Get real, the only trade even remotely equivalent to T-Mac would be Kobe or Lebron. Not happening. I still see T-Mac as one of the top 3 SG-SF in the league.
If we had Bosh, Garnett, or duncan instead of Yao we would have gona further , Yao was SUPPOSED to take some heat off McGrady and hes pretty much never done that!
are you serious? yao was here... before tmac was here. tmac was here... to compliment yao or vice versa. they were suppose to be dual leaders. and now, our true centerpiece is yao, whereas, mcgrady is the one showing a decline. mcgrady is expandable, but whether or not we actually want to do that, is up to morey. yao is not. personally, i think mcgrady should be given another half a season, then judge. or give him a half a season stretch where everyone is healthy.
Give him a half season stretch? What is that going to prove? The team won 55 games this season!!!! What makes you think that number is going to decline with a healthy roster next season? Don't get the logic. Neither player is expendable next season. We finally have our PF rotation set, only need a backup PG and SG/SF. Overreaction is amazing.
It all depends on where JVG coaches next. Wherever that is, take your pick of the players on that team for them.
Oh yea, you're right!! Please tell me when dream, horry, cassell, kenny, mad max, clyde, and elie are going to suit up in their prime. That's what is going to take to win a series. You the new clutch fan, who's never seen the team get out of the first round. First round my A$$, this clutch city and we expect nothing less than championships. I've been a rocket fan longer than you've been born.
and that's not a knock towards yao. the league has become faster and big men nowadays that are able to do many things offensively are more useful. look at how gasol obliterate denver. yao obviously is better than gasol as seen by the vastly more double teams he draws. but it's so easy to double team yao. with guys like KG, gasol, stoudamire..., in THIS system or today's style, we can score so many ways with those guys. imagine those guys receiving the passes of tmac that scola/landry/hayes fail to finish regularly in game 1. again, it's time for us to know that tmac is now at best a 22-23ppg, not 29-30. but his best asset that still makes him the 3rd best perimeter player behind kobe and lebron is his playmaking. he makes plays. if we can get shooters and finishers around tmac, we will be extremely dominant.
that's after sucking pretty much the entire 3 quarters. tmac puts all his energy into our first 3 quarters. that's why you need a TEAM effort if you want to win in the playoffs. plus, kobe got single coverage as the game wore on b/c the other guys were so dominant (esp. gasol). tmac got MORE double teams as the game wore on in game 1.
I see that some of you are saying that Kobe sucked today but they still won. Well thats true kobe did suck today, but who do they have, Gasol..he scored what 32? grabbed 15? Gasol was and probably is still an all-star imo..who else do we have...i am not saying that Scola sucks or anything but hes a rookie, he cant produce like Gasol...again..if yao was here, he would be the gasol...and battier doing his thing 7-7 from the field 4-4 3 pt land..tmac doing crap and luther thinking without his brain in his head
the three players mentioned have little to no value to others because they are just non-talented hustle players. Head can't even do that well, he just shoots. Tmac might bring you a talented young player with much less talent than tracy and we could hope he gets much better. The rockets' only hope for the future is to ride tmac into the ground until the end of his contract, sign him for cheap and hope we have developed some young good players to play around Yao. Yao and the rookies are pretty much the only players on the rockets with favorable trade value. Tmac's trade value just isn't good enough to make a move involving him. It reminds me of Kirelenko and Kobe in the offseason, the trade wouldn't make sense for either team.
gasol actually had 36, 16, and 8. those are career-like #s even for some of the greats. him and odom were dominating the nuggets on the boards. it's not even a comparison.
Is that an argument or just an observation? I said Kobe COULD suck for the rest of the game and the Lakers will still win, not he WILL suck and they will still win. The game was well over by then, it was a 19 point lead I believe and Phil Jackson still put him in so they could "keep the momentum going" or something like that. My point is, Kobe had the talent around him tonight to beat a team without him playing amazing for most of the game. He didn't need to score 18 in the 4th. Pau was insane with 36 or 38 or whatever it was. Everyone was hitting shots. Kobe faced single coverage (K-Mart) most of the game but his teammates STILL found ways to burn the Nuggets. Lamar was just too big and strong and athletic for the Nuggets to contain. Same with Pau. We just don't have that talent without Yao, maybe not even with him, but I'd bet on us against anybody with Yao in the lineup.
