Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


NBA League Update: The Playoffs, Conference Finals
By Sam Gray




The Bracket:


Injuries:


Round 2 Recap:

The West saw the Rockets battle it out with the Sonics, who didn’t let Houston’s defense — or their championships — intimidate them at all. Seattle lost Game 1, but then blew out the Rockets in the next two games thanks to the fireworks from Nate McMillan, who cooked the much younger Mark Macon. Houston survived Game 4, pulling away late, but the Rockets coaching staff knew they had issues to address — so they switched Pippen onto McMillan, and started Moses Malone at PF to help counter Shawn Kemp’s rebounding prowess in Game 5. The moves worked, letting Houston win the next two games and the series as McMillan went ice cold and Kemp looked frustrated by Moses Malone’s veteran moves.

In the other series, the Lakers and Warriors went six as well — they split the first four games evenly, close wins all, before the Lakers were forced to lean on their bench more in the next two games thanks to Magic Johnson’s back injury — Magic had to play less minutes to keep himself going, and Mo Cheeks stepped up with increased playtime, resulting in the Lakers taking the series.

In the East, the Bulls nailed the coffin shut on the Celtics, ending an era in NBA basketball in the process, as Boston and Bird were silenced. The Celtics managed to stave off elimination in Game 4, on their homefloor, but fell in Game 5 at Chicago — Bird was given a standing ovation as he checked out of the game, a sign of respect from fans and players alike as the legend likely heads off into retirement.

In the other series, the Knicks sent the Pistons home in a rather tidy manner — Detroit’s vaunted defense was no match against New York’s offense, as Ewing ate in the post (putting up 24-14 in the series) and Detroit had no answer; even starting Grant at that spot didn’t slow Ewing down much, as the Knicks closed out the Pistons and set up a date with the hated Bulls.

Conference Finals Preview:

The WCF comes down to the league leading Rockets and their closest competition out West, the star-studded Lakers. LA, unlike Houston, is a bit wounded — Divac is playing hurt, Magic is now battling a pinched nerve, and Houston has shown they’re not afraid to mix and match lineups in order to confuse — and beat — their opponents. The Lakers will need Barkley and Rodman to excel in this series, but that’s a tough ask with the defensive wizardry the Rockets possess.

In the East, the Bulls and Knicks face off in a series many have expected all year long. Chicago is built to beat the Knicks, but the Knicks can beat the Bulls — the series won’t come down to the superstars so much as the supporting cast; the Knicks are deeper, a bit younger, and hungrier, but Chicago has the weight of expectations threatening to crush them. Failing here, for the second year straight, would be a tough pill for the Bulls to swallow — Hakeem was brought to Chicago to dominate the centers of the East; Ewing will be the greatest test he has to face.

(The random number generator has assigned me Games 2 and 3 of the series. Will the Lakers be able to get back to the Finals, or is Houston going to get one step closer to the three-peat?)

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


Ch. 33

The LA Lakers weren’t at full-health; they weren’t even close. Vlade Divac had missed all of the playoffs so far with a triceps injury. Magic Johnson had a pinched nerve in his back, suffered in Round 2, and wasn’t playing at full-strength. The Lakers had made it this far thanks to the play of Charles Barkley (25-12-2) and Dennis Rodman (16-11-2), a devastating combo of players.

“We knew we were gonna have a tough test against Houston,” recalled Magic Johnson. “I wasn’t in great shape and Vlade wasn’t even close — the fact that he made a go of it still amazes me to this day. He was in real pain that entire series, but he wasn’t going to sit out the conference finals … we were so close.”

Divac and Johnson’s injuries gave Houston the edge — pundits were evenly divided on which team would advance. Wrote Houston Chronicle columnist Chris Judge:

The Rockets and Lakers are two teams with one thing on their mind: a championship. It’s been the goal of both since the beginning of the season and, if you ask anyone on either team, you’ll hear most say they expected it to come down to them. The best of the West has been these two teams all year and though Houston is a two-time defending champ, they’ve never had to face a team this good in the playoffs — even if the Lakers are wounded, they’re not dead and they have everything to fight for. Magic grabbing another title, making it six, would put him in rarefied air; add in the fact that his close friend, Larry Bird, has lost two years in a row to Houston and Johnson may have more motivation than many give him credit for. If you’re asking me which team is better right now, it’s Houston — they’re healthy, LA is not — and I’m picking them in seven to make it back to the Finals. But really, this series is a toss-up, and it wouldn’t surprise me if the Lakers pull it off.


The Rockets, for their part, weren’t taking the Lakers lightly — after the series with the Sonics, Houston wasn’t about to underestimate LA. “We had to be aware that the team we played during the regular season wasn’t here,” said Kern. “Johnson was beat up, Divac was injured … if the Lakers were going to beat us and win the West, they were going to be doing it on the backs of Barkley and Rodman.”

Kern kept veteran Walter Davis in the starting lineup while adding the younger Drobnjak back in; Moses Malone had done a great job against Shawn Kemp, but Rodman was going to be a tough matchup for the veteran Malone — Drobnjak was younger, more flexible, and could draw Rodman out of the paint with his shooting. “Coach told me to shoot that series,” recalled Drobnjak. “He wanted me to stretch the floor, keep Rodman from easy boards.”

Brimming with confidence after his closeout game against Seattle, Drobnjak took Kerns’ words to heart — if the coach wanted him to shoot, shoot Sasa Drobnjak would.

Game 1 tipped off and Houston asserted themselves; they started the game on a 6-0 run, four of those points from Drobnjak, and the tone was set early in the night — Houston wasn’t going to allow the Lakers to pound the ball inside and play at their speed. The Rockets got out and ran, which forced the Lakers to run, which just aggravated the injuries to Johnson and Divac.

Drobnjak was in command of the game from the beginning — when his shots weren’t falling, he was drawing fouls against Rodman, and the young player’s confidence was soaring through the roof. “Sasa was grooving,” recalled O’Neal. “He was locked in and not taking any *hit from Rodman.”

Drobnjak not only was playing great on offense, he was playing great on defense — not normally a calling card for the rookie, as he struggled all year with rotations. This game, however, he was forcing others to struggle and the young player was enjoying every second of it. “I grinned much that game, very happy and that didn’t make the Lakers very happy at all,” said Drobnjak. “Rodman was not pleased.”

LA went down 26-20 at the end of the first and proceeded to lose the remaining quarters, albeit just barely — Drobnjak’s confidence was contagious and the entire Houston team seemed to brim with it. Houston would win 101-92.

The Lakers didn’t panic but they knew they had issues — Game 1 had been close and probably was a game they needed to steal. “We needed a split against them,” said Johnson. “That first game was a good chance at it but we didn’t get it done then.”

Game 2 started was more of the same for the Lakers — a slow start combined with the Rockets defense saw them go down early.



That early lead ballooned in the second quarter and it soon became apparent that despite Charles Barkley playing well, he needed more help than the beat up Johnson or Divac could give him.



Pippen had a huge Game 2, finishing with 31-7-9-4 and got a generous near triple-double from Payton (28-8-11). Walter Davis had his best game of the playoffs — 18-4 — and O’Neal kept Divac off the boards, getting 18-11-6 on the night.






The Lakers lost emphatically, 133-96, and Barkley wasn’t happy. “I don’t know if any one of our *sses want to be out there,” Barkley said after the game. “Are we here to win or roll over? I’m not rolling over, so you guys better start asking someone else, because I can’t figure it out.”

Barkley’s frustration was beginning to boil over — this was the closest he had ever been to the Finals — and he was getting showed up by Scottie Pippen. Barkley and Jordan were friends, perhaps even close friends, and Barkley’s opinions on Pippen weren’t high. “Losing to Scottie Pippen, like that, sucked,” recalled Barkley. “We weren’t playing that bad, we were just hurt and that was the damned truth.”

Game 3 saw the series move to LA and it was a move that the Lakers hoped would shift the series. “We needed that home crowd to really drive Houston mad,” said Johnson. “We wanted them to get loud and in their faces.”



Pippen and Barkley were the key matchup and if the Lakers were going to win, they’d need Barkley to win against Pippen; so far in the series, Pippen had been smothering Barkley effectively on defense and getting around him with ease on offense. “Charles was too obsessed with getting back at you if you scored on him,” said Pippen. “He didn’t make the smart plays, he made the selfish plays — that was his MO from the beginning of his career. He wanted to be the one to win it all.”

The beginning of Game 3 saw Barkley play right into the Rockets hands — he took shots and he missed shots, and the offense was putting up nothing. Barkley’s misses just kept adding up and soon Houston was turning them into points.



