Why did we trade him when we drafted him in 2008? I remember the majority of us here liking the pick. From what I saw in wiki, we traded him for Greene and Dorsey? I think we traded Greene for someone to Sacramento later, anyone remember who?
We picked him FOR them not for us. NBA trades, for some reason, are not announced until after the selection is made by the team on the clock. Anyone know why? I much prefer the NFL method.
I think we basically traded the 24th pick for 28th pick and 31st pick. That's a good value trade. That the players didn't turn out as expected is some combination of bad scouting and bad luck. But that's why it's better to take multiple shots like the Rockets did. You hit some, you miss some.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-conversation="none" lang="en"><p><a href="https://twitter.com/ca_rockets">@ca_rockets</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/BimaThug">@BimaThug</a> not really a detail, one of the most mis-reported things. Like, for example, that we drafted Batum. Not how it works</p>— Daryl Morey (@dmorey) <a href="https://twitter.com/dmorey/status/552174391464042497">January 5, 2015</a></blockquote> <script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
This again. Do we also need to recap why Morey traded the rights to Rudy Gay for Shane Battier? The Matt Maloney contract? The Ralph Sampson trade? Not taking Jordan over Hakeem?
Spurs wanted him. Blazers did too. Rockets drafted him for the Blazers to keep Batum away from the Spurs. Spurs had a medical report that showed something negative (about his heart?) but neither they nor Batum would release the info to other teams. Blazers called the bluff and got their man.
Haha, I was thinking about this the other day, I think if Houston got the number 2 pick they probably wouldn't have drafted Jordan since they had Clyde. Back then though... Giving up tall players wasn't like it is now. When Houston had Hakeem and Sampson everyone thought the Twin towers would succeed, but damn injuries. I am honestly okay with how it turned out, I mean at least the Rockets didn't pass on Jordan and Durant in favor of busts... I'm sure that still haunts the Blazers...
To be fair, the twin towers with Sampson and Olajuwon looked to be very promising. They made it to a Finals series and lost against arguably one of the best teams of all time- the 86 Boston Celtics. And, unfortunately, injuries derailed Sampson's career and we could never see the twin towers realize their potential. Hindsight is always 20/20. I'm not sure if there really was an option to trade Ralph Sampson for Clyde+#2 pick (Jordan). But man...could you imagine how many championships a core of Jordan, Clyde and Hakeem would have been able to win?
Thanks for the clarification. My memory is terrible and didn't remember we traded the picks for more picks. Too bad I couldn't find any data on this. When I searched google, it just shows us as drafting Batum and trading him. In hindsight, it looked like a good deal, 2 late first rounders for one. I guess you could say it was somewhat successful. We were able to pawn off Greene for Artest.
Yeah, definitely agree, not sure if there was even possibility of a deal like that happening. And you're right Sampson and Hakeem would have definitely been good, I kinda mentioned that, just injuries of Sampson really hurt how long he could play.
The Batum trade was similar to the Gay trade in that the Rockets never intended to take the drafted player. They were trades of picks. It was said that the Rockets were going to select Thabo Sefolosha if the Battier deal did not work out. I don't know what we would have picked if the one pick for two picks trade with Portland fell through. Both trades are somewhat difficult to assess. Did we make a mistake of not picking Gay? Battier was a very good role player who could have been very instrumental had Yao and McGrady stayed healthy. What if we ended up picking Sefolosha? He was kind of like a younger less developed Battier. Gay turned out to be an inefficient volume shooter who did not make his team better. And what would have been if we took Batum rather than Greene and Dorsey? Dorsey was worthless. Greene got us Artest. Against, Artest could have been great if the two stars were healthy. We ended up letting him walk after one year and then signing Ariza, which was a disaster. Batum turned out to be a very good role player who is at least as good as Artest and Ariza.
When do people talk about not talking Jordan over Hakeem? Hakeem was a center in a center dominated league. It was the right move
