none of our stars are leaders. that's the bottom line. they just are not. they are guys who lead by examples. unfortunately, our players are not good enough to follow their lead. and that's not the fault of tmac and yao either. people do not understand that people can lead in many ways (vocally, internally, by example...). again, tmac and yao have done enough in the past 3 years (outside of the injury-ridden season in 05-06) to get us out of the first round. i mean ENOUGH. sure they could have done more, but they did just enough if only our role players were more capable. both combined for 50 pts in both playoff series to utah and dallas and we lost both. shaq and kobe combined for 52-55 pts during their run so our duo was not that way off (add onto that that we played a much slower pace). our role players just have incompetent most of the time. yes rafer is the best PG on this team and that shows how pathetic our PG position is. head is a guy that gets a lot of minutes when tmac is out => that shows the lack of depth at that position. again, for us to get to that next level, scola and bonzi have to be the ones to raise their level of play. those 2 have the capabilities to be more than just simple role players; they can be guys like stackhouse to the mavs, barbosa to the suns, ginobili to the spurs. it might take them both to do that. but only those 2 have the talent to help tmac and yao (that's why scola should start ) rafer, head, battier, hayes are just not capable for long stretches. brooks is still learning.
Call this team for what it is. A bunch of nonperformers. Former gloryhounds has-beens and rookies. The only true players are Yao and T-Mac and the rest are just that. Washed up, mediocre or will take years to develop.
Okay....the real quotes from Yao Ming....... So after all, the Sohu article was not a fake one and came hours before the Houston Chronicle one.
I think scola has the most potential. The guy was the MVP of the most competitive league in Europe, an established player. I like his quote in the other chron article : Avoiding the roller coaster With the Rockets on another emotional swing, forward Luis Scola said they must handle the highs and lows of the season more objectively. "We won five games straight, and everybody was so happy," he said. "Losing two games at home was really hard for us. I always think we have to get away from the stream. "Like when we start 6-1, we don't have to think we're the best in the world. When we lose six games in a row, we don't have to think we're the worst. It happens again. We won five games straight. We don't have to feel unbeatable and the greatest team ever. Now that we lost two games, we don't have to feel that we are the worst. "We have to get some balance, work hard and try to build a winning team."
Come to think of it, I do remember Kobe getting angry and gave some strong stare and even shout at his team mates when they start making errors or when they are losing their nerve. Yao should have done that when Rafer made that unbelieveable pass to the opponent unfortunately instead of Head or when Head made another "spectacular" pass. He should halted the team and calm those nervy guys down, slow the tempo and hold their nerve. Instead, these guys tried to counter attack quick and and continue with consecutive errors hence wiping out the 10 pts lead.
I think our coach needs to start coming up with plans to solve the fronting issue on Yao. like brook said they need to practice entry pass. now all the teams are going to shut down yao in 4th quarter in order to make up jacking up bricks. If Tmac is cold then we are really going to loss more games.
I'm sick of hearing these speeches after losing a couple games. Seriously, how many of these are we going to have to hear? The typical everybody played bad, including me. I want more walking, less talking. Anyone can talk to the media about how bad you've played but it's a whole different story to go out there and change all that.
I agree. Even if SF3 doesn't play many minutes, his energy seem to rub off on Yao and Rafer. Scola's always a madman, which I love. Brooks too.
The key is working hard all the time even when you are down or up. Players on the Rockets who seem to do this are: Luis Yao Battier Hayes Brooks Deke Players who seem to let the moment get to them, Tmac Rafer Luther Bonzi James Francis Incomplete - not enough action to judge this year Snyder Landry Novak If you notice almost all of the key ball handlers fall into the "Get down on themselves" category. That is the team's main problem.....the primary ball handlers lose confidence to easily and panic. Got to get Brooks in there, get some swagger back. DD
Brooks was not able to defend Miller Tuesday night, (hell, neither could Rafer ), that's why he was taken out. But RA, here is a clue -- TAKE HEAD OUT WHENEVER THE GAME GETS CLOSE!!!!!!!!!!!
That's prefect, I think you know some chinese lingo of description. Yao, he is a typical good Shanghai husband.
I'm tired of the board being cluttered with the melodramatic/stage play writers that dwell within the Chinese Media.I never thought it could get worse than our own,but the aforementioned parties are so blatant about their "sky is falling agenda",etc.I'll bet every time Yao takes a dump somebody from the media is smiling while hiding around the corner holding a pooper scooper ready to run to the nearest lab. You know,many in our media are agenda laden whores/paparazzi too.I just hear the influence of propaganda in many of the "reports" and I feel sad for so many....but after awhile it gets nuts. pryuen - I appreciate YOUR contributions but so many times I'll read Yao's quotes and think,there is no way he said that.Yao is an intelligent/witty/urbane man who is very articulate.I might add that I admire him greatly...handling everthing he does with such class and dignity ALL the while being a great amabassador to a nation.(and often carrying a team on his back)By the way he's one helluva baller too. Look,Yao needs to tell everybody something.He knows we're a work in progress though and will be fine.I realize that he's having to play through the metamorphosis,rather than watching.It's tough when you have to tell others something because most can't see or comprehend the truth.But Dude knows it's coMING. I guess he just needs to feed the monster.
That isn't the solution. The solution is the throw the ball to the weakside and let someone penetrate.
