He's probably in the cold seat now. Well maybe not yet, but I hope he plays the lottery because if he's going to get lucky there then there's still a shot, haha, honestly though he probably has better odds of winning that multiple times than with this team. I definitely agree with you on the lotto comment, hopefully some good changes are made to the team to make a playoff run more realistic. If the team goes into the playoffs with this lineup... that'll suck to say the least.
If Morey does not understand the importance of a good coach to lead a team, then he must be fired. He has made too many mistakes.
Alot of misdirection in this thread. If Morey's not getting the job done, coddling our star while creating a negative image of this franchise, then he needs to be terminated. Naming 10 better GM's is irrelevant. I'm not saying he should be fired but if Les did it tomorrow I wouldn't be mad at all.
I heard a rumor from a fairly decent source that Morey did NOT want to extend McHale, but Les really wanted to push for the contract extension. Perhaps someone (CyberX??) can confirm this.
The "handed the keys" comment was hyperbole and incorrect. That was a great run 22-25 years ago. His only other stint as general manager of a professional team? http://www.oregonlive.com/sports/oregonian/john_canzano/index.ssf/2013/12/canzano_steve_patterson_and_te.html Since he was let go from the Rockets, he's done a whole lot of bouncing from place to place. And there's a reason for that.
Yes, there's a reason for that. I know Steve and he can be quite prickly at times. He has a habit of rubbing people the wrong way. His short tenures in certain jobs have more to do with that and less to do with his abilities as a GM.
Quite prickly is being extremely generous. Obviously it's unrealistic that Les will rehire a guy who he fired in the early 90s. But a guy who has a bad reputation, likely few remaining relationships and no positive NBA experience in over 20 years?
for the record I think Morey is doing a great job as a GM and do not want him replaced now one thing that I disagree with Morey on is the extreme advancement of his basketball philosophy which resulted in the "layups, FTs, 3s" thinking and less reliance on coaching. McHale was a coach who did really well with getting a lot out of young guys and basically did what Morey asked him to do as a coach. But this Rockets team has like what maybe 4 or 5 set plays? Most of their "plays" are just freestyle type plays. I mean i get you want Harden to handle the ball he is the best players but if you are unable to figure out a way to get some plays for Harden off the ball, for him to get some easy shots especially now with Lawson I am at a loss. I have nothing against JBB but I have a hard time believing that the mentality of that locker room would change by keeping the same coaching staff and replacing McHale only. I mean JBB is younger than JET how much of a change is that going to produce? JBB has been .500 exactly since he took over, better than McHale but still horrible considering the talent on the team and the easy schedule they had to play so far. There needed to be a drastic coaching change when McHale was fired - whether it was Thibs, Adeleman (though doubt he comes back), JVG, Sloan, Mike Brown -- really dont care but it couldn't be the same coaches I am sorry it just couldn't. Right now though i think its time for Les to institute that change and get an actual head coach in place. I think Les is pleased with Morey so far but this has to be really upsetting for Les to see out there. A good portion of the Rockets issues this season has come from lack of proper coaching and its not like JBB has done a better job so far there has been some slight improvements but nothing drastic.
Keep Morey Keep Harden Keep Howard Add Thibs as coach Rearrage the deck chairs/role players to augment Harden/Howard Find the "3rd scorer" that can work WITH Harden. Random "what if?" What if Llull took the Rockets MLE offer and the Rockets resigned Josh Smith. (And the Lawson trade and keeping KJ didn't happen). How would that dynamic changed the team this year?
We don't have coach but some of you want to fire our GM too. The same GM that got us James Harden for nothing.
Except he's one of the most Hands Off owners in the league. Morey is/has been allowed to do whatever he wants with the exception of a few scenarios. Les might voice his displeasure to trade Dwight, or Harden because of ticket sales or whatever, but that doesn't mean that Morey doesn't want to trade them for other reasons too. Pretty much the only situation I can think of where Les probably won over something Morey wasn't as hot on was the Lin signing. Which obviously Morey was still high on Lin at a very basic level as well (since he was the one who initially picked him up the year before) so there is no evidence that Morey didn't like him as well.... he just maybe didn't like him at 8 mil per year. Is he making the final calls??... well sure he owns the freaking team. Is he a hands on owner that dictates everything like Vivek, Prok, or Cuban... hell no. The Houston Rockets have quite a few problems.... Les Alexander as the owner is very very far down the list, and Morey is pretty far down as well. There are very few issues that you and I see that do not if any. If anything they saw it first, and make or look to make the changes before you or I would. Sometimes you folks mistake patience to make the right moves at the right time, as ignorance that those problems do not exist. That's largely insulting to the intelligence of Morey and Les as an owner as well.
Agree with the top part. That's likely the course of action this trade season going into the Summer. Its insulting to Morey to think that its not, and he's somehow satisfied with the status quo. As for the "what if's"... I think Llull was greatly suited to be that 6th man type of scorer, and his uptempo style of play and hustle would have been a better fit for this team. There is no way to tell a player's impact until it happens, but I think regardless he's still a great fit for this team, and virtually any others as long as he's not put in a pressure situation to be a superstar or anything. As for Josh Smith... I've said it before that I believe we got the best Josh Smith we could have gotten last year. Josh also has a personality to not do well in bad times. I don't see him as the vocal leader to infuse positivity into a negative situation. If anything it would have been contagious and brought him down as well. Either way the Rockets were going to have a rough year as Harden has had a rough year that impacts everything. Changing a couple players here and there probably wouldn't have made a drastic difference. But that being said, re-tooling the role players will now be an important part of bringing this team back up to playoff contender status going into the offseason. It starts with Harden, and ends with him, but Morey has his work cut out for him to get the right coach into place, and adjust the right pieces around Harden to make him effective once again.
The problem in part is a complete lack of pride by the 15 players wearing a Rockets uniform. The coach (McHale or Bickerstaff) can talk a good game, but ultimately it comes down to what is in the heart of the top 3-4 players on the team. Coach Malone of the Nuggets put it perfectly, when talking about his own crappy team: "As a coach, I cannot coach effort. We are just a bad team now. We have very few guys that can defend and that makes it hard every night." The Rockets are not a good team. The Rockets have played 35 games and are under .500% and are trending further under .500. They have almost the same record as the Portland Trailblazers. Only one team is worse that the Rockets defensively, the Sacramento Kings. Yes, even the Lakers are better defensively. The Rockets are at or near the bottom of every single effort/discipline statistic. This team lacks any pride or discipline.... they do not respect their head coach and lack the desire to make the sacrifices needed to win. Honestly this group doesn't deserve to make the playoffs, and that is fitting... because they are not making the playoffs.
