McGrady down, Rockets grounded?

Now, similar to the situation with the Heat and Dwayne Wade, everyone got a first hand look at how devastating a missing superstar can be.

Yao down, all right. Recently I did a blog post detailing the Rockets emergence without their big man, and most of it is due to Coach Van Gundy and Tracy McGrady. While the team has historically struggled when one of them was down (which changed this season), the team is terrible without both--and tonight, the Rockets were terrible. Question: were they as terrible as the Boston Celtics?

Gamblers across the nation were kicking themselves in the face for not putting their houses and kid's college funds on the Celtics early--even if they just had a feeling. The odds on the money line were hovering around +400, but then that all changed drastically. McGrady was sick with the flu and the rationale was, why exert yourself when you can take a day off? Rest up against the lowly Celtics, your team should be able to handle them, then come back strong against the Toronto Raptors. Those same gamblers then collectively released a huge sigh of relief as the Rocket did just that, playing a ridiculous first half--and by ridiculous, I mean laughably terrible. The score was 35-29, but at least Houston was up by 6. The Rockets shot 1 of 22 from downtown. I mean, this was an ugly, ugly game, a game where Houston found themselves up by double digits--until the fourth quarter, that was.

Then things got really ugly, but now just for the Rockets. Those same gamblers who were cursing themselves off, then praising hallelujahs, were back to cursing themselves again as the Celtics first tied the game then took over on a three from Pierce with scant time remaining. Right before our eyes we saw a team self-destruct, just look completely lost without their general. You have the Suns without Nash, the Heat without Wade, and now the Rockets without McGrady. Not right. Losing to the Celtics, that's just not right.

Too bad the NBA can't turn off injuries like in a video game.

But you have to hand it to the Celtics. Just like the teams in the Eastern Conference who are smelling blood, they smelled blood on the Rockets and they attacked. Good for them and I'm sure they made a few people some decent money. In regards to myself, I made myself a halftime wager which I will go in detail tomorrow, give a little gambling advice on this blog. All right though, CollegeBoy is tired and needing some sleep. Until tomorrow...

Let's put all our injuries on hold, huh? It's much more exciting that way.