There was 0 reason for not re-upping dragic. You could tell mchale trusted him a lot. The guy was 26 or so coming into his prime and you didn't want to give a 4th yr? 8.3m is very,very easy to move especially for a good player. Hell rudy gay and his 17 mil has been rtraded 3 times in 18 months. Games like last night is why the rockets should've kept dragic. Beverly would be 13 min a night dude if we had dragic.
I have 0 evidence for this, but I suspected losing Dragic and to do with the plan to get Lin. It was known that Alexander was dead set on getting Lin back in the fold. The Linsanity thing was a huge embarrassment for Les and he let Morey know it (as Morey himself mentioned in radio interviews). I understand the team had a policy against player options, but it seemed a weird deal killer. But if they were so focused on re-acquiring Lin, the downside of losing Dragic may not have looked so bad, while the downside of the contract likely looked worse.
Pour salt on wounds, DAMN that is cold!!!! You are the king of picture references wait until LOF sees this.
Thats very true on being able to deal a good player at that contract rate Morey probably saw it as the 4th year wouldnt have been 7.5-8.3 mil, it'da been more like 10.5-11.5 mil if Dragic played well and opted into free agency (and I think the rules are tougher on sign-&-trades now) Or basically, its a "YOU don't decide ANY of YOUR fate, WE do ALL the deciding". Its a control issue, front office wanting to hold all leverage and give away none. In Morey's mind its "We'll keep you the first 2 years but out of spite since we can't get it OUR way in your 3rd-4th year we'll deal you after the 2nd year to regain back leverage that you took, forget about considerations of staying around more" Still, if a player is good and he's playing above is contract, that becomes a dealable asset that SOMEONE would want. To me at worse even if Dragic didnt do well heading into his 4th year, barring some physical or off-court catastrophe he'd still be at least be "Jeremy Lin" level asset.
I honestly think it was just the player option that was the sticking point. Of course unless Dragic is seriously injured before that option comes up, there's no way he's not going to opt out and get paid even more.
I honestly think Dragic was aching to go back to Phoenix anyway. He always said he liked it there while he was a Rocket. Wish we could've kept him though.
I think he would have probably preferred to stay here. He was playing pretty well down the stretch. We missed the playoffs by one game. Suns were in full out rebuild mode.
I really hope he makes the all star team this year. He'll probably get snubbed but I think he deserves it
I can't really think of many guards in the West that deserves it more than him outside of the usual suspects who're going to be starters anyway. Curry and Harden are shoo-ins, Westbrook and Paul are injured, Lillard is probably his biggest competition for a spot, but I think Goran deserves it more. He's putting up great numbers AND getting wins for a "bad" team.
IMO, the player option was just an excuse, a fake line in the sand Les Alexander required so he could bring back Lin. My guess is Morey wanted Dragic, Les gave him some leeway, but used that player option to keep Lin hopes alive.
Really don't understand why everybody thinks everything always has some ulterior motive. It is very clear that having the books open for 2015 was a huge priority.
