meant to say their talent isn't comparable... ariza at best can be the best role player on a championship team, maybe even a guy that could become a lesser rebounding version of a shawn marion with players to set him up (tho i think marion is severely overrated). tmac as much as everyone hates him was a perennial all-nba player that consistently finished in the top 8 of MVP voting, in fact finishing within the top 8 numerous times in his career. ariza won't come close to an all-nba finish, nor a top 10 mvp voting. and that's ok, because that's not what WE expect him to be.
LOL, you know your a r****d when your stretching like this...Bosh/Calderon?? THAT was past 2003, TMAC left Toronto in 2000...wow, i thought it couldn't get worse, it just did.
ofcourse their talent is not equal, T-Mac is a one in a lifetime player, he is a smaller version of Lamar Odom, just lazier and we all know how laid back Odom is. Ariza has something T-Mac lacks, fire, passion, a desire to be the best. Something I believe Kobe instead of quenching, ignited it. And for the person that said Ariza was a role player on a championship team, T-Mac was a role player in Toronto too, he was a role player on a first round playoff team and look at him now. Without Ariza's defense and offense, the Magic and Nuggets series would have def gone more games than it did. kobe gave his best in both series and it was still a nail biter, Ariza was the difference maker. He was the KG on that team, similar to the 08 celtics, while Pierce/Kobe won the mvp. Yeah I know, I will get flamed for comparing Ariza to KG. They both have the desire to win at all costs, except KG is bat crazy
i dunno man, i agree ariza was huge for em..but tmac by his third season was more than a role player..he was the second leading scorer for the raptors, their best defender. in fact in the playoffs u could argue tmac was their best player (tho carter played horrible--29% from the field, so anyone could have played better than him)..he was their second or third best rebounder on that team as well.
Why don't you look at this, Tmac at 18 years old was more talented, athletic and had more upside and potential than Ariza does at 24 years old. Hell, if all I had to do was shoot WIDE OPEN 3 pointers with Kobe, Odom, and Gasol creating those for he, then I could average 11 ppg in the playoffs. Robert Horry made a career out of that and won 7 titles in the process. That doesn't make him a more talented player than Tmac. Tmac in his 3rd season, was the 1st option off the bench, and was a starter in the playoffs. The difference is, he actually had to create his shots back then. He wasn't as fluid or smooth back then, but even though he was raw, teams still saw that he had superstar level talent and athleticism. You say Tmac only improved his average from 15 ppg to 16ppg in his first playoffs, but when has Ariza even been close to 16 ppg in the playoffs? Maybe in high school or college, he might have averaged 16 ppg, but he's never been close to that in the NBA. When has he had to create his own shots in the NBA? Can you honestly picture Ariza having the 4th highest ppg average in playoff history?? Tmac doesn't improve his playoff numbers right? By the time Tmac was 24, he had 4 All star appearances, 2 All NBA 1st Team selections, 2 All NBA Team 2nd Selections, and 2 scoring titles under his belt. Ariza was a good role player on a championship team with 3 legit playmakers/scorers. He's good at what he does, dirty work and hit wide open shots. Ariza's defense and athleticism is supposed to be his strong points of his game, Tmac as an 18 year old was MUCH better than him in those areas and even more better offensively. I showed you the #'s. What the hell did Ariza do for New York or Orlando? He had the luxury of a year in college. He's the same height and weight as Tmac, but not as athletic or explosive. I don't have anything against Ariza, except that I think we overpaid for him and gave him way too long of a contract. Also, I think Tmac from last year was better than Ariza was. Tmac from last year was able to create a shot for himself or for others (on one leg), instead of relying on other players to give him WIDE OPEN jump shots. Also, Tmac's 1-on-1 defense from 2 years ago is better than Ariza's defense now. You do remember Tmac making Dirk's life miserable in 2005 don't you? Who else has been able to guard Dirk that way? NOBODY. (except the Warriors team) Ariza is a help defender. He's average at best 1-on-1 defender. I mean Carmello only averaged 27.5 ppg vs. him in the WCF, while averaging 12.5 free throw attempts per game. That doesn't look like sound defense to me. You say Tmac had the green light to shoot, well Ariza has the green light to go after any steal he wanted to in LA. He knew Kobe wasn't going to let many players go by him, and he had a front line of 7'2 Bynum, 7'1 Gasol, and a 6'10 Odom behind him in case he didn't get the steal. Look, you won't win this argument. Its not even close. IF you compare Tmac of 09 to Ariza of 09, then maybe Ariza wins by a hair, just because he was more active and healthier. But even 09 Tmac could create his own shot on one leg, and he could still average 5 assists per game and 4 rebounds per game, and even a steal per game, all on one leg basically. Tmac still averaged more assists (by a lot), and just as many rebounds and blocks as Ariza did last year, on one leg and 6 years older. What makes you think Ariza is still capable of being better than Tmac? He wasn't even better than Tmac at his worst...as a rookie or an old, injured Tmac.
Sorry, playing only one end of the court and for only 3 quarters and shooting around 60 percent from the ft line is not winning anyone any championships.
