LOL - well.......no need to get all upset.....this will all be over soon and we can cheer on the Rockets team...sans their most divicive player. DD
Uh...no. At least not entirely. The fact he was the best player didn't hurt and was critical to our success. But you don't win without the right supporting cast. We had 3 of the all-time great role players in Elie, Sammy, and Horry. You can thank CD for those players. Hakeem was a beast throughout both playoff runs, but those 2 rings were also won with a huge number of clutch shots by the role players. There are similarites to this year's team: different clutch players stepping up every night to take the big shot, grab the timely rebound, or make the defensive stop.
Can I take my 20% off Rockets Shop card to the TC and snag a Randolph authentic to go with my Brooks yet? please...pretty please. lol.
Perhaps the team should have allowed McGrady to participate in preseason. He declared he was ready for training camp, but the Rockets wanted to wait until the Late Nov MRI to reevaluate if I recalll the events correctly. What harm would it have done the Rockets to see what Tracy had in preseason. It would have been even easier for them to dismiss him back then. I don't disagree that the coaching staff typically knows what they are doing. Heck, it's why they are paid the big bucks to do so right? I just get the eerie feeling similar to JVG squeezing what he could out of a team (outside of Yao and TMac) to make them overachieve. Now the team has a much better supporting cast, but the stars are out. Maybe that's why I'm frustrated as a fan.
I did think there was a slim 5-10% window, simply because you dont want $23 mil just sitting around. But it does look like a situation with burned bridges. I'm trying to think if Michael Redd, Gilbert Arenas, Danny Granger, Kevin Martin coming back, any other high scoring player would be limited by an 8 minute/6 game window? Yes if the player is just physically ineffective, or the player previously pissed off the organization. I think its a little of both in McGrady's case. That would only make sense, wouldnt it? Plus it'd be a easy way for the minor league club to fill a few more seats by promoting the star player. Like Roger Clemens in AA his rehab starts. Roger Clemens, in double AA ball! Thats a win for all sides, the player, the big club, and the little club. Plus its another way to showcase the player to other clubs. This needs to happen
Those three players were clutch performers without a doubt. However, as YOYO pointed out, Carroll Dawson was not the GM at the time when those players were acquired. Looking at Dawson's record, he made some questionable decisions.
Anybody that thinks 7-8 minutes over a couple of games is enough for a player like Tracy to prove his worth is on crack. Bottom line: they're done with him and this was the plan all along. This whole mini-showcasing thing was merely a stunt to get his name in the headlines and generate interest. Adelman never wanted him back in the first place but probably compromised with management to play him the 7-8 minutes in a meaningless role in order to appease management's request to showcase him for a trade.
Game 3 at Phoenix when the Rockets were down 0-2 and labeled "CHOKE CITY". you know.. (May 13-15, 1994) Two hours after blowing the biggest lead in NBA playoff history, the Rockets flew out of Choke City down 0-2 to the Phoenix Suns. Four days later, the Rockets flew into Clutch City with the series tied 2-2. In Game 1 of the 1994 Western Conference Semifinals, Houston built an 18-point lead but lost. In Game 2, they had a 20-point lead in the fourth quarter but lost in overtime. "I'll never forget getting on the charter flight after Game 2," Rockets television commentator Bill Worrell said. "It was like a morgue." The Rockets didn't rise from the dead until the second half of Game 3 when they found themselves behind 49-41 at halftime. Then Vernon Maxwell got hot, scoring 31 points in the second half as the Rockets won 118-102. Houston finished "Desert Sweep" by winning Game 4, 107-96, to even the series. http://www.nba.com/rockets/news/millennium_index.html
Adelman should get a sizable raise from participating in this charade with management. I DO think if Adelman said "I want to keep McGrady" then Morey would be less reluctant to try to deal him. But since they all happen to be in agreement that McGrady wont help, its easier for everyone to carry it through. Its easier for Morey to say its all been the coaches decision (c'mon now).
