I never thought i would feel this way but i think i hate francis more than Karla!

Ever hear of freedom of speech? A player has every right to voice his opinion, there's nothing stopping him. Bottom line is he'll play wherever he's traded to, because he has a contract. But he's got a right to say he prefers playing in Houston.

 

If Francis screws this trade up, He'll have done far more to hurt the Houston Rockets than Karla ever did.

 

no one is saying he CAN'T say this...they're saying he shouldn't be saying this in public. that you take care of business professionally behind closed doors without running to the media first.

 

make no mistake...i'm not happy with francis...but i'm even less happy with the Magic

 

I completely agree, that's the professional way to do things - leave the media out of it. But, Francis isn't the one who leaked details of the trade to the media. Once the media learned about it, it was to be expected that they'd ask Francis his opinion about the trade, and he'd respond.

Don't get me wrong, I love the rumors and it keeps things interesting, but in a perfect world I'd prefer that nothing was revealed until the deal was secured.

 

Problem is that we've all been blinded by our rockets red goggles. Steve has always been a whiny little b*tch.

 

I agree that Steve played hard for Houston and was committed to this team.

With T-Mac's insistence that he will only sign an extension with Houston, Steve cannot sink the trade.

So let him try to persuade others to get him where he would prefer to be. He said that he will play in Orlando if he's traded, regardless of his preference.

My impression: Wesibrod is playing his weak hand. T-Mac wants Houston; that's the trump. Now that so much water is under the bridge, Weisbrod understands that Steve can no longer be in Houston. That's the only leverage he has: the Rockets are now forced to move Francis (because of Francis' own comments regarding a potential trade). Weisbrod is talking to others about moving Steve. If he doesn't find excited takers, it further increases his leverage because he knows what the Rockets will face if the T-Mac deal crashes.

He could also be playing the role of an ignoramus (unlikely with his Harvard ego), or at least a rookie GM. Making CD think that he might do something irrational would also give him some slight leverage.

So Wiesbrod is just trying to squeeze as much from the Rockets as possible, while also doing his additional due diligence seeing if anyone else is willing to throw the dice on decimating their squad for a superstar who may not sign after 1 year (unlikely).

Unless T-Mac changes his mind, I don't see how this deal will die. Let Steve do what he feels the need to do.

 

It's pretty weak to remove your red goggles now just because Steve isn't doing exactly what you want him to do.

 

Very good points, Cohen. That's very likely the scenarios he's going through. And it seems to be working because he's squeezing the crap out of the Rocket's fans. Let's hope CD is smarter than that.

 

But everyone wants the guy who is currently asking to be traded out of the situation he doesn't like.

If this tarnishes his image for you, you probably didn't like him in the first place. A guy has a right to his opinion. I'm sure if the trade goes down he will play. What else can he do?


And lastly, if you think this is the main reason this trade hasn't gone through, you're not very smart. The Magic has played the Rockets against the other bidders and Carrol Dawson is looking like an idiot.

 

One shouldnt hate Francis for being Francis, after all isnt it just par for the course? Francis has been negative towards the success of the Rockets for two years, ever since he didnt get his own way and the club selected Yao Ming. For the last two years he has only given his best effort on occasions when he has seen fit, he has refused to pass the ball to Yao so many times that I have stopped counting, at least three times a game! Now he is trying to bring revenge upon the Rockets and CD should have non of it. If the Francis to Philly goes down then thank googness we will only see him once a year in Houston. If he spoils the Orlando Trade then he should be treated badly by the fans. The only way I can accept him is if he stops all the mess and goes to Orlando.I remember when Players did what they were told to do! Francis has broughty this situation upon himself and is deserving of no better.

 

Steve isn't honoring the contract he signed last year. It doesn't get any more black and white than that.

 

Is that what we all KNOW? You don't know a thing about what's going on behind the scenes. For you to say that you hate someone more than Karl Malone because you THINK you know what happens behind the scene is a rash statement.

We KNOW that Karl Malone has a histroy of cheap shots, elbows whining to officials when people do to him a mere fraction of what he does to others.

We KNOW that Francis wants to play in Houston. We KNOW that Francis doesn't want to play in Orlando. It's been reported that Orlando is not sure about the making the trade right now, but that it still might go down.

If you are going to guess what's going on behind the scenes and call that KNOWING, then hate that person based on what you guess more than what we all KNOW another player has done, that's your perogative.

For the record, I feel similar to Codell but not as resolute. Steve is only tarnishing his own image and reputation and value. Steve is only hurting his own career.

Steve did lead our teams in the playoffs. Say what you want about the series ending 3-1, but who expected more from a 2-7 matchup? What the series did show is that we were competitive in most games, and that one player(Steve Francis) elevated his game to another level and lead our team during those games. If every other player on our team elevated their game as much we might have won the series.

I'm disappointed in Steve, and sad, like Codell said, but until the deal is either officially off or officially happens I'm not going to make any statements totally hating on him, or totally thinking he's a saint in all of this. I will wait and until something official comes out and then make my final decision.

 

I don't blame Francis for this mess at all; it's all in the Magic's lap. They know, or should know, that Francis will get over the trauma of being traded before preseason if they just ignore him and close the deal. By delaying the deal, they incentivize complaints from Francis. If the trade goes through in the end, they'll have done significant PR damage to their new franchise player. Who will be excited to buy season tickets to see Francis when everyone feels insulted by him?

The alternative, of course, is that Orlando is pulling a Grunwald, using an almost-consummated deal to entice more offers, like Toronto had done with Stoudamire. If so, that's a pretty low trick and should get the GM black-balled by other GMs in the league. Why would you want to do business with a guy who will betray you?

As for Francis, I think he really has some poor self-control when he feels his position threatened. He did something similar when the Rockets had decided on Yao. The Rockets ignored him and he was later happy with the decision. If they'd close the deal already, I feel certain that he'll see the benefit here.

 

We don't know what's going on. If the trade doesn't go down we can say that. But until something official happens one way or the other we don't really know.

 

Francis hasn't been negative towards the success of the Rockets at all. Steve has gone out of his way to make Yao feel at home. Steve was a big positive in the limited success we had in making the playoffs and in the things that went right there. Which of the teammates was driving Yao around talking about the pressures of the NBA, the press etc? Which player went over and stretched by Yao, talked to teammates about how good Yao would be and that they should be excited to get him? STEVE FRANCIS.

Steve came up huge in the Denver game to clinch our playoff birth. We didn't win our playoff series but the biggest positive in that series was the play of Steve Francis. If other players including Yao Ming had elevated their game as much as STeve did we could have actually pulled off an upset.

 

this goes too far

 

Francis wants to stay in Houston and has also said he would go to Orlando if Shaq goes there too. So it's pretty obvious to me that he knows he needs a good big man to win it all.