Will McGrady be the greatest Rocket ever? Better than Hakeem?

dude we had Dream be4
we have t mac now
that's my point

 

Huh? What exactly are you trying to say here. Hakeem was an incredible athlete with great quickness, leaping ability and coordination. The chances of him NEVER doing a reverse layup or reverse dunk in his career is downright microscopic. And even if by some strange twist he never did, what is the point of this comment. When does making a certain kind of dunk or layup have any bearing on whether a player is great or not.

I usually don't get into these Rocket vs. Rocket threads (and have totally avoided this thread up till now. I guess I'm just too amped up for the Rox right now and am reading every thread.) But your comment just baffles me. Maybe that's why I stay out of these threads.

 

What was the point of the thread? To compare Hakeem and TMac of course? How do you do so?
I think you can compare 3 things, feel free to add anything that you think the followings don't cover:
1) Skills.
Hakeem was an incredible athlete with great quickness, leaping ability and coordination. I will also give you that he had some great moves, his dream shake was unstoppable, his little hook shots across the lane was money too ...
but you will be hard pressed to remember if he ever did a reverse dunk, reverse layups, dribble behind the back, layup with left hand, shot jumper with left hand ...
Tmac, on the other hand, is there anything the man can not do?

2) Stats.
Hakeem was better in rebounds, Tmac in assists. They both scored a bunch. TMac was the scoring champ a couple times. Pretty even here, I think.

3) Achievements.
Hakeem, 2 titles. TMac, none.

If you compare based on skills, the edge has to go to TMac, on achievements, Hakeem.

I will then suggest that 75% of you who claim Hakeem will always be the greatest is short sighted. How can you say Tmac can never, ever be the greatest if that is what you base on, the tittles? You can not tell the future. It's illogical to come to that conclusion.

 

Keep in mind that Hakeem didn't start playing basketball until he was 16 or some age close. Hakeem will always be the greatest Rocket, unless someone comes in and has a dynasty with many championships. Please everyone quit comparing stats and skill set so much. They play different positions. They are both extremely athletic and both great players. I think we should just leave it at that.

 

Dream had a reverse,one and two handed,since PSJ.

 

ok..now this is probably a more legit topic, because i have a reaction to this immediately.

frankly, they're very hard to compare. drexler/barkley are already retired...they have a whole career to look back on. McGrady seems to be just peaking in his...with many years left.

but just taking a snippet in time...if McGrady keeps doing this in the playoffs, I think he'll be remembered as a better player than Drexler or Barkley. ridiculous to say that, because it's only been 2 games...so i'm just saying, if he gets continued performances like these last 2 in the playoffs, i'd put him right up there with those guys.

 

wow. i dont think i've seen anyone do that in the NBA.

 

Barkley was a great player, but not a great Rocket.

 

No offense, but Hakeem whipped out the Dream Shake in '86 and tortured the Lakers with it in the playoffs. I kept saying... "No, no, no Jeez!" until game three.

The thing that pisses me off when people bring up Hakeem is that he transcended the center position in a way that no one has.
Wilt had some of the offensive moves Dream did. Russell had 100% of the defensive skill, but not the athletesism Hakeem had.

This is a great age, Jordan's supposededly the best player ever, and Shaq has journalists considering him possibly the best center in history.

What a joke. I'll commit heresy here by saying T-Mac is actually better than Jordan was at this age IMHO, but the league has much more athletecism now and Jordan had few rivals in overall talent.

T-Mac is going into some pretty heady territory now, but he'd have to go down on his knees and beg the league to stop him before I'd put him in Hakeem's class even if we run the table.

What short memories people have.

 

Hakeem did transcend the center position...Hakeem was a guard in a centers body. No center ever had that kind of foot work, ball handling skills, touch, power, quickness....in a six foot 10 body!!!

It's too bad you can never put Hakeem up against Wilt, but the closest modern day comparison to Wilt was Shaq, and Hakeem outplayed Shaq in the finals....

 

there is video of him doing a reverse dunk in ReasonSF3's hakeem tribute.

he switches hands to the left mid leap in the akeem olajuwon basketball superstar video that was recently posted.

you should download both of those videos if you think hakeem could only run fast and jump high.

 

This thread is a joke. Tmac has never got out of the first round yet. I'm as encouraged as everyone else because of the recent signs in the playoffs, but lets show Dream some respect.

I'm not saying Dream would beat him in a national popularity contest but any Houston sport fan of the last 10 years know that Hakeem dominated on both sides of the court.

Even if Tracey won 3 championships with Yao, it wouldn't make him better in my opinion. Hakeem won his without a superstar in their prime (Clyde on the tail end of his career for second title was not superstar status). There is no way Tracey would win one title without the help with Yao. He wont get out of the first round if Yao doesn't play at a high level consistently.

 

no.



hell no



ill tell you one thing, tmac could not lead this team to the playoffs without Yao ming.