May 5, 2008...7:25 am
Failure to launch: Rockets just don’t have enough fuel
Sooner or later, the Houston Rockets probably knew they were only going to go so far without the services of all-star center Yao Ming. Sooner or later, we knew that Tracy McGrady was going to need help. But once again, sooner came a lot faster than later. In fact, later was never really located. Not this season. Not last season. Not the last seven trips to the playoffs.
For the second straight year, the Utah Jazz eliminated the Houston Rockets in the first round of the playoffs. Last year, the Jazz needed the full seven games to oust the Rockets. This year it took six to rid themselves of Houston.
That now makes it four times in the past five years the Rockets have failed to advance past the first round. The Rockets’ past seven trips to the postseason have all ended the same way: first-round knockout. Four of those seven times have come at the hands of Utah. And for Tracy McGrady, well, the second round of the playoffs has now eluded McGrady seven times.
Sure 0-7 is kind of hard to ignore, and when you’re a premier star like McGrady people expect you to do big things and perform under the bright lights. But hell, even Michael had Scottie. Horace Grant was alway relieable. John Paxon and Steve Kerr managed to hit key shots. Shaq and Kobe had each other. Tim Duncan has Tony Parker and Manu Ginobli. Hakeem had Clyde. You get where I’m going with this.
There are no such thing as one-man shows in the playoffs. Just ask LeBron James. It was James last year playing virtually one against five, as the Cavs were systematically toyed with and dismantled by the San Antonio Spurs. Again, McGrady was the only clown in the circus. It happened in Orlando, and it’s happening in Houston. It’s happened to guys like Allen Iverson and Kevin Garnett. Management failed to construct capable teams around those guys. Houston is on their way to following what Minnesota and Philadelphia did.
Whether you think KG and AI are better players than McGrady is irrelevant right now. What is relevant, however, is that this recent playoff loss should not be dropped at McGrady’s feet. His 40 points, 10 boards and five assists says so. Only he and Luis Scola, who had 15 points, were the only Houston players in double figures in the 113-91 drubbing in Game 6 against Utah.
The rest of the Houston squad managed just 10 made field goals on 39 attempts, so it’s now wonder the Rockets never got close to activating the launch sequence. Maybe the most disappointing thing about this exit was that Houston looked listless and uninterested from the tip off. The Rockets fell behind by 19 points in the first half. Dikembe Mutombo picked two key, early fouls. They couldn’t get stops defensively. They couldn’t take care of the ball on offense. It was about as ugly as it could’ve gotten for Houston.
The lone brightspot was McGrady, who continued to drain shot after shot in the first half, finishing with 24 points while the rest of teammates were reduced to viewers rather than competitors, T-Mac watching rather than helping him shoulder the offensive load. One against five; McGrady never had a chance.
Rafaer Alston leaving the game in the first half with an ankle injury didn’t help make things better. But from where I’m looking at things, Utah was just the better team, bottom line. They were the better team before the series started and they proved why they were better when it ended. Carlos Boozer was better than Chuck Hayes and Dikembe Mutombo. Deron Williams was better than Rafaer Alston and Bobby Jackson. Mehmet Okur was better than Luis Scola. And so on, and so forth.
The supporting cast around McGrady might as well have been invisible. The Carl Landrys and Chuck Hayeses and Dikembe Mutombos that contributed greatly to the Rockets’ 22-game winning streak didn’t show up for this series. But Deron Williams did. Carlos Boozer did, too. The Rockets just didn’t have many answers for Utah, and if Game 6 were a test, then Houston didn’t even get past the first question.
Rick Adelman tried. Lord knows he tried to find the magical combination of five to put on the floor. But there were no tricks, no masterplans Adelman could draw up. Jerry Sloan’s crew stepped up. Adelman’s soldiers stepped aside.
Nobody can take away what Houston did this season, and as well as they played in this series, not even Utah’s series win for the second year in a row can erase Houston’s 22-game winning streak this season. They hustled. They excelled at the little things. They helped McGrady. They outworked you. They lost Yao Ming and by the end, they lost Alston.
But yet, somehow I believe the focus around basketball will be the failure of McGrady to make it to the first week of May. Basketball is a results business, just like football or baseball. The Patriots aren’t happier today than yesterday about going 18-1 and losing their only game in the Super Bowl. The bottom line will be that T-Mac couldn’t get out of the first round for the seventh straight time.
Is that fair? Of course it’s not fair. But that won’t stop the naysayers from proclaiming McGrady isn’t a guy you can be successful with. Or that he isn’t a player that’s capable of carrying a team to the promiseland. Well, as I stated before, neither is the so-called best player in the game, LeBron James.
Maybe a healthy Yao Ming next year will make the world of difference and land Houston into the second round. The Rockets found a point guard in Rafaer Alston. Alston has solidified the spot and turned the Rockets’ point guard situation into a strength rather than a weakness.
Houston can be better, and they will be better. The Rockets can get better through free agency, the NBA Draft, and trades. They must get better. They must get other players to pose an offensive threat besides Yao and T-Mac. We saw this year the Hornets are rapidly rising and the Lakers have returned to the top of the mountain. The Spurs are still the Spurs. Dallas and Phoenix will be back. And then there’s always Utah to contend with.
The Rockets need to stockpile fuel in order to have a successful and lengthy launch in the Western Conference next season. Otherwise, the same fate will await them a year from now: Failure to Launch. Mission Aborted.
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