Like it or not, we are officially into a new era of GMing. The work of the past to build a contender was wonderful - and I have no wish for this thread to become a comparison thread. But clearly we are in rebuild mode - and rebuilds are where the mettle of GMs is proven The ball is in your court Rafael Stone! So far he has done a decent job. The end product he was left with was extremely specialized to a particular methodology - small ball switch everything - and the reconstruction is now officially underway. So far we have 1. Get bigger - this was a tough one, trying to make moves which could improve the team in the short term while also giving rebuild flexibility should Harden not stay. So far, so good in the C department, but I feel there is still work to do. 2. Move Russ - I honestly though we would have to pay to ditch him. To gain a pick was an excellent effort. 3. Sort out Harden. - without convincing him to stay, the next best method was going to be accumulation of future assets and expiring contracts. How good those picks are may be irrelevant if he uses them to trade for a genuine star 4. Accumulate assets - this is where he has been doing well. The Covington move which became Wood plus draft conpensation was genius. Getting a pick for Russ. 4 picks and 4 swaps for James. How good those picks will be isn't necessarily the point, there comes a time you just want to throw picks into a trade, and he has excess picks for years to come. 5. Create cap flexibility - this is his next project. Can he move Gordon and create max salary space in the off-season? 6. Acquire a genuine star - cash in the assets to get the player who can bring a championship 7. Acquire the.complementary pieces - while it is customary to get a star first, it is also essential to have players who can contribute to a championship on decent salaries. While twiddling his thumbs and waiting for an available star, Stone needs to be finding underrated role players Let's see how the Stone age pans out! Thoughts on what else he needs to be doing? The rebuild is now on his terms, and it will be fascinating to see how he goes about it
Dude ... don't you miss a little bit of luck in that mix. Rewind to 2013, had OKC paid Harden those 6 mils and kept him over Ibaka, we wouldn't have had him. That was luck. It's more of luck than planning. You gotta draft the right players, go through the development seasons. Tough tough.
8. tilmen trades away said complementary pieces for tax savings just as they near contention 9. rinse 10. repeat
OKC's got their own issues but I don't recall they pull off trades to save for luxury taxes. Their mistakes were more of bad choices in terms of who they should have kept. Ours is more of self-inflicted destruction, which is way quicker than OKC's.
Also you can spend the time and money nurturing the talent but if by their third contract you haven’t won they’ll most likely bolt.
Yes. We are just not that used to dark age. Still rosy and giddy coming from an elite. Check back in 2 years. Shite's creek didn't happen in one day.
Good post overall .... #7 got me to thinking: We've had a "star" and put others around him and didn't get to the promised land (Yeah , GSW was a tough mountain to climb and they got damn close) Its damn hard to put quality pieces around a star player making max money and near impossible when you have two max guys. Maybe you accumulate the complimentary pieces first while keeping your cap figure near the floor .... then you have the ability to sign top tier FA's and make the acquisition via trade. As for Oladipo , I wonder if they move him for additional draft compensation / younger players at the deadline .... I think that would be ideal. He really doesn't fit this franchises timeline IMO.
It is the Nets method - they got the pieces before adding Durant and Kyrie (and Harden). In a sense it was also the Morey way pre-Harden Just need to be careful not to overcommit to non-stars
Good post, but let's not get carried away with the praise just yet. It was Tilman and Stone's GM-ing that got us to this point. And if the rumors posted here earlier are true (I can't remember who shared it first or I would credit them), Stone may have played a pretty insignificant role in today's moves.
What part of what I said is unrealistic? Do you want me to lie to you and say the rockets are bound to draft the next michael jordan who agrees to a minimum deal so they can stay beneath the luxury tax and simultaneously add the right players around him to win a championship? Or are you ready to believe that next time around mr fertita and mr fertita jr are going to actually pay up in order to keep together a championship level roster and coaching staff?
The fact is that we are just fans. We have no say in what the owners do nor predict what they will do in the future. Take what it is and go with it. Also, it's not even been a single season with a new GM, Coach, players, etc. So yes everything you have said is unrealistic because there is not enough long-term evidence to prove otherwise. We do not know how the draft will be (maybe next Jordan or next Kwame Brown), we do not know how Wall, Olalipo, Wood, Cousins will mesh (could surprise us or bust), will Fretita land a superstar next year or sell the team..... Everything is uncertain which you somehow claim to know with odd certainty. Just chillout!
