just waiting for the opportunity to blossom. check thier stats from last year. very dissapointing. I wish them all well, but I have had the luxury of watching them play for 82 games, you have not. So while I'm pretty sure they will all bomb, i hope the best for them so i can laugh our stupid mistakes of letting them go.
Well Orlando obviously had unrealistic expectations if Lue was considered a great signing. And i never really understood the Howard acquisition considering Gooden is almost identical to him. Tmac is definately right about the crappy management of Orlando(traded Mike Miller for Gooden and Giricek. Sign Howard who is the same as Gooden. Trade Giricek away for freakin Deshawn Stevenson, AFTER Garrity went down with an injury. goodbye shooters.) Also, why would orlando take Mo (similar yet worse all-around player compared to howard) in the trade? We've seen that they're dumb, but probably not that dumb. Obviously, the way these guys fit with Yao is much more important than what they did in the past. Howard is a solid scorer, and even though you think his 17 points don't mean much, he could take a lot of defensive pressure off of Yao. He can shoot from midrange and finish decently near the basket. Lue has proven that he can hit the 3, and that is why he could help this team. I don't know what the hell orlando was thinking by making him a starting point guard and expecting him to save the day. He can penetrate decently, so that's a change of pace from Ward at least. About Gaines, i agree he looks like trash, and does not do a single thing well (or even adequately) on the court. I don't see much promise in him. Overall, our team offense should be much better, and our rebounding and defense will be worse. I think I'd rather have Juwan learning defense from JVG and slightly struggling against the tougher 4's than watch our whole offense suck as a result of Cato's presence on the court. It's definately a give and take situation. Obviously the ideal situation would be to have a good defensive 4 who can knock down a jumpshot, but they don't exactly grow on trees.
I like your evaluation. It rings mostly true. I'm not sure why we did the moves we did, but i can tell you we HAD screwed up management. Most of us were calling for our GM's head over 2 seasons ago when he drafted Ryan Humpries, Steven Hunter and Jerryl Sasser (all in the 1st round). His other moves are jes rediculous too. This same bonehead brought in Shawn Babymachine Kemp, Horace old Grant, and Patrick older Ewing. So we all felt Tmac had every reason to b****. He had the stupidest GM on the planet working for him. The GM blamed the coach (Doc Rivers) for picking those players, and we watched the coach run the team into the ground. This is the same coach that once had Matt Harpring, Chucky Atkins, Troy Hudson, Darrell Armstrong, Big Ben Wallace, Bo Outloaw, Chuancy Billups, Correy Maggete, Michael Doleac, monty williams, Earl Boynkins, and Ron Mercer, and led them to just a .500 record, but through shear luck of anonymity got coach of the year for it. So with a coach like that who bullied his GM with stupid ideas and a nice Coach of the Year trophy, Tmac was doomed. But we cleaned house, GM Gabe is gone, Doc is Boston's problem now and players associated with last year are mostly gone. Are the players to blame? Probably not, and i think you may be right about Juwan and Lue, as least i hope so since they had a hard year last year.
Summer song "Well I pretty much disagree with everything you said. TMAC will come out with something to prove this year. JHoward is a solid NBA four, Lue a soldi if not great b/u point and Gaines is potential waiting to be tapped. " I still think JHoward is a stiff. I know it's only 1 game, but so far he hasn't shown me anything different than he did last year. Mo Taylor looked like a stud compared to Juwanna. Lue is a cokaroach. I knew they sucked and JVG knows it too. THere is a reason why Ward and Taylor started over these studs. They were garbage. Tmac will be exposed too. He is not as good as his average was the last few years showed. Nachbar could have averaged 25 ppg in our system if the coach was Doc "have it your way" Rivers. You will find time and time again that Tmac will run to the 3pt line and chuck away and start running in the opposite direction. In time JVG will have to bench Tmac to bring his point across and a feud will follow. Keep this thread as proof. oh and Juwan Howard sucks.
IMHO.... The game was very close - back and forth being tied or up/down 2 points through the first half and into the third quarter. But about halfway through the third, T-Mac and Yao sat down, and JVG let them rest too long. The Pistons built a 7-point lead. And that was the end. T-Mac and Yao came back in and we basically traded buckets with thim til the end (which won't win the game if you're 7 points behind). We lost because: T-Mac and Yao had a bad shooting night JVG let them sit for too long in the 3rd In the 3rd, while they were resting, our depth wasn't good enough to hold off the Pistons -- droxford
So, what if he T-Mac makes his three's (or at least half), will Jeff van Grumpy still bench him to send a mesasge? Just curious? We seem to forget that T-mac is not the only scoring threat on this team, so he might be a little open.
Nope, Rox lose because players like Tmac, and Juwanna are losers. They are all about the stats regardless of what they say. They are not team players. Team players don't whine about being 2nd fiddle to Vince Carter. Team players don't whine about not having help in Orlando or after just 2 losses.
To say T-Mac is not a team player after watching him this season thus far is flat-out idiotic. He should be leading the league in assist if the Rockets could hit an open shot. Not once did I see him go in a double team and hoist up a bad shot.
Tmac needs to just take over like he did in orlando if no one is hitting their open shots. If yao cant get going because he's being double then that makes gives tmac more room to do his thing. If tmac gets hot, then he'll get doubled, and thats when they should start moving the ball inside the post for Yao.
I actually agree with you... I've followed Tmac closely since his days in Toronto. It's been all about stats for him... through his days in Toronto to Orlando... He's definitely a great talent, but I always felt something was missing. He's horrible in the clutch as well. He is still young, so hopefully he'll improve on his weaknesses
I can tell you honestly that last night i saw Francis hit a CLUTCH shot to win the game. In watching the Magic the last 4 years, i CANNOT honestly say i remember 1, a single, clutch shot from Tmac. It seemed that EVERY shot that mattered was missed. Last year we were close on so many games, but with the final shot he would drive to the rim, jump, get basically a layup, and blow it. Or miss a 3 pointer, there was never anything in between. The years before last the game winner always came from Darrell Armstrong, pat garrity, Mike Miller or somebody else. I would love to see Tmac turn into a superstar, but i just don't think he's clutch enough. that's the role of a True leader. Something he admitted he never wanted to be.
