morey is human. he makes mistakes. he is a great gm because he makes less mistakes than almost any other gm. he also is very quick to fix his mistakes.
I agree with all of that, but his attitude towards players are assets is a big mistake in management. DD
Morey is a great GM who made a few mistakes. He is definitely overrated by those who put up his pictures in every trade he did and worship him like god.
The big picture here is superstars don't grow on trees. "DM gets a fail becuze he hasn't gotten a superstar. PLEEZ what kind of GM always gets roleplayerzzzz" If anybody hear can clap his hands and give us a superstar please apply for DM's job. I'm sure Les Alexander will be more than happy to fire DM and hire you. The fact is you can't both stock up on superstars and still be competitive year in and year out. Unless you're LA and can get Gasol for free you have to bottom out at some point and endure years of suckage. With DM on board we've skipped all that and still have some young pieces to build around. PP, Jordan Hill, C-bud aren't superstars by any stretch of the imagination but they're the type of players you already find in rebuilding teams like Indiana or Detroit. Unlike teams like those though we've always been competitive and put out a good product on the floor. Hell just look at Portland as an example: they collected lottery picks for years (including the number 1 pick) and only had 2 playoff runs to show for it. Now they're back to rebuilding as Greg Oden has been a bust so far and Roy looks like he's breaking down. Indy has been in rebuilding mode since Miller retired, and the Grizz have never been competitive. If DM's doing such a terrible job I'm sure everyone could point out all the horrendous moves he made that resulted in a 1-6 team. LOL is it somehow his fault that a team that won more games than they lost last season goes 1-6 after adding Yao, PP and Brad Miller in the roster?
Some people may over rate his slightly, but what big moves did he miss out on? No GM is going to be 100% correct on every signing, and one of the guys on 1560 AM said the Miller signing was something Adelman pushed heavily for against Morey's recommendation. Lowry is only over paid because he has been injured. There was no way for DM to know that would happen. Considering the mess of a roster he inherited I can't think of another GM that I would rather have. There are perhaps some that would do equally well, but I don't think we are in our current predicament because of bad GM moves. The main thing he hasn't done, is bring in a super star level talent. But there just hasn't been any such talent available. Take any GM in the world and switch places with him, and that would not change.
You need to a quantitative element regarding players so you can make the right decision for the franchise. If you treat players like your friends or whatever how the hell can you trade him for draft picks later on? See JVG getting washed up knicks players or Rudy T giving out ridiculous contracts for "non-asset" Gming.
Its supposed to be tongue-in-cheek. No one actually puts up his poster on their wall so they can see DM first thing in the morning and last thing at night.
Is DM overrated? No, but I think too many people put too much stock into him. He didn't come into the best of situations when he took over the team. He had bad contracts and two injury-prone players. I think he's done a great job in certain areas. He did overpay for Lowry and B. Miller but as others stated... Miller was Rick's guy. He did a great job in getting K-Mart, Hill, and those NY picks. Well he got one pick and the right to swap. Overall, Morey and Les will need to make some tough decisions within the next few months. If Yao is out long term, IMO they need to focus on breaking up this team to acquire some young talent and draft picks. I would hate to see this franchise go through a rebuilding stage again but I think Morey would be the guy to get it done. Teams like the Thunder and Portland aren't in their current position without having to suffer through those rebuilding stages. The Thunder were really bad for 4 years but they built their team through the draft and by taking advantage of other teams because of their capspace. Portland had the same situation but they had talent to trade for draft picks. Houston is at a crossroads at the moment.... Either way, I trust that Morey will make the right decision.
Agreed, but you can not seek out media attention and be saying things like "We are always looking to upgrade our team" etc.... And expect the players not to notice or be bothered by that. And there are some cases where a player has performed and deserves a contract...letting the market set the price is not always the best option. Because it only takes one stupid person in that market to gum up the works.....Cleveland cough cough.... DD
Morey is not overrated! Knows what he wants, and knows the team needs a SUPER-STAR to close games. just have not been able to land one. he has brought in wonderfu additions w/ trades, and in the draft. things in todays NBA change so fast. right now the hottest thing going is ATHLETIC ability, we have athletes....we just do not have athletes that are super stars, ours are role players. Being a GM is far from easy, morey has a vision. cant predict injuries, then when they come you have to adjust and keep playing games. had yao been healthy last year we would have been in western conference finals, had he been healthy 2 yrs ago...i liked our chances at beating LA, went 7 w/out him. As fans we must relax and take the good with the bad. Have to many good pieces to be a bad team, changes take time. We will turn the season around. Rotation of players do need to get cut though. everyone cant be happy. play the guys w/ heart!