Even with LA missing as much as they were, Houston’s early lead wasn’t insurmountable — if anything, the Rockets were letting the Lakers hang around a bit too much. But Houston’s play got a big boost thanks to a sequence from Shaquille O’Neal, who showed the Lakers that a beat-up Divac wasn’t even close to a match for the NBA’s Superman.



Houston looked like it was about to run away with it from there — and then Byron Scott and Magic Johnson started shooting threes. This wrinkle hadn’t been something Houston expected and the long range shooting threw the Rockets for a loop. “LA wasn’t a proficient three-point shooting team,” said Kern. “So our strategy was to give them that shot, because they were likely to miss and send us on a fast break.”

The Lakers, at least for the first quarter, didn’t miss — they made all four of them, swinging the quarter their way and winning it 31-25. It gave the Lakers a much needed morale boost and in the second quarter the two teams played close. Heading into halftime LA led 53-51, their first halftime lead of the series.

The second-half saw Kern go to his bench and start Moses Malone in the third; the Malone-O’Neal front court produced dividends and Houston won the third 29-18, then survived the Lakers fourth quarter comeback to win the game 102-96.

“We were that close,” Johnson said. “That close to getting one back and changing the makeup of the series.” The Lakers were down 3-0 in the WCF and Houston looked ready to cruise into the Finals.

Playing with survival first and foremost on their mind, the Lakers blitzed the Rockets in the first quarter of Game 4 33-20 — Showtime was back as Magic Johnson’s pinched nerve had, finally, subsided. “I was ready to really play now,” said Johnson. Johnson had 25-4-9 in the game, hitting some more three-pointers, and bending the Rockets defense to his will.

Houston lost 105-92 and the final score wasn’t even that close — but the Rockets didn’t panic. Game 5 was on their home floor, they still had an advantage with O’Neal in the paint over Divac … except it just wasn’t enough. Houston fell to the Lakers 108-103 in Game 5 as they watched Divac not score a single-bucket but he did get O’Neal to foul out.

“Tough game, tough loss,” said Kern. “We had it and could have punched our ticket then, but couldn’t stay out of foul trouble.”

Game 6, back in LA, saw a riveted Lakers crowd watch a classic — Houston and LA battled all game to a virtual standstill and the final points of the game, to decide the game, came down to a Barkley turnaround jumper over Drobnjak that went in and gave LA the win, 95-94. After being down 3-0, the Lakers had come all the way back and were one win away from ending the Rockets run and authoring one of the greatest playoff series ever.

One win. One game. It all came down to Game 7.

The Rockets players were sick — they had missed chances in Game 5 and 6 to close things out and it seemed the Lakers were pulling out wins in increasingly improbable ways. “Part of it felt like the basketball gods were against us,” said Pippen. “Maybe we had gotten too arrogant, too confident … we had met our equal.”

Game 7 had a familiar message on the chalkboard: adapt or die. Kern reemphasized the message he had for his team in Game 1 against Seattle the round before. “We have to be willing to change,” Kern told his team. “Passing, penetration, and persistence are the foundation of this team but that doesn’t mean we build the same thing atop it, game after game. We have to be willing to do things differently to win.”

Kern gave an order he rarely gave his team — shoot from deep when it’s there. Kern normally would tell his team to shoot from three when necessary; the three-point line was just a place to make an extra pass in his offense, but in Game 7 he wanted his players to shoot when open, regardless if the extra pass was there.

Houston’s players took notice of it — particular Sasa Drobnjak and Mark Macon. Houston got out to an early 28-23 lead after the first quarter but in the second Drobnjak and Macon bombed away and hit four threes combined, helping Houston put up a big 34-23 quarter. Heading into the half, the Rockets were up 62-46 and the Lakers looked stunned.

“We knew they weren’t a good team from three,” said Johnson. “We didn’t think they could make those shots.”

Kern, sensing the Lakers would look to shut down the perimeter scoring in the second-half, told his team to bang inside when halftime was over. “We stretched them out, now it’s time to take the paint back,” he told the team.

Veteran Walter Davis was the second-half hero as Davis repeatedly drove inside and got his shots to fall, frustrating the Lakers; 38-years-old, Davis was playing like he was ten years younger and the Lakers couldn’t make any headway in the third. LA would lose Game 7 110-97; Houston had, once again, punched their ticket to the Finals.

“If we were healthy, we’d have won it all that year,” said Barkley. “I’ll believe that to the day I die … we just got hurt at the wrong time. We almost won it all banged up, we could have done it healthy.”

The Rockets would be seeing a new opponent in the Finals but it wasn’t who Houston was expecting. Instead of the long awaited, much debated matchup between the Rockets and the Bulls — and all the history therein — the Rockets instead had a date with the New York Knicks.

[kibaxx7]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)

Pippen and Payton are making a superb duo. Is the Knicks roster the same as real life? Any movements?

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)

Pippen and Payton are making a superb duo. Is the Knicks roster the same as real life? Any movements?

The Knicks are close to real life at this point, but not exactly. A couple of trades they made IRL didn't happen here, but their starting lineup is nothing to shrug at:


1. PG Rod "The God" Strickland. 92 OVR, Rod has had an incredible season and has cemented himself as New York second star to Ewing. 17-3-9 with a steal, 60% from the field and 33% from deep.


2. SG Gerald Wilkins. 82 OVR, a solid SG, Wilkins has put up respectable (but not great or even good) numbers -- he's towards the bottom in offensive pecking order. 10-4-5 on 48% from the field, 33% from deep.



3. SF Steve Smith. 85 OVR, the Knicks 1991 draft pick, Smith has developed solidly so far. 13-3-3 on 45% from the field and 38% from deep. He hasn't hit his ceiling and one can argue he's underachieving, but on a team with Ewing he's doing enough.



4. PF Charles Smith. 89 OVR, the Knicks traded Charles Oakley for him during the 90-91 season while they were tanking. He's been a good second/third option, putting up 17-7 on a nightly basis with 58% shooting. Not as defensively gifted as Oakley, he's more offensively inclined and has a nice high-post jumper which helps space the floor for Ewing.



5. C Patrick Ewing. 97 OVR, the star of the Knicks, Ewing is consistently great. 23-13 a night on 54% from the field, he's excelled on this Knicks team and has them in the Finals -- and beat Jordan and Hakeem on the way! Ewing has a chance to cement his legacy in New York and avoid the grim fate that awaited him in our world (where the Knicks sent him off after many years to sad stints with the Sonics and Magic).



The Knicks bench is also fairly solid -- PG Lester Connor (81 OVR and former Net), SG Kevin Edwards (80 OVR and former Heat member), SF Willie Burton (77 OVR, former starter before Smith), and PF Kenny Walker (76 OVR and solid in certain matchups).



This Knicks team has arrived a bit earlier than I expected -- I figured Steve Smith would need to get closer to his final form than what we have here, but Ewing has carried them these playoffs. Can he carry them past the Rockets with all their star power? Can he get past a rookie Shaq, who feasted on Ewing during the regular season? Those are the questions that will keep the Knicks fans up at night.

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


NBA League Update: Finals Preview
By Sam Gray



The Bracket:




Conference Finals Recap:

The West saw the Rockets and Lakers go the full seven, as Houston jumped out to a 3-0 lead and then the Lakers clawed their way back — Games 4, 5, and 6 came down to a few final possessions in the fourth, as Houston lost them all and nearly choked away their “Clutch City” moniker, but the Rockets — back at home for Game 7 — finally put the Lakers away for good, thanks to a Walter Davis explosion of points (22 for the retiring veteran) and Houston has punched their ticket to the Finals.

In the East, the Bulls looked outmatched by the Knicks from Game 1 — Chicago came close the first two games, but fell short each time, as the offense got bogged down in the halfcourt, New York’s defense switching all over to prevent Chicago from exploiting easy matchups. Ewing got the better of Hakeem, Jordan was playing angry all series and his foul totals show it, and the Knicks swept Chicago, sending this version of the Bulls away in what may be the final game in a Bulls uniform for Hakeem … and perhaps Michael Jordan himself.


Finals Preview:

It’s two of the NBA’s biggest markets going at it in a big series as Houston has manged to make their way to the Finals for the third straight year, looking to beat the Knicks — these two teams matchup up very well and no one side has a significant advantage over the other. Both the Rockets and Knicks play a bruising offensive and defensive game, both possess great point guards (Payton, Strickland), great bigs (Ewing, and ROY O’Neal), and each has gone through the toughest opponents their conference has to offer.

