The Houston Rockets Are Officially Done

"It's on me" may not be a phrase you hear come out of Tracy McGrady's mouth in the months leading up this year's NBA Playoffs. With Yao Ming out for the rest of the season with a broken foot, the Houston Rockets are now a mere shell of their former selves and are officially out of the running for the NBA Finals.

They are a team that was on the brink, and fell off. Their early season miscues, floundering follies, and silly sequences, had put them in a hole that was too deep to climb out of, and yet they did it. They won 12 games in a row putting them right back in thick of the most anticipated race for the playoffs in the history of the NBA. They did it behind their horse, their stud, their go-to guy; a 7-foot, 5-inch, giant who dominated the paint with dunks and turnaround jumpers that left slow-footed centers helpless.

But now that stud is gone, and the Houston Rockets are left with only their one star, the oft-injured Tracy McGrady, who despite all of his accomplishments and successes on the court, he has never won anything of any merit in his entire NBA career.

That's not to take anything away from McGrady, because he is a great player. He has some of the more spectacular performances of the past 4 or 5 years. But America loves a winner, and that is not what McGrady has proven to be on the basketball court. He has lost all six of his first round playoff series, including a series where he was up 3-1 while with the Orlando Magic.

And with Yao Ming now out of the lineup, the Rockets have no one to turn to but McGrady. And even though there is no good time to lose Yao, this time certainly was not it. The Rockets were fresh off a 12-game wining streak and they were looking like one of the best 4 or 5 teams in the Western Conference, which is saying a lot given the level of competition this year. They also had just pulled off a trade that brought some stability to their point guard position with the acquisition of Bobby Jackson via the New Orleans Hornets.

But that is all for not. The season is over. McGrady couldn't lead this team to a playoff a victory with Yao Ming, so he certainly won't do it without him. Last year, McGrady's words of "It's on me" echoed loudly, but fell upon deaf ears when a McGrady-led team saw yet another first round exit.

So forget about the Rockets mental work in getting along with a new coach. Forget about their ability to overcome a bad start. Forget about their ability to overcome a litany of smaller injuries. Sure they climbed a steep wall, but as the story goes, Humpty Dumpty fell down... again.