Video: Clyde, Rick Adelman, Vernon Maxwell and Seinfeld

So it begins Poprocks,
I'm ready to take this to 1 million replies. you ready?


1993-94:
After this, his sixth season, Maxwell was included among the NBA's all-time leaders in three-point shooting-he ranked 10th in three-pointers made (634), just 15 treys shy of Larry Bird, who played 13 seasons....Maxwell also ranked fifth in three-pointers attempted (1,981) and easily ranked as the Houston Rockets' all-time leader in both categories....In 1993-94 Maxwell had a spectacular eight-game stretch in which his three-point shooting was largely responsible for Houston victories.....Perhaps the most memorable occurred on 12/9 in a game with the Miami Heat, when his fallaway trey from 35 feet sent the game into overtime.....then hit a three-pointer in overtime to give Houston a 7-point cushion.....On 1/6 Maxwell suffered an episode of atrial fibrillation, a particularly frightening event in the wake of Reggie Lewis's death in the offseason.....Medication restored Maxwell's heartbeat to normal rhythm, and he missed only three games....For the season, he averaged 13.6 points and a team-high 5.1 assists....Shot .389 from the floor, including .298 from three-point range....Became the 13th Rocket to score 1,000 points in a season and passed Sleepy Floyd for 12th on the team's all-time scoring list.... With an average of 13.8 points and 4.3 assists per game in the postseason, Maxwell helped the Rockets to their first NBA Championship. Houston defeated the New York Knicks in seven games in the NBA Finals.

1992-93:
While continuing to bomb from three-point range in 1992-93, Maxwell developed a reputation as an outstanding defender....Held opponents below their scoring averages in 35 of his 68 starts and notched 86 steals for the season.....Meanwhile, Maxwell led the Rockets in three-point field goals made for the third straight year, hitting 120 of 361 for a .332 percentage....His season ended prematurely when he fractured his left wrist at Seattle on 4/17, amid one of the best streaks of his career....In a sizzling span of nine games, Maxwell averaged 18.7 points while shooting .496 from the field and .404 (19-of-47) from three-point range....Also had 5.0 assists and 4.0 rebounds per game during that stretch....For the season, Maxwell finished second on the Rockets with an average of 13.8 points per game. He returned from his wrist injury to play in 9 of Houston's 12 playoff games, averaging 14.0 points in the postseason.

1991-92:
Maxwell again led the NBA in three-pointers made (162) and attempted (473) while finishing 29th in the league in three-point percentage (.342)....He bombed from downtown at a torrid pace in March, hitting 50 of 121 attempts (.413) to become the first player ever to make 50 three-pointers in a month.... Starting in all 80 of his appearances, the fourth-year pro set new career highs in scoring (17.2 ppg), three-point percentage, free-throw percentage (.772), rebounds (3.0 rpg), and assists (4.1 apg)....The first Rockets guard to average 17-plus points in consecutive seasons since Calvin Murphy had done so from 1973 through 1980....Scored a season-high 35 points twice-at Denver on 11/2 and against San Antonio on 12/14. On 3/12 he completed a four-point play against San Antonio, becoming one of only five NBA players to record the feat in 1991-92....Maxwell also notched at least 100 steals (104) for the second straight season.

1990-91:
Maxwell began shooting three-pointers on opening night, and he didn't stop until the Rockets' last game of the season....Hoisted 510 three-point attempts for the year, second only to Michael Adams' then-NBA-record 564 attempts....Made 172 of those shots, topping Adams' mark of 167. (Majerle has since passed them both with 192 treys, on 503 attempts, in 1993-94.)....On 1/ 26 Maxwell lit up the Cleveland Cavaliers for a career-high 51 points-30 in the fourth quarter....At the time, only four other players in NBA history had scored 30 points in a quarter: George Gervin (33), David Thompson (32), Wilt Chamberlain (31), and Michael Jordan (30)....Maxwell hit 14 of 25 field goals in that game, along with 4 of 10 three-pointers and 19 of 22 free throws in 46 minutes....He later scored 45 points in a game against Denver on 4/5, making a career-high 8 of 12 three-pointers, thus becoming only the fifth player in league history to make 8 treys in a game....Maxwell became a starter for the Rockets four games into the season and finished with an average of 17.0 points per game. He also led the club in steals, with 127....Houston posted a 52-30 regular-season record behind NBA Coach of the Year Don Chaney, but the Rockets were postseason disappointments, losing to the Los Angeles Lakers in the first round.

