Whaaat? He threw TMac's team(s) under the bus. Oh no! Yao called out a teammate? Oh no! Heh Well, I remember when Tracy got here and said all the right things. We see where that got him with the fan base.
Solid post. To me, effort comes on the defensive end. Watch Shane and Ron for 5 minutes, and you can clearly see the effort not being put out by Tracy on that end. Take the Celtics for example; Have you seen the defense that Paul Pierce and Ray Allen play? By no means are they great defenders, but the effort and will are clearly visible. This entire year, and stretches throughout his entire career, have shown me that he does not truly care like a Kobe/Mike/Bird/Charles etc care. He is just as talented and even better in some ways than those players. His love of the game, his will, and his passion on the floor have always been suspect, and are without a doubt lightyears behind real "max money" players. This quote encompasses Tracy. "Hard work beats talent when talent does not work hard"
This debate has two contexts -- as individual player skill-sets and as team player skill-sets. Obviously, the first is no good without the second, as has been pointed out. And as Chuck Hayes demonstrated last night, the second CAN be good without the first being great. IMO what has hampered T-mac the most is the media attention that goes with having gifted individual skills. The NBA is a business and wastes no time in creating it's marketable personas into "superstars". It can be very hard to handle. Some become obnoxious (see Kobe Bryant, past tense). But most find it hard not to buy into the implication that "they are the team" or "the team is built around me". In this respect, Yao's cultural imprint has been a blessing. At one time or another I have found 90%+ superstars to be obnoxious. I think the "it's MY team" mentality is hard to transcend. So far Artest is resisting it. But... ...there's always a concern when a player says that a LeBron James is only a "newer version of me." It just shows how hard that tendancy of "my importance" to the team is to shake. In reality, we as observers know that it DOES take a player or two with special skills/talent to get to championship level. The problem for the players is to not buy in to the hype that goes with it. The Rockets are enjoyable to watch right now because there are only 2-3 players that have more of a "me" tendancy than a "team" tendancy; Artest being one. So far he has kept it in check, or has been kept in check; whichever the case may be. And at least verbally, last night, Ron kept "team" up front. And I hope the "team" will validate the words. Right now, they are on a path to do so. Let's see if they can stay on it.
I care about the title, but I also care about the effort the team is displaying....because you clearly can't win the title every year. It kind of reminds me of that movie with Shaq, Penny, Nolte, etc (was it "The Program"?). At the end Nolte was saying his best team was the talent devoid one he had the year before, because even though they didn't win every game they always competed and gave it their all. I like teams like that. I like players like that. T-Mac was a great player, and I can't think of too many who could have carried us in the past two seasons when Yao went down. But just like we call our Karla Malone for not stepping up when it matters, or David Robinson, or Dirk....we have to do the same with McGrady. If he doesn't shoot under 40% we beat Utah in 07. 6-9 superstar wings have no excuse to get shut down against PG's. "Superstar" players don't go through streaks of not scoring in the clutch, as to where folks are running stats showing how abysmal their 4th quarters are. They don't go silent for the 2nd halves of closeout games. I call a spade a spade. T-Mac was a great player but not necessarily the guy you wanna go to war with when the going gets tough. Not every superstar player was a clutch player. He isn't the first.... T-Mac and Artest help teams in different ways. So again, do you think a player that is great offensively but avg at best defensively > than a player who is pretty good on both sides of the ball? And also note when we really, REALLY needed T-Mac to be great when we had a shot to advance....he was once and wasn't twice (yes, this is athletics so if ya can't stay healthy it counts as a loss as well). I'm not counting last year because we really had no shot.
the answer is yes & no. See tracy is like a leader of points. But RON RON he likes to do alot of dirty work.
It doesn't matter which one of the pair you want to blame, it boils down to they do not work with each other and what are you going to do about it? One of them's got to go, and it's pretty clear that the decision has been made to go with Yao.
No it isn't, it is both of them, their games do not match, well. And Tmac is a lot more of a problem than Yao is......because he is more dependent on NEEDING the ball. I did not know Ron would fit in with Yao so well, I will happily concede that point. I did know that Ron and Tracy wouldn't fit....and that Tracy and Yao were not fitting that well. DD
t-mac is better than artest when he's HEALTHY, matter fact, he's better than most of the allstars when he's healthy. i can't really say artest is better than t-mac, but he does fit into adelman's system a lot better, but he's right up there.
