Fournier was projected to be higher pick than he was at times, and was pretty high on everyone's radar, even on this website. The thing with Fournier over most of our draft picks from this year was . . . he is not considered a project, though lacking the upside of White, Jones, Lamb, and Motiejunas (last year). He's was much more NBA ready coming from Europe and having a game that translates well in the NBA -- great shooter, good fundamentals, really good passer, smart, good level of versatility, great defender potential, and decent athlete. In other words, he doesn't have alot of weaknesses in his game. Does not mean he's a perfect player or an all-star, it just means he can be a reliable starter or contributor in most cases as a bare minimum, that's alot for lower first round draft picks, where most players are in need of alot of maturing and development of basketball skills. Too early to tell, but in reality, Fournier has a better shot at becoming an all-star than White, Jones, Lamb, and Montiejunas, at this point. Fournier fell a little lower than he was supposed to in reality.
James Anderson disagrees. He look ok. I've decided it's not good for the Rockets to have 3 first rounders. We had that stellar crop of Bryce Drew, Mirsad Turkcan, and Michael Dickerson, and then we had the Eddie Griffin trade before this year. Sacrificial Lamb was worthwhile, and Terence Jones is showing signs of being our best power forward from Kentucky yet. #ohwell. #bewell
Fournier reminds me of a Euro Steph Curry. He can get hot from the outside, when you give him enough open looks. He also thrives in Denver because of the way George Karl runs the offense, set good picks, big men cut to the rim. Add the fact that the Rockets are terrible at transition D, perimeter D, and pick n' roll D, and we make the average player look like a superstar in any given night. Nothing new, nothing special here. Morey loves his jump shooters. Patterson and Marcus Morris over Larry Sanders and Faried, Morey would do the same if he had a chance to do it over.
I like getting him in 2K13. At age 27 he averages about 20 ppg on ~50% shooting. I also wanted the Rockets to get him as a second round pick, but for some reason things don't always work out the way I want.
For all the hate you throw out at morey for all his "missed" picks, none of those guys are better than harden. He landed us a star and you are complaining about missing role players in the draft? What a joke.
Lamb+Martin got us Harden. Jones is showing great potential and could become our starting PF soon. White, well...nobody could have predicted what this out to be so gotta give Morey a pass. Overall, a great draft for us.
I tend to think Morey's models are overfitting. If you read Kevin Pelton and Holllinger's model projections, Kawhi/Faried/Lawson are undisputed favorite prospects in basketball statistical analysis community(all of them have translated stats whithin top3 in their respective draft). Yet as the guru of stat power, I wonder how Morey passed those obvious choices? Keep an eye on Denver's second round pick - Quincy Miller. I think they got another good one hiding behind the bench.