1989-90:
Maxwell played the season's first 49 games for the Spurs but on 2/21 became the victim of a team overhaul when San Antonio traded him to the Houston Rockets for cash.....Satisfied with Willie Anderson at off guard and rookie Sean Elliott at small forward, the Spurs decided Maxwell was expendable....San Antonio enjoyed immediate success, transforming a 21-61 record the year before into a 56-26 mark and a Midwest Division championship. A 7-footer named David Robinson had a little bit to do with the turnaround.....Meanwhile, Maxwell thrived in Houston, appearing in the Rockets' final 30 games, the last 10 as a starter, and averaging 12.5 points....Scored a season-high 32 points against the Denver Nuggets on 3/13, adding 9 assists and 6 rebounds....Helped the Rockets (41-41) clinch a playoff berth with 27 points in the season finale against Utah.....Fired away in the postseason, shooting only .370 from the floor but averaging 19.8 points in a four-game first-round series loss to the Los Angeles Lakers.

1988-89:
Maxwell played in 79 games for San Antonio as the team's leading gunner from three-point range....Hit 32 of 129 treys for the season, attempting 84 more than the next Spur, Alvin Robertson....Started 36 times during the year and finished with overall averages of 11.7 points and 3.8 assists per game....Poured in a season-high 29 points against the Houston Rockets on 1/11.

 

(May 13, 1994) Down by 12 points at halftime in Game 3 of the 1994 Western Conference Semifinals, Vernon Maxwell turned the Rockets into road warriors. After losing the first two games of the series to the Suns at home, Maxwell made sure Houston wouldn't go down 0-3 in Phoenix by scoring 31 second-half points to lead the Rockets to a 118-102 win. "We are back," Rockets Head Coach Rudy Tomjanovich said. "Phoenix still has home-court advantage, but the pressure is on them now. And it's a lot different playing when you're under pressure."

 

come on dude, its a fun game of catching weights. they do it all gyms.

 

he'll come through with a fadeaway falling out of bounds 3 pointer to save the day!

 

Paper: HOUSTON CHRONICLE
Date: THU 02/29/1996
Section: Sports
Page: 1
Edition: 3 STAR

TOUGH ACT TO FOLLOW/Maxwell: Madness is behind me

By CARLTON THOMPSON
Staff

.

DALLAS - The artist formerly known as Prince has dropped the goofy symbol and returned to His Royal Badness. The basketball player formerly known as Mad Max doesn't intend to follow suit.

From the day he set foot in Philadelphia, Vernon Maxwell has been telling anyone who would listen that he doesn't want to be Mad Max anymore.

""I'm just Vernon," he keeps saying.

There will be 16,285 interested observers at The Summit tonight who would like to make that determination for themselves as the self-proclaimed ""changed man" makes his first trip to Houston as a member of the Philadelphia 76ers.

When Maxwell glances at the rafters, he'll see the 1994 championship banner he helped hang and the 1995 banner the team won after he took a leave of absence during the playoffs. Both are sure to remind Maxwell that he has gone from the defending world champions to the worst team in the NBA. But Maxwell insists he won't dwell on that reality.

""I don't think too much about Houston," he said. ""I watch them

play all the time. Those guys are still my friends. But I don't think about playing in Houston or that they're winning and I'm losing. I don't think about that at all."

And then, he added: ""With Clyde (Drexler out with a knee injury), they could use me now. But they'll be OK."

It was the Drexler trade last February that ultimately paved Maxwell's road out of town. Drexler cut into Maxwell's playing time, and the Rockets found out just how Mad Maxwell could get. He admittedly faked an injury and left the team during a playoff series in Utah.