Houston possesses a champions experience, however — two years of winning titles, two years of defending it, the Rockets have the edge there; but New York is hungry and vanquishing a former Bull in Scottie Pippen, in addition to Jordan and Hakeem, would make this an all-time great title run. The stage is set, the lights are bright, and these Finals promise to be one to remember.


(The random number generator has assigned me Games 2 and 5 of the series. The Rockets face Ewing for a title … can Patrick upset Houston here and prevent a three-peat or is Houston just too much to overcome?)

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


Ch. 34

The New York Knicks weren’t supposed to be here; that much the entire NBA world agreed on. The Knicks, led by Patrick Ewing, were a good team — one of the best in the conference, the second seed, but no way should the Knicks have managed to get past Jordan and Hakeem Olajuwon — how did they do it?

“Ewing had the series of his life,” recalled NBA columnist Sam Gray. “Ewing played Hakeem to a draw in Game 1 and Game 2, forcing Jordan to take more shots — the unbalanced triangle offense didn’t work that way. When Ewing and the Knicks got back to New York, they throttled the Bulls.”

Game 3 saw Ewing score 30 points with 15 boards to Hakeem’s 19-11. Then, in the closeout Game 4, Patrick Ewing dropped 45-20 on the Bulls, thoroughly outplaying Olajuwon (who finished with 26-7) as the Knicks won big, 142-128.

It was a fabulous performance and has gone down in NBA lore ever since. “We walked out of the ECF with a sweep of the Bulls and felt good,” recalled Patrick Ewing. “We felt good about our entire playoff run — we had only lost two games all postseason.”

The Knicks weren’t supposed to be this good — they had no second superstar like the Bulls but they had a lot of good players around Ewing and that lack of a second superstar looked like a blessing in disguise. “Everyone knew the team would win or lose based on Ewing’s performance and that took pressure off some guys,” said Gray. “The popular theory was Ewing’s singular importance to the Knicks made every else’s life easier … it took the heat off the rest of his teammates and allowed them to play freer basketball.”

Houston’s playoff run hadn’t been nearly as smooth as New York’s; for all the talent the Rockets had, for the transcendent ROY in Shaquille O’Neal, for the great culture the Rockets possessed, their playoff run had been a struggle at times. They didn’t look as invincible as they had in the regular season and they didn’t feel as invincible either.

“We were guys questioning some things,” recalled Scottie Pippen. “We got out of every series by the skin of our teeth and you got to ask yourself, ‘Is our luck running out?’”

Pippen wasn’t sure if it was. Neither was Gary Payton, who looked at the Knicks and wondered if they were the David to their Goliath. “*uck, someone’s got to take us out eventually … ain’t no one the bad*ss of the block forever, someone always comes around to *uck you up and take your place. Maybe the Knicks were those guys for us.”

But one player was certain that Houston’s time as champions wasn’t over quite yet: Shaquille O’Neal. “I wasn’t about to let Patrick Ewing walk over me,” said O’Neal. “He wasn’t good enough — he could put up a fight, but he wasn’t gonna beat me.”

O’Neal’s performance in the WCF had been a disappointment to the big man — battling against an injured Vlade Divac, O’Neal had been surprised at how well Divac moved and frustrated at how easily Divac had baited him into fouls. “He was smarter than me then, I was just a rook, and he used his brain to make up for his limitations … I can see that now. Then, though? Then I was pissed. I didn’t like it.”

O’Neal promised himself that he’d perform better in the Finals. “I wanted to win Finals MVP,” said O’Neal. “I knew it was hard to convince the writers to give that to a rookie, but I felt if I dominated Ewing, they’d have no choice.”

The stage was set and the lights shone brightly as Game 1 of the 1993 NBA Finals kicked off — and the first quarter showed that both teams were going to, at least for one game, fight tooth and nail for a win. In the first the Rockets took a slim four-point lead into the second, 25-21, before falling behind — at halftime Houston was down 45-42 in a close contest.

Unlike the last few games of the WCF, Coach Kern didn’t make any significant adjustments — the second-half would start off with Pippen manning the point, as they had done all playoffs, and that would determine if there was something really to worry about. “If we put Scottie out there and they had an answer for him, then I had something to be nervous about,” said Kern. “Scottie at point was a tough matchup for them.”

Pippen took the floor at point and Houston rolled in the third quarter — with Pippen roaming the floor and dishing the ball, it allowed other players to thrive; Gary Payton and Walter Davis started hitting more shots, while O’Neal and Ewing canceled each other out. Houston would win Game 1 95-85 thanks to a big second-half surge.

“Losing Game 1 was hard, because we felt like we had it,” said Ewing. “We got out of sorts in the third quarter … Pippen took over and he got in our heads.”

“The Summit Slugfest” hadn’t been forgotten about by either team, but the league office had warned both not to repeat those actions in the Finals. “The league office was very clear to us that if things even looked like it was getting out of hand, they’d start handing out ejections like candy,” said Kern. “I told the team to not engage with the Knicks … talk trash, fine, but don’t get physical. The first team that lost their cool would lose the series.”

The Knicks didn’t get physical, but they did get frustrated. Pippen’s trash talk, combined with Payton’s and O’Neal’s, pissed the Knicks players off. “We wanted to swing at them,” said Ewing, “but we knew it would be a surefire way to lose the Finals.”

Game 1 was in the books, so New York turned their attention to Game 2 — and so did Shaquille O’Neal. “I played like *hit in that first game,” said O’Neal. The Diesel had held Ewing to 8 points and 9 boards, while he himself scored 12-13, but both centers had locked the other down. If you were looking for great post play in Game 1, you were flat out of luck.

O’Neal was determined to make up for it in Game 2 — he wasn’t about to make Ewing look good and he went to Kern before the game started to let his coach know he was hungry. “I told him to feed me, I told him I needed some New York steak, I needed some red meat,” said O’Neal.

“He told me that and I told him if he was hungry, the buffet was gonna open early — so he better load his plate, because if I saw him pacing himself, I might close the buffet,” recalled Kern.

O’Neal got the message. “He always knew how to talk to me,” said O’Neal with a laugh. “He liked to eat, too.”



Game 2 started out with both teams taking it slow, but the action picked up with under 10 minutes to go in the first as O’Neal backed Ewing down and finished over him.



O’Neal’s first quarter dominance wasn’t just limited to offense either; defensively, O’Neal was setting the tone for the whole team and was altering the way the Knicks played. “I made sure Ewing rode the struggle bus,” said O’Neal. “Got him a first class ticket on that bus.”



The Knicks lost the first quarter, 27-17, and things just got worse from there — they lost the second and the third quarters, and entering the fourth they were down 81-63. O’Neal had rested for only two minutes the entire game and Kern kept asking if he needed a breather and O’Neal kept telling his coach to keep the buffet open.

“I kept him out there most of that game,” said Kern. “It wasn’t to embarrass anyone but it was because he wanted it … he wanted to be out there, he wanted to keep playing, and this was the biggest stage in the sport. I told him if he started getting sloppy, he was riding the pine … he never got sloppy.”

The Rockets won Game 2 122-90 in blowout fashion — O’Neal dominated, putting up 36-13-5 while staying away from foul trouble and shutting down Ewing. “I thought to myself, ‘I just need two more of these’ and I knew I could do it,” said O’Neal.





The game had become frustrating for the Knicks — New York complained about calls for nearly the entire game and every time a call went against them, it seemed to upset them more. “Looking back now, I know that we lost the mental edge,” said Ewing. “We had ceded it to Houston, to the refs, and we were out of it.”

The venue switched to New York in Game 3 and the Knicks believed — and hoped — that playing in Madison Square Garden would improve their fortunes. The New York faithful, led by Spike Lee, were ready to push their Knicks to victory, but being down 2-0 was new territory for New York — they hadn’t been down like that all postseason.

“Houston had struggled putting teams away all playoffs and there wasn’t a strong belief they could put the Knicks away in the Garden — it just wasn’t done,” said Gray. “The Knicks weren’t a team that would go quietly like that, they’d never be able to live it down in New York.”

Game 3 tipped off and saw a familiar pattern return — Houston got a lead in the first, locked down the Knicks in the second, and won big in the second-half to notch a 3-0 lead. Led by Gary Payton (21-6-10) and Pippen (20-5-8-2), the Knicks biggest advantage — Ewing — was neutralized by O’Neal (18-13). Ewing only managed 13-14, with five steals and four blocks, but his offense was non-existent — the ROY smothered him.

“It’s like trying to move a house made of concrete,” Ewing said after the game. “Getting by Shaq is hard, hard work, and we’ve just got to do better at making him uncomfortable.”

