Dude. Morey brought in some REALLY nice players (Howard, Harden, DMo). You need to blame him for picking city coaches though.
Oh, and Lawson. It didn't work out much, but Morey acquired some insane talent. Not many GMs could replicate it.
I am all in favor of making Morey our next coach. What to loose? 5 game +- . I am confident he can be the best coach NBA has ever seen.
thank you morey for letting us know about vibrating calculators. i hope to buy them one day so i can shove them up my ass!
It should be apparent by now to any objective observer that Maury is just an average GM at best. Some of us knew from the very beginning that this wouldn't work out and here we are almost 10 years later outside of a fluke WCF appearance still stuck in mediocrity. Maury would be better suited as an advisor or consultant or maybe even an assistant, but he's proven that he's not capable of building a legitimate championship contender as a GM.
After having JVG, Adleman, the dude picked his childhood hero Kevin McFail and it blew up in his face. He wants a coach he can dominate so coaches like Thibs scare the daylights out of him. Ask Chicago how it's working out for them with Hoiberg. Got blitzed by the Clippers. Give me a defensive minded coach any day of the week. Yes, I would love to see an offense of back door cuts and everyone moving without the ball instead of standing around waiting on a 3 pointer and your defender resting on defense. However, we have to stop someone 1st and our D is flat out horrible right now... We can't stop paint from drying.
During his tenure doesn't he have the 3rd best record in the western conference? By definition that is superior to mediocre.
I like Morey a lot, but he crapped all over himself by refusing to hire a coach who would run any kind of a system. He lived and died with something unsustainable, and it will ultimately cost him his job. The inmates are running the yard now, and they don't even pretend to care that playing defense matters. Why should they? There is no accountability from this organization at any level, just a bunch of empty and hollow words.
None of us could have predicted that taking a WCF team, relatively young, returning ALL the pieces and adding to it a PG who was an all star just a couple years ago would disappoint this much. ESPECIALLY none of you fake fans in this thread. Our franchise will take a huge step back if Morey is not here next year.
Well said. Firstly hiring a pathetic "players coach" like McFail and then not firing him much earlier will remain a big mistake. And yes no accountability, top to bottom. Players can do whatever the F they want with no repercussions.
Morey's biggest fail was rushing to lock up McHale last December, to me that may be the nail in his coffin with Les. DD
Has it been actually proven that it was purely a Morey decision and not a Les one? We know that Morey wants a coach that respects input from the FO, but has it been said that McHale was a Morey guy and not a Les guy?
This. Morey is a great GM. Not going to deny that he's had his share of mistakes, but he's one of the smartest guys in the business, and knows how to acquire talent. Give him another two years barring Harden being a full-blown cancer to fix this team.
That was probably more Les than Morey. Les I'm sure didn't want to compete with other teams in terms of price so locking him down early was supposed to save him money. I still like Morey but I'm starting to dislike his way of managing the entire team. I wish he would just hire a coach that would do his own thing and for Morey to just do GM stuff. No more pushing numbers and stats down to the coaching staff. Just sign, trade and draft. Let the coaches implement their system. Morey wants a coach that he can puppet to an extent and I'm not ok with that anymore.
I cant agree with this Morey has done a really good job at building this team back considering all he has had to deal with going from a hobbled Tracy/Yao team to not much and then getting Harden and Dwight. His best team in 08-09 was decimated by injuries (if TMac was actually rehabbed hard and was healthy that year) Once he had his stars in place he has done a really good job at getting the pieces around them to succeed. Again and he has done this with two BIG things working against him: 1) not being a marquee destination for FAs such as Los Angeles, NY, Miami, Chicago 2) a mandate from the owner to not tank and still remain competitive The best way to win in the league is to either draft your superstar or be a free agent destination for the stars. If you look at the last few champs they have had to endure some bad seasons at times to get their pick that star Warriors - bad consecutive seasons led to lotto picks in Curry, Thompson - drafted Green Spurs - tanked to get Duncan, drafted Kawhi via draft night trade Heat - had bad years after Shaq left, got James, Bosh via FA and drafted Wade Mavs - Drafted Dirk but had bad years prior to dirk Lakers - Had bad years post-shaq and now post-decent Kobe -- also drafted Kobe Boston - terrible years even with Pierce before making deals for KG/Ray Even now the contending teams in the league Cavs - They got James back but how many #1 picks have they had and terrible seasons after James left? OKC - they had some terrible years and got KD, WB, Harden and Ibaka and but they went through some growing pains to get where they are now LAC - Yeah they've always been terrible till Griffin was drafted and Paul came the Rockets are really the only team that haven't gone through a big tanking process to have a shot at a top 5 pick. The only time they had a shot was when the team was hit with a ton of injuries and they ended up with Rudy Gay/Shane Battier at #8. That year though was a poor draft with LMA being the best player followed by Rondo, Lowry and Milsap (outside of Roy of course who is now out of the league). It wasn't like the draft two years ago where there was a lot of talent available in the top 10 or even the 2008 draft. I think Morey's preferred way was to tank and get a top pick and build that way (if we see what Hinkie has done to an extreme in Philly). the one knock I will say though is I feel the front office has too much influence on the coaching aspect of the team. I felt McHale was a good coach when he got here and we had a young team and he was good for their confidence and development. Last year though when his contract was set for renewal I felt it was the perfect time for the Rockets to go out and get an more established coach to take this team to the next level. We needed McHale to help get Howard here, but it was clear what his limit was. JBB imo is going to be a great coach one day, but that day isnt now. I do like how JBB is passionate but he is very inexperienced and its hard to see how someone like him gets a shot like this with a talent rich team with high expectations. Usually rookie coaches do not get a team this loaded, especially if they are not former NBA players. On top of that usually rookie coaches will have vet assistants or former NBA coaches as their assistants, JBB (or McHale) doesnt even have that necessarily. Its the one miss when they let go of McHale I am not sure if Les didn't want to go out and pay for another coach since he was on the hook to pay McHale after he JUST signed his extension. I think firing McHale was done out of haste giving the timing, but was necessary. The front office though should have gotten a better coach, especially when there are a few out there including a coach whose strength is what the Rockets biggest weaknesses are right now in Thibs.
Actually, the big mistake was exercising that 4th year option on McHale less than 24 hours after Lillard hit that 3-pointer to win the Portland series. How anyone in the Rockets organization could think that he did a good job coaching that postseason is beyond me. He made no adjustments whatsoever until Game 3 when the Rockets were already down 0-2(with both losses coming at home). Yes, the 3-year extension less than 2 months into last season was absurd, but the fact that McHale was brought back after the Portland defeat was the first sign that Les and Morey really didn't give a damn about coaching. I also think the approach to building this roster has been flawed to say the least. Instituting a system of 3-pointers and getting to the foul line, yet loading the team with guys who can't shoot 3's or free throws or handle the ball makes no sense. Plus I'm sick of this obsession with signing big name free agents instead of relying more on the draft. The strategy nearly derailed our entire 2014-15 season until we landed Brewer and lucked into Josh Smith being cut by Detroit. And last but not least, Morey needs to be held accountable for his spotty drafting record. Dekker is a likely bust who can't even play this season. T-Jones is worthless. Capela may wind up being good, but has regressed back to his rookie season form. Royce White was a bust. Marcus Morris was ok, but isn't even here anymore. He did score with Parsons, but he defected to Dallas. And D-Mo's future is up in the air thanks to his back problems and restricted free agent status this summer. BTW, how many freaking SF/PF tweener types is Morey gonna draft?!
