Listen... Did I mention anything about winning a championship with "supporting players?" I said that the team play of the supporting cast is something that Rudy didn't concentrate on. He depended on the "stars" too much. That's the bottom line. Just because you have star players doesn't mean jack! You have to have a solid foundation of supporting cast and get them to play at the highest level. Once you have the ground work down, on a team scale (that means that they play the "team game" very well), that's when you incorporate the "star" into the mix. Then, and only then will you win at a constant rate, and possible a championship. Winning 40 games without Yao and Francis is "impossible?" It's imposible if they don't come to play every night. Again, who's fault is that? What I think is the problem is that you've gotten so used to being mediocre that you don't expect the Rockets (at full strenght) to be very good.
There have been three main problems with the Rockets teams of the last few years: 1. - Lack of experience 2. - Lack of chemistry 3. - Injuries The first problem will fix itself with time. The next problem is why there was a coaching change. It is a different breed of player in this Rockets team than the 94' team and team realized that and made a coaching change to fix that problem. The third is obviously in the lap of the gods. I think the Rocks have the talent to win, just these three things need to be fixed.
Yes, I left off Kerr too. But it doesn't matter... There's always those that say that team sucked without Jordan, and then at the same time say that team had HOFers and were great. Now which is it? Where they a great team w/o Jordan? Or were they are bad team w/o Jordan? (Isn't it a sacrilege to say that Pippen is better than Francis? ?). Remember, I was talking about the 93-94 Bulls. Not the 94-95 Bulls. As far as the spiraling in 94-95. Well, you do know that's when they started rebuilding the team. BJ, Cartwright, Paxton, Grant all gone. They still manged to get 47 wins. Now before you say, "The guys that left the team sucked, and at the same time say the new guys were great and should have won more" The issue is that the TEAM of the 94 Bulls were together for 3-4 years. That same core group. They knew each other and played hard everynight! They were an intergral part of the team. That's my point. And that's what our core group needs, minus Francis/Yao. The core supporting cast needs to play at the highest level and maintain that every night. Not just some nights. The 93-94 Bulls team, minus Jordan played as a TEAM, and shared the ball. They had to. They couldn't depend on Jordan to bail them out. It's obvous that after the 94 season the ownership belived that Jordan wasn't coming back. So, they started rebuilding.
actually, you said Mobley, Moochie, Griffin, Cato and Posey should be able to win 40+ games in the Western Conference. The bottomlines are you said Phil Jackson was undermanned with a Pippen, Kukoc, Grant (in their prime) and a Rockets '94-quality supporting cast coming off 3 rings. You ignored that the Bulls were spiraling down to sub.500 in 1995, and you still haven't told us when the JVG Knicks were more undermanned than Rudy's last 4 yrs.
not Steve Kerr. You left off Toni Kukoc, who joined the Bulls the year Jordan left. You remember Toni Kukoc, right. The guy Pippen hated coming in. The guy that Phil called that play for against the Knicks, so Pippen refused to go onto the court....then Kukoc proceeded to hit the game winner! You know, that 6'11 sweet passing Croatian? You know, the guy who one 6th Man in a landslide in the Bulls 4th ring year.
Yep. That's our supporting cast. Seems like a bunch of scrubs don't they? Don't you think they have been underachieving? Yes, no? By the way, when Posey left, our supporting cast dropped in talent. I'm glad we got Pike, but not sure he's at the same level. We'll see. As far as the rest of the team, well...of the core supporting cast can't win 40, then we wont be able to win 60 (in the coming years) with Yao and Francis. Unless our supporting cast improves in trades and free-agents. I'm sorry. But 40 wins is not asking too much. Hell, Sacramento was able to win 58 and 61 wins with Webber injured for many game. Could the Rockets do that with Francis on the bench? Now, what was I saying about the importance of the TEAM? Huh? I can't make out what you were trying to say above... In the last 4 years, never once did I think that JVG would win a championship with Speewell, Houston, Othella Harrington and Ward. Very good players. But what is missing? A leader! Plain and simple. The Knicks under JVG (even w/a aging Ewing), never had that leader. They had the core group, but were missing that "star" player. Are you really going to say that Speewell was the "leader" of that team? What about Allen Houston? Please...Those guys are starting players. Just because those players are "stars" doesn't mean jack. You need a leader. We have one: Francis. Can he do it. Not sure. So, when I say "undermanned" in regards to JVG. That's what I mean. He had the core group, but no star player to lead him. Guess who the leader was on the Spurs that beat the Knicks? Heh...
BJ Armstrong wasn't gone. He scored 14ppg, and Kukoc started lighting it up at 16ppg...Pippen was the freaking best SF in the league, bar none, and Luc Longley was much better than Cato. And they were 31-31 when Jordan announced his return...and you are saying a Rockets team without Francis and Yao should be 40+ in the most lopsided conference alignment the NBA has seen? That's just ridiculous. Just back off the whole Phil Jackson overachieved with an undermanned squad.
