Changing the uniforms after winning back-to-back championships. Why do that? Why?!!!! Other possible reasons - trading Hakeem and not bringing back Calvin Murphy... Perhaps a combination of all three....?
Several things come to mind when thinking of the bad luck the Rockets have had. 1st- The Charles Barkley trade, dismantling a Championship team for a over the hill player. Never giving them a chance to defend their title. The Charles era was fun, but the Rockets org. has never been the same. IMO every championship team should have a chance to defend their title. 2nd- Letting Hakeem walk, not giving him a bone and resigning him to retire and finish his career a Rocket. 3rd- The Pajama blue jersey's and changing the name from The Summit to Compaq center, which is now a church? 4th- The trading of the beloved Stevie "Franchise" and Cuttino "The Cat" Mobley for a former scoring champ with no heart. Steve and Cuttino loved this city and the Rockets and IMO were slapped in the face by the Rockets org. 5th- Letting JVG turn the Rockets into a reunion of former Knicks. 6th- Les's drive to instantly "buy" the Rockets another championship by bringing in over the hill former superstars(Ex. Glen Rice, Scottie Pippen, Barkley), while passing up hometown guys(Ex.Rashard Lewis). Hopefully tomorrow will be a better day!
Coughing up three picks for a human train wreck might be a good place to start and throwing tons of undeserved and unearned cash to Cato might be another.
Some combination of : 1. The bad late 90's space jerseys 2. The Summit turning into the Compaq Center which was now replaced by the Toyota Center (Honestly, how cool would it have been to name the new stadium something else (like after Hakeem or something )instead of selling naming rights. I hate this trend in sports). 3. Though most likely due to Carrol Dawson becoming General Manager in 1996...
1. Hitching your wagon to Yao knowing that the Chinese gov. would treat him like a disposable piece of meat. 2. Trading Horry 3. Hiring CD 4. Signing Pippen and Charles trade 5. Hiring Dr. Tom Clanton Not in that order but they were all terrible decisions.
The Astros...no, no...I'm going with DD on this one and saying health issues. I'd like to say we just got dealt a bad hand with T-Mac and Yao, but we really picked this hand. Just didn't know everything that came with it...what I wouldn't give for a whole, healthy season with our team now as it is...
Well said. Except that the Stevie-TMac trade should be done anyway. The only mistake is that we should have traded TMac to Pistons a season earlier.
I'm surprised no one mentioned Eddie Griffin yet...... I mean we traded Richard Jefferson and those 2 other guys for that miserable piece of human trash. Thank you very much, CD, for ****ing up twice in a 4 year span when the Rockets had 3 first round picks..... That set us back for years.
T-Mac Orlando Magic 2001-02 76 games 2002-03 75 games 2003-04 67 games Houston Rockets 2004-05 78 games (Traded to Rockets, Clanton starts working for Rockets) 2005-06 47 games (Misses 35 games due to injuries) http://www.nba.com/playerfile/tracy_mcgrady/career_stats.html Yao Ming 2002-03 82 games 2003-04 82 games 2004-05 80 games(Clanton starts working for Rockets) 2005-06 57 games(Misses 25 games due to injuries) http://www.nba.com/playerfile/yao_ming/career_stats.html Dion Glover Atlanta Hawks 2001-02 55 games 2002-03 76 games 2003-04 69 games(waived midseason and signed with Raptors) San Antonio Spurs 2004-05 7 games(Unsigned until March,two 10-day contracts with Spurs, Houston Rockets 2005-06 0 games(Signed with Rockets, Clanton does knee surgery in November 2005, end of his career) He was supposed to recover in 6 weeks, but the surgery ended his career. Rockets guards ailing Bob Sura Golden State Warriors 2002-03 55 games Detroit Pistons 2003-04 80 games(2nd half with Atlanta Hawks) Houston Rockets 2004-05 61 games(Clanton starts working for Rockets, knee surgery, back surgery, end of his career) 2005-06 0 games(rehabbing from surgery still) Do you see the pattern for 4 players in 2005-06? Dion Glover and Bob Sura were the first to go down.
Changing to the blue jerseys RIGHT after winning a championship. I think this curse won't be lifted until all traces of those uniforms are wiped off the face of the earth. I think we should have a PJ-demolition night a la "Disco Demolition Night" at Comiskey.
They were just trying to establish brand loyalty by... um, completely changing the winning formula!... Brilliant (greedy/boneheaded) move. Whoever's idea that was was a complete idiot and needs to be publicly ridiculed (for subjecting Rockets players to public ridicule in those ridiculous blue uniforms). A complete Failing grade as of today. A switch back to the 95 jerseys might help things, but at this point, the damage has been long done.
TMac, his team never got past first round. The year we were without him, we won the first time in 12 years.
