Would you rather have Jabari or Mobley in 2026-2030?

Taking your squad to the playoffs in the East as the main guy is not proof of anything. Banchero has one of the worst contracts in the league and Orlando screwed up their flexibility with that contract. He is young, so maybe he can develop a 3 pt shot and become a more efficient scorer, but I sure wouldn’t put any money on it.

 

Jabari is a different tier of player than Mobley and Banchero, i don't know why we are having this conversation.

Mobley's contract is bad for sure, but that doesn't really make sense to compare a role player to an all star.

I like Jabari and I think he's paid accordingly to his skill level and ceiling.

 

I would prefer to have the cap space and put it in an index fund

 

C'mon man. The fact of the matter is that no matter how much people here want to bag on Banchero, Mobley, etc, the Rockets got *maybe* the 5-10th best player in the 2022 draft in Smith, and even if you want to dumb it down to Salaries and Role players, as people are doing here in this thread, he's not even the best at that!

Easily Better overall players than Smith/All Star quality players

Banchero (please)
Holmgren
Jalen Williams
Jalen Duren


Probably Better or Comparable Role Players

Jaden Ivey
Dyson Daniels
Christian Braun
Andrew Nembhard (he would be great on this version of the Rockets right now!)
Tari Eason - yes, he is a better fit than Tari because he can guard down, KD, Sengun, can't, I doubt Finney Smith can, he looks slow as ****.

All of these guys would be *great fits* on the Rockets rotation in place of Smith FWIW. Imagine Dyson Daniels & Amen in a halfcourt trap, or Nembhard running a break instead of Josh Okogie. Or even, Smith's minutes turning into Eason's minutes. They'd barely miss a beat.


Others who you can credibly argue are on the same tier

Nikola Jovic
Shaedon Sharpe

It frankly is not that big of a deal. To get a top 10 player from a draft class is not that easy even with a top 3 pick - it could have been much worse! Keegan Murray looked better than Smith initially but now he can't shoot. Or you could end up with a bust like Sochan or Johnny Davis (lol) or Rockets Legend AJ Griffin.

My point here is not to argue that Jabari is bad, but that the cope in people pretending like he's a better player than Mobley or Banchero when his obviously not is pretty silly, and that hte "well he's a better ROLE player for THIS TEAM, therefore, we're BETTER OFF " argument is also pretty shabby becuase you can just as easily make it against Smith as you can make it for him.

That said I don't mind Jabari, he's fine. It's nitpicky; the Rockets team construction would be better with more wing-guard-guarders than pure 4-guarders but they're still pretty good.

 

Surprise, Surprise you are down on one of our young players. Chet is better. Jalen Williams is better (but a whole bunch of gms passed on him). The rest of your list is laughable.

 

You actually think Jabari Smith Jr is better than Jalen Duren - do you even follow the NBA (serious question)

 

For this team, yes. Duren is a foul machine and has no outside shot.

 

Not enough rolleyes in the world for this take

 

Mobley is a top ~15-25 player and is paid like it. Smith is a top ~85-100 player and paid like it. Both guys can go up or down, but I'd bet more on Mobley's ceiling because I don't know how Bari levels up without really being able to dribble or pass. I like Bari a lot for this team on this contract. I wouldn't want Mobley on this team on that deal because it would crunch our cap sheet with the talent on the roster and future extensions. If I had a bunch of cap space I'd much rather start out with Mobley on his max deal than Bari on his deal.

 

Well my issue is I dont think top 15-25 shouldnt be making rookie super maxes or 60M in 2030 and Mobley himself is overpaid for his deal.

Think about it Cavs are in the East and they have Darius Garland, Donovan Mitchell and Jarrett Allen basically 3 all star players. If Mobley was worth his contract why are they so bad? 4 all stars and gleaguers should at least be top 4 in the super weak East right?

 

Bari over Duren is ridiculous. Similar deal as Mobley that it would be difficult to work in Duren on his next contract with this roster but he is way better than Bari right now.

 

That's just what you generally have to pay if you have an allstar caliber rookie coming up for an extension even though we got pretty lucky with Sengun. We're gonna face something similar with Amen if he levels up next year and makes an All-NBA team. We'll see if the dynamic changes over the next few years. The last couple of years on his deal look worse but that's several years from now and he's got time to play into it. The Cavs and Mobley aren't off to a great start but last year he was the second most important player on a 62 win team. There's still plenty of basketball. Last night he played well in a win over the Spurs.

 

16/7/2 thats like Jabari's statline bro.

 

Do you think a 15/5/5 game from Reed Sheppard and Amen Thompson are pretty much the same?

 

But Mobley and Jabari have the same style so why are you bringing up Amen and Reed?

Both Mobley and Jabari are off the ball scorers right Mobley doesnt take players off the dribble like Sengun does.

 

Ok this explains your whole position. No real need to get into this further.

 

So you think they are different?

According to NBA.com Mobley scores 69% of his FG assisted and Jabari scores 74% of his shots assisted.

Thats just based on FACTS.

 

Mobley is also a role player. Being a star is solely based on offense thats why Steph Curry is considered a superstar and Draymond is just a career role player and even got called a backpack by Jordan Poole. Another example is Luka Doncic who is considered a superstar compared to say Rudy Gobert even if you can argue Luka is as bad on defense as Gobert is as bad on offense.

Mobley got voted an all star last year but he wont be an allstar this year so him and Jabari are the same.

 

Bari fans be like. I’ll take him over Wilt and Bill Russell!!!

@cheke64