Maxwell knows many Houston fans never will forgive him for that and other off-the-court episodes, but he also expects there to be a group of fans who appreciate the buzzer-beaters and his championship contributions.

""I feel the crowd reaction will be mixed (tonight)," Maxwell said with a chuckle. ""But it will probably be a little more of one than the other. I can't dwell on that. It really doesn't matter. I really couldn't tell you how the fans are going to react."

But if Maxwell doesn't care for the reaction, don't expect him to charge into the stands, as he did last year in Portland. That Vernon Maxwell, he says, is gone.

""I made some mistakes in the past, but I'm a lot better person since I came to Philadelphia," Maxwell said. ""I'm a lot smarter and wiser. I've matured every year, but especially this season. You don't see me getting into a lot of altercations or arguing with the refs. I'm not about that anymore. The people who come to the game (tonight) will see that. I've settled down."

Those in attendance tonight also will see a man on mission. Remember the Alamodome?

When Maxwell played for the Rockets, he always seemed to save his best performances for the San Antonio Spurs, another former team. Two years ago, he beat the Spurs with a shot at the buzzer and then taunted the crowd with a little ""Shakedown" dance.

Maxwell, who missed Philadelphia's previous game this season against the Rockets, would love to dance a similar jig tonight at The Summit.

""I'm going to love playing against the Rockets," he said. ""My dream scenario would be to throw one in at the buzzer so I could shake it up a little bit."

Sixers coach John Lucas knows a motivated Maxwell can be a valuable weapon to have in the arsenal, but he doesn't want Maxwell to make too much of one game.

""He's got to get throw through it with his emotions in check," Lucas said. ""I told Vernon this really isn't the team he was with. This is Sam Mack, Eldridge Recasner "

Sam Cassell, Mario Elie and Kenny Smith are very close to Maxwell, but the former Rockets guard said people would be surprised to learn that Hakeem Olajuwon was his best friend on the team.

""Dream was someone I looked up to," Maxwell said. ""I really respected him a lot for the way he changed his life with his religious beliefs. I'm sure it's hard for people to believe, but we were really good friends. I felt like he genuinely cared about me as a person, not just a basketball player.

""He knew that I was one of the guys who was going to play hard every night. But Mario, Sam and Kenny are my boys, too. Kenny and I are so close that my kids call him Uncle Kenny. So it's going to be great to spend some time with all of those guys."

Tonight will be one of the few highlights for Maxwell in a season that has included 43 losses in 54 games. And as the team's leader, Maxwell is looked upon to hold everything together and to keep the losses in perspective.

Who would have thought that possible when he was in Houston?

""I understand the position I'm in," Maxwell said. ""I'm playing

with a lot of guys who have never established themselves in the league. I have a lot of responsibility here, but I like that. Sometimes, I have to catch myself on the court because if I lose it, these young guys think they can lose it, too. It's a demanding role, and it's new for me. I'm trying to carry myself in a professional manner and let my basketball do the talking.

""Other than the losing, it's been OK. I love the city, I love my coach, and I love my teammates. But the losing has been tough. It's a lot tougher at the end of the game when you don't have Dream (Olajuwon) to throw it in to. I'm having to create a lot more shots at the end of games."

Tonight is about more than sticking it to the organization that gave up on Maxwell after he gave up on it. Tonight is about closing the book on the best and worst years of his career so far.

There will be other trips to Houston donning the enemy colors, but none more tantalizing than the first time. While Maxwell said he enjoyed his time in Houston, he maintains he was misunderstood outside the locker room.

""I felt like a lot of the people who didn't even know me were unfair," he said. ""But there were a lot of people in Houston who really liked me, too. I like Philly. It's a blue-collar town, and the people are very friendly - very genuine. They don't judge you for situations you've been through in the past. After all, it's the City of Brotherly Love. People who sit down and get to know me realize I'm not this bad person everyone thinks I am. I'm not a lunatic. I'm not going to go out and murder someone. I'm just Vernon."

And love him or hate him, he's back.

 

what the hater didn't tell you is that Max didn't have a very good relationship with 2nd wife.

His first wife is the one with Vernon Jr. Vernon was great dad to Vernon Jr, he would go watch all his pop warner football games. Vernon was a great defensive back in high school.

