Minstrel

Much was made, in past years, of the Lakers having a better record with Shaq out and just Kobe Bryant than with Kobe out and Shaq there. Were they a better team without Shaq? Not at all, but losing Kobe dropped the level of the ball-handling, passing and perimeter focus. With Kobe gone, defenses could collapse entirely on Shaq and the offense stagnated. With Kobe and no Shaq, the team was more easily pushed around in the middle, but still had a more diverse attack.

The underlying problem, for those Lakers and these Rockets, is that they're built for one perimeter superstar and one interior superstar. Therefore, when one goes down, especially the perimeter guy, things grind to a halt much more. If a team didn't have the perimeter superstar, only the interior superstar, the team would be built differently (more and better shooters, perhaps a bruising rebounding power forward, etc) and the team would function fine without that star on the perimeter. But when you're built to exploit the talents of two superstars, one alone has troubles, especially when that one is a big man who can't create for himself and others at will.

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You'll never live like common people
You'll never do what common people do
You'll never fail like common people
You'll never watch your life slide out of view
And dance and drink and screw
Because there's nothing else to do.