Sources: Celtics approached the Rockets on interest in Gordon Hayward

Paul for Hayward presents an interesting balance to the lineup.

Harden-Gordon-Hayward-Tucker-Capela

With MLE, Shumpert and the 3 young guys on the bench. They could definitely have a worse offseason.

 

Cant argue with what Morey did in acquiring talent …. you are right , more often than not that's the right thig to do.

Last year it almost got them home …. this year they weren't quite as good.

If I were Morey , I'd do that again with hindsight.


But its time to realize that CP3 isn't CP3 anymore …. and try to get out of that contract for Some return.

 

Grey area, man. Rockets' need might be in the 5% of wrong.

They needed some youth, athleticism, talent on the wings.....especially with smallball guys like Gordon, Harden and Chris.

I luv Tucker but he isn't as good on Offense as he is on Defense.

Picking up random talent on positions that does not matter as much was also Morey's calling card all those years.

 

This is the tricky part. I'm not sure the answer is still yes. Hindsight is an AMAZING tool to have, lol. As an outside observer and fan, I get to do that. Long response, but to explain it thoroughly... I get to see things like:

(1) Dwight was a declining (because of back injury) version of his former self with attitude problems (two strikes but we thought he'd change?) in a league moving away from that position. Again, it actually "worked" - WCF certainly not bad in a league where there's no parity. BUT... and this is a HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE HUGE thing to consider... Dwight was down to teams like the Rockets AND the Warriors. The Warriors WANTED HIM. Had DM seen the writing on the wall, so to speak, 70% chance Dwight went to the Warriors, imo. Imagine a world where DM passes on Dwight but picks up Iggy instead. Sure, Iggy was never his old Philly self again once joining the Warriors, but to the style of game, and the way the game was changing, he would have slotted into SF perfectly. And most importantly, Dwight probably "wrecks" that Warriors locker room in a similar way. He probably sees shooting and says run through me and I'll hit the open shooters. It, too, would have "worked" to an extent, but not with the current GSW success.

(2) CP3 was an aging PG, never used to playing in an ISO system, at a position of strength for the team. Remember, Harden was the best PG in the league before acquiring CP3

(3) Lou Williams is now better than CP3

(4) Trez would now be our starting SF, and a REALLY good one at that.... OR the amazing off the bench frontcourt guy he was for the Clipper

(5) Forwards. DM for years kept trying to find what would ultimately become Draymond Green. Remember how he kept drafting those undersized forwards, culminating into being pressured into picking Royce White by McHale? The problem - 95% of these types of picks will miss. Draymond's are unicorns. Moreover, while he was trying to find unicorns, there started to be an increasing amount of LONG 3&D wings. More tall 3's, then short 4's, so to speak. Don't get me wrong... MOST GMs also missed here. Meanwhile...

(6) Guards. After missing on the hybrid 4 for half a decade, DM kind of just said f'it, and went all guards in terms of strength. This was somewhat pressure from Harden. The need for help creating that Harden pushed for after the first WCF loss. In comes Lawson. Fail, but try again with EG, success, then add Lou, then add CP3, then add Rivers, etc. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying those are bad moves. You need talent at EVERY position to win a ring. But I think so much was "on Harden", and he was so "tired" after the first WCF loss, this became a huge priority. But even with it as a priority, we now know, CLEARLY, that it doesn't matter how many guards you have, they run a system where it will ALWAYS be on Harden, so to speak.

The above doesn't speak directly to clear misses or action going forward, but rather to big picture type decisions, that, in HINDSIGHT, I'd definitely do differently. Specific to CP3, would I do that again? NO. Inherent in that was resigning him to a massive contract. He's hurt too often in the regular season, he can be hurt in the playoffs. While it seems like the pile of "crap" the Rockets traded for him was crap, Lou+Trez+assets probably gets you something decent. AND... LOTS of players have moved and continue to move. By locking up their move that early in the offseason, they basically locked up all their moves for the next few years - as we've seen.

And don't forget that essentially DM's big plan to follow-on with CP3 was to get Melo. We went through two summers of Melo. All the while, some of us on this board (me, plenty of others, but probably not the majority) were like "wtf... Melo??". The fact that it was 1,000% obvious to some of us internet GMs that Melo wouldn't work, wouldn't fit, and made no sense with their system and style... YET that DM's master plan the whole time was Harden+CP3+Melo... well, it's head-scratching. Remember how DM kept saying "it's always good to add Olympic team players!". One, clearly that's not true. Two, you didn't add him anyway until DEEP into the following offseason.

