Ric Bucher: I dont see a Tmac-led team winning a chip, EVER

Nobody should agree with this. I'll agree that TMac has a lot of problems with his back but it doesn't make sense to me that someone can say one of the best players in the league can't lead his team to a championship. He'll be the leader this year and they could possibly win a championship. And he'll be the leader of this team for a few more years too and I think we can only get better with young players like Brooks and Landry developing into major contributors.

 

Because Tmac the player is awesome, but Tmac the leader ...not so much.

There are great players who by their sheer force of will get their team to perform better, Jordan, Hakeem, Bird, Magic, Isaiah.

Tmac is as gifted as any of them, but he hardly has that killer instinct....I think he wants to win, but the great leaders REFUSE to lose.

Hopefully, some of the fire we added to the team this year will cause everyone to raise their game.

DD

 

i think when u have a better "team", it's easier to raise your "killer" instinct.

i don't think tim duncan is any better of a leader than tracy nor have a better killer instinct than tracy. but he wins b/c of his team. duncan doesn't always make the crucial offensive plays down the stretch much, even in his prime (though he does the little things).

i believe next yr, tmac will know he has a better team b/c he won't have to do everything.

jordan began to truly win when he had pippen to do the defense, rebouding, and ballhandling. kobe had shaq to do the offense for 75% of the time, defense, rebunding, intimidation...

next yr, tmac will see we have one of the best benches. we have more ballhandlers who can create.

so next yr, tmac's job will be simple => SCORE SCORE SCORE. when u have 1-2 jobs to focus on, it's very easy to do it well.

and w/ tmac's back, it's very crucial to limit his responsibilities so he can be fresh going down the stretch.

 

i dont think this is much of a productive topic for conversation honestly. if things break the right way, anyone can win a championship. if wade and that team of geriatrics can win one, tracy can win one.

whether he will or won't, who knows. that's why we watch. but to say that he can't or won't is just silly.

 

Clyde only has one.

 

Agreed. All's well that ends well. The only thing that will silence the critics and naysayers of Yao , Tmac and the rockets is that championship trophy.

But the good thing this season is we've upgraded every conceivable spot on our roster from the coach, general manager to the players... something's gotta give when you make such a substantial improvement. to paraphrase morey " we've dotted all the i's and crossed all the t's ".

 

it's tempting to think that way, but let me say (via analogy) that if you don't use systems thinking with a basketball team, you almost always end up mistaken.

so, here's my analogy. we're building a car to win a race. let's take best in class stuff from everywhere, put it all together, and we'll have a best in class car right? well, no. we'd have the engine from one car, the tranny from another, the body from another, the suspension, the brakes, etc. . . . you see how just grabbing best in class stuff and hoping it all fits isn't the way to do this . . . it all needs to have the right fit, the right interfaces, the ability to communicate and work as one, living, breathing machine. so yes, the upgrades are nice, but if they don't end up fitting with the rest of the team and the philosophy, it won't really help the team get to the next level. just like bonzi last year. a great piece that didn't help at all.

this is a team. it needs to be built of good parts, but good parts that fit together and complement each other is infinitely better than great parts that don't.

 

If Duncan didn't have a killer instinct, the spurs wouldn't win any championships.

 

The person primarily responsible for that is the head coach. That is why I have a good feeling about this team, even with last year's lineup I would be more confident with Adelman at the helm. The only thing certain right now is no one knows for sure how they will turn out. So the answer to the question on " so we'll have the best car right?" isn't no. the correct answer would be " it depends".

 

Do you really think Duncan should have "killer instinct" when they beat Cavs 4-0? I don't think so. If Duncan couldn't get it goin' there was always Ginobili/Horry/Parker, Finley, etc...

 

I was grouping these players together, not saying Clyde himself got more than 1.

This is the wrong question. Duncan may not have a killer instinct (though I would not say this personally), but he is the KEY BEAST on that team and has been since he has been there. During the Lakers 3 peat Shaq was the key beast. Now did SA and LAL turn to those beasts every key play, every key situation, no. Kobe and Manu and Clyde (in 95), had their moments in some of tighter moments various championship years, but everybody knows who the key hoss was.