I agree, Ron Artest has played well recently. Much of that may be because tmac went down with the injury. However, it was clear before that Ron Artest and Tmac are 2 players who need a good chunk of time with the ball on offense. They both do similar things in a different fashion. The reason why Paul Pierce and Ray Allen fit so well is because Ray Allen is at his best without the ball. Paul Pierce, like Tmac and Artest are best with the ball in their hands in isolations, pick n' rolls, and post ups. You can't have 2 guys who do that on the same team with Yao. There simply will not be enough shots to go around. with that being said, this year Tmac was seriously limited as far as his mobility and explosiveness goes. He was hurt. That was it. when you are hurt, you can't be the same player, especially an athletic player like Tmac. People seem to forget real easily how much Tmac had to carry the Rockets by himself here. 2005, Yao was not the consistent, dominant Yao. Tmac took a lot of shots because of that(which is why his fg% was low). He was the only creator on the team until Mike James got there late in the season. In the playoffs, he averaged 30 ppg, 8 rpg, and 7 apg. 2006, Tmac and Yao were both injured and there were some bad offseason moves, which never really gave the Rockets a chance. tmac and Yao still played well however when they were able to play. 2007, tmac still had back problems, so he made sure a much improved Yao was getting touches. yao was averaging 25 ppg, 10 rpg, and 2 bpg. He was playing at a near MVP type level. However, Yao went down with a devastating knee injury which sidelined him for 2 months during the season. tmac stepped up his game, averaging 28 ppg, while leading a starting lineup of mutombo, Juwan Howard, battier, and Alston and a bench of head, Lucas jr. , and hayes, to a 20-12 record without Yao. Tmac was playing at an MVP level during this stretch. Yao came back, but was never the same as he was pre-injury. He was still good, but struggled with his mobility. They made it to the playoffs, and game 3 told the story. Only 4 players scored for the Rockets, with Tmac and Yao scoring 51 of the 67 total points by the Rockets. Tmac and Yao carried that team for 7 games. In Game 5 Tmac had 26 points nad 16 assists and in game 7 he had 29 points and 13 assists. There was not much more you could ask of Tmac in that series. He says he was tired, and I believe him. The Jazz will beat you up for 48 minutes every game. With Tmac being the only playmaker, he took that beating along with Yao, and at the end of the day, you can't win playing 2 on 5. The Jazz were just a much deeper team. in 2008, Tmac got off to a great start. Then the injuries started coming, and he had to sit for awhile. The Rockets struggled, but then he came back, and by February the team began to click. They won 12 games in a row with the entire team playing great. It was no longer just Tmac and Yao, but they were leading the way. then, Yao goes down with the injury which ended his season. Tmac still helped lead the Rockets to a 22 game winning streak. we faced Utah once again, but even with our improved depth, it was no match for Utah, especially with Rafer only able to play 3.5 games and Battier being limited. Scola gave Tmac some help, but it wasn't enough. Game 6 told the story as Tmac had 40 points, 10 rebounds, and 5 assists (while he was hurt), but the Rockets still lost by 22 points. In all honesty, Tmac has had one real shot at winning, which was in 2007, and we lost that in game 7 by 4 points to a much deeper team. its too much to ask one guy to do this much for you and still expect to win, yet we win 50 + games 3/4 years, and we went to 7 games twice, but lost. And last year, in series we should've been swept in (due to injuries), but a hurt Tmac still managed to carry us to a 6th game. I know people are frustrated with him, but the man did carry the Rockets for 4 years. whether you want to admit it or not, its the truth. Yao will say it, JVG will say it, and RA will say it. Ask anybody who played with him here. Tmac did about as much as he could with as little talent and the amount of injuries he and the team have had. Its not fair to forget how good Tmac was for us the last 4 years.
I disagree, tmac and Yao ran the pick and roll to perfection, especially against UTAH. They combined for most of the points, Rockets just did not have anybody else step up. Right now, Artest does not really work well with Yao in specific. Moreover, Yao himself says that he'd rather have tmac pass him the ball than anybody else. So i don't agree with that.
It is not just about Tmac, but what you just said...as well.....A Yao centric team has him concentrated on the post and then everyone else feeding off of him. Whereas a TMac centric team has everyone waiting on him to make his move and set up his teamates. One has a focus on a player but anyone can make a play, the other has a focus on the player and only he makes a play. That is the difference. DD
with a not working well Artest and a missing-TMAC Yao, the team record is ridiculously good. It sounds strange.