So long way of saying:
- DM has underperformed
- Absolutely I don't do the CP3 trade over in retrospect

 

share some of your adderall man

 

Wonder how Kevin Durant's injury last night impacts Rockets off season plans. By my calculation, there are only two true difference-making stars available in free agency (Durant and Kawhi) and one available through trade (Anthony Davis). We'll find out more today, but speculation is Durant has an achilles tear, an injury that takes at least the better part of a year to return from and my bet is Team Durant will not rush back this time. Probably means Durant signs his player option to remain in Golden State. If not, whatever team signs him does so knowing he won't be available until the playoffs at the earliest. Rockets probably weren't getting any additions of the caliber of these three players anyway. I'm in the camp that believes "moving heaven and earth", as one report described what the Rockets would do to get a player the caliber of Kawhi, is only worth it to create cap space in the event that you know you can get a Kahwi, Durant, Davis, now removing Durant from the conversation of course, the most plausible target of these (3) unlikely acquisitions. I wouldn't go so far as to say Durant's injury means no current Rockets will be traded, but I think whatever sliver of a chance the Rockets had for a contender morphing splash off season move just got even narrower than it already was. I don't expect Chris Paul to be moved now. Capela still on the table.

 

If you want short responses with little thought.... here you go: https://www.reddit.com/r/nba/

 

@JayZ750

Cmon man , you are saying Morey shouldn't have signed Dwight because he should have known that Dwight would wreck GS locker room .... the same GS that houston had no problem beating all 12-13 ?

GS didn't get really good until 14-15

Coincidentally , I've been thinking about making a post about the 14-15 squad .

It was underrated and things just didn't work out healthwise , as things seem to often do to us .

We made it to the WCF down two starters .

Beverley and Dmo may not be world beaters , but they were starting caliber players that year .

Dwight was never fully healthy all season and unfortunately he got hurt in game 1 of the Wcf .... now he played through it , but I'm pretty sure he had surgery in the offseason ... MCL injury I believe .

We kept up with them in oracle the first two games and almost pulled game 2 out , then harden had a bad game 3 at home and series over .

That team was so strong .

Bev
Harden
Ariza
Dmo
Dwight

With josh smith , good Corey brewer , terry off the bench .

One of the biggest mysteries of the rockets organization is just what the hell happened in the offseason .

Lawson move sucked .
Chemistry fell apart
Coach got canned 10 games into the season

We were at a point during that series where I was pretty confident we should just bring everyone back . But like I said , everything went wrong next year .

That 14-15 season could have been the beginning of something great .

I think it's the third best team Morey has made , behind last year and 08-09 .

3 teams with a legit shot (IMO) over a 10 year period is pretty good . It's even better considering you had to completely restructure your team after the first shot because your stars were too injured .

Same thing moving on from Dwight .

I get what you are arguing kinda ... I understand the feeling that Morey should have been less aggressive and more patient ... and wait for a younger , better fit to become available next to James .

But , there's no guarantee anyone ever comes here if we do that .

Also to your #5 ... man he was trying to find draymond BEFORE draymond got good .

Skilled , but undersized forwards were undervalued and that's why he took so many of them . Given the direction the league has gone , he was 100 percent right .

Morey isn't batting 1.000

But he's pretty damn good .

 

I almost started a thread on this topic - more about its league wide effect and that of the Rockets …. but I never start threads.
This would be an interesting topic.

 

bring the essays on. the longer the better.

 

Ha... I could have shortened it by basically saying "I have hindsight, so obviously I know the mistakes that were made!"

 

No, see, I think you're misinterpreting what I'm saying, which isn't necessarily that before the moves they were bad moves to make. Just that I HAVE HINDSIGHT. I can judge with that basis. And with that basis, the reasons for keeping DM as the GM, are increasingly because he's MOST LIKELY better than whatever the replacement is, and less because he's made the right moves. Interesting question... do you have to bat 1.000 to win a chip in the NBA? Certainly close to it, right? That being the case, if you want to win a championship as I do, than of course I'm going to judge things, with the benefit of hindsight, where he went from 1.000 down to whatever he is.

