Tracy is not everyone's favorite person, including myself, but we shouldn’t deny his floor vision, length, ball-handling and basketball IQ improves the team. That in an essence is making the team better. Take the name away and a player like that certainly helps as long as he's not averaging 20 shots a game. Winning a championship as the primary player is another story though. I don’t think we can say that about anyone on the team. Too many what ifs and not enough results (substaining health, mental weakness, injury toll) from both McGrady and Yao.
Is "dominating the ball" the latest hip criticism when it comes to McGrady? Name me one great PG or point forward (anyone considered a playmaker) that doesn't dominate the ball. We'd actually want him to "dominate" the ball so he can take care of the ball-handling responsibilities instead of guys like Ariza and Battier who wouldn't be able to do anything with the ball other than passing or shooting. This motion offense is going to win us games because of the players, not necessarily just the system itself. This is one of the best supporting casts in basketball. Team this cast up with a healthy T-Mac and we're playoff bound and then some. Brooks is playing well, but his history is full of inconsistency. What happens when he hits a wall and he gets in a shooting slump? Then he's pretty much useless, unlike McGrady who can be a huge part of the offense even if he's shooting poorly. Scola? We already know what he can do when he's leading the frontcourt from international basketball. He can dominate that league, but the superior height and athleticism of opponents give him trouble in the NBA. I like Scola as the 2nd/3rd guy on the team that can focus on rebounding like he did vs Utah. You think this season is just some sort of experiment to develop players? That's what the D-league is for. Morey absolutely believes this is a playoff team especially with McGrady playing. Developing the young guys is one goal we want to accomplish, but winning is still the #1 priority. The coaches and players will welcome T-Mac back with open arms, unlike the majority of bashers here.
1) in a JVG halfcourt offense, would you imagine chuck hayes being of any use? he was the only player on our team who got chuck hayes EASY (i mean point blank buckets. how about a broken down sura or wesley on the offensive end? both averaged double digits in mcgrady's first year. 2) what is shane's best year in houston? 06-07, the same year tracy averaged his most assists. shane shot 42% from 3s that year and averaged 10.1 points. his offensive production has gotten down as tracy has gotten more injured. shane's #s are finally back up a little bit b/c we play a faster paced offense. i mean, tracy gets shane shots in a way shane is able to catch the ball, look at the ball, read the spalding label, and then shoot. 3) he gets guys OPEN shots. he's doing what aaron brooks is doing but v. tougher defenses and in a HALFCOURT offense. to average 6+ assists in a halfcourt offense is pretty amazing for a 6'8 player (in a JVG-offense mind you). the only other player who has done that in recent years is the best player in the league, lebron james. 4) here's an amazing stat. we all know we had subpar offensive talent under JVG and tracy was our best player in those years, but LOOKING AT THE STATS (i know it doesn't say everything) - despite playing a much slower tempo, we put up 96 and 97 points per game in 04-05 and 06-07. our points per game under adelman the last 2 years were 97 and 98 points per game. say whether tracy dominates teh ball or not, he did make others better or else we wouldn't score the ball a lick. - look at the postseason last year alone tells a lot. without mcgrady's playmaking (WHEN HEALTHY), we averaged 91.8 points. that's beyond HORRIFIC. even adelman was complaining how tracy would MAKE others better if he was playing. 5) and from the stat guru himself, daryl morey. he has claimed MANY times that in the past few years (excluding last year), tracy led the league in getting his teammates easy points or something to that nature. DARYL MOREY keeps those stats. or you can ask guys like JVG, adelman, morey, pop, george karl, jerry sloan. those guys have gone on record to say tracy is one of the best playmakers in the game.
tracy does need to adjust to this team when he gets back and that won't be a problem. he adjusted to trigger our 22 game winning, and he'll do the same. i agree he has to find ways to be much more efficient, and i think AB's emergence will help him. with AB's play right now: 1) no longer does adelman need tracy to create from the top of the key. that was necessary before b/c we had rafer alston. 2) without yao, we can utilize tracy as a post presence (either low/mid/high). beleive it or not, he can be one of our top 2 options down there along with scola. that alone will make tracy a much more efficient player b/c it utilizes his great midrange game (and he does have one) and puts him closer to the basket. 3) it'll reduce his responsibilities. no longer will tracy have the ball in his hands every single play with every player dependent on his playmaking. AB is as good of a playmaker as anyone in the L right now.
The Rockets will have Yao another season no matter what, which makes his situation different than McGrady's. Plus, think back to game 1 last year against the Lakers. Then think about about game 2 with about 8-9 mins left before Ron Ron started acting stupid. To this day, I think the Rockets would have won if Idiot-head hadn't acted up. The Lakers had lost their confidence and were ready to fall, but Ron made himself the center of attention, fired up Kobe and the rest is history. Yao can fit on an Adelman team. McGrady will not IMO, primarily because of his lack of toughness and hustle. I'm not a hater, but McGrady needs to get out of Dodge. To who mentioned it before: Why do you think McGrady will be back here next year? Just curious. I don't have any inside info, but I think the Rockets can't wait to cut him loose.
