What's new here Ultimately Mauri is a very mediocre GM who has done a good job of making excuses and fooling the kool aid brigade with his PR speeches - Very mediocre drafter - Disrespects coaching hiring crap like McFail - Bent over backwards and coddled James Harden to the detriment of this franchise - Institutes an offense where we jack 3's at will but has some of the worst brickers around - Has never seen a gym and never stepped on a treadmill and sets a bad precedent to others like Keith Jones and Harden basically saying they can be overweight
... and last year Morey was a genius when the Rockets made it to the WCF, losing to the eventual champions. Last year, Sam Presti was a complete idiot for missing the playoffs.
when Durant didn't play ?? what about year after trade OKC were still #1 in west super deep, but bev hurt westbrook ? they were team to beat that year
Good plan, let's just head to the Durant store and pick up a couple. Please note, the Rockets signed Dwight in 2013. In 2012, ESPN named him the third best player in the NBA. Yeah, some signs were there that he was done as a star player, but signing him was the biggest starpower move any team made that year; it's absolutely ludicrous to say the Rockets didn't prioritize a second star.
He has also hit on his later picks. He has gotten Ibaka, Reggie Jackson->Kanter, Adams. Philly had multiple high picks what do they really have to show for it. Presti is really good drafting.
Presti had very little to do with OKC's success this year. He's very fortunate that the team clicked when it did this year because if OKC didn't get this far, Durant would have likely left, which would have likely ended with Westbrook leaving after next year, and Presti getting fired. Sure Presti has been GREAT at drafting, but they've had about a gazilion solid draft picks to get role players. They've also struck out with folks like Perry Jones, and Jeremy Lamb. Some of the better role players they've had came from trading a superstar (superstar > role players), and we are also talking about the GM who relied on Kendrick Perkins and Derrick Fisher to play significant roles on a contending team. Presti has done really well for himself, and I'm glad for him that his hard work is paying off with his team saving his a#$ this postseason to ultimately save him Durant for another year at least. Dude has alot of talent to evaluate young prospects. But let's not act like he's fireproof or anything. Had the Spurs played up to their normal standards Durant is likely gone, and Presti's legacy takes a huge spill. .......... Morey is probably just as hard working and smart although he likely doesn't have the resume for drafting. That being said, he's got plenty of great qualities for trades and plucking undervalued players that aren't in the draft for cheap that Presti hasn't really shown. Morey had sh$%y luck this year, and Presti had good luck. I think ANY team would be lucky to have either GM, but let's not act like they both don't have their strengths, weaknesses, and mixture of good/bad fortune.
LOL - I am at work - we have an advisory board meeting in a bit....this is my smoke break and I am a really fast typer. DD
As with many things in life, a lot comes down to timing and luck. I think that Morey and Presti are both good GM's, both have their share of bad moves (Perkins contract, Harden trade for OKC but for the most part the good has outweighed the bad. Morey turned the failed era of Yao/Tracy into an upper-echelon team until the wheels fell off this year, and Presti made OKC a perennial contender with his drafting and now shrewd moves like Dion Waiters. Presti finally caught some luck this year and had both of his superstars healthy to go along with a stellar supporting cast. If anything, Les should learn something from this as OKC was allowed to fully rebuild and thus land those stars through the draft while Morey has been forced into free agent recruitment year after year.
Presti does not fall in love with 6'9" power forwards and will draft BIG and let them develop. Their entire team is tall. TALL matters. DD
And most of us knew at the beginning of the series that GS's Achilles Heel was that soft underbelly inside.
We flipped our role players into Harden. Problem is that Les doesn't let Morey do his job but forces him to try to make the playoffs instead of building a contender. Les needs to let Morey rebuild.
I have been SCREAMING for a team to go big against them - and watched the rest of the NBA - us included - try to beat them at their game. Glad to see OKC putting them in their place. DD