 

its an old article but you know your boy tinman will come through, not like the dumb rookies here.

Otis Thorpe shook my hand when I thanked him for winning the 1st championship. Then you get that post about Juwan Howard not taking pictures with a fan. The old Rockets were true.


Paper: Houston Chronicle
Date: SUN 06/13/2004
Section: Sports
Page: 1
Edition: 4 STAR

BELIEVE IT: 10 YEARS LATER / 'The times of our lives' / For the players and coaches who delivered it, the Rockets' first championship in 1994 remains something to celebrate

By FRAN BLINEBURY
Staff

Ten years and half a world separate him from the time and place. But Hakeem Olajuwon, currently a language studies student at the University of Jordan, can simply close his eyes and go back.

It is June 22, 1994, and the late-night scene at The Summit is so hot, so loud, so joyous and so completely out of control that it feels like a string of firecrackers has exploded inside your head.

There are winners running up and down the court with a glee they barely know how to express. There are losers, heads down, trying to walk through the mob to reach their locker room. There are fans kissing, strangers hugging and an entire city vibrating like one giant tuning fork. There is confetti falling and We Are the Champions blaring from the loudspeaker. Yet one man - the one who more than any other made it happen - might as well be tucked inside a cocoon.

All around him is a palette of color and unbridled emotion. Olajuwon, with the game ball in his arms, is standing serenely to one side of the court, taking it all in. It is intentional, purposeful, like so much of the way he goes about his craft, to burn that picture in his mind's eye, to be called up at will in the future, filling him with the warmth of memory.

``That mental picture is still fresh,'' Olajuwon said recently in an e-mail from his home in Amman, Jordan. ``When I talk about my career, the memory of that game comes back. I'll never forget the sound of the buzzer at the end of the game - that's when you knew you could finally exhale."

A decade has passed since the night the Rockets defeated the New York Knicks 90-84 in Game 7 of the NBA Finals to win the first major sports championship in Houston history. So much has changed about the nation's fourth-largest city in 10 tumultuous years - from Enron to Tropical Storm Allison to the advent of light rail - yet perhaps nothing has altered the way Houston looked at itself more than the exploits of one professional basketball team, led by a transplanted "lifer" from Hamtramck, Mich., in head coach Rudy Tomjanovich and an adopted son from Lagos, Nigeria, in Olajuwon.

A city enraptured

Gone by the time the final horn sounded were all of those painful Houston sports memories. No more nightmares in Buffalo. No more ninth-inning collapses at the Astrodome.

"This city has been so good to me and my family through the years that it was so gratifying to deliver," Tomjanovich said.

"Any championship is special," Mario Elie said. "But when you're the first, that's a very special place. Nobody can ever move us out of there. We raised the bar and the way Houston thinks of itself. It's not about possibilities anymore. After us, everybody knows it can happen.

"To this day, I go out to eat or just about anywhere on the streets, and people will come up and start talking to me about those days. It will always live with me and live with this city."

Kenny Smith, the Rockets' starting point guard that season, recalls the craziness that enveloped the city the night of the clincher.

"An hour or so after we won Game 7, I got in my car and was ready to drive home like normal," Smith said. "But I turned out of the tunnel, and the traffic was stopped on 59, and it was just one big, happy party. I think we changed everything."

"Ah, man," said Sam Cassell, then a nervy rookie out of Florida State and now a 33-year-old veteran with the Minnesota Timberwolves, "you're talkin' about the times of our lives. Do I think about them? Only every day when I'm back home in Houston in the summer."

It was an amazing season that began with a searing 15-0 start that broke the NBA record and served notice that the Rockets were a real contender.

It was a gritty, testing playoff run that saw the Rockets turn the humiliation of their "Choke City" experience - blowing a 20-point fourth-quarter lead at home to fall behind 2-0 against Phoenix - into a rallying point and a battle cry that never would let them quit. Clutch City.

It was a regal, dominating, almost incomparable season by Olajuwon that had him sweeping the regular-season Most Valuable Player award, the Defensive Player of the Year award and then MVP of the Finals.

