i agree with the mcgrady part. it's funny how fast people forget about the past. when mcgrady was in his prime scoring-wise, he was the best at taking and making incredibly difficult mid-range jumpers. he was a lot better than kobe back then (backed up by watching games and statistics). also, in 04-05, t-mac was incredible at making game decisive shots. he was huge that year and again a lot better than kobe. since then it's obvious that mcgrady has gotten a lot worse with his shot. i don't think the loss of athleticism is the only reason for it because that's not an explanation for why he's gotten worse at shooting free throws as well. i agree. i think it's ridiculous that people think that closers have to shoot the ball all the time. that's the main reason people believe kobe bryant can't do wrong in the clutch. in reality, though, kobe bryant isn't half the clutch player that people think he is. there are two reasons for this fact. a) kobe is a lot worse at making potential game winners than people think (14/56 since 03-04 via 82games). b) kobe always wants to take the last shot by himself because he doesn't trust his teammates (1 assist vs. 56 fga). the ideal clutch player is a guy that needs to be doubled, has the shooting range to make a contested shot from nearly anywhere on the court and is a willing passer when his teammates are in a better scoring position. imho, that's the description of tracy mcgrady prior to this season. i don't know if he can come back to this level, though. on the other hand it's not like the rockets have too many better options regardless. exactly. we have seen so many dumb plays by brooks or artest when their shots weren't falling or yao was fronted. basically you could predict the outcome of a close game by how good or how bad brooks or artest have shot during the game. it would be great to have a guy on the floor again who makes great decisions with the ball in his hands and who is one of the best in the league at getting his teammates high percentage shots. ....if your memory is bad i'm talking about a healthy tracy mcgrady.
game 7 39min 3asts 5t/o game 6 41min 4asts 4t/o game 5 30min 2asts 2t/o game 4 39min 4asts 3t/o game 3 27min 1asts 3t/o game 2 43min 2asts 2t/o game 1 36min 2asts 3t/o those are the minutes played, assists and turnover #'s of ab in the lakers series. i don't see how yao or no yao makes any difference for ab in terms of assists and turnovers. go back and watch the tapes again, yao or scola, ron or landry, ab's passing and turnovers were pretty much the same. with yao out and ab being one of the primary ball handler and scorer, his assist/turnover ratio did not improve at all. actually, in the game where the lakers won, their success came from letting him penetrate and pressuring him once he got inside, and forcing him make a bad decision. i agree that the closer must be a good decision-maker. but that good decision-maker is just not ab. at least not yet. if in a tied game with 6 minutes left in the 4th, the rockets go to ab every play and rely on his decision-making, we'd be doomed.
here is the deal I am in no way a tmac apologist you may label me as a "hater" of sorts thats mainly from the attitude and effort he has displayed the past two seasons. Moreso this season than last season but even then it seemed that Tracy never really bought into Adelman's "equal" offense. BUT there are some things that you cannot simply ignore throughout most of the fourth quarters this year our offense would get stagnant completely and Brooks' speed is an asset but his size is a disadvantage a lot of times he would blow by his defender but still turn the ball over since the help defenders length were too much for him when he tried to kick the ball out. We have seen plenty of times in the past that McGrady has made a lot of correct plays late in games whether its passing the ball out or running a pick and roll with Yao. The Rockets in the playoffs this year especially after Yao went down had too many stretches where they simply couldn't score even though the defense was solid. This team is still lacks a true play maker which McGrady is. I know a lot of people here are still hoping that Brooks becomes that guy but honestly from what I have seen from our PGs I feel that Lowry is much much better as a play maker than Brooks is. I really hope Lowry can develop his 3 ball to become the starting PG. But back to McGrady he would have definitely helped in those situations. In the playoffs there were too many times when Artest went "mcgrady" on us and became a ball stopper. Honestly between the two I would rather have McGrady do that than ron. Looking objectively McGrady is still our greatest offensive threat and right now getting him back healthy is the key. Once he is healthy the team has to look then what to do with him. If he comes back and truly buys into Adelman's system then he will be huge asset for this team next season. If he comes back healthy and tries to go back to wanting to be the offense then he will be moved i believe. I do think that McGrady is that go to guy, while he wasnt necessarily needed in the lakers series as the numbers suggest (though I would say you need to throw out games 4,5,7 since those were blowouts going into the fourth) there were moments in games 2 (especially) and game 3 where having a mcgrady there handle the ball and make some decisions would have changed the outcomes of those games. while the Rockets may have been real close against the lakers unlike in the reg season those games were lost in the fourth quarter when the lakers kept missing due to our defense but we lost the game by taking bad shots (artest) and turning the ball over (everyone on the team) while you can accuse mcgrady of taking bad shots (true) he also creates the easiests baskets for everyone else on the team. my best case scenario is that this injury forces mcgrady to look hard in the mirror at himself and his actions. he has a lot of talent where he can be a huge factor on any team despite his diminished athleticism. maybe when he comes back he realizes that he cant be that top 5 player anymore with his athleticism gone down and is content being a 15-20 ppg threat, but an efficient scorer rather than a volume scorer. clearly the rockets were much much better off this season without the mcgrady of this season, but if we had a healthy (or at least a tmac from two years ago) we would have fared a lot lot better in the playoffs where sometimes you have to rely on the greatness of players carrying a team for stretches instead of a team offense.