LG, I think this is a very interesting point (thanks for making it). I somewhat disagree that the solution to it should have been firing the coach though. Sometimes it doesn't matter who the coach is, chemistry can never be acheived depending on your core group of players. Over the last few years, teams have gone through more than 1 coach, with the same group of players and never acheived any notable success. In our case, chemistry was indeed a problem. But what could Rudy have done differently??? Personally, I don't see how Rudy could have gotten any more out of Yao than he did. I don't see how Rudy could have facilitated Mo's healing process or EG's development. I don't see how Rudy could have kept Steve from making piss poor decisions with the ball (keep in mind, Steve has played under 3 different offensive systems with Rudy and has had the same problems (TOs) with all of them). I don't see how Rudy could have kept Glen's knees healthy so that he wasn't just a one dimensional pony or how Rudy could have turned JP into a 40% 3 point shooter. This team lacked a couple of key things last year that kept it from being a playoff team: 1) A legit PF who could bang, play D and rebound (not asking for Duncan; but an Oakley or Thorpe type would have been nice) 2) A solid catch and shoot 3 (Rice did well in limited minutes but was often a liability on D, thus negating his O) that could keep the zones off of Yao 3) A backup 1/2 who could limit Steve and Cat's minutes, while at the same time, be effective Its hard to say that having these 3 things doesn't make us a playoff team last year. You can't survive without a decent 4 in the West, you can't survive without good outside shooting to keep the D off your big man and you can't survive when two of your best players are having to play 42+ night in and night out. This team didn't just have chemistry problems though. It had personnel problems (which, I guess, you could blame Rudy for).
Yes. I know. I was saying that I left off Kukoc and Kerr, but it didn't matter because everyone just says that the Bulls sucked w/out Jordan. If all you are trying to suggest is that the 94 Bulls were better than our supporting cast team. Well, you are one of the few that believe that. Most just say that the Bulls sucked w/out Jordan. Remember, it's easy to say that Kukoc was "sooooo great" after the fact. At the time, both Kukoc and Kerr were new players. No legendary status. Can Pike do that? What about Mobley as sixth man? Never say never.
dude, if Francis was a leader, so were Ewing (who scored 20.8 and 22.4 ppg in JVG 1st two yrs), Sprewell and Houston...and the JVG teams had a lot of experience. Why are you mentioning Ward and Othella?? oh, just conveniently ignore Starks (who started JVG 1st 2 yrs), Larry Johnson, Marcus Camby, Kurt Thomas, and Ewing (who was their leading scorer in 97, 98, 99 and was even their #3 scorer through two playoff series in 1999).
I will not backoff that. I'll tell you why. Because it goes right to the core of what I seen WRONG with the Rockets and Rudy's philosophy for the last 4-5 years. Rudy expected too much of his "star" players and too little from his supporting players. One of the thing that I learned over the years from the supporting players is that they seem to overachieve when they play as one (TEAM). Phill seem to galvanize this whole mentality. He was able to get more than expected (compared to other coaches of other teams) from his supporting cast. He was able to get them to believe (that's key) they were better than the actually were. Guess what happens? They actually become better!!! That's what happens when you push someone over the their own expectations. Zen? Psychology? What ever works. Guess what he did with lazy, scared players? Either give them an ultimatum, or trade them. Simple. Get the job done or you are gone. Longly was an example of that. What happened when he went to another team. Never heard of him again. It works. So, if Phil can get 55 wins with that core group. Then why can't we get 40 wins with our core supporting players. That's 15 less wins! Geeesh!!!! Talk about low expectations!
Ignore Starks? You're acting like he's some great "star." So, Starks was going to lead them? The 7 game choker? Who else? Camby? Johnson? Again, those JVG teams had a good core group. And he was able to push them over the hump and had some success. But they lacked that one leader. As far as the Ewing/Francis comparison. Well, remember. I'm a Francis-basher. So, it's up to him if he wants to take the "leadership role." Not sure he can do it. But he can't, we are screwed. Because it wont be Yao.
dude, you just don't remember Kukoc is all. He arrival was much anticipated and he delivered immediately, as soon as Phil could get Pippen to play with him. I am most definitely saying that if you take Hakeem off the 94 Rockets, the Jordan-less '94 Bulls had superior talent to us. Do you actually believe that's not true? I'd like you to find one person on the BBS who thinks Hakeem's supporting cast was better than Jordan's in 1994.
