With harden on the bench and cp3 playing, the rockets were +6-7. That's a mid 50s win pace Per nbawowy. Make no mistake, if we replace cp3 with non stars, its gonna suck.
I think Smith has seen the rampant fan criticism of CP3’s play in the playoffs and in comparison to his contract (heck, he probably has a guy following that stuff), so Smith tossed that out there. If nothing happens regarding Chris and someone mentions his comment, he can say he was just repeating the speculation he’d heard. If Chris is moved, he can proclaim his genius. He sees it as a win-win. Typical SAS, if you ask me, @Clutch.
Chris Paul was a dud in 5 out of the 6 games against the Warriors. He had the ball in his hands in Game 5 and was running the show. He was just bad at it. This is the same Chris Paul that was excellent in last year's playoff playing under the SAME SYSTEM. The system is designed for Chris and Harden to take turns running the team offense. There was no change from last year's system to this year's system. The change was that Chris Paul has declined from last year to this year. It was much more difficult for him to score this year.
Yes. It’s tough to say if CP3 is declining (probably, if just a little) or if he lost some fire in his ass due to (a) the Harden-honeymoon phase being over (b) signing the gigantic contract after finally making it past the semifinals in the playoffs (c) removing jalapeños from his Texas diet (looking back at my phrasing).
Sure, when you are over the cap, extra money can be given as you don't have cap to sign players either way, but as a team you are also thinking about the luxury tax. Having the mini MLE vs the full MLE makes a difference in who you can sign. You also get more flexibility in the moves you can make, so while it doesn't make a difference for cap space in terms of signing players, it makes a difference in flexibility to make moves.
I guess I didn't get my point across or came across as combative towards you , that wasn't the intent. I just think the whole avoid it now to avoid it later thing is bullsh*t. They have 3 years to put the best team that they can on the floor before they had to be concerned with the repeater. But beyond that … Nothing like GSW who's ~$43.5m over for last season and potentially that much over again this season which equates to something like $169m in tax. They (the Rockets) never were going to be much over the tax , a few million maybe. Nothing that would even make the repeater prohibitive. So my point was that …. you can dump that miniscule amount of salary to dip below the tax line at any point beyond. It wasn't ever going to take a monumental effort to do that because the actual amount wasn't ever going to be prohibitive. And there would be a line of teams waiting to help them by taking a contributing player or two off their hands for pennies on the dollar at any time between now and that 4th tax year. We see that happen every year at the deadline , teams not in contention dumping contributors to contenders for whatever asset they can squeeze out of them. I guess what really bothers me is that they threw away that first round pick and Brandon Knight's contract only to dip below the tax and acted like we were idiots - It was an accident , we didn't mean to do that. Nevermind that they didn't bother to use their MLE at all ….( $800k for Hartenstein) Yet they handcuffed themselves as a result - how the hell do they get better when half their rotation are free agents and all they have to offer is one MLE and minimum contracts?! That first round pick and Knight's contract were their ticket to making an impact acquisition this offseason and they threw it away and called us idiots in the process.
Completely agree with all of this. Especially the "called us idiots in the process" part. Just galling watching that low-rent restaurant P.T. Barnum cheap his way through the season, then call us idiots if we dared to point that out.
You are not gonna get back equal value for him. Enough, trading him will not make us better now and teams are gonna get ALOT better in the coming years. Our shot is now.
They need to reconcile...we can’t trade him. It shocks me how players collecting 30 /40 million dollars while sitting out countless games have the audacity to pull **** like this. Tough luck. And if you piss us off you’re not gonna see the ****ing court. Also, James needs to sit down and hear cp3 our, because he has some valid point s
Sometimes I wonder to what extent this accounts for our offensive troubles. Instead of resting on the bench, Harden often rests on the court. When Curry et al are off the ball, they're moving and creating havoc. When Harden's off the ball, he's usually taking the possession off. Even when he's on the ball, he's using every bit of the first 8 seconds to take his time walking it up.
Thus far with Tillman it is not about getting “better” but rather about saving money while talking a big time game. He has played us as fools and deserves no credit whatsoever until we see him make his first big move as an owner (other than trading our first rounder for Shumpert).
Sometimes I feel like the national media makes things up when they went a certain team to fail and another to succeed. In this case they hate Houston and are trying everything to pair LBJ with some superstar so that LA can be relevant again.
Then maybe they can put a team around him that stays healthier. Keep him to 34 minutes per game, tops. Quit riding him like Seabiscuit. And quit putting the whole show on him, which leads to spectacular play but ballhogging that becomes semi-necessary but difficult to quit when the rest of the team comes back. Hell, Curry plays, what?, 31 mpg? A lot easier to stay fresh with that kind of depth he had. Had.