First of all we need to be able to get the ball to Yao and since Tmac has been gone it honestly looks like a chore where it seemed to come at ease for Tmac. Not only could he get the ball to Yao but Tmac was able to get Yao the ball where he could easily make a high percentage shot without dribbling where Yao turns it over. There is no excuse though for our guys to just be standing around when they don't have the ball. They definitely need to move without the ball more and do whatever they can to clear the lane. Heck if I'm not mistaken a couple years ago when JVG was still our coach that team with Yao and Tmac were one of the top two teams in points allowed. I honestly think we were a better defensive team then than we were last season. We need to sit and wait it out. Give him a chance to prove he deserves to be in a Rockets uniform this coming season and if it doesn't pan out we can trade him then.
We don't have a go to guy yet. I think where we suffered in the past was that our offense was always structured around revolving around one player, which made it easier for other teams to game plan around taking that option away. One of the reasons Kobe is considered a 4th quarter clutch player is because he doesn't turn up his offense until the second half trying to get other players around him involved and to become legit threats that the opposing team has to take seriously. Most games where Kobe carries the load from start to finish end badly for the Lakers, just like most games McGrady or Artest tried to do the same end badly. The closest thing to a go to guy I thought we had was Scola, but these playoffs have shown me, that he is actually more of a early scorer unless the defense completely forgets about him. I like Brooks as a scoring option but his build puts him at a disadvantage for being the "Go-to" unless its off a turn over or the other team has bad defense. Honestly, if we don't run our entire offense through just Yao, McGrady or whoever so early in games, they could be "Go-to" guys because the other team might not know how to respond to them. That or we find someone that can light it up from off the bench, consistently and play well with the starters as a game closer. But that is no easy order to fill.
More importantly, grow a few inches so he can actually see the court over his defenders and find the open man.
To the guys that are proclaiming that AB is a go-to-guy or can become a go-to-guy... STOP IT. 1) Brooks has been inconsistent since his days in high school and in college. A go-to-guy is first and foremost CONSISTENT . When I say consistent I don't mean he has to score 20+ Points night in and night out although that would be nice and most go-to-guys do that but more importantly every legit go-to-guy is consistent with their shot selection and decision/play making ability. When Brooks is not hitting his shot it seems as though the world is ending in terms of the rest of his play. He starts to make stupid passes, gets out of control and forces things. 2) Brooks is a gimmick player who you play depending on the matchups on the opposing team. This is evidenced by what Adelman does splitting time between he and Lowry. When Brooks is on he looks like he's the next big thing and when he's not he looks like Ultra Lucas. Once again it boils down to consistency. 3) Brooks is a shooting guard trapped in a jockey's body. He's not a point guard and he never will be one. He's very similar to Nate Robinson in NY. A natural scorer rather than creater. Final thought: Brooks is best utilized when he plays alongside another playmaker. Another PG like when Lowry was in the back court with him. He was this way too his senior year in college when Tajuan Porter took over PG reigns and Brooks was free to roam and shoot.
Tmac was great in the past. He is not great anymore....toss him in the dust bin, get us players that can play now. Good career, here is your watch, don't let the door knob hit ya where the good lord split ya. DD
You never konw what will happen once Tmac gets healthy. He's only 30. Unless you get great talent in return, a healthy Tmac will be very helpful.
I would play it smarter than that, play the odds, get something you KNOW is healthy. Guys who are injury prone and in their 30s do not suddenly get more healthy. Tmac's body has betrayed him, get something for him while you can. It is just good sound asset management. DD
People have said the same thing about S. Francis, see the result you got. Francis was around 30 during that time, but never got 100% healthy again. As for TMac, a chance to get healthy is not high, but if he can still play the ball at certain level, that is good for the team to reload him.
Alright DaDakota who do you expect to trade for tmac. honestly... besides his contract, name a team right now that would just be willing to trade their players for guy who hasn't played all of last season. They may give us scraps but I doubt anyone will give you their "effecient" scorer. I just don't see anyone willing to play that gamble. His contract is the only thing that may seem appealing. But if you are say GM of New Orleans or Thunder or Clippers would you be willing to give up your players for Tmac?