And it was an intense, grueling, debilitating victory over Patrick Ewing and the Knicks that fittingly went the full seven excruciating games, the last time the league championship has been decided at the limit.

Sour taste in '93

For all the Rockets accomplished that year, it was a championship born out of the frustration of failure from the previous season. The Rockets had followed up a seven-game losing streak at midseason by going 41-11. Then in the spring of 1993 they finished one game behind Seattle in the overall standings.

That one-game difference meant Seattle held home-court advantage in the best-of-seven second round. The home team won every game of the series, and the Rockets lost Game 7 103-100.

"That was a bad experience," said Robert Horry, who would win five NBA titles with the Rockets and Lakers and is now a member of the San Antonio Spurs. "But it made us who we were the next year."

"Everything grew out of the disappointment of losing to Seattle the year before," said Rockets general manager Carroll Dawson, who was then an assistant coach. "It hammered home to everybody that the regular season, the home court was important."

The game that took their record to 15-0 came Dec. 2 in New York and maybe was an omen. The Knicks had talked loudly leading up to the game that the Rockets would not break the record in "our house." But the Rockets thumped the Knicks from the start and won 94-85. Nobody knew it then, but that victory allowed the Rockets to eventually finish with one more win than the Knicks (56-55) and ultimately put Games 6 and 7 of the NBA Finals in Houston rather than New York.

"All the difference in the world," Olajuwon said.

How time flies

They are, of course, all a decade older now, every one of them gone from the Rockets except Dawson, who has moved into the front office, and Rudy T, now in the role of a consultant. Only Cassell and Horry are playing in the NBA. Carl Herrera is pursuing a basketball career in his native Venezuela. Vernon Maxwell is in jail.

"Ten years? Are you kidding me? I hadn't even thought about that," said Smith, now a national analyst on TNT who seems to have every other number and stat on total recall. "In my mind, it only seems like four or five."

"I don't think about it in one specific way or in terms of one specific play," said power forward Otis Thorpe, who is retired and living in Round Rock. "It means that these days I can sit down in front of a TV and watch the championship games in all sports with an extra sense of appreciation. I can say, `I achieved that. I know what it takes to get that done.' "

Olajuwon had reached the NBA Finals in his second pro season in 1986, when the Rockets lost to the Boston Celtics. It took him eight more years to get another chance.

"Success doesn't come easy in anything you do," he said. "You always have to overcome obstacles and challenges, and that is what gives you the taste of satisfaction when you finally do succeed. That's what winning a championship is all about - life lessons."

Test of character

Choke City was the label they had to overcome. Actually, it was the headline on the sports section of the Chronicle the day after the Game 2 catastrophe against Phoenix.

"Nothing that ever took place, the first championship and especially the second, wouldn't have happened without `Choke City,' " Tomjanovich said. "It became the last thing that made us a team. It drove us."

"Oh yeah, we needed it," Elie said. "It tested our character. It actually propelled us."

So they climbed back to beat Charles Barkley and the Suns in seven games. They dusted off Utah in five games to win the West. Then it was the Knicks in the NBA Finals.

New York was a brutish, defensive-minded team molded by coach Pat Riley after his move from the Lakers and the TV booth. For Olajuwon, it was a rematch with college rival Ewing, who had led Georgetown past Houston in the 1984 NCAA championship game.

"From a big man point of view, there was special satisfaction in beating New York, because they had a legitimate big man," Olajuwon said.

"It was Madison Square Garden, the mecca of basketball, and that just added a different level of accomplishment," Horry said. "If you're going to announce to the world that you've arrived, you do it in New York."

It was the series many believe gave the NBA a changed face that exists today. The Rockets cracked 90 points only twice during the series.

"I remember watching Kenny trying to bring the ball upcourt against Derek Harper," Matt Bullard said. "He was literally getting beat up."

"It was New York, my hometown," Smith said. "It was so intense, I could hardly breathe."

Assist from Rangers

The teams split the first two games in Houston and arrived in New York with the Rockets back on their heels.