Down 3-0, their pride on the line, the Knicks knew they could come back — after all, the battered Lakers had nearly done so in the WCF. “It had been done to Houston in the conference Finals, they could manage it … maybe,” said Gray.

Houston knew that to win Game 4, on the road, and claim the title they’d need big performances from their three stars — and that’s exactly what they got. O’Neal once more put on a show, putting Ewing on the struggle bus and pushing that bus off a cliff as the ROY put up 27-11-3; Payton added 19-2-12, while Pippen put up an all-around 18-11-9-5-2 performance, stuffing the stat sheet.




The Finals ended in anti-climatic fashion: a sweep, every win by double-digits, and the Knicks only looking close to a win in Game 1. The few fans in attendance for Houston celebrated with the team as the Rockets completed the three-peat, the first team to do so since the old 60s Celtics.



Pippen was named Finals MVP and O’Neal, though disappointed, was happy for his teammate. “He earned it, played every game great,” said O’Neal. “I told him I was getting the next one.”




The cheers, though limited, were welcome as Houston took the Larry O’Brien trophy and passed it around. For certain members on the team, this was their first title — and it meant more to them than they’d expected.




“I was just a tall basketball player,” recalled Drobnjak. “In my country, that didn’t mean a lot … but when we fought and won our independence, when we became our own after so long of being someone else’s, that meant our people could make their lives anything. I chose to make my life in basketball, to help my family with basketball, and holding that trophy … I felt I made right choice. All I and my other countrymen had suffered was worth it. We could do anything.”




For veteran Walter Davis, the championship was the final piece of a long career — it was the last thing he wanted to accomplish as a basketball player. “To get it like that, in a sweep, after the hard postseason we had … it meant more than anything else,” said Davis. “You fight your whole life to be recognized as something, to be remembered as something, and I was going to be remembered for playing a part in this … I was a champion.”








The Houston Rockets had accomplished the near-impossible — the mythical three-peat was theirs and their place in history was secured. Despite having to trade Scot Roth and Horace Grant, despite a difficult postseason full of near-misses, the Rockets had etched their name into the history books.

They weren’t flukes. They weren’t pretenders. They didn’t benefit from an easy schedule or a weak conference. They were three-time champions and their run, once looked upon as more luck than skill, was now firmly respected.

Greatness doesn’t guarantee greatness in the future, however — Houston’s Finals sweep had made the Rockets look just as invincible as ever, but nothing lasts forever. For Houston, change was coming.

And change was never easy.

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


Ch. 35

Another title, another championship parade, another summer filled with big decisions — this was the life of Nate Hale as he entered his fourth summer in charge of the Houston Rockets. The three-peat was fresh on everyone’s minds in Houston and the NBA, mostly, tended to give the Rockets the benefit of the doubt now.

It was a refreshing in many ways, but it didn’t change the bottom line: Houston’s expectations were now firmly championship or bust, barring major issues. “The one thing I wanted the players to know was that they should use the summer to rest up, heal up, and keep their nose clean,” said Hale. “I was worried about what happened that postseason … every series we had out West was a long, tough series. The playoff miles were starting to add up.”

Rockets trainer Harvey Ross reemphasized Hale’s message and so did head coach Randy Kern. “Stay healthy, stay in shape, and stay out of trouble,” Kern told his team.

The changes for Houston began almost immediately after they landed back in Texas. Walter Davis, good to his word, formally announced his retirement — he would celebrate the championship with the Rockets during the parade and receive his ring on opening night 1993, but he was done with basketball. “I had done everything I wanted, and I was ready for a vacation,” joked Davis. “I wanted to do some traveling.” After the parade, Davis would hop on a flight to Europe and begin a summer of touring the great sights.





Losing Davis was expected by Houston and the front office. They knew they would have to replace him and the trade for Mark Macon earlier in the season helped, but they needed more youth. Houston’s bench had, for the first time in Hale’s tenure, performed poorly in the playoffs. “That was partly due to trading for Shaq,” said Hale. “We cannibalized our depth to grab a great player, and I’d do that trade a hundred times out of a hundred. But we needed to restock in the draft and free agency,” said Hale.





The draft would be Houston’s first shot at shoring up their depth and the Rockets had two picks in the first round, pick 15 and pick 30. With no lottery picks — the Rockets bet that Atlanta would be bad enough to get into the lottery didn’t pay off — Houston would have to be wise with their selections.

The 1993 draft had a lot of talent, but where the Rockets most needed help — at the SG and SF spots — the talent was fleeting. “We felt we’d probably have to trade up to get someone or trade the picks for a player already in the league,” said Hale. “The draft would have to fall just right for us to grab someone who could really help us in the fall.”

Letting a prospect sit and get some seasoning wasn’t a strategy Houston normally employed — rookies had been key to Houston’s success since the Hale family got there and they were expected to play in their first year. “You had to contribute,” recalled ROY Shaquille O’Neal. “The vets didn’t want to see you sitting down and sucking your thumb … you didn’t get babied in Houston, they treated you like an adult.”

In the case you weren’t getting time on the court, the coaching staff — particularly Coach Kern — expected the players who weren’t playing in live games to practice hard. “Show me you’re ready when I call on you. That’s what I wanted to see from them … you have to be willing to sacrifice for your teammates. If that means not starting immediately and being a hell of a practice player, than so be it — show me you can do that,” said Kern.

The Rockets were going to need help to grab one of their preferred players in the draft — Houston’s draft board wasn’t filled to the brim with players. “We had five guys we were targeting,” recalled Hale. “Calbert Cheaney, Isaiah Rider, Allan Houston, Rodney Rogers, and Chris Mills. We weren’t sure how the draft was going to break after the first five picks.”

The 1993 draft’s top five players had been well-established for months at that point. Chris Webber was destined to go first, then after that some combination of Jamal Mashburn, Penny Hardaway, Vin Baker, and Shawn Bradley. Size, skill, and athleticism was the order of the day for the NBA in the summer of 1993.

“Everyone was trying to catch the Rockets,” said NBA columnist Sam Gray. “Houston had engineered a remarkable turnaround and just continued to get better year after year … it was an incredible story and the NBA is a copy-cat league. If the Rockets could do it, why couldn’t other teams?”

The Rockets weren’t the only team in need of help at the SG and SF spots — other teams ahead of them needed help there, too, and they were teams that weren’t exactly eager to trade with Houston. Hale made cursory calls to those teams, but was rebuffed with ludicrous trade offers. “They didn’t want to help us and I can’t blame them,” said Hale. “They didn’t hang up on me, but what they were asking for in a hypothetical trade was insane. They weren’t serious.”

Frozen out by the teams ahead, it would be up to the randomness of the draft to help out the Rockets.

Or a prospect making themselves clear they wanted to only be in Houston. Enter Chris Mills, who wasn’t a stranger to controversy. Mills had started his collegiate career at the University of Kentucky but was kicked off the team after it was found out his father was receiving improper benefits — cold, hard cash.

“My dad was just doing what everyone else was doing,” recalled Mills. “We got sacrificed to the NCAA so they’d stop looking into the rest of Kentucky, I’ll believe that forever.”

Mills made his way to the University of Arizona after that and had a fine college career, but the scandal lingered around him. NBA scouts liked to use the term “character questions” in their reports about him — talent-wise, Mills was one of the better players to come out of California, particularly the Los Angeles area, but what kind of NBA career he would have was up for debate.

“Mills was a divisive player … on one hand, he was really good in college, but on the other he didn’t seem to ever have a dominating performance against other NBA-level talent,” said Gray. “We in the press wondered if he really was good enough to be a starter in the NBA.”

Mills believed he could be but more than that he believed his career would best be served by staying away from bad teams. “Why is it that I get to select what college I go to, but not what pro team I go to?” Mills asked his agent.

His agent agreed — Mills and other college prospects probably should be allowed to make their own choices, but that wasn’t how the NBA did things. His agent knew how to play their game, though.

That agent was Jarrod “J-Dog” Mitchell. “I signed on with Chris because he was a smart guy,” said Mitchell. “He wasn’t some knucklehead like the pro scouts made him out to be … he was someone who wanted to make his own choice.”

After seeing what happened to his other client — Scottie Pippen — and having to loudly declare for Shaquille O’Neal that Toronto and Milwaukee were unacceptable locations, Mitchell knew that players in the NBA didn’t have many chances to choose where they wanted to play. “It basically boiled down to the draft, free agency, and demanding trades — those were your three ways out if you were a player,” said Mitchell. “I told Chris I’d try to get him to a winning squad, but he was going to have listen to me.”

