No way! Sarunas was MUCH better. Much better outside shooter and a great finisher. Seems like he could always get to the line. He was just a flat-out scorer...I wouldn't put that tag on Ginobili -- he's more of a utility guy I'd say. What ever happened to SM? Seems like he may have faded fast.
The World Championships where the USA finished 6th? I know Ginobili played well there, but it is also a different league. Maybe it does mean he's good, but I can't really tell. I'm just saying he doesn't have an NBA track record where we can compare apples to apples.
And Rudy's plan was to sign Mo Taylor to a ridiculous contract because they were afraid to loose him, and signing an average back up point to a multi million dollar contract and a broken down Glenn Rice who is a good piece but he never plays. Oh yeah, and Cato. Come on TheFreak, this is even something you can't defend Rudy on. Just think how this team would have been if it wasn't LUCKY enough to get Yao Ming. The Spurs have done exactly what the Rockets did with Hakeem during the championship years, unfortunately, they can't do it with Ming because of several bad contracts.
If Yao Ming becomes as good as Duncan, I don't see why they can't do what the Spurs did. The Spurs plugged in some cheap role-players to play off the strengths of Tim Duncan and to play some defense. You don't need cap money for that.
Kelvin Cato should be making the minimum! I can't believe he makes 7 million a year...why the heck did we pay him that much? The Spurs are good because they have a balance of veterans and mentors and young players. And of course....THEY HAVE TIM DUNCAN! He makes everyone around him better! I think Yao could do the same thing as Duncan....but not as good.
Actually 3 years I remember going to the Rox vs New Jersey. I remember Stephen Jackson Van Horn, and Marbury were killing us the whole game but we won.
If Yao was as good as Duncan, we would have another title right now. As much as everyone including myself loves Yao, I've yet to see even the potential of Yao being that good.
If the timeline for Ming approaching the level of Duncan is near (2004 - 2005 season or 2005 -2006 season) and they find some suitable role players at reasonable salaries, what happens to the <b>expensive</b> role players currently on the payroll? How many <i>Steve Smith</i> players can a team carry before it becomes unwieldy?
I don't understand the comparison either. If Yao starts putting up 18 and 12 numbers next year then maybe. At age 22, he's still young and has a lot of potential but you can't compare him to Duncan now. People assume Yao will increase his strength and stamina. Strength maybe but stamina, I'm not sure. That will be the key.
I should have said if "Yao becomes that good". But even he doesn't, the Rockets were still lucky to get him.
The mistake was trying to build around Francis. But that's pure hindsight. It was amazing work for them to be able to nab a player like that. Not many could have turned down that opportunity. Guys like Mo Taylor and Cato are adequate enough supporting pieces. They just don't have a player as good as Duncan to make them look decent like Malik Rose, Parker, Ginobili, etc. do. The Rockets without Ming have a much brighter future than the Spurs without Duncan. That's crazy. Contracts are not holding the Rockets back at all. If Ming becomes dominate, the players the Rockets have around him will be good enough to get the job done. There's nothing special about Parker, Bowen, and Stephen Jackson. You can always acquire little pieces here and there. It's getting that best player that's good enough to take you places that's the hard part. Of course the Rockets were lucky too. But the Spurs aren't as shrewd as people make them out to be. They basically have Duncan and a bunch of scrubs. They may not be paying them all that much, but that's because they're not worth that much. Duncan makes them look good.
Malik Rose signed a deal similar to Cato and Taylor. Steve Smith made 10 million this year and didn't play. Danny Ferry made more than Moochie and almost as much as Mobley. The Spurs as a team had a higher payroll than the Rockets this year.
I think the Spurs were incredibly lucky to get the best player -big man to come out in a decade. We may not have seen the best ball from Tim Duncan yet. I really admire Tim Duncan- all class and talent. The Spurs Coach is not the genius their fans like to gloat over- I saw him continually struggle with line ups in the playoffs. The Spurs had much more talent than the Nets overall, the Mavericks in the middle. The Spurs would be absolutely nothin without Tim Duncan. It would be so funny if Duncan decided to move to another team-will not happen though.... I hope the Spurs make a deal for Jason Kidd at 30 years old plus, and pass on Jermaine O'Neill.
The contracts of Smith, Ferry, and Robinson expire this year. Even if they had a higher payroll, they set themselves up to reload and bring in another franchise player next year. I consider that good planning.
