The Rockets are cheaters! And I have the email to prove it.

We all know the Rockets tanked the season to land Hakeem (or Akeem back then), and when Dallas coach Dick Motta blew up behind the scenes to the league, they realized they had to do something to prevent losing squads from just quitting in the last 20 games or so. Enter the lottery.

Of course, the Rockets subsequently hit the lottery and scored the #1 pick to draft Yao Ming while the Mavs were the favorites to land both Shaquille O'Neal and Chris Webber but were snubbed both times.

The lesson? Whistleblowers get a karma kick in the ass while cheaters win 2 titles, steal a franchise center, and dupe some hockey GM out of a top 5 player. Someday texasnba.com contributer Ben A. will post a fun trade trail for his Rockettes.

Why do I bring all this up? Well, Ben and I had an enjoyable email exchange I thought I might share:

Ben:
Not a surprise for savvy UT fans (*coughcough*), but: http://insider.espn.go.com/espn/blog/index?name=ford_chad
The chickens have apparently come home to roost:
"He's fallen … can he get up?" Texas is a team of extremes at the moment. NBA scouts are running to get on LaMarcus Aldridge's bandwagon while moving quickly to hop off point guard Daniel Gibson's.

Marc:
Yeah, Aldridge may be the #1 pick. He'd look god as a Rocket, eh? Send Tracy to the bench for the year! Meanwhile, I like how in 2 weeks Gibson's gone from "best PG in America" to selfish and terrible. Did any of these "scouts" watch him last year? He's always been selfish and terrible.

Ben:
If the Rockets miss the playoffs and hit the lottery jackpot again:
1) Your head will explode
2) New Orleans and Atlanta will invade Houston

Marc:
True, true. Boston always whines about missing out on Duncan when they "deserved" him, but we missed out on Shaq and Mourning and Webber and Hardaway. F***ing Rockets. The only reason we even have the lottery system is because they're cheaters.

Ben:
1) Missing out on Hardaway was a blessing in disguise.
2) Louisville should love the lottery, since it got their college program to the Final Four.
3) Not only did Boston miss the pick, but they couldn't get anyone to bite on their trade of THREE FIRST ROUNDERS for it afterwards. Sucks to miss in such an absurdly lopsided draft.
4) Connecting the dots again, we traded a broken-down Otis Thorpe to Vancouver for Francis. So if we miss the lottery, clearly we need NOK to draft Aldridge, and him to refuse to play for them, leading to our trade of Howard to NOK for LaMarcus. Pencil it in.

Marc:
1) Not for like 8 years it wouldn't have been.
2) I wonder if former Pitino protégé Tubby Smith has to pull a Stuart Smalley in the mirror before every UK-Louisville game now.
2.5) I wonder if that's followed by gritting teeth and sobs to the effect of "how could he do this to me?!"
3) I repeat: SHAQ. MOURNING. We got MASHBURN. You want lopsided? You can't HANDLE lopsided.
4) Dirk sucks.

It just had to be said.

Ben:
Didn't Penny go in the tank after 3 seasons or so? When did he start his Danny Manning routine? Also, Shaq and Mourning, you got Mash. Timmy D, they got Ron Mercer. If you had to draft one injury-prone Kentucky player, would it be Ron? Admittedly, they also got Billups in that draft, but you had Kidd! And Billups sucked at Boston!

To sum up, Dirk gets blocked by Bruce Bowen.

Marc:
3 seasons? He and Shaq were epic together for 4 seasons, and remember after Shaq left when Hardaway single-handedly whupped the Heat for an entire series? He scored 40 points in every win, I think. So let's say 5 years. Which is about what Mash gave us -- we actually got Mash in that draft, Jimmy Jackson in the Shaq draft.

To sum up, Keith Van Horn should not pass.

Ben:
So epic that they got swept by the 6 seed from the west [editor's note: does anyone really think the Rockets cared about their seed that year? Barkely was sipping Mai Thais on the bench while Drexler tried to learn how to read. "6 seed" says nothing about that team except that they cheated regular-season attendees out of a lot of wins with their lazy asses]. It was less a testament to Hardaway's greatness than the epic lameness of the mid-90's eastern conference. Basically, I'm saying that even though we traded for Rafer Alston, at least we didn't sign Doug Christie.

Marc:
No, true. At least you didn't sign Doug Christie for 3 mil and already waive him. It's much better to have David "remember when I used to get some lift on the ball?" Wesley on the payroll for eternity. How's that Collier pick working out for you, by the way?

Ben:
As well as our Samaki Walker pick. Or your Samaki Walker pick. Whichever.
At least we drafted the second best player on the T'wolves. After KG gets traded, what will YOU have done for the poor people of Minnesota, you heartless Grinch?

Marc:
Man, I thought you would read me the riot act for slamming a dead guy. But I guess you're the one who spits on Jimmy V.'s corpse every chance he gets, so maybe I shouldn't be surprised.
All the Mavs did for the Wolves was humiliate them in a 3-0 playoff sweep. But I believe that encouraged them to go out and get Sprewell, so that's something.

Ben:
If you think I'm bad (although I'm maybe worse for going to look), do a search on Collier among NBA players on ESPN. So much for honoring the dead. I guess they couldn't cough up those few hundred bytes of database space for the rest of the season. Also, while Jimmy V is dead, so is my grandfather, who was the biggest Cougar fan in the universe, and Jimmy V kicked him right in the Phi Slama Jamas, if you know what I mean.

Hey, don't you love the possibility of a KG to NYK trade? Wouldn't it be awesome to see Marbury at the first post-trade press conference? Although KG forcing a trade shouldn't make Zeke look good... Check all that. What would be awesome is Thomas biting on a blockbuster trade of Mark Madsen, Rashad McCants, and WallyWorld for Starbury. Humiliation all around! I get the giggles just thinking about it. Even though Isaiah would never trade for two white guys.

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...and it's always appropriate to end on a ripping of Isiah. See why I want these guys to post more?