Mitchell told Mills that the only way he’d fall in the draft is if more questions about his character came to the forefront. Mitchell and Mills engaged in a sabotage campaign — they would purposefully perform badly in any workouts with teams Mills didn’t want to go to and perform out of this world for teams Mills did like.

It wasn’t the first time such a strategy had been used in the NBA draft, but Mills had a chance to be a top-ten pick and wanted nothing to do with any of those squads. “I was fine sacrificing money to go somewhere I liked,” said Mills. “I could be making a billion dollars on some *hit team, but I’d hate putting on their uniform and playing for them … I wanted to be somewhere that I could win.”

Officially, there is no record of Mitchell and Hale ever discussing Mills or the sabotage campaign the agent was engaged in, but teams around the league loudly scoffed when Houston selected Mills at pick 15. “It stank,” said Gray. “But there was no proof of collusion, no proof of manipulation, and no proof Houston thought Mills would drop that far.”

“He was passed on by teams that could have used him, I don’t know why to this day,” said Hale. “They had questions about him but rather than really getting to know the player, they punted — they didn’t want the headache.”

Mills draft slide was a major story in the 1993 NBA Draft, but it was quickly overshadowed by free agency and one of the biggest trades to happen in NBA history.

[marshdaddy]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA 2K20)

Another disappointing run by Chicago. I know, or at least think, you’re still ahead, but is a deal in the future? How many times are they gonna get upset before they do some changes?

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


The SI 1993 NBA Draft Recap
By Sam Gray

The NBA draft went down but there were few surprises — a couple of reaches, and no pre-draft trades as multiple teams are keeping their powder dry before the crazy free agency period sets in.




At the top, the Kings took PF Chris Webber. Webber has widely been considered the best player in his class and after his Michigan team success, every NBA team with a top pick was hoping to convince the Kings to trade down — Sacramento refused (despite the Raptors success last year) and instead took Webber, setting up an immediate conflict with incumbent PF Wayman Tisdale — Tisdale is likely to be traded away, but to where is a question many in the league are unsure on. Regardless, expectations for Webber are sky high and he’ll have a tough bar to meet after Shaq’s success last year.


2nd overall, the the Bucks made the easy selection of PG Penny Hardaway. A top-tier PG to pair with their top-tier C (Mourning finished with 19-11 and 3 blocks), Hardaway made too much sense for the young Bucks. Penny will bring highlight level plays and fun passing to a Milwaukee organization attempting to rebuild its value in the eyes of players and agents after last season’s debacle with Shaquille O’Neal (who, lest we forget, said some mighty unkind things about the city).

3rd overall, the Wizards selected Jamal Mashburn. Mashburn is a well-rounded scorer who also can do a fair bit on defense — by far not the sexiest name in this draft, Mashburn is a proven commodity who will help re-energize a lethargic, painful to watch Wizards offense.

4th overall, the Grizzlies selected C/PF Vin Baker. Baker is a big who possesses the ability to rebound, play solid defense, and score when called upon; NBA scouts are all amazed by his skills but they question whether Baker can behave himself, as he was known as a bit of a party player in college and that lifestyle has not worked out well for some in the NBA. Memphis is hopeful that with an actual post presence manning the five spot, they can compete in the West — a tough ask considering the division they play in.


5th overall, the T’Wolves made the first “reach” pick of the night, but it wasn’t a terrible one in C Shawn Bradley. Bradley is tall — really, really tall — and Minnesota has struggled the last two seasons with trying (and failing) to defend the post. While Bradley won’t be known as a Kareem-like scorer in the paint, his defensive abilities and rebounding will be just what the T’Wolves need to compete for a playoff spot out West again.




6th overall, the Pelicans really reached and selected C Gheorghe Muresan. Muresan was widely expected to be a late 1st rounder but NOLA was spooked into selecting the next best center in the draft, and that meant Muresan. If there was ever a player who didn’t struggle scoring in the paint, it was Muresan as he’s 7’7” and a concrete post once he gets in a position he likes — his height, combined with his strength, should give NOLA a chance to defend the likes of Shaq and David Robinson, but how well Muresan will hold up under the grind of an NBA season is one of the concerns scouts have about him.

7th overall, the Blazers select SF Calbert Cheaney. Cheaney will be sliding into the SF role vacated by Clyde Drexler last year and hopefully will provide Portland with a chance at stabilizing their franchise — Drexler’s departure in free agency left the team a crater and their chance to bounce back from it with a top-3 pick was taken from them cruelly by the lottery balls.

8th overall, the Hornets select SG Isaiah Rider. Rider is potentially a replacement for fan-favorite Dell Curry (whose contract is up in 2 years) and will, at the very least, provide a scoring presence off the bench to anchor Charlotte’s woeful bench unit (among the worst in the NBA last season). Rider may not be a homerun pick, but if he develops Charlotte may be able to surround Larry Johnson with good talent — something the team is having difficulty with.

9th overall were the Magic and Orlando selected SG/SF Allan Houston. Houston looks to slot in as a scorer off the bench initially, but could seize the starting SF spot depending on how free agency and training camp break out. Houston can be relied upon to get you points when needed, though his defensive abilities can be lacking at times. Orlando is hopeful that his presence can help alleviate the pressure put on Christian Laettner last year (he put up 20-9-2 with 2 blocks, but faded down the stretch).

10th saw the Wizards back on the clock and selecting college star PG Bobby Hurley. Hurley was a need pick for the Wizards, who have Sleepy Floyd starting at the moment — but Floyd has only 1 year left remaining on his deal and he’s likely to decamp from Washington to find a winning squad in the final years of his career. If Floyd does indeed leave, the Wizards will need a replacement next season and they’re hopeful Hurley and his playmaking ability can fill the void.



At 11, the Jazz made one of the more sobering selections in their history — that of PF Rodney Rogers, a clear sign Utah is expecting Karl Malone to leave in free agency and not give the Jazz a chance. Rogers isn’t Malone — not in build, height, or demeanor — but Rodgers can get buckets and play satisfactory (mostly) defense against bigger foes. With Utah locked into Stockton (3 more years), the Jazz are going to have to do a lot to build around their remaining star — Doc Rivers is reportedly unhappy and may demand a trade before the deadline, so even with Malone gone, Utah will have problems to solve.

At 12, the Nets selected PG/SG Sam Cassell. Cassell is adept at playing either guard spot and New Jersey is anticipating he’ll win the starting job over incumbent Dennis Hopson, who has battled injuries the last few seasons. New Jersey hasn’t been competitive in years and losing the Shaq draft last season was a big blow to a franchise that could have used a huge boost like O’Neal (a Newark native). Cassell won’t have the same effect as Shaq would, but his presence at the two spot may be enough to allow the Nets to sneak into the playoffs if their other young pieces come into their own.

At 13, the Pacers add PF Scott Haskins. Haskins is a big man who can shoot, but how capable he is of playing NBA-level defense is a question that remains unanswered. Scouts were concerned that Haskins didn’t have the foot speed to keep up with some of the league’s better PFs, but Indiana wasn’t scared off — after trading away some of their pieces last season, the Pacers are officially trying to rebuild the team on the fly.

At 14, the Nuggets select PF Corie Blount. Denver was blindsided by the surprise retirement of Ed Horton, who retired due to medical issues stemming from an injury he suffered two seasons ago; Horton’s retirement left Denver needing a PF and Blount was the best remaining one on the board, though just how effective he’ll be is unknown. Blount’s calling card in college was rebounding and defense, but the competition he faced at the college level was nowhere near that of the NBA — Denver is hoping Blount can rise to the challenge.

At 15, the Rockets add SF Chris Mills. Mills slid down draft boards due to poor pre-draft workouts — he didn’t look enthused with the teams in the lottery and rumors that his agent purposefully instructed Mills to perform poorly began circulating almost as soon as the workouts concluded. Whatever the case, Mills has landed in the laps of the 3-time defending NBA champs and will get ample play time in Houston, an organization that has seen rookie players thrive early on in their careers.



The most interesting pick here is PG Nick Van Exel. The speedy PG isn’t exactly an ideal fit in Coach Pop’s defensive -oriented system, but the change of pace Van Exel would bring — namely his speed and scoring chops — may be exactly what the Spurs want as San Antonio continues to pursue a Finals run.



At 24 the Mavericks select SF Bruce Bowen. A classic 3 and D wing, Bowen knows his role and doesn’t try to do too much — a necessity for a Dallas team loaded with scorers. Bowen’s selection telegraphs the possibility that Sam Perkins, the ever reliable sixth man for Dallas last year, may be moving on.