Why not? Lots of great players havn't lead their teams to championships as the man. Heck Tmac and Kobe havn't got out of the 1st round when asked to be the key guy or carry a team. Just being a great player, even an NBA 1st team quality player, isn't sufficient to say that guy can lead his team to 4 playoff series wins. You have to be legendary good and make others around you better for a sustained period.

In a nutshell, you have to consider Yao can potentially be just a much more consistent force in the half court than Tmac. Yao is an insanely efficient half court player--in such things as shooting %, drawing fouls, and converting fouls, and potentially can be even better. Tmac can get hot and be unstoppable for stretches, but IMO our best hope for a guy to systematically break down whatever defense we face (they way Shaq/Duncan/Hakeem/Jordan/Wade did on their ways to MVPs) is Yao Ming. To put in this way, Tmac can get us wins any particular game or quarter or make an individual key play down the stretch, but we need Yao to have sustained dominance to win series and championships.

 

Let's put it this way - The Spurs team has a killer instinct

 

no, its b/c the spurs always have a great team w/ veteran leadership.

who hit the clutch shot to win their first title? no other than avery johnson.

who was the clutch guys during the others? stephen jackson, manu, sean elliot...

duncan has always been surrounded by great veteran guys...

so no, your response is not accurate.

 

exactly, duncan didn't exactly dominate the finals u know. he was great defensively, but offensively others took over.

can u say, tmac has others taking over for him for stretches? i don't think so.

 

ok, the TEAM. it's easy to have a killer instinct when ur BETTER than the other team. spurs always have one of the most complete teams in the league.

 

Ric Bucher got 50% right. TMac gives up too easily and mentally too soft.

 

I think once Tmac is surrounded by All Stars at every position with a 6th man of the year candidate coming off the bench we will see just how great a leader he is.

Seriously, folks, the whole BS excuse about him not having enough talent around him to win was destroyed in this year's playoffs. No matter how many BB Scientists tell you otherwise the fact remains that the Rockets should have beat the Jazz. Tmac came up short and couldn't even exploit his match-up against a 6'1" guard. He came up short and it is "all on" him because he said so.

 

i can't argue against that. but i'm not gonna give up on the player. he's too talented. sooner or later he's gonna make it happen. he never played a great game 7 before. he did this year. he's gonna take the next step next yr i have no doubt.

 

people keep bringing up his "all on me" quote. yeah, he added pressure on himself, but if you watched the freaking games you would know he had to do EVERYTHING. the jazz had what, 5 players that could create for themselves? williams, boozer, harpring, ak47, okur...do I need to continue?

we were down by 15 freaking points in game 7. we needed what? 12 assists from tmac to even be competitive? yao can create for us, but a lot of the buckets even HE got were from assists off tracy.

yeah, tracy could have attacked the basket a bit more at key times, but seriously what do you expect? the jazz had a much better team than us -- much better. we had the best two players (arguably one, since boozer ransacked us), that's it.

tracy was double teamed and pushed around / fouled ridiculously the entire series, and he was expected to create on basically every play. he also had to defend and score himself. I love yao, but even I saw that at times he just could do nothing vs okur. he was playing at about 80% due to his injuries.

you can't blame it on tmac and say it's all his fault. where the hell was luther (he's my boy and I can admit he had the worst playoff imaginable)? where was juwan? the bottom line is we lost in the last minute of the game because we lost 3 consecutive offensive rebounds. there are 5 guys out there you are not going to pin it all on mcgrady.

I've been humbled by our past 2 playoff series, but I'm saying it right now -- we're going to have a phenomenal year.

 

I watched all 7 games. I was courtside for two of them. He did not have the fire a player needs to have to lead his team to a ring. To be honest, he didn't even have the fire that he had against Dallas in '05. The excuses need to stop. When you are the best player on your team and your team loses to an inferior team (even a slightly inferior one) then it is indeed on your shoulders.

Granted, the team played like crap but there were opportunities where Tmac could have willed this team into the second round. Instead, he got "tired." The reason you have superstars is so they can take over close games. Do you really think Kobe, Wade, Duncan, Nash etc. would have let Utah get away with game 7? There is no way they would have.