I understand eerything you say, but the difference is, the Spurs were looking forward to this summer. When Derek Anderson wanted 7 yrs at 6 mill a yr for a guy with injury history, the balked and traded him for a veteran who's contract expire after this season. When Smith wanted a extension. they balked because they were looking forward to this summer. Even when the SA's icon negotiated the contract, they set it up for this summer. Here is something to think about: A few yrs back, they Knicks were in a similar situation with Ewing. They could have had Ewings 16mill coming off the books and found them a player to go along with Spreewell and Houston who didn't have big contracts at the time. Instead, they traded Ewing and his contract for fillers like Glen Rice and someone else even though they already had Spree and Houston. I agree it has something to do with luck, but it also has a lot to do with planning. Orlando traded away picks,players, and salaries to go get 2 max type players in Hill and Mcgrady. They wanted Dunca then hill, but when he resigned they settled for McGrady. Eventhough Hill hasn't stayed healthy, at the time he was a top ten player in the league and getting ready to enter his prime with a up and coming stud in McGrady. Realistically the Rox have done good and bad in the rebuilding process. They got Francis and Mobley for the backcourt, the problems they have had was over paying for role players and give long term deals. To be fair, the Rockets could have offered Taylor,Norris and Hakeem 2 yr deals. Taylor and Norris could have been told either take it or leave it. I think the only players you lock in for long periods oftime is the core players and even then I'm still concerned about them because of injury. Look at the Rockets and see how many player have 6 yr deals. Those long term deals with no escape is where the problem is. If Taylor,Cato and Norris deals were 3 or 4 yrs, teams would mind taking that on before the 6 and 7 yr deals. Draft a plan, and stick to it no matter what , like the Spurs have done.
hey at least we're not paying Maloney, Price, and drew any more. Oh wait we may be. Honestly has anyone noticed that since Patterson left the organization our personnel decisions have been questionable at best. pg - Mooch sg - Maloney sf - Rice Pf - taylor c - Cato Thats my starting 5 most overpaid players in franchise history. I guess we're done paying Maloney, but any coincidence that we're still paying 4 of the 5. With all this said, as much as I hate the above contracts lets not freak out an dump all of our players for cap room. There are plenty of teams that have done that (or tried) and to be honest none of them are in much better position. Lets face it Taylor has a ton of talent (not a big fan of his, the SF mindset in the PF postion is a bad mix), Cato is an above average STARTING center in this league (I hate to admit it because I hate Cato, but the center position is so weak right now). Mobley would be a great Sixth Man. Griffin is just young, (and he's not earning a max contract). His 3pt attempts were down and his 2pt attempts were up, thats promising as were his rebounds (slightly). I hear trade ideas, and don't get me wrong if we get some talent in exchange then EVERYONE except yao (to include francis) is available, but lets not trade just for the sake of getting rid of cap money. I'm pretty interested in seeing what van gundy does with this team (He wasn't my first choice but who knows maybe I was wrong.) Who knows maybe he'll light a fire under either Griffin or Taylor. As I see it 1 of 3 things needs to happen for the rockets to really impove from last year. 1. We need an average to above average PF 2. We need a PG 3. We need a SF That assumes that of course Yao improves. And I think our best chance is for either Griffin or MoT to step up. If MoT would just start to rebound and play D, he's got the size. I don't see us getting a pg (I'm one of those crazy people who thinks we need francis as a 2, [see his assist/turnover ratio]). And I think that maybe we will end up with Posey or Boki (though I confess I haven't really seen anything from boki) at the 3. Basically the point is that at least we are overpaying for some talent (when it comes to MoT and Cato at least). We can win with the roster we've got right now and I would hate to see us trade them for someone who either has no talent, or is old and an injury risk (see Rice). At least when MoT and Cato's contracts expire we'll have Divs on an overpaid player with some game (and we don't have to take them up on it), where as if we just trade him to get more cap space and wind up with an aging vet when his contract expires we've got divs on a retiree. Well that's long enough for me. From what I've seen reciently, I'm sure this message is long enough for those who like to nit pick at the message and point out flawed statements rather than comment on the point of the message. Mike
The spurs had a championship too.. It seems crazy to me that people point out how lucky the spurs are to have Duncan and a few also rans, or that people dogged them for tanking it. I'd have to say that what happened to Robinson was bad enough luck, why not go ahead and sit the whole year out and at least improve your roster the next year.
