Spoiler Some of it, not all of it. "We're very confident we're better than last year..." @DreamShook "We're buzzing and the phones are buzzing too. ... A lot of trade buzz in the air." In on Jimmy Butler? I can't directly address it. Whenever there's players available who can help the Rockets, it's my job to explore. We love our team. We're focused on what we got. What else am I doing except trying to explore everything? That's what they really pay me to do. Is Jimmy Butler available? NBA rules are so...I can't talk about players on other teams. Apologize I can't make news today. Why are you so open about talking about the Warriors Daryl? It's weird not to talk about them. If you asked a fan on the street and said "What should the Rockets be doing?" They'd say "The Warriors are so good, they have to beat them." It's almost silly to not talk about it. They are a historically great team, maybe best ever. ... What is the way to beat them? We're going at it the only way possible which is space the floor, shoot the three, be in transition, guys who can guard multiple positions. ... Feel we have the best approach but obviously haven't done it. Super team? That's a huge part of it. When there are players available, it's my job to look. The only way to beat USA Basketball is to have the 1B team. We need to have as much talent as possible. Sometimes it doesn't always work but it gives us a chance where as not having a highly talented squad, you might as well pack it in. If Chris Paul's hamstring had not given way, you'd have knocked off the Warriors? We do believe that. That's unfair to the Warriors. They could have beat us with Chris healthy & they had Iguodala out. It would have been nice given they have 4 of the top players and we are comfortable that we have 2 of the top players in the league. It would have been nice if injury luck went the other way, knocking them down to 3 guys instead of us 2 to 1. We do believe we would have done it but injuries are part of the game. We're chasing them down again this year. Harden/Paul part of the acquisition of Carmelo? Absolutely. One thing that has helped make us successful is at the end of the day, teams are about your top players. They have to set the culture & tone for everything. To do that, they have feel like they're part of everything. I have discussions with them about everything. James, Chris, Coach D'Antoni, they're absolutely critical to any acquisition we make. If they don't feel like it won't fit, we may still do it but it's pretty rare. We want everyone on the same page. Carmelo as Sixth Man? That's up to coach. He's still figuring out what he thinks will work best. One great thing about our season last year is every player on our team was willing to take any role. That's true again this year. No matter what, guys like Eric Gordon, Ryan Anderson, we got good players coming off the bench, good players starting & a big part of our success is every player has been willing to do anything. Melo may start, Melo may come off the bench but haven't figured that out yet. Your reaction when you saw LeBron was coming West? Someone every team would love to have. He's been an amazing player. It'll make it that much harder in the West. I'm used to it. My whole career, West has been the best conference. Pretty normal. Think you had a shot at LeBron? We go for everyone. We're not picky. If you're talented, we want you at the Rockets. We feel if we get a chance to talk to you, for you to understand what we want to do, that we got a real shot. We strike out a lot but also swing a lot and every once in awhile we hit one out like James & Chris and hopefully guys down the road. Did you get in the batter's box? You never know. I don't think we were really in the mix like we would like to be. We were due up when he went somewhere else. On deck? In the hole? On deck with a couple of teams or something like that.
Clearly, Morey has become more confident after a couple days of training camp. I'm encouraged now that Morey has made his definitive statement.. Crazy he thinks this team is better than last year. Morey does not blow smoke, just hot fire. If Morey believes it, I believe it.
Yeah....Morey always seems pretty straight. The lack of posturing may put off some people, but I never get the sense that he's giving anything other than the truth, even if it's incomplete. He clearly believes we are better than last year. We had two clear weaknesses that were exposed in the playoffs: lack of competent guards after Harden, CP3 and Gordon and lack of playmakers after Harden and CP3. We were able to maintain our level of play when Luc went down but not when CP3 got hurt. With Knight and MCW in the fold, we have addressed the first issue and Melo addresses the 2nd. While losing Ariza and Luc will cost us on the defensive end, the staff seems very high on Ennis, so perhaps he's a reasonable replacement for one of them. Let's see, but I think there is reason for optimism. My main concern with the Warriors actually has very little to do with Cousins. How much better can he make them? The real issue is that the cat is out of the bag...they know exactly what our game plan is in a full 7 game series. Will our mental edge be wiped out in a re-match?
Honestly, I've been baffled by the big percentage of CFers who are all doom-and-gloom regarding this off-season. Of course, it's that way every off-season, but this summer we basically: 1) lost an aging starter 2) moved our top-notch 6th man into that starter slot 3) brought in a 10-time All-Star as our new top-notch 6th man 4) replaced an aging 3&D rotation guy with injury questions with a younger, healthier, more energetic 3&D rotation guy Everything else was pretty much just tinkering on the margins of the rotation. How the hell did people come away with the idea that we got MUCH worse?
We also have Chriss who at worse is still better than Black and MCW/Knight who can pass better than whoever we had behind CP3 at PG.
