YAO is getting better every year. Before his injury this year his average was better and he looked better than previous years. TMAC's abilities are declining due to injury. He is not as explosive as he used to be and I doubt we can expect another repeat of last years playoff performance. One arrow is going up the other is down, and the rest of our team is built around these two guys. Will YAO's game improve enough within the time TMAC has left (as one of the great ones) to be a true contender? I guess the real question is when do you think YAO will peak and when that time comes will TMAC be a shell of his former self? These back problems are chronic and not going anywhere.
I think the key for a Championship title by TMAC & YAO is not the 2 gentlemen here but more on the role players around them. Even with his back problem, TMAC is still killing other teams.
The key is one guy who can take the load off. A 3rd option. Our stars are not shaq and kobe. They need some backup that isn't 35 years old and going.
Are you guys talking about a 3rd weapon on offense? I thought the thinking was to get perimeter shooters and take advantage of the double teams on our 2 guys. What position will the 3rd option come from?
ya our third option is gonna come from open 3s all over the place. i mean come on..we gonna demand a double on yao or tracy or both. our pg and sg should be lined up at the 3 line ready to fire.
The ONLY thing preventing us from winning a championship is the maturation of Yao and the health of TMac. This team will go as far as our two stars takes us. Virtually all championship teams are defined by the superstar ...not the role players. Who has the BEST player on the court on that night is almost always the winner. Better role players and/or a thrid scoring option would be nice but not mandetory. Superstar players rise to whatever the occasion.
i agree, but it's also impossible to do it yourself. everyone that posted so far has made a good point: we need a 3rd scoring option. even shaq and kobe had glen rice for thier first championship. we need shooters. head was a step in the right direction. i can see him replacing wesley as the stating 2, but we need more than just head and tmac hitting 3's. we also need better defense. our guards can't stop anyone from getting in the paint. our PF's can't guard anyone, even though they can rebound and score fairly well. those 3 things will bring us a championship for sure.
Obviously anyone that thinks Tmac performance last year was a fluke needs to go watch tapes of the guy. The guy dominates playoff games his back is his back he still goes out and is avg. 27+ pts a game for the season and that is with a bad back..So with a bad back hes avg. more pts. and more rebounds this year than last year. I hate when people try to take away from Tmac when its a problem hes dealt with since high school, he'll live with it and guys if we make it to the playoffs this year wait till you see him in action. I think the people who talk bad about his back havent seen tmac play but in a Rox uni. The guy scored 62 pts in a game once he will take us to the promised land I say 5 years of greatness left maybe more depending on how he thinks his back is in 4 yrs.
Three words: better role players. You guys are right, a third option, a shooter, a taller guard who can defend. These qualities could all be in one person. Most of us thought this might be Derek Anderson, but he was horrible most of the time he played and he can't stay on the floor. How many of you believe that Head and Hayes are part of this team's future? The team just seems to do better when Hayes is on the floor. Head needs alot of work, but could be special. He needs a mid-range jumper and to work on his defense. He has a knack for stealing the ball.
Just to remind everyone that the last time we won a Championship we had our two STARS in Hakeem and Drexler but we also had role players that were a threat to score if they had the ball- Smith, Horry,Cassel,Ellie etc So we not only need the 3rd option like everyone is talking about but we need role players that can perform when called upon to do so.
that's why a top draft pick in this upcoming draft would be ideal. i don't see yao improving enough to offset t-mac's eventual decline. you can't expect to find someone to fill the 3rd option role with the MLE. it's not happening.
I'm quite impressed by your opticism. However, I don't think that it is appropriate to talk about winning an NBA title when your team is in the last place of the Western Conference.
am sure not the only one here who believe that it was the injuries that caused us the current position. If both of them are healthy, I cannot see why we are not in the 4th or even higher position now.
Hard to tyell when T-MAC has to spend all his energy trying to make these chumps put up one successful fieldgoal.
if we had someone like tony parker on our team then we could be a real contender. yao and t-mac are not enough.
Odds are against this team ever winning a championship, its exceedingly difficult for a team to assemble all the pieces it needs to even get to the finals let alone win it. Someone wrote in a thread that other NBA teams are stacked with great athletic players and that we needed an infusion of talent to match these teams and I agree. What makes it even more difficult for us is Les is unwilling to bust the cap like Miami or the Kniicks and we don't have a collection of players like Miami or the Suns where the team can be reworked over again till you get the right collection of players to contend for that championship so we need to get lucky in the draft, get lucky be trading for an underachiever like Darko and hope he blossoms here. I would love to see what Colangelo or Dumars would do with this team.
I guarantee it. S#@t man, look at us right now, won 4 in a row, 6 games out of playoff contention right now, with everyong starting to come back from injuries. If we win on wed. we are 5 games out with just under half the season left to go. Dallas and the other top seeded teams need to start getting worried again, especially in Dallas, cause we are just a few weeks off from being the team everyone thought we would be at the beginning of the year.