At 30, the Rockets pick up SG Pete Hunter. Hunter was widely expected to be picked up a few picks before this, but teams passed on him due to poor defensive effort during workouts — Houston is confident they can mold Hunter into a solid defender, and he’ll ride the bench until then.

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


1993 Free Agency Recap
By Sam Gray



The moratorium period is over and the NBA is back to business, in a league reshaped by multiple big signings.

First up the trades:



The first action at the start of free agency was the Hawks unloading overpaid benchwarmer Jon Koncak. Koncak hasn’t seen a minute of action in almost 2 seasons but his contract was killing the Hawks cap and so they unloaded him to Memphis, along with a minimally protected 1997 1st rounder — Atlanta will receive a 1997 2nd rounder in return.



The big domino has fallen — Hakeem is out of Chicago. A massive 3-team trade saw the Bulls send Hakeem to Dallas for Derek Harper, Sam Perkins, and an unprotected 1994 1st in a huge sign and trade. The Bulls also sent PG Jay Humphries and PF Stacey King to the Kings for PF Wayman Tisdale. Hakeem is reunited with his college friend and teammate Drexler, while Harper and Perkins join the Bulls on a team that will still employ Michael Jordan (who re-signed with Chicago as soon as Hakeem was dealt, in a not so subtle jab at his former teammate). Jordan gets Harper and Perkins (a former college teammate of his), two players who have struggled at times in the West but should see more success on Jordan’s team out East.



Finally, the Magic moved on from SF Jerome Kersey — a signing last season that didn’t work out for anyone really — and sent him to the Nets for SG Kevin Lynch and a 1996 2nd rounder. Lynch saw little time in New Jersey and the Nets weren’t going to be giving their former 1st rounder much of a chance there; Kersey will provide veteran scoring and leadership off the bench, which should help the Nets get closer to the playoffs.

Now onto the major signings — good, bad, or ugly:

C Moses Malone to PHI — Good. Malone is coming off two seasons as semi-starter/sixth man big for the Rockets, where he was crucial to their success and their championships; Malone got plenty of rest playing that way and wanted to finish his NBA career starting for an organization he liked. Enter Philly, who are eager to get to the Finals and are hoping old man Moses has one more run left in him.

PG Morlon Wiley to MIL — Good. Milwaukee’s Wiley was one of their few productive bench players last season and Milwaukee will need all the production they can get as they attempt to rebuild their roster.

SG Michael Jordan/C Rick Mahorn to CHI — Good. The Bulls sign and traded Hakeem, which netted them Harper and Perkins, but they also brought back Jordan on a mega-deal, cementing MJ as a Bull for the forseeable future; adding in former Piston and Maverick (teammate with Harper and Perkins) Mahorn as their starting big man was a solid move and should keep Chicago’s defense near the top of the league.

SG Byron Irvin to CLE — Good. Cleveland disappointed last season, losing to Detroit in 4, and that was due in no small part to their lack of guard depth; Irvin will solve that, bringing almost 16 PPG off the bench and — potentially — replacing Ron Harper next season if Harper leaves in free agency (Harper has declined any contract extensions from Cleveland and wants to make his own choices next summer). The Cavs may have only one more run with this core before they have to make some changes to a roster that has carried them to great success, but no titles.

C Andrew Lang/PF Larry Nance/PG Danny Ainge/SG John Paxton/SF Ron Anderson to BOS — Good? The Celtics are looking creaky. After last year’s Round 2 loss to the Bulls (4-1), the Celtics seemed to have decided the best way to beat the Bulls was add a third of their roster to the team; Boston did grab big man Andrew Lang (put up 14-8 last season as Memphis’ starter) and bring back Danny Ainge, but they lost Kevin McHale in free agency and that may mark the end of this team, even if Bird decided to stay.

PF Karl Malone/SG Ricky Pierce to ATL — Good! The Hawks stunned everyone in free agency by managing to woo Malone to ATL. Malone had been publicly very dissatisfied with the Jazz ownership (and Utah’s brutal winters) and moving down South, to a place closer to home, was the pitch Atlanta made and Malone accepted. The Hawks also got super-scorer Pierce to play SG, reuniting with his former Bucks teammate Alvin Robertson (who’ll shift to PG) and for what feels like the first time in years, the Hawks have surrounded Dominique with a good core of players.


PG Danny Young/PF Derrick Gervin to CHA — Bad. The Hornets grabbed two players from the Pelicans, both of whom put up empty stats on bad teams and Charlotte is hoping they can produce on their squad. Neither of these transactions was one that moves the needle, though Young was necessary after Charlotte botched the negotiations with Mugsey Bogues (who was more than happy to bolt).

PF Detlef Schrempf to UTA — Good? The Jazz lost Malone, drafted a replacement, but then decided they’d rather have a veteran … and that’s how we’ve arrived here with Schrempf joining the Jazz. Detlef doesn’t bring much in defensive value but he does score — with Utah’s new HC instituting a new system, that scoring might be more useful than Jazz fans are used to.

PG Rod Strickland/PG Lester Conner to NYK — Good. The Knicks were swept in the Finals but rather than overreact and blow it up, New York has re-upped it’s key contributors and are betting continuity will help more than hurt. Strickland got a big contract, but after his season (17-4-10), he deserves every penny.


PF Danny Ferry to ORL — Bad. The Magic got younger at the four and brought in a productive bench player, but Ferry hasn’t lived up to his draft position (second overall) and is basically a turnstile on defense if his matchup is stronger than him (that’s about half the NBA). As a bench guy, Ferry is fine, but this isn’t the move to get Orlando into the playoffs for the first time in franchise history.

PG Fat Lever to DAL — Good. Dallas traded for Hakeem, letting the older Hale brother get one up on his younger (and so far very successful) one. Adding in Lever, who has played well for Denver the last few seasons (16-5-8) is a good move to replace some of Harper’s production and Lever comes at a much cheaper price. Make no mistake, Dallas is aiming for at least a WCF appearance and if they don’t get that, their coach is probably the next one on the chopping block.

C Sam Bowie to DEN— Good? The Nuggets had a huge hole at center they needed to address and adding Bowie (a solid 12-8 starter) isn’t a bad thing, but Denver’s needs are so numerous that Bowie doesn’t necessarily make the most longterm sense. Playing in the West with Hakeem, Robinson, and Shaq, just how likely is it that Bowie will make that much a difference?

SF Orlando Woolridge to IND— Bad. The Pacers lost out on Blackman, who rejected their contract offer for another team (a winning one) and Indy settled for Woolridge, who has bounced around the last few seasons as a sixth-man/semi-starter.

PF Terry Catledge to HOU — Good. The Rockets watched Malone leave and needed a reliable big off the bench; Catledge is that guy. Putting up 17-6 last year off the bench for the Magic, Catledge can score and play decent enough defense to at least make the opposition think about taking a shot. Though not as good as Malone on the boards, Catledge is a good deal younger and more mobile.

PG Mugsey Bogues to SA — Good. The Spurs continue to add to their PG depth and signed Bogues, who is on his first winning team in his career and should play like it. Despite being only 5’4”, Bogues is a feared thief and the opposing defense easily loses him if he disappears into the paint, surrounded by bigs.

PG Darnell Valentine/SF Rolando Blackman/PF Tom Chambers to PHX — Good. The Suns tried to get out of the first round last year and failed, losing to the Sonics 3-2 and finding out they just didn’t have the offense to keep up with Seattle — Phoenix remedied that this offseason by bringing back Chambers, adding Blackman, and signing Valentine as their veteran backup.

SF Alex English to SEA — Good. The Sonics almost beat the Rockets with their offensive fireworks but fell short due to a lack of depth; English is a certified bucket and should thrive in his sixth-man role in Seattle just as he did last season with Boston (20-3 off the bench).

PF Kevin McHale/PG Spud Webb to MINN — Good. The T’Wolves have had a miserable time the last two seasons and getting a veteran of McHale’s stature, one who cares about the state of Minnesota and wants the T’Wolves to do well, is a huge move. Adding in the veteran presence of Webb is a nice bonus and hopefully should allow the T’Wolves to get back to the postseason.

[vinaa23]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)

Hakeem to the Mavs? Called it! Very good stuff as usual, trek. Is next year's class the legendary kobe/iverson one?

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)

Hakeem to the Mavs? Called it! Very good stuff as usual, trek. Is next year's class the legendary kobe/iverson one?

Nope, next year is 1994 - Grant Hill and Jason Kidd. 1995 is KG and Rasheed Wallace. Then we get to 1996 with Kobe and AI in a stacked class.

