How much longer do players such as Horry and Grant have? A couple of simi productive years at best? How about Shaq? He is almost strictly a post up player that depends on physical strenth to dominate. How long till he starts to show some wear and tear? By the time players like Curry, Diop and Brown start to mature we will see if Shaq starts to loose some of his polish. ------------------
Bulk or Tall won't make much of a difference. What we need is a scorer, but given the question and given the fact this is about Shaq, I'd take tall and agile. Shaq would then be forced to rely on sheer power cause he doesn't have any arc on his shot. If you go with bulk I think you'd be hard pressed to find a big guy with his quickness, and even if you did, how do you stop shaqs little hook shot. You need height to make him nervous. ------------------ humble, but hungry. [This message has been edited by PhiSlammaJamma (edited June 14, 2001).]
The problem presented by Shaq is that he is a freak of nature. He is so big and so strong, that even the likes of Thomas "two sandwiches" Hamilton or Sabonis can do little to stop him. Ditto Mutombo, and just about everyone else. You can't get to the finals without getting past him, but you can't build your team exclusively to beat him. Rudy and Carroll have to be thinking that it will be at least two to three more years before the Rockets can contend for the Western Championship. So you build to beat the other 27 teams in the league. If Kelvin Cato had ever lived up to his tremendous defensive potential, this team would be in pretty good shape. But he didn't. So that leaves us with a need for other big men who can play defense and compliment this youthful team. I still like the idea of at least one good, big Veteran who can play 24-30 mpg, so that means Dream and/or one other vet. It also means at least one young guy to groom. As far as Shaq goes, since the league is going to let him commit offensive fouls every possession, you have to be able to throw at least three big bodies at him per game. And it means hacking him. He cannot be defended in a legitimate sense, because he is not called for most of his offensive fouls. I like CWebb, but do not consider him to be the catch at $15 mil that some do. Personally, I feel that having a defense at the five which would include Dream, Sabonis and Davis would be money better spent. Hopefully, we keep Dream at about 6-7 mil. Davis sounds like he is gone elsewhere. Who knows where Sabonis will be, but it won't be Portland. He might get 4-5 mil a year. So add a new seven footer who can run the floor and play decent D, and you have a three man tandem that might be able to give us a credible post presence 48 minutes a game. Considering that we had about 30% of the minutes at the five played by power forwards this past year, it is amazing we won 45 games. And none of the power forwards played good D in the 4 spot, much less the 5. But, yeah, size counts, and we need more of it. ------------------
HonestAbe: cisse hired an agent. he cannot pull out of the draft now, despite the reports just NOW coming out about his previously torn ACL. too bad. but i'd take a late pick on him. just like randy livingston.
High schoolers can't pull out period. He is ineligible for NCAA Division I basketball just because he declared. Maybe he could play DII or III. Anyone know? ------------------ Time is a great teacher-- only problem is it kills all its pupils.
