Yea, Morey's strengh has been in finding good role players that can keep the team competitive. I wouldn't be suprised if we saw him trade away multiple quality players for that one star. The key is trading mediocre pieces for good pieces, then good pieces for great ones. Alston for Lowry, expirings for Martin, Lowry for lotto pick, lotto picks+Martin for Harden.
Being a great GM is easy with 20/20 hindsight. But as a fan though, even with 20/20 hindsight, it is impossible to know what deals were even out there. Were there any deals at all? So you may be right, but you may be wrong. It is impossible to ever say. And if we play .500 ball with the youngest roster in the league ... hey it sounds like optimism may be in order.
So basically you're saying they shouldn't have taken Harden because it cost them the chance to get Harden...Seriously now I know why people complain about low quality posting.
Favors is their only big with prototypical size and reliable defense. Hayward is a future foundation player.
You're misreading my post. I was (and am) a huge fan of the Harden trade. Check my post history if you don't believe me. Whenever you get a chance to acquire for a player of Harden's age, talent, health, character, and contract situation, you pull the trigger and don't think twice. What I'm objecting to is the fact that we didn't do the smart thing and tank when Yao went down. We would have enough value on the roster to acquire Harden (or some other star in the intervening period) AND have enough left over to get a second star to go with him. Instead, we opted to play .500 basketball instead of .250 basketball, and we're back where we were before - a decent team with no clear path to contention.
The point is we would have been in a better position if we tanked. And we would have been in a lot worse of a position if the team didn't go on that historic skid at the end of last season. Losing pays off when you're stuck in the middle.
Umm...we have Harden AND enough value on the roster (or enough cap space) to acquire a second star to go with him. Our position is not bad. It all depends on the next move.
I agree with you. We have very good value, it was interesting to see morey work in retrospect. He had very good value last year in terms of future cap spaace with te expiring contracts. Then he went out and got more value with picks. But a lot if value has come from his drafting of his second rd players. Bud, parson, Landry, etc. he was able to turn those pick into some very better value. Gotta credit his the front offices attention to detail.
In the Harden trade, the Rockets gave up pick #12, a future lottery pick, and Kevin Martin. All 3 pieces that were available by not sucking. Assuming the Rockets just simply tanked, they would have gotten likely something along the lines of Cousins, Lillard, and Derrick Williams in the past 3 drafts. If they're lucky, something along the lines of Monroe, Irving, and Harrison Barnes. Of course they would have very little else of value, since in your scenario they simply tanked and gutted their roster. Honestly, is that really something you're saying would put us in a much better situation? Honestly, if there was a Duncan/Lebron/Shaq in any of those drafts, it would be one thing. But the drafts these past years have lacked that super-mega-franchise changing star. Irving is the best of the bunch, and I wouldn't say he'll definitely have a better career than Harden.
I don't see how you can suggest that this team wouldn't be in a better position to become a contender if we had Cousins, Williams, and Lillard either in the lineup or as trade bait instead of Patterson, Morris, and whatever percentage of James Harden that Jeremy Lamb paid for. The Harden trade is a perfect example of what I'm talking about. Lillard and Martin might have been enough to get the Harden trade done. We would be better off because then we would still have the Raps pick, the Mavs pick, and our own second rounder to use to get a second star. Yes. That's exactly what I'm saying. When you gut a roster, your current assets don't just disappear. You trade them for future assets, like we did with Lowry, Bud, Hill, and Brooks. Combined with the better draft picks and increased playing time for your young players, yes, I am saying that puts us in a much better situation. If we had tanked when we should have, we would have more value on the roster to use or trade because we'd have gotten better picks. Did we get something even better from finishing .500 instead of .250? If the answer is no, we are worse off for not tanking.
We got to keep our manhood for one. The Rockets got to stay in Houston for two. Seeing how there has been 0 generational talents in the draft the past few years that could have elevated us to contender. And even if there was such a player, the chances of the Rockets drafting him would still have been extremely slim after tanking. This means we would have sucked year after year. Which is fine, and all part of the plan for tanking, while "building assets". But also realize, trading for Harden in the first place was and always has been an extremely low probability play also. That means if we didn't pull it off, a tanking team is still stuck with sucking with no end in sight. This is the problem with most people. They only think about the the scenarios that work out, while ignoring the potential downside and pitfalls. How many years of this sucking do you think Les is willing to put up with, while bleeding cash? Les made his fortune as a bond trader, mind you. He knows all about risk and downside. And the man definitely knows how to cut his losses.
