Free Agency Has Not Been Kind to the Houston Rockets

I completely agree with the OP , but lets not forget, as far as owners are

concerned, signings are/were more about ticket sales then winning.

Look back at everyone of those signing and see how much our fan cried to bring over EVERYONE of those free agents.
Managment reacts to fan desires/interests.

 

sent before i finished...

Yeah he basically chickened out. AND took more money. But what people should note is that he probably just got creeped out by Morey approaching him at night at his home while he was in his PJs.

 

The Rockets really haven't pursued big name free agents... they've built through the draft (Yao, Mobley, Brooks) and through trades (Francis, McGrady, Artest, Scola, Rafer). And they've been consistantly pretty good, never great, during the post-championship era, so it's hard to question the results.

We have yet to see this team with legitimate cap space. As Cab's pointed out, the signings we've had were low dollar guys, either older vets to fill a specific role or guys we took fliers on for their upside. The upside guys missed (Shandersen, Mo Taylor, Stro), the vets were a bit too old (Brent Barry, Ward, Carr), but none of them were particularly costly. Quitten was the one big name, high dollar free agent we got... it's too bad his attitude got in the way. If you nibble at small time free agents, you shouldn't expect a lot of big time players. You'll get some bargains, most won't amount to anything special.

I think though that you're being unfair to Morey in judging his 3 free agent acquisitions as "failures". Francis was worth a shot, and when he didn't have anything left, we got rid of his contract for free. The "high 2nd round draft choice" was replaced by 3 others that we bought for cash, no roster talent lost. Bouncy Whales was a pretty decent bench player, 9 points, 5 boards, who we got for cheap and then left. Barry was passed up in the rotation by Wafer, but still hit his 3s and was a veteran presence on the bench. Now, he's the only veteran SG on the roster. And, again, not much cost. I don't remember alot of people on clutchfans or anywhere else lambasting these signings at the time they were made. On the contrary, all 3 were almost universally applauded at the time.

One thing that the Rockets have done very well during the last 15 years is use the bargain-basement free agents, the NBDL and CBA types who you've chosen not to discuss. Matt Maloney, Sam Mack, Von Wafer, Mike Harris, Chuck Hayes, etc. all built off the legacy of Rudy-era guys like Chucky Brown and Chris Jent. I don't know of a team in the league who's been better able to recognize and develop those types of guys on a consistant basis. It seems like every season there's one who makes the rotation and contributes.

 

Most of the difference was in the length of deals. You see above that there were just as many 'busts'. I think the league-wide trend at that time was for those 7-yr contracts. I'm not sure why that was. Then teams stopped doing that and went to the shorter deals.

 

Steve Francis was Les' signing. Barry? He's a bi-annual exception. Who was out there for that amount that we missed?

Because of Landry and Scola, we never had the full MLE to work with during Morey's regime. In a way, Ariza is his first true FA signing. So it's WAAAAYYY too early to draw any conclusions.

 

CD was well liked enough for most fans overlook it (and blame different coaches first), but that is a grizzly streak of signings. I do agree they were mostly stopgaps, but that they weren't keepers really stunted our progress and maintained a league reputation of weakness at certain positions.

I think money was flush enough for other teams below the cap to poach talent. The current CBA encouraged long term contracts and keeping FA on the same team.

 

Anyone else find this comment to be some horrible foreshadowing or something.

He broke his right foot and missed basically half a season in 08.

 

I wouldn't consider Ariza as a '"major" FA signing. It is just a MLE deal, he is a proven role player but not a marquee name. While we will be depending heavily on his offensive game for the first half of this year, I don't think anyone is expecting him to be a #1 or 2 option for the course of this contract. He will be a success if he just replaces Battier as Mr. Intangible. The only real failure for him would to not be a starter or 6th man, not put up "league average" numbers or develop some sort of public petulance.