You are entitled to your opinion, but I don't think the coaches and players want McGrady back. Of course the Rockets will try to win as much as possible because the players they have will give full effort. Yes, this season is an experiment. The Rockets will take a full-season look at AB, Scola, Ariza, (maybe) Landry, Budinger and all of their rotation players. Some will be keepers; others may need to go. That is more important than a couple of wins here and there. If the Rockets are competing for a playoff spot mid to late season, then their final record will take on more importance. But giving playing time to McGrady when it's very unlikely he returns doesn't make much sense. Especially since he will likely play with a high degree of caution, unlike the other Rockets. I think you are making a big mistake in thinking McGrady will be an impact player this year. T-Mac is gone. Whatever McGrady emerges this season won't command nearly the attention T-Mac used to. Have you thought about that? The first-step quickness, overall speed, hops and athleticism will be diminished.
The win steak started while he was away from the team so he didn't trigger anything. I am not sure how you can say for certainty that he can adjust. He's coming off microfracture surgery and even in the win streak 2 seasons ago he was shooting the ball a lot during a shooting slump. I'm not sure there is any history you can draw from that shows him having Yao-like shot attempt averages for a significant stretch. I'll believe it when I see it and I'm not going to put my hand in the fire just because of how well Arenas is showing and connect the dots like a few have done. It took Arenas almost two seasons of delays to get where he could substain it ... his comeback started way before this summer. Wade too, the season their team got Beasley was not pretty. People forget that. It's only natural that there will be hiccups. The issue is ... is it worth it? If the team plans to resign him then the answer should be yes. But if there is doubt, then I can certainly understand those worried about hindering the development of the players now on the court.
i agree with those who say we need to trade him b/c the team is going in a different direction. yao and tracy cannot play the adelman offense completely b/c both are preferentially halfcourt players remember, tracy was injured that year and had to suck it up when yao went down. but let's also not forget the offensive efficiency was sky high WITH tracy for a long period of time. hopefully he can adjust again to what we are doing and fit in, if he still remains with the team. the thing with arenas was he came back early multiple times, just like mcgrady did last year. tracy is actually taking his time this time so we'll see the results.
Oh ... here we go again. We've certainly never been through this before. Team starts to play well, and the popular talk becomes how they can succeed without McGrady. Or Yao gets injured and then the popular talk becomes how the Rockets don't need Yao to succeed. Surely the past few years have taught us nothing. This BBS is like a freaking broken record. Year in, year out.
of course those guys would make us a much more formidable team. but they're always injured, and getting up there in age. we don't know what tracy can still do when he returns. and we know for sure yao ming is not going to play more than 30 minutes a game or handle the offensive load he used to. what we have shown is we can be extremely competitive without those guys. and it's time to look forward (which les isn't by sticking with yao) and see what stars we can bring in to fit adelman's offense. i don't know how we can do that, but that's why they pay morey the big bucks.
Excess talent is never a bad thing to have. It is a fallacy to say "we can be competitive without this guy, ergo, we don't need him". The ultimate goal is not to be merely "competitive".
Because Leslie Alexander is in love with him. Why do you think the Rockets "can't wait" to cut him loose? Please give me facts and not speculation.
There is plenty of speculation here and always will be. This is a fan forum. If you have "facts" proving Leslie Alexander "loves" McGrady, please feel free to share them. If you don't, then your speculation is no different than mine. At least I clearly said it was speculation. I think McGrady burnt himself with the organization when he blurted out that he was having season-ending surgery. This was right before the trade deadline and there was trade speculation at the time.
The only reason we are having this talk about McGrady dominating the ball and not playing team ball is because of last season. Take last season away and MOST of us still love McGrady. How would his playmaking ability not help us in our offense? Again, if we forget about last year, and McGrady is healthy, he will easily make our team MUCH MUCH better.
This is just not true, last season was the final straw for a lot of us but we are having this discussion because of his entire history. Some of us have had enough.... Let me explain it this way, while the rest of the team is busy putting their hard hats on and getting to work, Tmac was busy peering over the fence and going "Gosh if I was on Boston, we would have won it all"..... Meanwhile his teamates that he basically just said "Sucked" are putting it together, working hard and making the most of the situation they are given...and they are playing hard on both ends of the floor and playing together. Tracy has always mailed it in during some games, and has even quit in others....his attitude is precisely the reason I am done with him....I hope he gets healthy, I don't wish injury on anyone, but I have seen enough, and heard enough to know that his mindset is one of a perpetual underacheiver. We need to move on as a franchise and a fanbase, IMO. DD
Thats all well and good but it isnt that simple to just "move on". Sure, everyone wants an elite level talent, no one argues that. What is argued is having McGrady instead of nothing. Its silly to think we would be better without him, underacheiver or not.
Well there is the gulf then, I am assuming we trade him for something, from a cash strapped franchise. DD
How? Always? Thats bs. Did McGrady quit when Yao was done for the season when they won 22 in a row? He actually played through that pain (leg and shoulder) and played with all his heart. He went into the playoffs as well draining his knee (PAIN) and basically carrying this team. Yes, it was a loss obviously, but he hasnt quit ALL the time.