Yes He is a Tad Overrated; he's done well in some areas but far from flawless .... But it's your own fault in a way Rockets fans; you built this guy into something he is not GOD and I think he now believes he can do no wrong.. The biggest problem for this team right now and it goes from the Managing department to the Players is CHEMISTRY, and I'm sorry but I don't think Morey's Ipad, Iphone, Software, Blackberry, software, excel, or whatever number crushing device can compute chemistry.. Morey and Adelman are not on the same page, I don't think morey wanted Miller but the coach did Adelman is Old, Tired, Stubborn and cannot coach much Defense which is what this team is lacking the most.. There's no defensive identity and JVG is no longer here. Aaron Brooks is a great scorer but you have one Disgruntled dude over $$$$ and on the court he plays 1 0n 5, passes to K Mart and others with 7 seconds left on the clock, No chemistry there guys. Lowry got his money, now his boiler seems to be getting larger hence the back spasms; I still prefer lowry to quarterback the team over brooks. Yao: I feel bad for this guy; Man he works his ass off to get back from injury but unfortunately it's just never happening for him which is pretty sad and unfair. Daryl: Those Knicks picks are losing value, A brooks is losing value and the Battier experiment is over and the dude is getting old..... Time to move those pieces; and it does not have to be superstars because at this point not one star would want to come here. Around the league this team and city is viewed as a place where you come to get hurt.. I hate the spurs and jazz but I don't think their fans are idolizing their GM's as GOD and they seem to be doing just fine..
Prior to going down, he was the best center in the league. He was a major reason as to why we beat Portland in the 1st round 2 years ago and completely beasted the Lakers in game 1. Never changed an important game....
Wow. The amount of faulty reasoning in this thread is making my head spin... OK, a few things: First, Morey wants superstars. He's stated over and over and over and over that championship teams have superstars. The fact that we don't currently have superstars doesn't mean that Morey isn't trying his darndest to acquire them, or that we won't have them in the future; it's because superstars are really, really hard to get. You haters can piss and moan and complain as much as you like, but Orlando isn't going to trade us Dwight Howard for Chase, Hill, expirings, and the Knicks picks. What's more, the Superfriends and Carmelo have both shown that even if you have the assets to make a deal, the stars don't necessarily want to come to your team. Houston isn't the natural draw that LA, Miami, or NY are, so the pool of superstars available to us is smaller. Once again, this is beyond Morey's control; if LaLa wants to go to New York, there's not a whole lot we can do about it. Premium draft picks are the same way. The Wizards aren't giving us the 2010 first overall for the 14 and our 2011. Be patient. Morey said we had a deal in place for Philly's #2 pick in the most recent draft before they pulled out at the last minute. He gets that we need stars. He gets it. Just chill out and let the man work. Basically, you have to judge a GM by the overall body of work, what he's done with the options available to him. Kupchak's got rings. Does anyone seriously think he's a great GM? Put another way, would he still be winning titles if his team didn't have Kobe Bryant, the LA media market, the Buss's money, and stupidity on the part of the Grizzlies? By this measure, Morey has been outstanding. He's made some mistakes: I didn't care for the Miller signing and Gay for Battier I think was a net loss, but so what? Everyone screws up from time to time, the decisions were made based on solid reasoning, and his successes vastly outweigh any missteps. And lay off Les, the guy's shown plenty of willingness to pay out if it's going to get us results. He's not going to go 15 mil over the tax for a mediocre team and I don't blame him.
<a target='_blank' title='ImageShack - Image And Video Hosting' href='http://img143.imageshack.us/i/duped.jpg/'><img src='http://img143.imageshack.us/img143/396/duped.jpg' border='0'/></a> lol this season couldn't have started any worse!
Why would Lowry or Scola would have agreed to a lesser contract than they recieved, when they and their agents know all it takes is one team to drive that contract value up? Especially since Lowry had aspirations of starting at some point and that was unlikely to happen any time soon here. If you are worried about the player's being "bothered", then how would low balling them on contract offers make them feel? The good thing about letting the market set the price is you don't end up being the stupid team way over paying more than any other team would have offered. And if another team does make such an offer, you have the option of letting the guy go. I suspect if the Rockets were dealing with a superstar max level player they would go ahead and do an extension, because the player is going to get the max regardless. But especially with a new labor agreement coming up, it makes since to err on the side of caution.
Morph it happens all the time, the answer is security. Both of them could have had a career ending injury, so they take a little less for security. DD
I will admit that Morey did forsee this coming....why else would his first choices at obtaining a free agent where two big men (Gortat/Bosh), that was not a coincedence by any means. He knew that clear skies where not promised for Yao and the Rockets. If YAO was the future why push so hard for these two guys (web pages begging these guys to come to Houston ) and trying to stock pile at the center position.Morey knew the odds where against the team......Now that it has happened lets not be too suprised but anticipate a move as soon as yao and brooks are cleared to play. Lock it......
Actually he did not push hard for Gortat, he didn't even offer the full MLE like Dallas did, and I am convinced that the Bosh thing was more about marketing than it was about the Rox trying to get him. DD
I'm sure some players would do that if the offer was close enough to what they think they would get on the market, but I think the risk of over paying that way may be even higher. I don't think Lowry is one of those players anyway, since he was gunning for a starting job in addition to his first big contract. It certainly isn't a given to the point that I could consider waiting a mistake. I'd argue the opposite approach actually has a higher risk of giving you Moochie Norris, Kelvin Cato, Matt Maloney type contracts.