 

All true Cab. Interestingly, these were mostly signings that were applauded at the time. I agree, the end results have been bad bad, but I think it is easy to forget that Mo Taylor, Shandon Anderson, Stromile Swift, Steve Francis even, were generally coveted by the Rockets, other teams, and Houston fans - it was not so much the NY Knicks model of just overpaying mediocre players for the sake of getting them. These were targets, we were competitive in getting them. We scored the popular dates at the off season prom. Its just that they ended up not putting out.*

I have a weird good feeling about Ariza, btw, I thought he was a killer in the playoffs and I am glad we got him.

But as usual, provocative interesting stuff from el cabbagio.

*re: this classy metaphor - you are welcome

 

What a great thread!

Free Agency really is 2 parts. There is the MLE for teams over the cap and then just general cap room for teams that are below the cap. I can't totally remember, but I think during this era we were only under the cap twice - when we got pippen, and then the year where we basically resigned our own guys in Taylor, Norris etc. So we really bombed in this regard.

As for the MLE, basically if your team is good and fortunate then you get a solid role player. No one gets "stars" with the MLE. The two best MLE signings by any team probably are Billups in Detroit and Hedo in Orlando. But that is rare. If you get a solid role player then you did your job.

But the real key here, is being able to have a "continues movement of assets." Sign guys to players that are cap friendly, then if they bomb you can move them and aren't stuck. thacabbbage's example of Willis and how we were able to flip him for picks is a perfect example.

I think in the past era, the Rockets just weren't looking to far down the road, just the here and now. And that's not a good strategy for a GM to take. Having options, having "assets" to parlay for moves is what you have to do.

 

Great thread! I agree with most of your analysis, but I think if you are going to mention the negative long-term ramifications of some of the signings, we should mention the positives as well.

Morey was able to turn Bonzi Wells into Bobby Jackson. Then, in the offseason, Bobby Jackson was a big part of the trade that landed us Artest. So, in the end, that signing was not so terrible, thanks to Morey's wheeling and dealing.

 

+1

CD was promoted up to the GM position but didn't have the business/legal/statistical savvy to build a strong team.

It's sad but for a multimillion dollar business there was a point when most GMs were not qualified for their jobs. When you listen to Morey talk about players, salaries, contract lengths, agents, etc, you can tell he has breadth and depth in his understanding of players and what it takes to acquire him.

No wonder some teams can pull such great trades; it takes a sharp mind to put together a dozen trade scenarios that work under the cap and to have the savvy to execute one.

 

Great thread. Should also serve as a nice history lesson for those that didn't already know all this. It's a great example of our bad luck (imagine that, right?) with free agency.

My favorite BAD example of this was the 05/06 offseason. After that Dallas series our lack of youth and athleticism was badly exposed. So what did we do? Signed one of the best young athletes in the league, signed a proven run-and-jump athlete/scorer and drafted one of the most athletic players available to us in the draft. Perfect examples of the right type of moves completely backfiring on us. The logic behind all those moves was sound. It just stinks Luther Head ended up being the best player out of that trio.

 

Great post by the cabbage. Well researched and well written too. Please give us some more sir.

 

Good deal cabbage. Of all those signingss;i didn't like either of those. I wasn't a swift fan because I knew jvg wasn't going to open the transition game up. I never like taylor, didn't like anderson, rice was way past his capable years also. I liked shandon and sura though. When u talk about mle, its not a lot in terms of nba money and those contract are easy to trade.Morey has shown he will take a low risk high reward gamble,the problem has been that he hasn't signed a guy that is crestin forward until he signed ariza. Also it was great getting scola, but we also had to take jackie butler which handicapped the team and put the squad near lt territory. I really like ariza, who if we're being truthful about it, is the makeup of the blown lotto pick giveaway. Overrall, he and the team are doing what they can.It would be nice to see those te's could be moved to improve the roster.

 

i think this free agent signing is a different one for morey. the previous ones were old/broke down players and this one is a young player who has improved year over year.

 

An injury which gave one Clarence Brown the opportunity to start, which he continued to do all 82 games due to his total dominance.

 

Just to be accurate, Pippen wasn't signed as a free agent. He was acquired via a trade.

 

I blame the wives of good free agents for not choosing the Rox Good read