Naw, Pau Gasol played excellent vs. Denver and Orlando. The one series he somewhat struggled in was vs. the ROckets, and thus that series went 7 games, even without Yao. Ariza was a non-factor in our series. Versus Denver, he had a couple of big steals, but Denver was idiotic in those plays too. Give Ariza credit, he made that play, but that was truly dumb of George Karl to let Carter and Martin inbound the ball. Stan Van Gundy leaving Jameer Nelson in the game was another idiotic coaching move, and Nelson backing off of Fisher in Game 4 was dumb as well. By Game 5, Orlando had already surrendered. But the MVP's of that series were Kobe and Gasol, not Ariza. Please stop with the Lamar Odom comparison to Tmac...you can't be lazy and a top 8 MVP finisher for 5 years, win 2 scoring titles, be all NBA selections, and have the 4th highest playoff average by being lazy. This league is too damn good for that...cmon man. Clearly you are just a Tmac hater. Give the man the credit he deserves for being a top 5 player in the league at one time. Not too many players can say that when they played...
I am even more surprised the #1 Wafer fan hasn't put the #1 Ariza fan and the #1 T-mac fan in their place.
It is funny, that you could even compare these 2 players in one sentance, especially when 1 player was possibly better in high school than the other as a 24 year old man. I'm not the #1 tmac fan, but I do think that he gets more criticism than he warrants, and not enough credit for what he's done, that is my only beef with ppl wrongfully criticizing him. Criticize his lack of health, his leadership, and shooting %'s in recent years, and shot selection... Thats fine with me. Every player has their faults, and those are his. But to say that he's lazy, has no desire, hasn't accomplished anything, isn't talented, is less talented than Ariza (the newest and most odd one to me), thats when it gets kind of ridiculous IMO. If he recovers from Microfracture, I don't think anybody can ever question his heart and desire again...even though it shouldn't have been questioned in the 1st place. Although he was a role player in Toronto, his handles and shot weren't nearly as smooth and polished as it was til 2008. You don't get that good without working hard...there's been many talented players who've amounted to nothing in this league. The NBA is too good for lazy athletes to succeed IMO. Also, none of us has ever watched Tmac in the off season and trained him to say that he hasn't worked hard, etc. We honestly can't judge any NBA player til we have seen it with our own eyes. I think individual success is the only way we can truly judge a player on an individual basis and that gives some kind of idea as to how hard a player works. But other than that, WE can't judge that.
then how did tracy do it? like it or not, the man puts in the bare minimum of effort. there are numerous league sources, trainers, other players, coaches, and GMs who can testify to tracy's desire to work as little as possible on being a good basketball player, and work as much as possible on being a superstar celebrity. you really don't have to look too hard, so go find the stories for yourself. at the end of the day, you're wrong. tracy did all that and its amazing, even more amazing when you consider how badly he has trained and how little he has worked on his game since he made it big.
thats right give the man the respect he deserves and i do believe ariza is going to be our late game shut down defernder after battier has worn our opponents best scorer. LET T-MAC PLAY!
What exactly has he done. Before -Tmac, steve francis and a brand new yao ming got us a first round exit. T-Mac came in, Yao got better and we still have the same results. So Tell me, what exactly has T-Mac done. I am not the #1 fan Ariza fan, I love the Houston rockets, to me- t-mac is no longer a Houston Rockets. He has played with my emotions too long and cost me many broken tv remotes
Post some of those comments from GM's, trainers, players, and coaches then I'll believe it. The only one I've read is Horace Grant comparing Tmac to Kobe, in which he said Kobe does work harder. He is a good source, since he was a teammate of both of them. However, I could believe Kobe works harder than most players in the NBA, if not all NBA players. But there is also a reason why Kobe is the at worst the 2nd best player in the league, but could easily be the best, just depending on who you ask. He works hard. He started off as a bench player, who air balled in the playoffs. But he became a scoring champ and accomplished all kinds of individual records along with titles. Tmac was a defensive specialist, who worked his way to becoming a top 5 talent in the league. Injuries have definetily taken away a lot, but he still had to work hard to get to where he reached IMO. But if you post those comments by other players, coaches, GM's etc, then I'll believe it. But, its just mind boggling to me that he can go from 7 ppg to 32 ppg and a top 8 MVP candidate for numerous years with minimum work. I can't believe that. I could believe that other players work harder, but to say that he doesn't work hard is just hard to believe. I mean Chuck Hayes could work harder than anybody, but there's only so much he can do. I'm sure Joe Johnson works hard, but he may never be better than Tmac at his peak. But no matter what, it does take work...I'm a firm believer of that, no matter what you do, whether its playing basketball, being an entertainer, getting a degree, your career, raising a family, whatever you do, it takes work, and what you get is dependent on what you put into it. I mean, a few ppl get lucky out there, they may have super rich relatives/family, could be born into a royal family or they win the lottery or something, so those few people may be spoiled and never work hard in life, but you have a better chance to be struck by lightening than to have that kind of luck.
Um... ...can I ask a question (to nobody in particular)? ...unless either DD or ThaBlackKnight wants to answer it...? Do either of you (or anybody else) believe that, if Tracy McGrady were a harder worker, or more committed to his job, or really wanted to win... ...that it would have made that much difference in the Rockets' fortunes the last few seasons? I only ask because...you know... ...great players win by themselves, and don't need any teammates....
Anybody that wouldn't welcome a healthy T-Mac back to this team needs their heads examined. If the front office decides to keep him (increasingly likely with each day) then I think i'll trust their decision making over a few hundred biased T-Mac haters that have brainwashed themselves into thinking a player like Ariza is better. Wake up.
