Do yall think Hakeem will retire at the end of the season?

I'll give you $17 million reasons why he'll play next year.

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Ciao!

 

I want him to finish out his contract for two reasons.

1.) I am selfish, and I want to keep watching him play for as long as I can.

2.) If he retires his contract still counts against the Rockets cap space, if I'm not mistaken.

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I really do believe he'll want to come back and finish his career on a better note than, what this season has produced.

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I have a dream.........his name's Hakeem.

 

Who knows but it will probably depend on

*How he plays this season
*If the team improves with himself, cato and tmass in the line-up this season
*Offseason improvement that CD can make, via draft, FA and trades
*Money
*Loyalty

 

"If he retires his contract still counts against the Rockets cap space, if I'm not mistaken."

You are not mistaken DREAMer. He will count even if he retires. He might as well play and get his 17 million bones.

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Tanking is not acceptable. End of story.




[This message has been edited by RocketsPimp (edited January 13, 2000).]

 

I believe in a recent article Hakeem discussed that he was planning on retiring after this season, going out with Chuck.

That was until Chuck got injured.

 

Hakeem will DEFINITELY retire at the end of this season.

1) Several different reports have already stated that he will attempt to buy out his contract at the end of the season.

2) Hakeem is as we all know now very rich, and the need for more money is no longer the main goal in his life.

3) Hakeem is on the now deep on the downward spiral of his career. His game gets worse now every year.

4) Charles is gone and with it the superstar power to contend.

5) Hakeem has already been forgotten about relatively because he has Cato now as his obvious replacement.

6) Hakeem has accomplished all he has set out to do and hope to do.

So the best question is what is his inspiration to stay in this league? My belief is that inspiration has already run out.

And also I want to say that his hastening his retirement is good for this team. We are team begining to rebuild and him staying only complicates because due to his legend he must be accomodated specially on the team. It also gives the fans and team illusions that the Rockets can still compete.

 

A few Sundays ago, the Chronicle had a big article on Hakeem and his future plans. In the article Hakeem said that he was definetly going to play next year. He sounded pretty determined.

Here's a couple of the quotes:

"So at halftime of Tuesday's game with the New York Knicks, Olajuwon met again with Tomjanovich and informed the coach of his decision to play out his contract, to do everything to help the Rockets out of their current situation."

"I am going to play next season and I would like it to come to an end in Houston. It would be 17 years, all here, the way it should be."

 

CS, I don't think you have it quite right on point #1. He said he had explored the option of a buy-out last summer so that he could end his career at the same time as Barkley. But he didn't do the buy-out and now with Barkley out early, the point of doing it seems lost.

I think he'll want to play out his contract for two reasons:

(1) He likes to play basketball.

(2) As a Muslim, he considers his contract binding. Though he has the option of retiring before the contract runs out, he feels that it would be breaking his promise to the Rockets if he did so without a buy-out. I suspect he doesn't even sit well with the buy-out situation. I'm basing this point on a vaguely-remembered article in the Chronicle from almost a year ago.

Besides, I think it will be better for the Rockets if Dream could ease them into the next era instead of just plunking them down into it. Of course, he might screw up our lottery hopes.

 

I argued vehemently and somewhat lucidly last summer that Hakeem should retire. It really hurt to see him badly outplayed, as I feel he was in the first round of the playoffs.

I argued and argued, typed my fingers off, and made dozens... OK, at least two... good points as to why I was right.

It was then quietly and politely pointed out to me that even if Hakeem retires, we're basically paying him anyway. He does indeed count against our cap. So, we have the choice of paying Hakeem $17 million to play (which he'll still do better than roughly 23 of the starting centers in the league), or paying him $17 million to do his Walt Williams impression and contribute diddly.

He'll be back.