So much material to cover, I am sorry I did not jump one earlier, but here we go: Tmo, I have been one of the bigger supporters of Tmo, but enough is enough. He is skilled and talented but he has some serious mental type problems. It is no accident that people went away from him in the draft. A couple sat's ago, I saw on ESPN Classic, a Maryland game from last year and he, as a senior. just disappeared. Billy Packer in the early part of the game predicted what Tmo was going to do: hide; and that is exactly what he did. It was an eye opener. Rudy has given him the chance and will continue to do so but I think we have seen enough of Morris to know that he can play in this league and will eventually come around. By come around, I mean get over the mental thing. It is not just the airballs that he throws up but also, all of a sudden, his poor hands around the basket. His confidence is shot, really. In the meantime we have other people who need exposure too. In addition to OT, we also have Langhi and Collier who need chances too. So I would sit Tmo for the next five games or so and let us see if it all sinks in and he settles down. If not then we will wait for the off season. To those who say we could not make the playoff, I would like to point out that we probably could have won 8 of our last ten games, including last night and the Hornets game. If we had done that then we would not be going into the all-star game thinking we are out. Having said that, I believe that Rudy has to take the blame for where we at, based on his poor management of the rotation despite Francis andKT being in and out, and the team's inability or disinterest in, playing defense. I have been saying for weeks that the defense and untempo game needs to be stepped up. That is purely Rudy's fault. I know it is broken record but it is these little things that's causing the frustration. One final thought: I know that Mobley has a very sweet jumper; in fact, it can give you diabetes. But did you see the open jumper from Langhi. It was as sweet as any that Person put up last night. I would like to remain on record as saying that both OT and Langhi have prolific scorer potential. If we did not waste so much time with the stiffs, Rice and Williams, and to a much lesser extent, Tmo, we would probably have seen more of that potential.
I don't think I or anyone has denied that Tmo has confidence problems. Nor would I deny that Langhi and Collier should get their chances, or that Torres this season has been better than Morris. What I don't like is Terence's games being incorrectly described as 'terrible.' He has enough truly terrible games to be ignorantly trashed for games of his that aren't. There is a tendency of almost everyone on this board to be shamelessly hyperbolic. I know my responses get tedious, but I simply can't let this shamelessness slide without comment.
I think the issue with playing poorly without enough minutes is that it's hard for a player to be incorporated into the flow of a game when he's getting on the court irregularly. Personally, I think that's why Cat makes such a great bench player. Some players seem to need to start. They can't handle being interjected randomly into games. Cuttino seems to thrive on it. He'll take the sub, or tired starter, and abuse them. In fact, if we had a serviceable 2 guard, I'd rather Cat come off the bench. He'd still be the 2nd best player on the team... but he and Francis can be slightly redundant, and Cat could provite terrific offense for the 2nd team. Torres... Morris... the reason I like Oscar more is that he seems more significant when he is playing. Morris often looks lost on the court in a way that Torres does not. Other teams, at times, seem as if they're simply not afraid of Morris getting the ball. They'll rotate off of him, and pay him no respect. They don't seem to do this with Oscar... because Oscar wouldn't be afraid to attack them if they ignored him. I do appreciate the fact that both of these guys play hard on defense. Incidentally, Moochie's tiny. Surely playing him against Cleveland in the 4th was a mistake. Sometimes, Eddie can erase our guards mistakes. But he's not quite at that stage yet where the Rockets can simply funnel the drivesr to him, and let him clean up the mess.
