Well obviously the stats aren't, but your reasoning is just ridiculous. Are you simply trying not to conform? Are you an angry person? I still don't understand why you hate the guy.
You are making an interesting arguable point here. Clutchfan doesn't necessarily need to love every player of the club.
You don't have to love the guy, but you, as a Rocket's fan should at least support him. He is part of the team.
I think Rafer averaging 44 minutes per game and shooting 34 and 32 % from the the field and 3 point land was much more critical and his inability to contain Deron Williams. I think Yao's mismatch with Okur's perimeter scoring and Boozer's quickness was a big deal as well...Boozer killed us that series. This also affected Yao's stamina and shooting %'s. I think Luther Head and Juwan Howard disappearing act should be noted as well. Howard's ppg dropped by 4 ppg and Luther's ppg dropped by 6 ppg. They went from 19 ppg combined to 9 ppg combined. I think Chuck Hayes inability to function offensively allowed another defender to cheat on Yao and Tmac, thus their shooting %'s (39 % Tmac and 44% Yao). These aren't excuses...these are the facts. Ya, Tmac did shoot free throws bad, but he and Yao were the only ones getting there, because the Jazz didn't bother guarding the other guys cuz outside of Battier, none of them could shoot. Try winning with a team that shoots that horribly and has 2 mismatches vs. your opponents all stars. Tmac in all honesty should get the least blame for this series...without his production and creating offense, we get swept by the Jazz.
Hey, maybe Coach Adelman should have had Deke in there for that crucial rebound in the playoffs instead of Landry....to paraphrase Tmac. Or...or...maybe Tmac should not have tipped the ball away from Landry. But...in Tmac land...that was Adelman's fault. I will root for the Rockets but I don't believe they will ever win with Tmac playing a major role.... DD
If I remember correctly, there were two 7'2" guys on the bench. For a crucial rebound, you have to have your tallest players in the game. T-mac and the undersized crew were simply overmatched in that instance. Mutumbo or even Woods would have been able to grab that rebound.
Yao SHOULD have gotten the rebounds. If your 7"6, you HAVE to use your height to get a DAMN board. 7"6!
Hey, tmac says a lot of dumb things, but I he was actually right on that one...Rick Adelman isn't exactly known to be a great crunch time coach over his career himself... Portland and Sacremento both underachieved...I think he just simply forget to put Deke in, which was costly.
Yao was hurt that year remember? That is why the Rockets made the move to sign Woods. He was brought here for those kind of moments, yet he was not utilized. Amazing.
My only expectation on T-Mac is that he won't ball-hog and hinder the development of young guys like Brooks.
When someone is sick, do you want to keep him with the disease if he is your friend? I don't mean T-Mac is the cancer of the team. He apparently doesn't fit in with the current system and peaked in his career as a basketball player. You are changing concepts of the team and a single player.
Tmac at the moment, is the only player that is talented enough to lead our team to any type of success. Whether you like it or not, that is a fact. Trevor Ariza, Aaron Brooks, and Luis Scola and Battier arent leading us to the playoffs...we need that star player. Scola can put up star stats with hustle plays, and Brooks has his explosive scoring days, but the difference between a role player and a star is that the star consistently shows up and creates consistently. Ariza is unproven, but he has potential...I just don't see him being great offensively this year...give him a year or 2 in our system...Pippen didn't get great offensive #'s til he was in the triangle for a couple of years. The NBA is a star's league...it aint NCAA...in order to win, you need somebody that can make something out of nothing and hit difficult shots and make difficult passes and plays when your team needs them. Tmac is the only one thats proven he can do that on this team.
The most chance we have to get value for T-Mac is if he doesn´t play at all, or if he comes back team oriented and playing like the allstar he once was. As things are, the most likely, scenario to happen is the first one. If he doesn´t play he can be traded as an expiring contract, no one will be scared of messing with team chemistry as he cannot play and he won´t demand playing time. If he comes back, playing bad, or playing well but with a detriment in the team production, we are dead, no one will buy into a player that gets 20 ppg but his team goes from a team able to push the lakers to 7 games to aa looser game. Equal value for tmac theories make me laugh, we are talking about a player that never showed anything similar to a winner actitude, and that his team best PO record was with him sitting on the stands, that´s a hard fact to negate.
We pushed the Lakers to 7 because our outside shots were falling in games 4 and 6...when they didn't fall we lost by 40 points and 20 points in games 5 and 7. Also, we are not going to play every game at home (games 4 and 6 were at home) and we won't play the same team every night and won't have the same matchups every night. The Rockets played hard from games 4-7...but we just didn't have the fire power to keep up with the Lakers or any NBA team for that matter, and that was with Ron Artest, a person who is a proven scorer. No way the Rockets win anything without Yao, TMac or any star player. Luis Scola and Brooks are nice, solid starting NBA players. But they aren't stars yet. Brooks is undersized and Scola isn't athletic enough to score when a defense is focused on him for 82 games. The reason the Rockets lost was because we had nobody to give the ball to that could score consistently and create for others...Artest dribbling for 20 seconds aimlessly was a detriment to our team. Tmac is coming back...he's already playing 5-on-5 basketball...even with Dwade. He may be ready by training camp...according to Tim Grover, the doctors and the Physical therapists in Chicago. If we trade him, we'll NEVER get equal value for him...he is a rare talent, not many players who are 6'8 with his wing span with his skill and athleticism, when he's healthy. He is our only chance to win this year...our young guys won't develop...maybe except Scola, but he would gain the most with Tmac, since they could run pick n' rolls together the same way TMac and Yao used to. Its the facts...
Portland was a MUCH MORE favorable matchup than Utah. Yao guards Oden and Pryzbilla (no offense) instead of Boozer and Okur (quickness/strength and 3 point shooter) They also had Brandon Roy and who else...Aldridge was okay, but he's soft for a power forward. Also, we did have Artest, who did okay in that series vs. Batum. We also had Brooks, Scola, Landry, Lowery, and Hayes as support...instead of Deke, Hayes, Howard, Head, Rafer, Bobby Jackson, and rookies (scola, landry, brooks) With tmac, we probably would've swept the blazers...there was a reason why Jeff Van Gundy predicted us to blow the Blazers out...he knew how much of a favorable matchup it was for us. Roy had no help...