And most specific to the post I was responding to, that being the case, I would definitely NOT do the CP3 trade again. I'm not sure how anyone can say otherwise?? Because if he didn't get injured it might have worked?? He DID get injured. Why even talk about hypotheticals? We know exactly what happened - the only reason you could say you'd do the trade again TODAY is if you truly believed that DM will add the right pieces this offseason (or next), CP3 won't age much anymore and still be an integral part of a team that goes to the NBA Finals and wins a ring. Which ok... if someone believes that, that's what they believe.

Oh, and yes, he was trying to find Draymond before Draymond... but it's telling that there's only 1 Draymond... AND he didn't find him, lol.

 

I mean you should have done a lot differently in hindsight . But using hindsight is not a good way of judging lol . Of course we know CP3 got hurt now lol .

I don't think DM is perfect , but I think he is the lesser of our "problems" when it comes to management .

One of your points was about guards and how because James was tired , we switched focus to get another guard to help handle .

Doesn't that same hindsight apply to the coach and say "why the hell were you wearing him out all year ?"

Idk man , I don't think you have to bag close to 1.000 to get that championship .

Say CP3 doesn't get injured and we win it last year , Morey's "batting percentage " doesn't change does it ? Or is the batting percent only determined by the results at the end of the year ....( in other words if you win you batted 100 percent ?) that seems kinda silly .

The warriors won their first by having some really good players , but then running into a string of injured teams .

Did the cavs GM bat near 1.000 they year they won ? Or did they win because Lebron was amazing .

I think DM has put together 3 seperate teams in a 10 year window that have had a GOOD (i.e. We were a top 2-3 talented team) chance to win . We haven't had the breaks . Some of that is self inflicted due to taking risks ... I understand . But what's the alternative , try to build assets and wait for the perfect player to become available ? We were gonna be stuck in perpetual also-ran if we went down that path. Harden is too good not to win us 50 games .

 

Sweet talk Hayward to me a few more times, and I might fold.....

 

Well from a league wide perspective, two things come to mind. The first is the Knicks with stories going back to March stating "Durant to New York is a done deal". Are the Knicks desperate enough to sign Durant to a max deal with a lost season? They might just be, but what about the other max free agent they hoped to sign to join Durant in the Big Apple? Would a Durantless Knicks roster in 2019-2020 be as enticing for a Kyrie Irving or Jimmy Butler? Might the Knicks now turn their attention to trying to trade for Anthony Davis? The second is the ripple effect of KD opting in for $30million plus with Golden State next year. Suddenly, the money that Golden State might have used to resign Klay Thompson goes to Durant. It's not clear to me whether or not Golden State can decline Durant's decision to opt in, but let's say they could. Might they decline a KD opt-in and resign Klay out of a desire not face an entire season next year without both of them? I should add, I believe it's legally possible due to Bird Rights for Golden State to take on both KD's opt-in while resigning Thompson to a max deal, but the luxury tax owed would be record breaking.

 

I think the Knicks have to shift gears away from Durant …. an Achilles injury is one you don't take lightly. That's just too big a risk for $35m or more.

So what about the second max FA they can sign ? Do they still get a top tier guy or …. do they have to settle for a lesser option ? If its the lesser option , I might pass and just tank again. No sense tying up your cap space for less than a marquee FA - Or go the AD route but I don't know if they have the assets to pry him away from NO.

I could see Durant staying in GSW assuming he's going to be out for a year , may as well get paid while you rehab ….
On Clay - GSW can extend him regardless of Durant's decision but if he does stay , they'll be well over the tax. The are gonna pay huge tax …. Hell , they will probably be taxpayers without Clay (if Durant stays). I haven't looked at their cap situation …. but I assume they are over either way. They may let Clay walk …. and with Durant likely out most of the season , they wont be very good.

Where does Clay end up if that's the case ?!

On AD - I don't want to see him go to the Flakers. I hate that franchise more than the Pittsburg Steelers and that goes back to the 70's when they kept beating the Oilers. And screw Lebron with all that tampering crap. I really don't know why anyone would want to play with that guy ? He gets all the credit if they are good , you get all the blame if they don't then bolts for greener pastures (funny the grass aint greener in LA).
With the Durant / Knicks issue up in the air …. what happens to Kyree and Boston ? Maybe a 1+ a player option to stay there ? Does he go to NY anyway ?

