Houston Isn't Getting a Storybook T-Mac Finish

Yesterday was indeed a day of many transactions, and thus rumors continued to rise and fall throughout the night. Amare Stoudemire came up quite a bit. But you also heard about the return of the T-Mac trade. McGrady is indeed an interesting piece, a prodigious talent when healthy, but somewhere between "player" and "contract" these days. The injury-prone swingman is currently rehabbing from microfracture surgery, which means he could be out until next spring, and all but back to 100 percent. So while there's an off-chance that T-Mac could come back mid-season for the Rockets, it's unlikely he'll do them any good. And while his $20-million salary expires next summer, it's still a huge chunk of the cap lying fallow. The Rockets, they want to win now. All of which opens up an intriguing possibility: Teams willing to take on salary when, supposedly, all teams are preparing like mad for 2010. We saw it when the Spurs traded for Jefferson, and then...