I think at this point the organization isnt doing the fans any favors. We knew it would be a tough year with Yao out, and Mcgrady coming back from microfracture. I get that. What I dont understand is the constant uproar of the Mcgrady saga. The teams uses the stance that 1. They want to be careful bringing Mcgrady along b/c of the surgery. Well, he has slightly with the limited time given, proven he can at least be out there healthy. Then the team said 2. They didnt want to disrupt team chemistry. What do they think they are doing. The Rockets are in every basketball column with this on-going drama. I dont think holding on to him is making chemistry any better. Most guys in the locker room are probably looking around wondering who is going to get packaged with him in a inevitable trade. I knew all along that it was bait and switch from the organization. They knew from day one, that they were going to drag this along as far as they could, hoping Feb would eventually roll around. Why lie about it. Any basketball guru could see that coming during the NBA draft over the summer. Im not a Tmac groupy, but I dont hate the guy either. Im a Rockets fan, and will be so, before Mcgrady came and after he leaves. I just hope they give the fans the pleasure of seeing a near cap filled team on the court. There is 23 million in assets we are sitting on. I understand holding out for the best deal, but this is getting a bit out of control. (Side note: I hate the YOFs, TOFs, and the new yellowback TOHs. What happened to all being Rocket fans? Weird agendas on the board are quite pathetic. Love em when they win, love em when they lose. )
Pretty much. There's absolutely no way I believe that Adelman, being the brilliant basketball mind that he is, doesn't see what's in front of his very eyes unless there's a compelling reason preventing him doing the sensible thing (reducing Ariza's minutes/role, giving Tracy a more serious look). The Orlando game was the best example of this when the dreaded Battrizo duo was at it's absolute worst. Before Tracy's "comeback", if you could read between the lines of just about every Adelman interview you definitely got the sense that he feels bringing him back wasn't worth it. For appearances sake, he had to keep regurgitating the whole "Stick to the plan, see what happens" talking points but I really don't believe the intent was to ever seriously bring him back.
I said February 9th, 2009 that was the last time we'd ever see McGrady in a Rockets uniform. I wasn't right, but I get the feeling I'm going to be pretty damn close.
It's not only that. The only way those 8 minutes per could have been any use to Mcgrady is if he went all Kobe Bryant over the team, gave them the middle finger and went on a scoring spree every time he touched the ball. But then management would have pointed to him, said "he's disrupting, he thinks he's the star, he can't play in the system." I'm far from a Tmac "fan" but what I saw was him slowly playing himself into shape, trying to play within the system and giving a good faith effort to fit in with the program. But by virtue of doing that he hasn't "shown enough" to merit more PT. It's damned if you do damned if you dont. This is the first really bad move by Morey and company... and it's bad because it stinks of hubris. If the Rockets think that they're untouchable, they're in a for a fall. How the **** are you going to **** on a $23 million contract? If no respect for Tmac's skills, at least properly showcase him to move him and get trade value back for the $23 million. It's like they're willing to shoot themselves in the ass to spite Tmac. Morey has done great with his drafts and trades but what does he think he's going to do with Trevor Ariza and Carl Landry as the centerpieces of a team? Does he think he's going to win a championship with those 2?
Why can't anyone take Adelman at face value that he can't figure out how to incorporate TMAC in a team that needs to share the ball to win. That he will make a decision today on what the plan going forward will be.
I think if you could have gotten an honest answer from Morey or Adelman at that time they would have agreed with you. I think something changed that no one expected and that is why McGrady got his 6 game stint. He wasn't in the 09-10 plan until they found they had no takers for him as recently as a month ago. That's my best guess.
Or he could have just matched the effort of guys like Hayes and Battier o n defense. It's not all about how he performed with the ball in his hands.
I suspect Tmac was given a very tight list of expectations, including accepting what ever play time was given to him as a condition to getting the original 8 minutes per game. Conditions he no doubt agreed to at the time in order to get on the court. Then he assumed after a few games he would be back to dominating the offense and playing 20-30 minutes a game. It didn't happen, the Rockets told him to take the 8 minutes or nothing, and he choose to take nothing and head home for the holidays. That scenario makes more sense to me than saying they were trying to punish him from the start; if they were they didn't need to bring him back at all. Or that they were trying to show case him; if they were then 8 minutes was not going to be sufficient to up his trade value at all, especially when the coach is saying Tmac is no longer capable of playing as a primary scoring option. I think the Rockets were trying to give Tracy a chance to play his way back in, but he wasn't patient enough with their process and expected them to bend to his wishes. They wouldn't and that leaves us where we are now.
I feel ya. I've been saying since about October that my gut feeling was that we would be forced to trade him for fricken Eddy Curry. Seeing that "T-Mac to NY" rumor on the first page does nothing to put me at ease in that regard.