The story will be taking some twists and turns over the next few seasons. Stay tuned. [emoji6]

Sent from my SM-A536U1 using Tapatalk

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


Ch. 36

The trade heard around the NBA once more involved Hakeem Olajuwon — this time leaving the Bulls in a sign and trade to team up with his old college buddy, Clyde Drexler, in Dallas. It was a coup of epic proportions and one over a year in the making for Mavericks owner Trent Lewis.

“We had struggled to get far in the playoffs and the biggest issue we had was shutting down the inside,” said Lewis. “Getting Clyde was incredible, but we were going to need more to compete for titles … my father and brother had upped the ante for the entire league and I felt like we were getting left behind.”

The Mavericks radically remade their roster with one major trade, sending longtime fan-favorite Derek Harper away to Chicago (in addition to Sam Perkins) to grab Hakeem “The Dream” Olajuwon; Harper was disappointed it came down to that, especially after his lone season with Drexler — Harper had averaged 17-3-14-2 with the Mavericks, he had played his entire career with the team, but approaching 32 years-old, Dallas knew his value would only decline.

“I really thought I’d retire there,” recalled Harper. “Trent Lewis tried to call me and explain things, but I didn’t want to hear anything from him … I felt like the blame for our failures was falling on me, falling on Sam, and I was ready to start a new chapter in Chicago.”

Perkins was happy to be traded to a team where he could start again and one which employed his old college buddy, Michael Jordan. “Landing with Mike was a great thing in my mind,” recalled Perkins. “He’d gotten close but the team around him just wasn’t good enough … me and Derek were more than good enough, we were better combined than Hakeem in my mind.”

Olajuwon was also pleased to be out of Chicago — the trade there to unite with Jordan had initially been welcome, but the postseason struggles combined with Jordan’s intense competitive streak made being a teammate to Jordan increasingly difficult. “He was very driven and very intense … I thought I was as well, but nothing like him,” said Olajuwon. “Our relationship was professional, but not friendly … our struggles to get to the Finals took a toll.”

The weather in Chicago was also pretty cold for Olajuwon and the big man was glad to be back in the warmer climate of Texas; joining up with Drexler was an amazing opportunity and, for the first time in a few years, Hakeem Olajuwon was looking forward to having fun playing basketball — yes, there were championship aspirations in Dallas, but Lewis made it clear to Olajuwon that besting Houston was the real goal.

“I wanted to beat them bad and so did he,” said Lewis. “We wanted a title, but more than anything we wanted to beat the Rockets, to make them regret discounting either of us. Hakeem was going to be a pillar of the Mavericks in my mind, the player who elevated our franchise to new heights and set a standard for all to follow … he wasn’t getting traded unless he told me he wanted out. It wasn’t a no-trade-clause, but it was pretty damn close.”

While the Mavericks and Bulls got better, Houston got more depth — albeit not as much as Nate Hale and his front office would have liked. Signing Terry Catledge, a solid big man, was nice but the Rockets still had issues on the wing — they’d end up inking Reggie Theus to a one-year deal to provide some scoring off the bench, but Theus’ lack of defensive ability was glaring.

“His knees were old and his foot speed non-existent,” recalled Coach Kern. “I told Nate I wasn’t going to play him much if he couldn’t provide some defense, but the basketball gods had other ideas.”

Indeed, the fickle basketball gods — both merciful and merciless — struck Houston early. Rookie Pete Hunter, the 30th overall pick in the 1993 draft, suffered an eye injury during training camp and had to undergo emergency surgery. “It was a damned strange injury,” recalled trainer Harvey Ross. “He went up for a dunk, but misjudged the jump and went face-first into the rim, lacerated his eye. Blood was everywhere, we had to rush him to the hospital.”

The bloody-injury was going to keep Hunter out for 16 weeks at least — he was effectively done for the first half of the season.

“I felt awful,” recalled Hunter. “You don’t want to be the guy who gets hurt in camp and just has to mull around the team … you get lonely that way. You get down. I had a *ucking eye patch and couldn’t really practice with anyone else because I could only see out of one eye.”

Hunter’s eye injury shook the team. “Lots of *ucking blood, he was screaming in pain,” said Gary Payton. “It was ominous … we took the rest of the day off, we were all a little freaked by it.”

With Hunter out, the Rockets signed SF Kevin Gamble, who had spent the past three seasons in Memphis and then NOLA; Gamble was 6’5” and was a solid defender with good ball handling skills; he didn’t have the sweet-shooting stroke of Hunter, but he was a veteran and brought much-needed energy to the bench. Houston also signed former Rocket Ralph Sampson, released from Sacramento, back to the team to backup Shaquille O’Neal and Terry Moncrief.

All and all, training camp was relatively successful and injury free outside of Hunter’s accident and quickly the Rockets players and coaching staff turned their attention to their home opener. The NBA schedule makers had, once again, decided to match Houston up with a team they had history with: the Detroit Pistons.

Former Rockets Scot Roth and Horace Grant, who had demanded a trade before the 1993 trade deadline, would now have to watch their former teammates accept their championship rings and celebrate the three-peat in front of the Rockets home crowd.

“The schedule makers were some real *ssholes that year,” recalled Grant. “Scot and I both watched the Finals, of course, and we both wondered if the team would have done as well with us or if we all were better off. You try not to regret or be bitter, but the two of us definitely were a little of both.”

This would be the first time the Rockets and Pistons met since the trade, and the Rockets players weren’t in a forgiving mood. “We wanted to embarrass them,” recalled Shaquille O’Neal. “We didn’t have any love for those guys … Grant and Roth, they had turned their backs on us. Scottie wasn’t looking to bury the hatchet and neither was I.”

The ring ceremony highlighted the Rockets players and their championship rings, shiny and new. The Rockets video team made sure to show clips of the squad after the trade and didn’t include Grant or Roth in the least.




From there the game tipped off and it was almost instantly chippy; O’Neal got nailed with an early foul, getting a little too rough screening Isiah Thomas.



And the Pistons — the former Bad Boys of the NBA — responded with words, but didn’t try to fight the younger Rockets; the two teams would continue trading buckets and fouls for the early part of the game.



But as the first quarter began to wind down the Rockets began to wind up — Houston’s younger legs and swarming defense clamped down on Detroit, forcing the Pistons into uncomfortable situations on both ends.



The Rockets took a 62-42 lead into halftime and then choked the Pistons out in the second-half, allowing only 25 total second-half points — one of the worst second-half performances in NBA history. The final score of the game was a loud, boastful, 113-67.



“We got beat bad,” said Isiah Thomas after the game. “I feel like we’re a bunch of JV kids that just got smoked by an NBA team.”




O’Neal’s early game foul trouble was an aberration — the Diesel would only get one more foul the entire game and would finish with 33 points and 9 boards. Pippen and Payton both added in points as well, but the game was very much O’Neal’s — even with the Rockets starters mostly sitting out the second-half.

The Rockets beatdown of Detroit would set the tone for the next few games — Houston would demolish the 76ers (105-86), then the Warriors (117-100), and the Kings (114-91) before welcoming the rival Mavericks to Houston. Dallas, unlike Houston, was struggling integrating their new teammates together and their record reflected that.




Houston looked like the superior team by record and, on paper, they certainly had more starpower. “I wanted that win badly,” recalled Mavericks owner Trent Lewis. “We had just gotten Hakeem in, we had Clyde, we had Fat Lever … the team was loaded with talent. We were a better roster than theirs.”

Houston didn’t believe that was the case at all. “We were three-time defending champions,” said Payton. “Those *ucks in Dallas thought they won the ring when they signed Hakeem, but how many rings did he have? Zero. They were delusional.”

Early on, the Mavericks looked like more than a match for Houston — a defensive, tense first quarter saw both teams struggle to score, talk trash, and play chippy. “The game started off a muddy brawl,” said Kern. “I took two timeouts trying to calm guys down, but it barely made a difference.”

With a little over six minutes to go, Houston finally started to get going.



The run began then — Dallas answered, but Houston came right back and the Rockets had lift off.



Houston would finish the first quarter up 22-16 in a defensive affair, but in the second would watch as O’Neal and Olajuwon went back and forth at one another. The premiere matchup lived up to its billing as both bigs played well, but only one got help — O’Neal — while Olajuwon’s teammates were largely ineffective.



“Hakeem was the most-skilled big man in the game,” said O’Neal. “He showed up every time we played … didn’t duck me, didn’t whine, he went at me. I respected him coming in and gained even more respect playing him.”

The Mavericks fell to Houston 125-95, and the game wasn’t close.