In response to that, everybody counts out the Rockets right now because they do not have a closer. As good as Ron Artest is, he does not have one attribute that makes him unstoppable. He makes his threes but most of them are when he's open. He's rarely double teamed, most players play him one on one. When Yao does miss, continually make turnovers, or is in foul trouble, as he is usually, the Rockets are stuck. What happens almost always at the begginning of the fourth quarter. Yao is good, don't get my wrong. He carries this team. But when the time comes towards the end of the game and Yao is not producing, Artest cannot handle end of game double teams, pressure, and intense defense (double teams). Thats when TMAC proves to be one of the best players in the NBA. He can handle double team, be a driving force, post up force, spot up jumper force. Many coaches admit, that TMAC is one of the hardest players to guard. Much like Kobe. Artest does not have such skill. TMAC fitted in better with this team than Ron ARtest. Right now ARtest fits in because he is shooting 55+% from 3. The moment he goes in a slump, what will happen to artest? He'll bulldoze his way to the rim and throw up a prayer and miss? Thats what I saw earlier on in the season. ARtest is making his three's, thats why he is fitting in. TMAC doesn't have to make threes, he can take it to the rack, post-up much more efficiently, and not to mention manage the system far better. Again he was the leading assiter, him and alston. He is the best passer in our system. Tmac agreed to feeding Yao the ball and did so, but when time can when Yao was tiered, not producing, or in foul trouble, tmac could step up and become an even more unstoppable force than artest. And tmac was the best defender come playoff time, because like an ALL STAR HE ELEVATES HIS GAME COME PLAYOFF TIME. Artest has not done such in his past years. In indiana it was always miller, o'neal, and the team as a whole. In sacremento it was bonzi, and bibby. This is because intense defense in playoff times restrict ARtest's game. No one, NO ONE can guard a healthy TMAC. He's as unstoppable as Kobe, Lebron, and Wade. We just forget that because of his current year performance. You give the same injury to wade, lebron, and kobe and I wanna see where they go. Tmac fits the system better than anyone, proves why he carried the team to 22 wins. This was before aaron, vafer, and barry played half as good as they do now.
You are right that the Jazz were a deeper team....but if T-Mac plays like a superstar we win that series, period. Folks keep saying he didn't have enough help and gloss over the fact that he shot under 40% against a matchup that a superstar wing should have dominated. When I think of recent teams that struggle to stop big, athletic wings...the two that come to mind immediately are the Utah Jazz and the Dallas Mavericks. It's the same situation with Karla Malone losing to MJ in the Finals twice. Yeah, the Bulls had more talent...but when you look at that series you will note the Jazz usually won when Malone played like a superstar and lost when he played like garbage. Role players and scrubs are shaky. Superstars are not supposed to be. T0 T-Mac's credit, he wasn't shaky until after the Mav series.
Where was this T-Mac in the 2007 postseason? The player you just described doesn't shoot sub 40% while being checked by a 6-2 PG and AK-47. To clarify, I think T-Mac used to be that player...and was in his first season here...but not thereafter. That T-Mac is gone....
Artest is the better player, no contest. He takes full advantage of his God given talent, Tracy does not so there you go !!
If you cant value his performance last post season, you don't know basketball. First, UTAH is the MOST physical team second, Tmac had nobody around him, not even Alston for the first 2 games. Third, Tmac carried the team, and was still unstoppable pushing that series to 6 games. Forth, if you want to compare it to Kobe compare his lakers w/o gasol to the suns for two straight seasons. They didn't get anywhere either. Wade right now w/o any post prescense went no where. Lebron has a decent post prescense, w/ Illgaskus and not to mention the east was crap besides Detroit. What I am trying to say is tht none of these Superstars carried there team to 22 game win streak. But you supplement Tmac w/ artest, and I just don't see anything close to that happening. Tmac was a warrior last playoff series. Besides the fact that his shoulder and knee needed medical attention. Don't forget this microfracture injury was also in its early stages existent in last year's playoff series. Seriously man, I respect your other posts and views, but I don't think this argument is credible.
QFT. Look at the scoring since T-Mac went out--it's extremely balanced. When the Rockets are doing a good job of running the offense they get five or six guys in double figures.