well since yao was the difference in 40 and 50, i'll assume francis should also add 10 wins to get us to 60. so DavidS, you merely think we should've challenged for the #1 seed in the greatest conference ever. how fair to rudy of you. i guess if we had overachieved we'd have made a run at 72-10. i have no idea how to do this, but ask any analyst, writer, tv person, beat writer, whatever, to take francis and yao off last year's team and then ask them how much the starting lineup of moochie, cuttino, posey, eg, cato with backups nobody, nobody, rice, mo t, and nobody (oh i'm sorry, collier) should've won. i'd be shocked if anyone responded with 30 or higher and wouldn't be suprised if no one said over 25. for you to say 40+ was just a matter of effort is understate the value of talent to the nth degree. as for the bulls, who tries to have their cake and eat it too? don't most people think one of two ways: 1) jordan was God. the team was a bunch of scrubs w/o him. they needed him. he was the greatest ever. 2) uhh, they had plenty of talent around jordan, they weren't winning with mj and scrubs. look at 93-94, two less wins w/o him. he was definitely great, but so was that team. i know i am a firm believer in #2. so lets not say jackson was undermanned. and again, you asked rudy to compensate for being undermanned by injuries. injuries are one thing, but what happened in 99 and 01 was ridiculous. in 99, at one point our top 6 frontcourt guys (barkley, rogers, massenburg, hakeem, cato, two sammiches) were all gone and pig miller and matt bullard started a few games at pf/c TOGETHER. how the hell is any coach going to overcome that. and we still finished 14-9 with a rookie and 2nd year guy leading us, not bad. then in '01, our pf and sf missed essentially the whole season and our best player missed 25 games. at one point in december, cuttino was the only projected starter playing, and was doing so on two bad ankles. that's not undermanned, that's devestated. all the teamwork in the world can't make moochie/hurt cuttino/torres/eg/collier (good lord did he start?) win ballgames. and is 40 wins asking too much out of a team's supporting cast after losing it's two best players? uhh, yeah, how much does SA win w/o duncan, much less w/o duncan/parker (or drob or whoever). minny w/o kg and wally? the lakers w/o shaq and kobe (maybe 15 games if they're lucky). sac and dallas are the only two teams with amazing supporting casts with a reasonable ability to compete. everyone else would be like us in that the extras just don't have it. 40+ wins IS impossible.
No I'm not acting like he's a great star. But you did ignore him vs Ward. sheesh. And I most definitely am saying Sprewell, Houston and Ewing had All-Star years under JVG. You just try to pretend that didn't happen, just to make your point that JVG didn't have a Tim Duncan...like Rudy did, or 'sumpin. I mean, I don't even understand your insinuation that Rudy had a leader and JVG didn't. I'm done. This is just getting silly.
Yes, all that is true. As far as the last part. I've had debates about that same issue. Some homers refuse to admit that the Bulls 94 supporting cast were better than the Rockets 94 supporint cast. What's funny is that those same people say that that team sucked without Jordan?
Look at what the lakers did with Shaq out this season. They had a top five player and still weren't over .500. Look how the Spurs did without Duncan in the playoffs a few years back. They got their butts handed to them by the Suns. How did they do with Robinson? Bad enough to get two time MVP Foward. So is Pops terrible coach? Give me a break, you give way too much credit to the coaches for winning and losing, when in fact it is the team with the best players who win championships.
The Magic prior to MaCrady went .500 with Mike Miller and DA leading the show. They did it by playing every night and playing team basketball under Doc Rivers. The Rockets went losing 14 straight games without Francis with Cuttino Mobley and Kenny Thomas leading the show. They did it by lack of heart and team play, poorly coached in other words, under Rudy T. There is a world of difference between good and bad coaching.
That part of about "two less wins w/out him" is not looking at the whole picture. In 91, 92, 93, the Bulls were building their legacy. The TEAM was getting better. They were gaining momentum. The "two less" was that TEAM momentum. The core group knew each other (chemistry) and they had (talent). Enough talent to win it all? Not likely. But good enough to compete at a high level. If Jordan did not retired in for the start of 94, they wouldn't have done the "two less" wins record. They probably would have gotten 10 more wins (65). P.S. This BBS acceptance that the 94 Bulls had talent is amazing to me. Eight Months ago I had a debate about this very same issue. No one was admitting the Bulls had talent. All they would say is that the Bull sucked w/o Jordan and that the Rockets supporting cast was sooooo much better. Now, f4p and HeyP are saying the opposite. Where where you back then?
I thought I already did. 1992-1996, .638 winning percentage. 1992-1998, .617 winning percentage. You have to have BOTH. That was the beauty and brilliance of the first championship here. Hakeem dominated, but he also trusted his supporting cast. Ask Olajuwon - with the exception of Sampson's early years, he never trusted his supporting cast until RT became the head coach. I don't "blame Phil" for winning. Up until this year, he HAS done it. He deserves plenty of credit for that. However, he has always had one or more of the top 3-4 players in the league on those winning clubs. That needs to be taken into account. For what it's worth, I don't get you either. RT is the best Rockets head coach to date. Period. That list includes luminaries like Bill Fitch and Del Harris.
