RoxFan08 wrote:
And then you go and make completely stupid, erroneous comments like this one. I challenge you to take a look at Tracy's playoff stats from last year, hell, from his career. I'm pretty sure he's top 5 all time in postseason scoring average, and his numbers last year were SICK. He had numerous 20+ point 12+ assist games. His teammates choked. Tracy brought them to the doorstep and they tripped.
Take a look at Yao's numbers from last year's playoff series. He was terrible. Tracy was a one man army on the floor, just like in Orlando. And he had it, down to the final minute.
Take your hate elsewhere. Or at least make comments that are relevant.
I agree with the fact that the role players in that series was horrible. Alston, Battier, Hayes, Howard and especially Head produced absolutely nothing while having literally no defensive attention on them (Game 4 only 4 total players scored, easily had the worst depth of any team last season) but McGrady was far from SICK in that series.
He averaged 25, 6, and 7, but shot only 39% from the field, and under 25% from three. He did have a great game 7, but his jumper which was off all series, he decided to settle for in the last couple minutes of the game when he was so effective taking it to the rim especially with Utah being in the penalty. He wasn't the reason we lost, but he could have been much better in that series, especially compared to what he's done in previous playoffs (near 30, 6, 6 on 44%). Same with Yao who was limited by Okur, 25 and 10 but on only 44% and averaged nearly 5 turnovers a game.
Nobody played well in that series. If the role players stepped up, no doubt we win (which I'd have to admit makes a good supporting cast, on paper it's all fine and dandy but it's pointless if nobody steps up in the playoffs which Wade was very fortunate to have) but the same could be said if either Yao or McGrady upped up their game as well.
To win in the playoffs everybody has to play up to their full most potential. That's what Wade and his teammates did (Wade exceeded averaging 35 and 8 for the series as a whole and a near 40 in their sweep of games), Shaq drew attention averaged 14 ppg and hit clutch FT's (had a very good playoffs over 18 points per game), Gary Payton had a game-winner, Walker chipped in with 14 points and Haslem did a FANTASTIC job on Dirk.
It's a team game, Miami won the championship because Wade was superb and everybody around him stepped up their games. For the Rockets, it's rare when our role players step up, but last season none of our stars really exceeded any expectations. Wade is the better playoff performer than McGrady and it's not a question.
To the original topic of the thread (which was essentially asking if the situation is the same as it was for McGrady in Orlando) and the answer is yes and no. It shows that no matter how great a player can be, everybody needs a supporting cast to win, and when you have a bad one which McGrady had and Wade has, then you're not going to win many games. Teams are too talented these days. No, because Wade has a championship ring and loads of playoff experience to fall back on which McGrady doesn't and thus resulting in more blame. It's not that hard to understand, the situation might be the same, but looking over what each have accomplished from a winning standpoint, it's kind of obvious to see who gets more blame, whether it's fair or not.
