Amare Stoudemire dragged the Phoenix Suns into Game 6 of a Western Conference Final that could have been over long ago, showing why he's a better option to be powerlifting the Houston Rockets next season.

Make no mistake, the reason the Suns are still stubbornly standing in front of the Los Angeles Lakers tonight is because Amare (not media-darling Steve Nash) turned his game up. It took 42 points and 11 rebounds of Stoudemire in Game 3 to stop this series from being a sweep. Stoudemire also made several plays to close out Game 4 (another Suns win) and he's the best chance Phoenix has of delaying that Boston-LA NBA Finals talk for several more days (Nash guarantees aside).

In short, for the last week, Stoudemire's been putting together the ultimate audition tape for any free agent suitors (Amare's a free agent at season's end and Suns owner Robert Sarver is too cheap and Suns general manager Steve Kerr is too Michael-Jordan dumb to resign him). One can only hope that Rockets general manager Daryl Morey has taken note of Stoudemire's spree.

For this isn't just a contract drive — it could the Rockets' avoid a mistake drive.

That blunder would be Chris Bosh, the Toronto Raptor All-Star forward who is still somehow on the top of Houston's free-agent wish list. The best move would still be to go insane on Dwyane Wade (especially if Morey truly believes that Yao Ming will be the Yao of old next season). But if the Rockets are fixated on getting another big, if they're that terrified of Yao's future health (and maybe they should be), at least grab the right power forward.

Bosh gets 10 times the praise Stoudemire receives while delivering one 10th of the results.

This fun-helping, Twitter king, Dallas native couldn't even push the Toronto Raptors into the playoffs — in the East. Think about that for a second. It's almost impossible not to make the playoffs in the NBA's Eastern Conference if you have one elite player. The Raptors finished 40-42 and basically choked away the last playoff spot in the East to a dysfunctional Chicago Bulls team.

So you really think Chris Bosh is anything close to a franchise player?

The Houston Rockets fans who started that Web site (Houston4Bosh.com) urging Bosh to come to Clutch City are targeting the worst possible type of player. Bosh would fit right in on this current Rockets, because he's another player who looks better the worse his team is. He's the Aaron Brooks (another player who's only good on a bad team) of power forwards.

Stoudemire, on the other dunk, helped push an underdog Suns team to one of the better records in the grueling Western Conference. And now he's giving the Lakers and their much taller, bulkier front line some shove back.

This idea that Amare is somehow a creation of Steve Nash is absurd. Just watch how Nash's numbers are the ones that go down when Stoudemire leaves the Valley of the Sun. Stoudemire would make the Rockets a faster, more athletic team. He'd fit perfectly with Kevin Martin and change the tempo (remember Yao's likely, at best, a 25-minute-a-night player from now on). Ripping on Amare's defense suggests that Bosh is somehow a new-age Bill Russell and sorry he's not changing games on the defensive end either.

It's time to defy the conventional wisdom that Bosh is better and go with the player that's still proving it as the calendar turns to summer.