Who did MJ have as starting forwards again? And wasn't Will Perdue part of that team. Jordan and other GREAT players make those around them better....Francis....well, he can jump high. DD
Either way, the point is valid....MJ made his teamates better. Francis doesn't. Francis is the SINGLE most overated player in the NBA. He can not shoot well, he can not dribble well, he can not pass well...BUT.....he hustles his butt off and is a ferocious competitor. The single biggest problem with Steve is that he THINKS he is better than he is...... He is NO superstar....just a very good athlete who needs to learn to play the game with his mind or he will be out of the league in 5 years. DD
gotta agree with pgabriel here. he did have good forwards and the guys further down the bench, at every position, knew their roles and did not deviate from them. every player on the bulls was there for one reason, to support michael in winning championships. we are far from having that kind of single-mindedness. the spurs have the same deal. hell, the rockets had it with hakeem. i don't know where the whole, you-need-two-stars thing comes from. it's nice, but you really only need one. the kings, for example have a lot of great players but no superstar. webber defered to bibby when it counted most in the playoffs- so he i not THE MAN. great players do make those around them better by communicating team goals clearly through action or words, but it is really up to all the guys on the team to know there roles and take responsibility. the superstars main purpose is to be the go-to-guy at the most crucial times. francis is not a superstar, his contributions can be found almost entirely on the stat sheet rather than the intangibles like, when you get your points, how you lead your team etc. etc. etc. sorry this turned into a rant, i'll stop now.
Also, people like to say Francis hasn't made the playoffs but I just went to the Bulls Web site and I was astonished to learn that the Bulls made it to the Playoffs in Jordan's first two years with a 38 win total and a 30 win total. Not comparing Francis to Jordan, just saying that the no playoff birth complaint isn't really that valid.
Does anyone realize that Lakers never use zone defense? They play man defense, and Shaq is a slow center who can't help on defense as he did before. Payton is an old point guard who can't guard quicker guards. It's when Steve confronts teams who use a combination of man and zone that it starts giving him problems in his shooting. It gets even worse when the opposing team goes full zone like with the Mavericks. There's essentially zero penetration into the paint with the way the Mavericks play their zones. Yao can't even walk in the paint two steps without bumping into two Mav defenders. I was watching the game last night with the Mavs and Spurs, and the Mavericks didn't go nuts on the zone defense because the game was pretty close until the beginning of the 2nd half. It was a big difference than when the Rockets busted the Mavs for a 16 point 1st quarter lead. Mavs immediately went into a full zone with a huge emphasis on forcing the jumpshot. Steve has to shoot the jumper at that point. Is this JVG's fault? No, NBA changed the rules, and that's just pretty much it. I think Rudy T screwed up badly when he didn't prepare the Rocket guards, especially Steve, for the zone defenses by putting more emphasis on shooting jumpers. I just remember Rudy T complaining about the zone defense and not trying to get his players to adapt to it. I read that Bibby and Bobby Jackson have put in a whole bunch of time after practices just shooting jumpers in the gym. I think the Songalia guy for the Kings is probably a better shooter than 80% of the Rockets. As much as I think Steve likes basketball, I think he has worried about his dunk more than his jumpshot at least until recently when it seems like Steve is practicing extra jumpers with Van Gundy. Is it too late? I don't think so. Since Yao is being helped by Ewing, I think Steve needs to hire Calvin Murphy. Look at Calvin Murphy's statistics in his career. http://www.basketballreference.com/players/playerpage.htm?ilkid=MURPHCA01
JVG is the kinda coach the rockets need whether steve likes it or not.....steve has 2 options......play thru his problems w/ JVG and dlook past em....or request a trade.......both options are workable.
One, we can't be 9 games above .500 after 82 games, it has to be an even number, i.e. 8 or 10. Two, if we are even 10 games above .500, we'd be at 46 wins, which is not heck of a lot better than last year. Just knit picking at somethings you said
Charvo, Steve (not this season) is a good shooter. He shoots extremely well from the 3 in his first 4 years. His mid range jumper off the dribble was money in the past. But the biggest problem this season to me is mental. He's getting criticized so much that he's shooting to not miss instead of shooting to make the shot. I think if he gets traded to another team where the media wont focus on him like they're doing right now and have more supporting fans, his game will improve. The ideal situation is if he can find his shot as a Rocket. But at this point, if the right deal came along for both the Rox and Francis, I wouldn't mind a trade to benefit both parties.
Same argument can apply to Rudy. In fact, last summer, I use this argument to argue against the Rudy bashers who kept saying that Rudy had to go because "we missed the playoffs for 4 years."
