I moved this year from Orlando to Houston and I was excited when I found out McGrady would be following me. I've watched him closely, and often in person over the last 5 years. He's one of the best ballplayers I've ever seen and when he's on his game NO ONE can stop him. That being said, I've never seen him play as poorly as he has this year from an offensive standpoint. More specifically, his shooting is horrendous. His FG% is similar to last years, but last year he started in a slump and finished strong from mid Jan through the end of the season. His aweful shooting nights have come in spurts throughout this year. I don't see that changing through the end of the season. I don't know what the problem is. Back trouble again? Minutes too heavy? Simply a shooting slump? Whatever it is, I hope that he really puts in some work this summer to improve. He's a member of a team that will contend for the championship yearly; it's worth the hard work.
I doubt many people work harder than T-Mac, the guy puts it 45 minutes of workout time AFTER the game! I can barely do that without playing a couple of hours of run and gun basketball. With that being said though, I think it is no coincidence that Francis played better/put up better numbers without Yao clogging the middle, I think as good as T-Mac goes, he is facing the same situation: that is being relegated to a jump shooter many times throughout the games. With that being said though, T-Mac would have been easily averaging 27-28 ppg in the season now if you take November away, since it was a month in which he scored only 20 ppg I believe, and was not aggressive enough (he said later he didn't want to step on Yao's feet, and wanted to show him respect by deferring to him) I wouldn't make a big deal out of this, but boy, if T-Mac should work on his game, imagine what could be said about other NBA players
Wade makes a living driving to the hole (more than Tmac and SF3 combined) and he has Shaq in the lane all game
May be they find a way to open the lane for him a bit by adapting a different game plan than the Rockets do. It is not a complain, but I think it is just an observation I have. Sometimes when Yao is away from the basket, T-Mac cuts inside. But bottomline, T-Mac's game is not the type of game that Wade has (Wade has a weak jumper, so he drives inside more to up his shooting percentage, and he has a strong, well-built body that is wide and can absorb some hits. T-Mac has light-bone density). Lebron also drives inside more mainly because of his body type, just like Wade. Besides that, if you have watched many of Miami's game (which I have), then you would see that almost every game (as they are beating teams already), they take Shaq out for most of the 4th quarter, and then Wade completely takes over the game by attacking relentlessly inside and pounding the defense. He tends to get the majority of his point in that quarter with Shaq out.
After T-mac beat the Spurs with that Amazing comeback the man went and lifted weights after I have proof on DVD He works hard as it is now....
Bad excuse. Yao leaves the middle plenty of time to set picks. Tmac has all the chance to go inside, but even he does, he misses layups left and right. His inside game is not that great. Yao's butterfingers is a serious problem for us to feed the post. But again, it's very easy to lose the ball in the crowed post. Duncan gets many similar TOs too. If Yao could reduce his butterfinger TOs by 1/3, then we should have a much better feeding-the-post game.
Lately, teams have doubled him hard off the PnR and have pushed him 10 feet outside the 3 point line. Its very rare to see him try to split that double and take it to the hole. Boston and Minny did it a ton and I think I remember him doing that only once or twice. Would like to see him do that much more, especially when his jumper is off.
Wade attacks the glass the whole live long game, not just in the 4th. TMac has to go to the glass and apply the pressure to the defense not let the defense apply the pressure to him. Once he establishes that the defense has to guard the drive, they have to lay off his jumper and it's over. But, he's got to establish the drive. The aggressiveness is what made Jordan great and it's what is making Wade great. TMac is aggressive shooting. He needs to become hyper aggressive taking the ball to the hole, Yao or no Yao. Yao is just as smart as Shaq. He can play with TMac taking it in just as well as Shaq does with Wade.
The other factor that is hurting us right now is Bob Sura, I'm sorry to say. He's my favorite player, but he doesn't spot up good. There were several instances in recent games where TMac drove to the rack, only to throw it out to Sura, who instead of taking the shot, he then drives into a clogged up paint area where TMac has just been with his defender. Then the whole offense gets jammed.
Like Grendal said, everyone goes through a shooting slump. TMac was averaging 30ppg with 53% shooting last week, he couldn't keep it up forever. But he is definitely settling for too many jumpers. The guy is an amazing shooter, but he is also an unstoppable penetrator. Greg Anthony said lasnight, "When you're having an off night, the FT line is your best friend." We need TMac to drive in a little more, it makes the defense react and opens up a lot of options for the team.
Why do his stats matter? Overall, he's playing the best basketball of his career, and his team is playing better than any of his Magic teams ever played, that's all that really matters. Why not mention his defense which has been close to outstanding this season? Maybe that takes away some of his energy on offense? Besides, we all knew going into this season that his stats would take a hit, so lets not act surprised or disappointed. This offense just doesn't encourage penetration and most of the time all he's doing is taking what the defense gives him, so although a case can be made that he should drive more there are reasons why he doesn't. Jeff Van Gundy's game plan is all about self sacrifice for the good of the team, he drills that type of talk onto his players, especially his stars. Last season we saw Steve Francis take a big hit in numbers, so what? Van Gundy would be the first to tell you that stats don't matter, that Francis sacrificed his game for the team and that's a huge reasons why the team was succesful. T-Mac is doing the exact same thing, only difference is he's a lot better than Francis so his numbers haven't dropped off that much (overall of course, not these past few games,) he's playing the right way though, the wins and play of the Rockets prove it.
If you want TMax to end up like AI, then yeah, keep clamoring for him to drive to the hole. All guards, if they want to not breakdown, need to develop an outside game, cuz going inside, while it looks good, will only wind up getting you hurt. I do wish TMax took it to the hole more often, but I can't complain when his outside game was carrying us for so long
I have the same DVD. I am not saying he doesn't work hard. I'm not saying he's lazy. I'm not saying I dislike him shooting as much as he does. I am simply saying that his shot is worse this year than it has been in 5 years. I hope he works hard on it during the summer.
hotballa, I pointed this exact thing out in an earlier thread, and I completely agree with you, but I think this "agreement" thing is getting outta hand But I have a question: I noticed in another thread that you have used "T-Max", and in this post alone you used the word twice. Is the "C" button missing on your keyboard, or do you think T-Mac should take a paycut?
You don't become a top-notch level of player such as T-Mac, AI, Shaq, Kobe, Lebron, Amare, etc. without being a workout/practice freak in the off season, because that is when you build those skills that make you great. But a little hard work in the summer never hurt anyone, but I can't say that someone should "work extra hard in the summer" when I have no idea how much/hard he works in the summer, I have no idea about that, but may be someone in the "know" can fill us in on T-Mac's regimen in the off season. But more than anyone else, Yao MUST stay in Houston this year and work his butt off on conditioning/skills so he can come back next season as dominant as we all think he can be. I have stated that Yao will come back next year blazin', I hope I don't eat crow on that. I have a lot of confidence in his potential.