The Rockets win further emboldened the team — Houston’s confidence skyrocketed. “We were flying high and feeling fine,” said Kern. “Too much so, I thought, but every night they went out there and earned their confidence.”

The Rockets would play two nights later and narrowly win against Seattle, 116-108, and then would fall into a funk — 7-0, they would lose four games straight by close margins before grabbing a win against Orlando and Denver. They would spend the next two weeks trading winning and losing streaks; at the end of November, they were 11-6 and not looking quite as confident.

“The rest of the league had gotten better around us,” recalled Nate Hale. “We had driven everyone else to be better and they picked on our younger players.” The losses Houston suffered weren’t blowouts, they were close, but they showed that Houston had two major weaknesses.

First, their three-point shooting was practically non-existent; Kern’s eschewing of shots beyond the arc and betting on penetration in the paint made Houston’s offense a bit predictable. That, in of itself, wouldn’t have been a bad thing if, when Houston got into the paint and got fouled, they could hit their free-throw shots.

That was the biggest problem — the Rockets were dead last in the NBA in free-throw makes. With a FT% of .708, Houston’s team foul-shooting was abysmal. Largely responsible for that was bad foul shooting from Pippen (72% on the year, down from 76%), O’Neal (56% — a worrying sign for the young big), and rookie starter Chris Mills (67%, down from 78% in college). The Rockets new bench players also weren’t doing better than 68% as a group — the foul line was Houston’s kryptonite.

“If we just managed to hit our shots at the line, we’d be fine,” said Kern. “But we were struggling and it wasn’t a good sign.” Multiple theories for why Houston’s foul-shooting was so bad were floated about, but the likeliest was simply statistical probability and luck.

Houston’s luck wouldn’t get much better as November turned to December — in fact, it would get much, much worse.

[trekfan]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)


Ch. 37

December 2nd, 1993: it’s a date that doesn’t mean much to many people, but to NBA history it is the date for the beginning of something — the beginning of a seismic shift in the league as a whole. Scottie Pippen, who was having a great season so far (22.3 PPG, 7.6 RPG, 6.2 APG, 2.8 SPG, 1.3 BPG) was coming down the stairs at his home and slipped going down — he would suffer a major injury in the fall.



It was a dislocated left patella, on the same knee sprained in the playoffs over two years before, and it was a bad one. “His kneecap was trashed,” recalled trainer Harvey Ross. “Utterly *ucked and he was in a lot of pain.”

Pippen went under the knife for surgery, but what the doctors found wasn’t comforting. “They got my knee open and it was like someone had bombed my kneecap … it just was everywhere it shouldn’t be,” said Pippen. “Shards of it were in the muscles, in the tendons … the damage was greater than they expected.”

Pippen was ruled out for the remainder of the regular season and, likely, the playoffs. It was a devastating blow to the team. “Without Scottie our defense wasn’t the same,” recalled Gary Payton. “With him, we were a *ucking squad of lockdown performers … without him, we were just good.”

The Rockets compensated by giving more minutes to players off the bench but soon Pippen’s injury would just be one of many things going wrong in Houston.

December 5th, 1993 — only a few days after Pippen’s injury, Sam Hale is visited by agents from the IRS, complete with search warrants. Hale’s longtime tax accountant, James Fisher (known as “Jimmy Fish” in certain circles) had been knowingly defrauding the IRS when filing taxes for the Hale family ranches and had been doing it for nearly 25 years.

“To say it was a shock would be an understatement,” recalled Nate Hale. “My father was beside himself … Fisher had been a close family friend for a long time and my father had never been good about filing taxes, it’s why he hired Fisher in the first place.”

Not only had Fisher been defrauding the IRS, he’s also been gambling away the money to some seedy individuals — the Hale family ranches had been used by Fisher, but had unknowingly supported his various illegal endeavors. “We were in hot water, to say the least,” said Hale. “The entire family of ranches owed the IRS massive amounts of back taxes and fines.”

The news broke while the Rockets were on the road and Houston promptly had another distraction — they’d go 0-3 on the road trip before coming home on December 11th. But, once they reached home, SG Mark Macon requested a trade out of Houston. Unhappy with his minutes and usage, Macon wanted a starting job somewhere — anywhere — and was tired of dealing with head coach Randy Kern.

“He just wouldn’t listen to me,” said Macon. “He was set in his ways, set in trying to win games the way he had before, and I was telling him we needed to shoot more threes, we needed to open up the floor. But he didn’t have time for me.”

“Macon thought he knew better,” said Kern. “He wanted to shoot more threes because he was better at that than playing inside, which was fine, but it wasn’t how the offense worked — we played at a fast pace and we got into the paint. He didn’t like that.”

Nate Hale didn’t bother trying to smooth things over with Macon — Kern wanted him gone and Hale couldn’t blame him. He promptly traded Macon to the Nets for Dennis Hopson, a player who wasn’t as young or athletically inclined as Macon, but who was a team player. “I just wanted a two-guard who could run and play unselfish ball,” said Hale. “I didn’t need any real star power.”



The trade was completed on December 13th and the next day Samuel Hale met with his son to deliver even more bad news. “My father told me that he was going to have to sell the team to keep the ranches,” said Hale. “I couldn’t believe it had come to that — were the ranches really that poorly run? Were they really that far in debt to the IRS?”

The answer was a defeated “Yes.” Not only were the ranches in trouble with the IRS, multiple loans had been taken out in their name by Fisher and none of them had been paid off — Fisher had dropped a bomb on the family’s finances. Only the cash infusion from the sale of the Rockets would save the Hale family ranches.

News broke about the team being up for sale on December 16th, 1993, and the rest of the NBA was stunned — but not many were too sad about it.

“To be frank, the Hale family had come in and embarrassed the elite of the league — from the Celtics to the Lakers,” said NBA columnist Sam Gray. “Those big market owners, across the board, were happy to see them go and none was happier than Trent Lewis — no one, in fact, was more pleased than Lewis.”

Lewis wasn’t just pleased, he was ecstatic. “I couldn’t believe it took so long for karma to get them,” Lewis said to the press the next day. Lewis — along with some other NBA owners — wanted to be sure Houston’s new ownership wasn’t a problem like the Hale family, so the owners unofficially invited Solomon Grady to bid on the team.

Grady was a food magnate — his various “Grandma Grady’s” brand of foods were in grocery stores across the nation. The brand was well-known for its home-cooking, nostalgic commercials featuring the character of “Grandma Grady” and its foods were popular, if not exactly high-quality.

“Grady was a character — the type of man who had more money than he knew what to do with and was more a businessman than a sports fan,” said Gray. “He submitted his bid and the Hales didn’t want to sell to him, but the board of governors made it clear that Grady’s bid would be the only one they’d approve of. Other bids weren’t as strong as Grady’s, so financially it was the right move for the NBA to welcome in his money, but the Hales didn’t like him … but they really didn’t have a choice.”

In desperate need of the cash infusion before April 1994, Sam Hale accepted Grady’s offer for the team on December 30th, 1993.

The Rockets, thanks to the trade of Macon, had been on a 9-game win streak then — the day of the sale, they played the Nuggets and lost. “We were all down,” recalled Shaquille O’Neal. “We all liked Mr. Hale … he let us play, he was happy to spend money on us, he didn’t complain to the press at all. He was a good one.”

The new year didn’t hold happy times for Houston: Terry Moncrief broke his hand, joining SF Kenny Payne (out for the season) and Pippen (out for at least the regular season) on the injury report. The Rockets depth had taken a major hit but Houston kept on chugging along — all the adversity, all the talk, was causing the team to bunker down.

“It was us against the world,” said Payton. “No *hit, we were close-knit then, like a group of guys on the battlefield … we were focused on winning and shutting everyone up.”

Houston would romp through January, losing only two games all month long (close losses to the Bulls and Mavericks). Despite all the drama, despite all the noise, the Houston Rockets were succeeding and succeeding well. “The rest of the NBA couldn’t believe how well the team was doing,” said Hale. “Frankly, I couldn’t either but I was so proud of them.”

January turned to February and Houston continued to roll along but change was coming at Houston faster than anyone expected. All-Star weekend was approaching and with it, the vote to approve the sale of the Rockets to Solomon Grady … once that vote passed, everything for Houston would change.

[marshdaddy]

Re: Texas Two Step: An Alternate NBA History (NBA2K20)

Had some catching up to. Guess the question about the impending trade wasn't as far fetched as I thought, but I didn't have the stones to predict the landing spot. Big shakeup.

I thought that would mean a bigger family rivalry in Texas, but clearly not. Does that mean the story is shifting more to the Mavs? Is Grady expected to be tight on the purse strings than Hale?