A source that does business with Hakeem said he plans to fly to California in 4 days. The intentions of the trip were not specified, but seems like a possible recruitment trip right when free agency begins. Seems like Hakeem would have a greater influence on griffin, but the greatest center of all time can have a resounding influence on any position, so possibly for Paul too. The more I think about griffin in our offense the more I like it with his passing ability and finishing he would be a dangerous roll man combined with all the threats that harden brings to the table. Plus he can play some 5 in small ball. We do lose some spacing that Anderson provided, but he can hit an open jumper so the defense can't leave him, and if he is the pnr man he the spacing he would provide doesn't matter anyway. IMO I think griffin should be number 1 target. To be fair I am partial due to being a sooner, but it wouldn't definitely be fun to watch too. I know this doesn't make us better than the warriors, but I like griffins potential in he offense.
Our recruiting team is always Hakeem, Maury, Harden and Uncle Le$. If we are pursuing a big man, throw in Yao. I love how the Dream is 200% Rockets. Rockets deserve another title just for the Dream who puts in plenty work behind the scenes.
There are very few scenarios where the Rockets are a favorite against the warriors. Basically only one - get Lebron plus. So from a fun perspective, adding Griffin makes the most sense for sure.
I'm not sure adding Griffin moves the needle. He can't shoot so all you'd be doing is further clogging the lane by putting him out there with Capela. Honestly if they are headed to California to recruit someone, CP3 makes a LOT more sense, especially if they are considering flipping guys like Gordon.
If he's running the pnr he won't be clogging the lane I know what ure saying, but he has a respectable enough jumper to where the defense can't abandon him, and hopefully he could play a lot of 5. I would hope he wouldn't clog the lane for those reasons, but I know it's a possibility and spacing was the only thing Anderson brought with him in the playoffs.
I like Blake in the small ball line up, also when harden is resting. But the starting line up would be kind of an adjustment from what we saw this year. But harden and blake are great and MDA is an offensive wiz, so I would say it would be fine. One thing that might me a negative is Blake comes and Starts shooting way too many 3s. Hopefully this isn't the case and it should be a great pick up.
Im pretty damn sure that if Griffin came here, Dantoni would use him exclusively at center. Every team he coaches, he always wants shooters at four of the positions.
I'm hoping this is true, if so we can make the trade for George. Capella is probably our best prospect.
Man Griffin would be a fool to leave LA. Nobody in the west is knocking off the Warriors regardless so he'd be leaving the good life to come to Houston? He'd be leaving all that guaranteed money on the table for nothing. I'm sure not being in LA would also affect his endorsement deals.
The blake/harden PnR would be devastating because blake isn't just a great finisher, but a great passer too. spacing without ryno may not be as big an issue as people think. if opponents leave blake open, you can still pass him the ball on the perimeter and he can damn sure put it on the floor to score or break down the defense then kick it out to a shooter. also, consider how much effect ryno's spacing had in the playoffs, vs blake's scoring/passing abilities will have. harden won't be tripple teamed anymore. we can give it to blake in the post during crunch time when nothing else is working. these are all things that benefit us more than ryno's spacing. the clippers never had problems with spacing because of pairing blake and deandre either. while hayward and PG are my first 2 options due to age and durability, blake is my #3 for the reasons above. yes he is a bit injury prone, but less so than CP3. i'd rather not pair harden with a couple of 32 year olds like CP3 and millsap, or another player who disappears in the playoffs like lowry.
I don't know if Hakeem would have any influence on these free agents today. He should, but I don't know if these young guys care about anyone that played 20 years ago. These guys today look up to rappers and such. Can Hakeem even rap at all?
Griffin is hardly Clint Capela offensively. You're talking about a guy with a pretty damn good mid-range shot who actually started extending his jumper to the 3-point line last season. More than 28 percent of Griffin's shots came from 16 feet out to the 3-point line, and he hit a career high 44 percent from that range last season. He also shot a career high 113 3-point attempts at a respectable rate of 33.6 percent. Griffin is no Ryan Anderson, but he's a solid perimeter shooter who could play either the 4 or the 5 in this offense and who would be a massive upgrade over what the Rockets have in the front court offensively today.
The mid range shot is not something the Rockets want players taking, so it doesn't really matter if he can do it or not. I don't think he can hit the 3 well enough to keep teams from cheating off of him and encouraging him to chuck up a brick. So unless he can get a LOT better at shooting 3's he's a terrible fit even if he manages to stay healthy.
