Trade Capela for 2 pgs then go extreme small lineups where Harden plays Center. Ounce this becomes a problem Coach has an epiphany "We must go smaller" Coach has whole team play without shoes. Still not working Rockets begin a feverish search for the best small person bball player on the planet. Then Coach while thumbing thru pay per view he spots the documentary "Murderball"
This is hardly covering new ground, but regardless of whether we move Paul or Capela, we need upgrades at the SF, PF and C positions in either the first or second spots on the depth chart. The departure of Ariza and injured-Moute wasn't addressed, and needs to be. Toronto and Milwaukee improved because of 3&D guys. I've been a Morey fan, but increasingly I feel like his relentless pursuit of "below-value" players results in him not signing guys for par value. This last summer was his worst, surely this summer has to be better? Melo was a 3-not-D player. MCW was a D-not-3 player. Ennis was an enigma. Tucker and Capela are a fine starting front-court with Paul/Harden, but rebounding takes energy, depth, and .... oh yeah, guys taller than 6'8". We just didn't have a team that could make it "hard" on the other team to get to their spots and run their sets. Ariza brought that in spades, something the fans didn't always value or see. Paul takes much of the ire here (for his salary, rightfully) but a Paul-Gordon-Harden back court can go to war with anyone. It's the massive drop off in front court play that caused our playoff funk. Whether you blame D'Antoni, Capela, Faried, Morey, whatever, the front court needs attention. However, if we can't get / don't get rid of Paul, I still believe this team is a contender if we upgrade the front court. The assistant coaches and Tilman narratives and whatever else are just distractions. If we don't upgrade SF/PF/C, next year will suck.
I really believe Les sold Tilman on the premise that we were going to win it this year and that we probably would have won it last year if Cp3 didnt go down. Only now after the second round loss Tilman realises the reality of the situation.
Morey is done making winning moves. Morey is still one of the best gms in the league but at this point its clear that hes nothing more than tilmens accountant tilmen is the reason why we havent fired dantoni yet. Morey would have canned him the minute we were eliminated tilmen is the reason we went into this season with a halfassed roster. Morey would have resigned luc and ariza and would not have spent the entirety of last offseason signing a pair of dirty assholes that we proceeded to waive anyways. Morey would not have traded our pick for yet another useless cunt like shumpert and we wouldnt be debuting our brand new ugly ass jerseys on draft night Seeing as tilmen is still around, do not count on a "response". Odds are we are trotting out a worse iteration of last years team once again
"I've been a Morey fan, but increasingly I feel like his relentless pursuit of "below-value" players results in him not signing guys for par value." This. Its like, the player has to be a undervalued unknown or he wont sign him. He has to feel like hes getting bang for his buck or something. Which is fine but at some point we need talent more than we need bargains. I think his data sort of clouds his judgement. Like how do you pass on Kawhi? His freakish atheltism alone should have been enough to gamble on him, and then you ended up trading MMorris anyway.....For data and wheeling and dealing Morey gets a A++ but a C for eyeing talent.
House, Clark and Hartenstein have potential They have all shown glimpses This season is not about wins. . . not about being 1 or 2 It is about conditioning and learning to WIN So that means taking some losses but getting those three minutes getting the team to Play the right way To Play to win We need to practice more Rocket River
Yeah, well said. I don't get hung up on the Kawhi thing - we aren't the only team that passed up on him, but you're right. Morris was a bad pick regardless. Enough with the tweeners. I don't mind the bargain bin guys and digging for gems, but we need to buy some stuff straight off of the shelf sometimes. Off the cuff, Gordon & Anderson come to mind as the last signings were the last time Morey just went straight after role players at value. (Anderson didn't work out, but it was arguably a justified signing at the time. Gordon has turned out to be one of the best values in the league.)
No, it's not. Morey is the GM. Everyone wants to say the owner is behind the questionable decisions, but it's all conjecture. Morey's a good GM, and we're lucky to have him, but he has as many misses as hits. He has made some brilliant moves and some bad moves. For some people here, though, he's like Teflon. There's nothing to justify the way some people deify him.
How do all those other teams pass on Kawhi? How do you draft Jan Vesley, Derrick Williams, and Alec Burks before him? That's an absurd knock considering you have this hindsight to influence your opinion.
Rockets are slowly on everything. Too many issues to be solved. Incompetent coach. Cheap owner. The nerd GM. Choking leader. Crap roster.. Its a match made in heaven. Sign...
Except for when they got Ron Artest, James Harden, Dwight Howard & Chris Paul in the last few years. Contending for championships throughout...
It's not a question of hindsight at all. Kawhi's upside was obvious as compared to the slow moving tweener Marcus Morris. Kawhi was a terrific defender with length and good athleticism. If he had a jumper in his arsenal, he could have been the top pick of the draft. The Spurs saw enough, and then they developed him. I'm sure they didn't know how good he would be, but their pick paid off.
Not absurd at all. Length, skill and atheltism wins basketball games. Thats one way to see it, i guess.....Actually since we are going to go there its not even about Kawhi or Morris, seriously, any PF above 6'8 would have be fine. Lol, you know at some point addressing an area of need. Passing Kawhi was just salt in the wound. Dont act like we wouldn't be running Chuck Hayes at C on a cheap deal if we had him.