a team that included a dominant big man who plays both sides of the court and a sidekick in the frontcourt willing to do all the intangibles

two wing players who can score

a point guard who is willing to run the team hard and play hard defense, although the player may be limited in his offensive basketball abilities

good solid 4 man bench rotation


every player had high character hard work ethic and good coaching, willing to run the floor hard both ways for 40 minutes. why high character is so importatnt--because high character guys will work harder in every facet whther its the game or pracrtice or conditioning

a team that is built on defense and rebounding with very good athletiscm across the board.


this team reminds me of the spurs, its almost a replica of the spurs and unless you have jordan or shaq--really this model is the one that has worked in the NBA from SA to Houston--its a good model to build a basketball team

LOL.... DOminant Big men are not a Dime a dozen these days.
Over 20 other teams will go on a bidding war whenever one comes to the Free Agent market.
Why do you suppose Todd Mccalugh, Keon Clark, an others got the big bucks...
when a big man even shows signs of being "decent" he gets a Ton of cash on his lap for his "potential" services.

It's easy to look at t a championship tewam and talk about all the things they do right. It's a completely other thing to put one together, especially with all these rules dictating how much money can be paid out, what kind of payroll can be traded from team to team, and the lack of talent lately at the 5 NBA wide.

I don't disagree with you Briggs....
BALANCE is the key to winning!!
Isaiah is getting us there lil by lil.


KNICKS RULE!!!!!!!!!!!
VAN Horn Drools!!!!!!!

The Houston Briggs was referring to was the Rockets teams with Olajuwon, not Yao.

Since there are so few big men to build teams around, I think that other options have to be exercised, like the Run and Gun teams (Dallas, NJ), teams that play tough D (the old Knicks and Heat teams, Philly when they made their Finals run), etc. It's not easy to say let's just find a dominant big man, there are like 4-5 of them.

Even when you do have them, it takes so much to get them and keep them its hard to fill the team with other players (see: Minnesota).