We did not make it because SF lost his confidence...

This is why Steve needs to move to the 2-guard position. Give him the shots he currently takes plus Mobley's. If he doesn't have to stress about getting everyone else involved(which frankly he sucks at anyway) and can just concentrate on scoring, he'll be a much better and more confident player. Not to mention, this will have no bearing on Yao Ming's touches.

 

steve would get eatin' up alive the much bigger stronger 2 guards in the league. Steve trying to guard McGrady?

 

If Steve Francis ever tries to guard Tracy McGrady with James Posey on the court, I will join the monastery and move to Vermont.

 

Just because Steve is at the 2 on offense doesn't mean he has to defend the opposing shooting guard. And besides, it's not like he currently plays any D against the other team's point guard, so what are we really losing?

 

You have good points. But you have to realize that Steve was lacking so much of the point guard skill department for most of his career, that Rox fans pushed for forced change. Even though this forced change (angry fans) might cause Steve to sacrifice his strong skill sets (scoring).

But it was necessary. An attention getter for Steve. It wasn't that Steve was shooting too much for most of his his career. The problem was that he did NOT know how to make a good pass when he saw it. He lacked all the things that make a good point guard; court vision. We didn't want him to be a "great point guard," just good. And he wasn't even "good." He was a great scorer, but a bad point guard.

Then, throw Yao in the mix and you create a reason for the angry fans to say, "Pass Yao the ball." Almost like that was going to solve Francis's lack of passing skills.

It really didn't address the problem head on. But it did send a few messages to Francis: One, you're not a good point guard. Two, if you don't improve your point guard skills, we'll just cut you out of the equation and demand you give the ball to Yao. How do you like them apples!

This "message" was only a band-aid. In reality, Francis has to cut down his turnovers (passing skills) and improve his shooting efficiency. Then, and only then will people be ok with him having the ball in his hands.

That's when he starts to, and we've all heard it, "Make his teammates better!"

 

Steve will never lose confidence, he thinks too highly of himself to do that. He did lose confidence in his teammates though.

 

LOL..........My thoughts exactly, Steve's matador defense never seems to keep anyone in front of him. In fact I think he makes Yao look bad on defense cause he always has to switch over on the weak side to try to block some shot late.

 

I think we did not make the playoff due to a variety of reasons such as:

- We did not adjust well to the zone defence and still primarily stick with ISO in a lot of games. It is difficulty to rely solely on ISO when the other team is playing zone defence.

- Yao has not participated in the pre-season training. So, we have not designed much plays involving Yao nor had not defined the roles for other players. When we were forced to play Yao, we relied on simple plays. That worked if we could pass the ball to Yao. Later, when we adjusted slightly and got the ball to Yao, the other teams realized the importance of double or treble teaming Yao most of the time. So, we still have the problem - not only passing the ball to Yao but also helping Yao to cope with that.

- Rudy was sick at the critical moment. It was still Rudy's team even though Larry took over. Although Larry might want to play a different system, the team did not respond either Larry had no control of the team or simply not adequate practice to adjust the team.

Poor luck. Let's try again next season and hope a better fate.