"One of the things that has been overlooked through the years is that while we were in New York to play the Knicks, the Rangers won the Stanley Cup," Dawson said. "Our players got to see firsthand how a city could just go crazy. They watched the parade. It was like an assist from New York. I think it helped our guys want it more."

It began to look like a return trip to "Choke City" when the Rockets blew a 14-point lead in the fourth quarter of Game 3. But with the Knicks holding a two-point lead and Ewing, Charles Oakley and Anthony Mason providing a triple-team blanket, the shot clock was running down when Olajuwon spotted an open teammate at the last possible second.

"I saw it was Sam," Olajuwon said. "All I thought was, `Good!' "

And it was. Cassell's 3-pointer with 32.6 seconds remaining put the Rockets in front 89-88. He added four free throws. Seven points in barely half a minute, and the rookie, whom the New York tabloids had linked to a late-night dalliance with Madonna during the series, saved the Rockets.

The Knicks won the next two. Game 5 was noteworthy for being interrupted in midstream while NBC cut away to the infamous O.J. Simpson white Bronco chase. The game was off the air for most of the third quarter. The fourth quarter was shown in a split-screen format - half basketball and half murder suspect on the run.

"It just made the whole thing more of a circus," Bullard said. "It added to the mystique of the series."

The Rockets were returning home down 3-2 with all of the burden on them. Or so it seemed.

"We were in the elevator, leaving the Garden, and I had my head down," Elie said. "Dream (Olajuwon) just looked at me and said, `Mario, we are going home. It will be OK.' "

It was. Because of Olajuwon.

Dream finish

New York's John Starks was electric in Game 6. He scored 16 of his 27 points in a fourth-quarter comeback. He'd hit five 3-pointers.

The Rockets held an 86-84 lead as Starks had the ball in his hands directly in front of the Rockets' bench with the clock running out. He let go a wide-open trey with two seconds left.

"I'm standing there, lined up perfectly behind Starks and the shot, and I'm watching and saying, `Damn, it can't end like this!' " Tomjanovich said. "Then he shows up. The Dream."

Olajuwon had slipped but then recovered and, on his second effort, reached up with his right hand to get barely a fingertip on Starks' shot. The ball wound up in the arms of Thorpe, who cradled it like a priceless vase.

Game 7. Starks' shot had vanished. He vainly shot 2-for-18. Olajuwon finished with 25 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists.

When Maxwell nailed a 3-pointer with 1:48 left in the game, he rolled on the floor, his teammates piled on top of him, and the celebration began.

The final horn made it official.

"You start running all around, looking for somebody to hug," Bullard said.

"You're just overwhelmed because it's so big," Thorpe said. "You can't begin to describe it."

One man still can. The one who stood there smiling and soaking all of it in. A decade later, from the far side of the world, he types onto a keyboard, and his emotion spills off the computer screen.

"Seeing the confetti drop all around us was exciting, and the fans rushing to the floor was thrilling," Olajuwon wrote. "It was a great feeling to see the entire city celebrating with us. I can go into my memory, and I'm back there."

Ten years in the blink of an eye.

...

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Catching up with the members of the Rockets' 1994 team:

Scott Brooks: Denver Nuggets assistant coach.

Matt Bullard: Radio/TV analyst for Rockets and Comets. Lives in The Woodlands.

Sam Cassell: Minnesota Timberwolves point guard. Lives in Houston.

Earl Cureton: Retired in Detroit.

Carroll Dawson: Former assistant coach has been Rockets' general manager for last eight seasons.

Mario Elie: San Antonio Spurs assistant coach. Lives in Houston.

Carl Herrera: Playing professional basketball in Venezuela.

Robert Horry: San Antonio Spurs backup forward. Lives in Houston.

Chris Jent: Philadelphia 76ers assistant coach.

Vernon Maxwell: In a Florida prison for non-payment of child support.

Hakeem Olajuwon: Arabic language student at the University of Jordan. Lives in Houston and Jordan.

Kenny Smith: TNT analyst. Lives in Houston and Los Angeles.

Otis Thorpe: Retired in Round Rock.

Rudy Tomjanovich: Personnel consultant for Rockets.