[nbatv-gary payton] "I think Houston is better without McGrady"

So far as I recall, Rick Adelman has only referred to Yao as the Rockets' anchor and not anyone else.

Last year it was a ship without an anchor. This year it is present. So nope, entirely different teams.

 

is ANY team better with an injured player?

why is this question so hard?

 

I am not going to argue TMac can still score 30 points in the playoffs if he dominates the offense, but when was the last time he closed the game for us?

 

we've been winning without tracy this year more on a team effort. yao hasn't completely dominated and carried the team. the team is very balanced and complete.

 

Well....If you wanna look at it that way, you could just go ahead and say that we lost to the Blazers earlier this season with T-Mac in the lineup, in a game where he actually played pretty well. Played them without him and we managed to pull it out.

Not so ridiculous.

 

again, we're not better this year with tracy. he's injured and can't play well consistent (or even good consistently).

but if we can't beat teams like the blazers or mavs by more than a few points at home, we're not going to go anywhere. the blazers are a good team, but it's not a team we should struggle with.

and we lost earlier this year on a lucky shot. on the road. earlier in the season.

 

We do not need a 'superstar' to score 30 points to win, we have a team!

 

u need that superstar in the playoffs. b/c like you saw tonight, you will have offensive droughts, role players will struggle... that's when your superstar or best player has to take over.

that's where you give the ball to that guy and just let him go to work for a few possessions and return the momentum to us. all great teams have that guy. we don't right now.

but the team ball will help obviously. when it falters, you need "that guy" to step up though is all i'm saying.

 

He said Rafer was as good as Jameer though. It seemed to me he thought Rafer to be the better PG.

 

I agree. And the way the team is set up right now, it's very difficult just to get "that guy" the dang ball. And when he does get the ball, he gets flustered by double teams -- particularly when they come after he's put the ball on the floor.

The Rockets need to hope that Aaron Brooks, Kyle Lowry, and Ron Artest become reliable scoring options for us in crunch time. Artest has been playing much, much better the last month or so .. so that's encouraging. Brooks is the next guy that has to be able to step up.

 

No, if this team is going to make a playoff run it will be similar...VERY similar to how Detroit did it...VERY VERY similar to how detroit did it...

As a TEAM, no superstar over the other, but everyone doing their roles and just playing better ball. We beat Cleveland and who knows...maybe there is hope yet.

 

Tonight was hardly a struggle... the shots just weren't falling at the end.

 

I said we do not need a 'superstar', if we can get a Kobe or James, I agree with you completely. I would rather playing the team ball in the final minutes than TMac shooting contested 3s. I am not just talking about this season.

 

artest is playing very well. i've been very impressed with him the past couple of weeks. this was what i envisioned him to play when we got him intially.

scola has GOT to get more shots. it's ridiculous how many attempts he gets with the kind of defenses he faces. brooks took too many shots for my liking tonight.

yao just has to be aggressive. we see stretches here and there, but it's the same yao ming. we played better with him OFF the floor tonight. and that's unacceptable b/c we base a lot of our things around him. and double teams can disrupt him, esp. if they double with bigger guys, rather than midgets.

it's still february so we can still get better. i'm optimistic.

and shane battier, what can i say? only with houston can shane play 39 minutes.

 

superstar doesn't mean you have to score. that's the thing people misconceive about superstars. they make PLAYS.

so are you saying yao's not a superstar? he's our consistent mismatch night in and night out. he's gotta be able to dominate that.

 

Except we know from the Rockets themselves that this is not how they plan on doing things. They believe the offense needs to run through Yao in the fourth quarter. That's a very different team philosophy from Detroit's with their "Big 5". For Detroit, there was no single guy that had to be fed the ball down the stretch. The Rockets are still built on the superstar model, but there are big questions over how consistently their superstar (Yao) can rise to the occasion.

 

So "superstars" don't have droughts? That's news to me.

 

Shane was averaging 35 minute a game for his previous team as well, so I doubt that.

Scola's shots should come primarily from other guys making plays (pick and rolls, drive and kicks, or finding him under the basket) or the offensive glass. Unless he's being guarded by a small guy, he's not a great option in the post in my opinion.

Brooks is our best penetrator, easily, so I like him being aggressive in the fourth. He can do a better job of seeking out open players.

 

so why are we paying yao max money? if we're going to pattern our team after detroit, might as well trade yao and trade tmac when we can and just use all those capspace to get a ton of really good players at every position.

so i don't agree with that. every team loves a balanced attack. we're good for it too. what i'm saying is in games like tonight where our offense just goes nowhere for long stretches, somebody has to step up and demand the ball for 2-3 possessions and just return the momentum in our favor. that's all i'm saying.

and playoff basketball requires that. detroit is an anomaly.