What about Toronto and Kawhi ? Butler and the 6ers ? CP3 and the Rockets ….


The entire landscape of the league could change this offseason.

 

The first name that came to mind in regards to Klay is the Lakers.

 

Hayward and Horford (after opt-in) for CP3 and Capela

Use the MLE to re-sign Rivers or go after Bev

 

I mean, I kind of disagree. Using hindsight ALONE might not be the BEST way of judging. But one should absolutely use hindsight to judge.

Especially over a 10 year window....

I think your last comment is all-telling. Have we not had the breaks? Is that just what it comes down to, ultimately? That's certainly NOT how it (sports) is described in retrospect by anyone. MJ is the best right? Because he had the breaks? And Nique, and Drexler, just didn't?

I get the role of luck, but I'm also not going to use it as a crutch. One time, fine. Twice maybe. Three times... And probably another remodel required? After 3 times, 4 times... isn't it about time to say something about the approach is wrong? And we know this... because of HINDSIGHT. All that means is we are looking at the results to judge success.

Most people were ready to crucify - in the basketball executive sense - Vlade Divac when he traded Boogie for Buddy Hield basically. I think they got Harry Giles out of it as well (well they got that pick... of note, Terrence Ferguson was the next pick, Jarrett Allen was the next pick, Anunoby was the next pick, Kuzma was picked later, so it was a valuable pick). Hield, a pick, cap space, getting worse to get better. Maybe he could have gotten more earlier, or later. Or maybe they just got lucky in that Hield has been very solid and they picked Fox instead of Isaac or Ntilinka, and that Bagley is turning out to be legit (so far, though I still would have picked Doncic, but Bagley per 100 numbers were ultimately REALLY good, and his lack of PT is probably what led to Joeger's firing). But again... in retrospect, with hindsight and results in front of us, my opinion has to change from "what is vlade doing... to he got lucky... to hey, he may actually know what he's doing!".

I understand as a message board, part of our roles is to provide the "right way" and what so and so "should have done". The backlash against Nick Nurse's timeout this morning is the perfect example. Apparently it was the worst coaching decision ever and cost them a championship. And since we clearly know the alternative - to have NOT called a timeout - folks can pretend behind a keyboard to say what the alternative should have been and would have done. Of course, had he not called a timeout and the result was the same, it'd be the same keyboard warriors (no pun intended) complaining about his not calling a timeout he was about to lose anyway.

Point being... if I knew what the alternative was, I'd be an NBA GM. Then again, I listen to Ryan McDonough on XM NBA Radio regularly... and if he could be an NBA GM, then indeed I can, lol. I don't like that guy - he sounds like an autobot ... of course he got fired with no success.

Anyway, do I know for sure? No. I was pretty clear 2 years ago the path I would have taken, but that didn't happen. So what to do TODAY? Well, either complete rebuild (my preference), or everyone BUT Harden on the table to try and re-tool as best as possible.

 

@JayZ750

I think we are backed into somewhat of a corner right now lol .

But , every team that is "going for it" will have their own inflexiblilties . It can be magnified by luck .

Everyone praises the warriors front office to high heaven . But they are in a pickle with this KD situation . KD could easily opt in and leave them paying 35 mil (plus more in taxes) for nothing the entire next year .

They could sign him to an extension , taking the risk . If he doesn't come back the same then they have their own CP3 contract .

Or they could let him go and resign klay and green but not have any room to go after good players .

If we go total rebuild that's a mistake IMO , you can't get close to equal value for James and that's just fact .

I'd prefer we retool

It's possible cp3 has another good year in him .

Athletes don't always just decline and fall off a cliff . They have up and down years . There is no denying that CP3 is declining . But it's also possible that he has a mini rebound next season .

Also ... with the 3 teams thing ... I'm not saying we got unlucky 3 times in a row . But the 08-09 team was good enough to win . The 14-15 team was good enough to win . And last year's team was good enough to win .

It sucks that we couldn't do it with the same players so the years would be consecutive ...maybe that would have felt more like a success .

But the ability to move quickly and build a new team capable of contending is also impressive .