A lot of words so I will keep it short. When you trade a top 5 player in the league for assets…. When you tank harder than anyone in the league for three years… and have lots of cap space… you should be better than “a top 10 team”… which you seem to think is some sort of accomplishment….. there are only around 30 teams in the league… and are you even a top 10 team if you cannot get out of the first round? Stone has been the Rockets GM for nearly 6 years. The Rockets have never won a playoff series under him…. The Rockets don’t have a franchise player…. They don’t have cap space… their success is largely predicated on a 38 year old and 32 year old… they traded out of the best draft in years and haven’t had a first rounder in two seasons… and while you like to talk about Westbrook, you fail to consider that Stone is a big reason Westbrook was a Rocket. Half of his first round draft pick are no longer on the team… he busted on the #2 pick in a good draft… he drafted a role player with the #3 draft pick… and his head coach doesn’t even want to play He paraded KPJ around like he was some amazing person and find,.. he encouraged 19 year old Jalen Green to hang around KPJ…. KPJ was kicked off his high school team, his college team… his AAU team and even the Cavs…. But Stone thought he was a good guy. Didn’t matter than he blew off practices, treated staff like garbage. The ego of Stone had to be right. Stone wanted to build around Christian Wood. Stone believed that the man to lead and set the culture was Silas. Stone tried to extend Oladipo and was convinced he would get a great package for him in trade… he didn’t. Stone decided to invest in free agents in their mid 30’s with either injury histories or high mileage… then cried when they got hurt. Stone named Wallace as his scouting director, which is on par with Gar Foreman. Stone did not even consider the fit of the players he drafted… there was no detail or vision to anything they did the last 4-5 years, except tank… assistant coaches complained to him…. Players in the draft had leaders doing what they could to not be drafted by the Rockets…. But Stone and TF know better. The arrogance is staggering… the conference at the end of the year demonstrated it.
I thought we were talking about the number of picks Stone has gained in the years he's the GM. The fact that he didn't have a lot of picks to start with is not relevant to our discussion. Your claim is that Stone got more picks than he inherited. My point was that it didn't really prove that he's a good GM. The situation was that the team was going to lose their franchise player. Of course he was going to trade Harden for picks. Of course he would gain more picks than he started with. And since it was clearly a rebuild situation, he traded veterans like Covington (who BTW was a valuable asset) for future picks. I just don't think "gaining more picks" is a good argument to show how good a GM he is. And we aren't even talking about the fact that he squandered a few of the picks he had. Granted those were mid to low FRPs. It's not his fault he didn't get a franchise player through the draft. But except for Sengun, one can argue that none of the players he drafted have outperformed their draft positions. A few of them underperformed so far. So he is at best a mediocre talent evaluator.
LMAO. Yes it was certainly Stone who wanted to trade for Westbrook and not have to rebuild after Harden left….. definitely not Tilman wanting to remain competitive after buying the team. It’s pretty sad how you think the GM is the owner.
And he gave your Herpes and stole your girl apparently.... Do you watch any of the other teams? Like @Joe Joe keeps saying and you keep dismissing....we are top ten after being bottom 3 for three consecutive years. We are not some terrible team as you keep insisting. And all these words are coming from someone who has disliked Stone from the beginning..... You are taking the position that Stone is at fault and working backwards from that belief. STONE IS NOT THE OWNER. TILMAN IS. You are an intelligent poster. Why do you keep ignoring who actually sets the entire direction for the team? You think Stone truly wanted to build around Dipo and Wood or do you think it's more likely Tilman didn't want to rebuild so soon after buying the Rockets? You think Stone gets to set the payroll for his staff? The way I know you are wrong and I am right..... Ain't no national media echoing your thoughts.... We are not the Magic yet where there are major questions about our future going forward. There are no pundits talking about how we should have seen FVV's ACL injury because he is old.....
The starting position is relevant if you care to have an honest discussion of the job done by Stone..... You and @Nook prefer not to have an honest discussion. How many picks has Presti squandered??? ..... That idiot traded us both Harden and Sengun. Presti gave max extensions to Chet and Jalen Williams. We could have traded Harden for Ben Simmons or Jaylen Brown as a headliner to keep competing but we didn't..... Yall are absolutely unreasonable and completely entitled after the Morey era. Do yourself a favor and follow the greater NBA to gain some perspective.
