Oscar Robertson is one of those old tools that hasn't done anything with his life since playing and spends all day dreaming about the good old days trying to stay relevant. Always talking trash like he feels he was the best player ever in his time.
Not to criticise McGrady's game or comparing him to others but the dude needs to take a look at what Kobe did in game 3 (as opposed to game 2) Vs the Suns. Second half, the guy didn't hesitate to drive it to the hoop and very rarely settled for the jumper (apart from 1 or 2 heat checks here and there). Kobe is a punk and I have no love for him, but if McGrady employs the same mentality of not settling for jumpers in game 4, the Rockets have a better chance of winning. When McGrady takes jumpers left-right-centre I feel it allows the Jazz to rest somewhat on D, and it becomes a gamble for the Rockets whereas if he takes the ball to the hoop you are pressuring the Jazzholes to react and adjust constantly. Regardless I have faith in T-Mac and I can only hope that whatever he decides to do, he doesn't hesitate...
http://blogs.chron.com/franblinebury/ April 26, 2007 So easy a caveman could do it: Jazz 81, Rockets 67 Tracy McGrady came out and hit 6 of his first 7 shots. The jumper was falling. So easy. Too easy. Then McGrady spent the rest of the night tossing rocks at the basket. Boulders mostly, which rattled off the backboard and the rim when they hit anything at all. He made only 2 of his next 15 shots until a garbage-time trey in the last 13 seconds. A caveman could have been more effective tossing stones at a dinosaur. This was one of those nights when it is both a blessing and a curse to be T-Mac. Because even he can fool himself into thinking everything can be as smooth as silk and there's no reason to really get his hands dirty. Oh, Oscar Robertson was right. There are plenty of places to point the fingers of blame in this NBA playoff version of the Westminster Dog Show. There was Yao Ming's slow start, his fumbling hands, his astonishingly inept 8 turnovers. There was the bench that resembled the black hole of Calcutta. Can somebody explain how four so-called professionals can log a combined 47 minutes on the floor and not stumble into a single point? Only four players on the entire Rockets roster scored in the game. By that standard, Billy Spanoulis, John Lucas and Jake Tsakalidis were damn good. And they never left the bench. 33 points by the Jazz bench, 0 points for the Rockets' footstool. Bonzi could have done that with a box of doughnuts in one hand. The Rockets were slow-starting, bad-finishing and absolutely abysmal in the middle. It was as if they were waiting for the Jazz to do a repeat of their third-quarter foldo from the first two games and were simply disappointed when it never happened. Utah, by the way, did not put on a clinic. The Jazz shot just 38.8 percent. They kept the Rockets close and appeared ready to give the game away even late in the fourth quarter. But the Rockets were worse because they were more timid all night long. They took the lead from their leader, who decided it wasn't worth his trouble to attack the basket, as he had done so effectively in the first two games, converting drives and getting to the free-throw line. Derek Fisher got an up-close view of McGrady's early 6-for-7 blitz from the outside and figured it was better than the alternative. "Even if he's hitting them, if you can keep a player of his caliber shooting from the perimeter, it saves you a lot of headaches," Fisher said. "It saves you the foul trouble; it keeps him off the free-throw line. "So even if he has another night where he comes out firing and shooting good, I don't know that we do much to change it. If he's hitting jump shots, you live with it. Because it's only him scoring. "The key is to slow his penetration into the lane. Because that's when he gets everybody else involved -- driving, passing, dealing. He makes Yao better, everybody better. We'll live with him on the perimeter." Don't give all of the credit for McGrady's woes to the Utah defense. Andrei Kirilenko could not stay with McGrady any time he put the ball on the floor. But McGrady didn't put the ball on the floor and go enough. Not nearly enough. Kirilenko finished with four fouls and should have been fouled out by the half. The Jazz rotated different bodies on McGrady. But what made him less effective was the part of his body above his shoulders. When you go before the TV cameras and say you're going to carry the load, you'd better be strong enough to shoulder the burden. "I cannot stop a player of Tracy McGrady's talent," said Kirilenko. "I do not have talent like that. I can only make him work hard, break his percentage. Keeping him on the outside helps." It has been a season-long problem, these lapses in concentration. Sometimes the Rockets don't close games. Sometimes they don't start games. And sometimes they are just too cool for themselves. That's because too often they follow their leader. Sometimes it is wise to listen to your elders. T-Mac could still learn a thing or two from Oscar.
Agreed. Oscar couldn't be more right about tmac. His shot selection is terrible. He's so afraid of driving to the rack now that it drives me crazy. I saw him so many times fake a guy out and instead of driving, he settled for the jumper and bricked them. It may be time to consider whether a team can win or not with tmac as the leader of the team. He does a lot of talking, but not much doing to back up that big talk.
My sentiments exactly! Talk a lot but does not walk the talk. Rockets should split the so called dynamic duo if they want to win a championship. Either one must go!!!!
