Quick Update
Apparently, my brain is still functioning. I am sure all of you are glad to hear that. Then again, I’m sure that many of you are doubting that my brain ever was functioning.
There is something that I have long contemplated, and I guess now is as good of a time as any to discuss it. This is the potential greatness of Tracy McGrady. I say ‘potential’ because I believed that he was on the verge of outshining Kobe as the best all-around player in the NBA. Of course, I began to think that five years ago. Now, he is still on the verge of passing Kobe, which means he has not done it yet. With the injuries to his back, questions about his defense, and mounting disappointments with sub .500 teams over the past four years, T-Mac began to, in Tysononics, “fade to Bolivia.” He even began to take a second-fiddle role to Yao, until the big prophet went down yet again this year. (Sidebar: Yao and T-Mac have had some terrible injuries during their tenure together to the point that this three to four year span rivals that of the C-Webb/Bibby injury-riddled disappointing years in Sacramento.)
Then Yao went down, at a time when the Rockets were 16-11 with Yao. T-Mac was also hurt with lingering back problems. With a cast of the corpse of Dikembe Mutombo, the imitation of a jump shot by the former Skip-to-my-Lou Rafer Alston, Shane Battier’s freakish scalp, and the uber-crazy Bonzi Wells, this team looked D O O M E D.
Of course, T-Mac came back, and the Rockets are scorching hot. T-Mac is playing better than anybody in the league right now, with the exception of Dirk and Nash (ouch, that hurts to say). And, I think he’s playing better than Kobe, simply because both teams are thin across the board but T-Mac’s Rockets are playing better all the way around the court. They lead the league in several important defensive categories, and I’d much rather be playing alongside Lamar Odom than Shane Battier. (I admit, it’s partially because of the scalp thing. Seriously, that’s freaky.)
Maybe this is the year that the two will meet up in the playoffs, and we will get to see a battle where T-Mac and Kobe go at one another in a scoring duel that would rival the Dominique-Larry Legend battle in the mid-1980’s (right down to the classic uniform Lakers/Celtics versus the red eyesore jersey Hawks/Rockets). And with the way T-Mac is lighting it up, I think I’d put my money on him over good ol’ #8…I mean #24. (That’s just dumb, but it does give me another reason to dislike Kobe.)