Our discussion started by you responding to one of my posts and bolding these words,"......... crippled by lack of picks when he started.". You responded by saying "He was not crippled by lack of picks when he started. " How am I supposed to know we aren't talking about didn't have a lot of picks to start? If anything, that is the only thing that is relevant. Correct. This is a fact. Do you dispute this? Can you find a team that has accumulated more net FRPs and FRP swaps since Stone became GM? My rough count was Nets tied in picks, but Rockets won in swaps. Stone was given 4 picks that have been used. He has 5 good young players and is plus 2 in FRPs going forward. You can make the argument that his actual picking hasn't been great, but he still has more successes (even if not the best player remaining) and net picks remaining than the picks he's used by three (i.e., he's added more picks than he's missed). Overall his accumulation of picks and drafting skill has lead to a big positive in acquiring good young players. No team is perfect on all their picks. Covington was a 30-something with one year left of his deal. Stone gets totally slammed by the Stone haters for signing 30 year olds because it should be assumed that 30-year old guys are an injury risk even though he spent 1 total FRP for Durant, FVV, Adams, DFS, and Capela. Stone trades away 30-year olds that performed worse in 19-20 than the guys he signed performed in 24-25 and those guys are valuable. For all intents and purposes, Stone has replaced the veteran value that he traded away without spending nearly as many picks as he gained. Sure, most of those picks missed, but Sengun is worth more than the 4 30-something vets Stone traded away by far.
If youre gonna post something like this Ima need you to post a few links of TIllman saying this is what he wants because every itnerview and all proof that Ive read over the years tells me these were GM moves. Yeah Tillman may have wanted to stay competitive and gave him that as a directive but how to do that is what the GM does. Unless you can show me quotes from TIllman saying he wanted those things or quotes from Stone saying he was told to do those things. If he was I was never aware of it. Youre acting like its somehow common knowledge. If it was show me cuz I didnt know.
They are showing everyone that if you feel you have a lot of talent and youre not succeeding ITS THE COACH. I mean Ime is just like Thibbs. We need to find our Mike Brown.
I'll keep this short because you can't. The Rockets were a dying team when Stone became GM. Morey knew it. Harden knew it. They have better young talent now. They are in a better position with draft capital going forward now. A mid GM does not get the Rockets to where they are from where they started.
Do your own research…. Maybe you’ll learn something. You still think the GM just gets to do what they want? You think Tilman and his son were hands off? Ultimately…. KPJ, Woods, and Dipo didn’t matter to the franchise. We quickly pivoted away from the latter and the former got caught up in legal trouble. It’s just weird to keep whining and crying about players who ultimately didn’t matter. Unless…. you just want to whine about Stone.
You know how I know so many of you are just butt hurt…. I listen to the overall NBA discourse. Doesn’t mean they are right all the time but it does give me a good baseline…. And a lot of yall need a hobby or a girlfriend.
Also, to clarify: I am a little worried Stone makes a mistake that actually harms the Rockets long-term this year. I don't expect perfection, but he may actually spend a lot of resources to try to fix team.
All fans that have somewhat high expectations should all be struck by lightning......esp when they support a franchise that was the 7th or 8th most lucrative one conducted by Forbes.......God forbid.
That post was totally ironic because he was the only one being emotional. Some people are just fans of someone and will say anything and attack anyone to defend them. He doesnt have anything substantive to defend Stone so he's just attacking everyone personally lol
As said, Rafael can be anything other than a GM, I am totally fine with it and I would be fine with him staying the course until they find a younger guy. That is the natural cycle, but this gets misconstrued as we are all out to get him and we should find ourselves a hobby and an AI GF.
Right back at you.... Your whole story relies on the GM setting the direction and ultimately deciding on how the money is spent, not the owner... without a shred of evidence. Going to link some press conferences about KPJ/Wood/Dipo? Maybe bring up WOW again? As if the Rockets were ever not going to twist whatever situation into a positive light. In the end, KPJ, Wood, Dipo, and John Wall are long gone. KPJ cost some second round picks to move, which is a mark against Stone, but still don't ultimately cost much. You Stone haters should be focusing more on Reed over Castle instead of crying about stuff that ultimately didn't matter.
