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

he was on a bad team. this team is pretty talented if i might say so.

 

exactly. from this year, 4th quarter is yao ball. we're going to milk this in the playoffs. let's see what happens.

 

like i said again, superstars don't necessarily have to score, they can make plays.

so in that sense, no, very rarely (in terms of making plays).

see lebron v. the lakers a few weeks ago. 5-20 shooting. that's a drought. but he put up 11 assists and 8 rebounds to counter that poor scoring. that's a superstar.

 

I think we are trying to pattern our team after the Spurs. Coach A is trying really hard to turn AB into a new Parker ...I can envision our guards will close the games for us, by playing TEAM BALL.

 

Kenny Smith and Charles made it seem that way too.

Hell Kenny said Rafer pushes the Magic past Cleveland or Boston I forgot which one. Either way I don't see how they came to that conclusion.

 

Memphis won 49 games. I mean, they became a bad team after he left, but they were pretty good while he was there.

 

spurs play team ball at the end? all i see is either in tony's or manu's hands all the time at the end and those guys make plays, with duncan's post ups. if i'm not mistaking, that's called stars making plays.

and AB will never be tony parker.

 

Sure they did - they played team ball for 3.5 quarters and fed the hot hand at the end of the game just like any other team. Some games it was Chauncey, some games it was Sheed, some times it was Rip but regardless their close games always ended by taking the best matchup to exploit in the 4th. They were different in that they had 5 guys who could get hot and not one consistent superstar(rather they had a bunch of stars) but the concept is basically the same.

 

but we always feed yao.

i was in disbelief at scola's lack of shots with how portland defended. utter disbelief.

 

Yao was not the hot hand against the Blazers in this game, or in the previous game in Portland when he scored only 10 points. And yet, the focus of our offense in the fourth quarter was ... YAO MING.

Not the same.

 

Gee, I've seen Roger Mason with the ball in his hands at the end of the game, Matt Bonner with the ball in his hands and the end of the game. I don't know what you are talking about.

The correct play in basketball is to get an open shot. Sometimes, your non-superstar PG starts the play. Sometimes it is your non-superstar SG. The point is, you want to create an advantage and get an open look.

Some players can create their own shot. AB, Yao, Artest, and Scola can do this. If they get doubled, the correct play is to pass it to the open man. I'm not sure what superstardom has to do with this.

The problem with some "superstars" is they think they need to make the shot / play. That's why one of our least efficient plays is to give TMac the ball at the top of the key at the end of quarters. The "normal" offense gives you about a 40% chance of making it. The iso probably gives you about a 25% chance. That's stupid "superstar" basketball.

 

The Rockets have not had "that guy" since Dream. At least right now we have a group of guys who are learning to play as a unit and not standing around watching one guy make all the plays. That isn't a knock on McGrady because many nights he seemed forced to dominate the ball because nobody else had the confidence at the end of games. That was and always will be a recipe for failure unless you have a true superstar handling the rock that much.

This year's formula has more potential IMO.

 

The offense wouldn't get stagnant like it did tonight if the players on the floor recognized what the defense was doing quicker and rotated the ball faster. AB as the floor general needs to stop over dribbling, be more patient and allow the play to develop. Scola will get more shots this way and so would Yao (even with the fronting).

If they get more comfortable running the read and react offense in the 4th, there would be less reliance on a superstar guard to bail the team out. See the way the San Antonio team executes for reference. They wouldn't have made the mistakes our team made tonight to even need a bail out. Yao flashed in the paint 3 consecutive possessions and was missed ... the ball also never made it to Scola'a side of the court. And if it did it didn't get there fast enough.

 

tony parker tonight with duncan and manu out. 32 shots. 12 assists. i would say the ball is in his hands quite often i would say.

the ball is in mason's or bonner's hands TO SHOOT. they're not making any plays. do you know the difference?

what i have a problem with is adelman is clearly making this yao's team in terms of offense. our goal is to let him touch the ball every time down. if that's the case, he has got to dominate, either with scoring or making plays.

for the bolded part, i think dwayne wade answered it best earlier this season. the reason wade says he's a superstar is b/c he feels the responsibility to do whatever is necessary for his team to win (i think he answered something like that in regards to hit shot attempts). he said he shot a lot, but he also makes plays.

superstars are superstars b/c they feel the pressure and they want to take on the pressure. why do you think kobe is kobe? when he feels his team struggling for a few possessions, he'll just disregard the offense and goes off on his own to restore the momentum.

again, if we made this a balanced offense and run equal # of plays around, then sure. but we don't. yao is our #1 and #2 options.

 

Where have you been? Rockets have been having 4qtr meltdowns for years while Tmac was on the court, some people have selective memory...

 

Charles was on the set last thursday.

But since he had to do 5 days I assume he won't be there thursday when we play Cleveland.

I still don't think adding Rafer pushes them past Boston or Cleveland though. I didn't think they would beat those teams in the playoffs with Jameer neither.

 

so what else is knew?

 

Thats nice but Tmac has never been that guy. The Rockets offense has stalled plenty of times in the Yao and Tmac era.

 

not if that mcgrady was on this team. in the past, we expect tracy to be kobe, which he clearly is not. we expected him to score AND create.

if tracy was healthy on this year's team, he would be an excellent playmaker with yao's fronting, b/c of all the talent offensively.

artest made some nice plays tonight. hopefully he'll take on more of the playmaking b/c nobody else looks like they can.