I know Stone has a bunch of haters - and I'm not all that enamored with him myself... but this was a good interview.... I didnt get the cockiness he sometimes displays... I didnt get the feeling that he was passing the buck... building a champion - "Obviously we didnt do a real good job of that last year..." Acknowledged KD was run for too many minutes... Complimentary of guys without it feeling like just lawyer speak... Thornton, Reed putting on some muscle... I liked what he had to say...
Can’t trust anything Stone says - but in fairness to him, general managers lie. Glad he gave an interview. I like the Thornton pick because Udoka will play him. He is physical, he is a mediocre playmaker but he does protect the ball and he is aggressive but not mistake prone- he will get minutes for that reason. Let’s hope for a huge leap from Amen or Reed - have one of them become a 25+ point a night scorer and tone setter. Marcus Smart is a reliable ball handler and won’t freeze like a rabbit. There is no title on the horizon but this is a competitive team that I expect to play hard and could be even better defensively this year.
Yeh, I was put off by those efforts... but its all about trying to create assets and signing guys who outplay their contracts... Obviously Stone's route is injury reclamation players... signing guys with injuries at below market and hoping they can return to previous form... Adams, DFS, etc... Which makes sense... he's very frugal and doesnt want to overpay for healthy players... Morey was all about hoping aging stars can defy father time and resurrecting lottery busts... The other option is paying on 'potential'... and that can get u a 6 year contract for Kelvin Cato... lol
Of course. Because he's not in damage control/plausible deniability/tempering expectations mode....just wait. This is what they're serving today.
He doesn’t have a vision or a plan to build a team. He only makes the safest moves. He is a lawyer who doesn’t understand basketball. He drafts players based on their rankings in mock drafts and only makes trades when the cost is low because he is afraid of making mistakes. That’s why he went after a 38-year-old KD but doesn’t have the balls to move chips for Jaylen Brown or LaMelo Ball. But building a competitive team requires courage and decisiveness to make the big moves. In fact, he should be really aggressive right now because when Amen gets extended, you are looking at a very expensive team that is very mediocre. I don’t know what the hell he is doing right now but I can tell you the guy is delusional. By the time he gets canned our window will be gone and all of our draft picks will be squandered. I hate this guy to death.
sure... but i think we all react differently based on the level of crap thats being dumped on us at any given time... We all want to be the guy that owns our mistakes - "my bad..." but if its coming too hard and fast most of us become defensive and try to deflect... its human nature...
i cant say i disagree with your assessment... as i said, dude is very frugal and doesnt want to overpay and get locked into a longterm bad contract... like 6 years to Cato... I dont think JBrown was the play... i might've gamble on LaMelo.... Personally, I think he oughta go after Kyrie (if he can be got at a reasonable price) and do the old guys on short contracts for the KD window... while our younger guys hopefully continue to develop and we add a few more frp players to the mix... Theoretically, after 2 years of KD/Kyrie we could have a roster 8 or 9 frp players aged 20-27... I think the big swing is going to be trading Sengun... I dont think hes a championship rim defender...
The interview was a big nothing burger. He’s just not a basketball guy, so has to lean on Ime for his opinions. I thought it was hilarious that he confirmed FVV as a “crutch for all of us” when CF’s have been using that as a derogatory for Ime for 2 years. Pretty sad when your GM and coach have to lean on a crutch player. As far as Thornton is concerned, he will probably get a few junk minutes here and there. I don’t think he has the athleticism to create space for himself. He is really slow. He does seem to have really good basketball instincts in regards to seeing the floor and finding the open players. I do think Cluff is a decent find and may give us an opportunity to unload Clint later in the year. He will probably spending all his time in RGV. Crawford will probably get some minutes here and there. He is an NBA worthy player, but is kind of a tweener.
It’s hard for Amen to take a big leap without being the main initiator. I just don’t see Ime handing the keys to him. I don’t know how Reed gets the minutes to make a big jump, unless he and Smart can share the floor a lot. Smart’s defense may be able to give some opportunity there. I think Kd and Amen will both see some minute reductions as long as Smart is healthy and still playing good defense.
Rafael Stone may have been hired without any job that was in a front office except for kind of hanging around and learning but he's been the GM of the Rockets for 6 years now, can we stop referring to him as not a basketball guy. He may not make decisions that we like but he has access to so much data that we don't have access to and he clearly gives a ****. I'm not his biggest fan but I promise you, he's more qualified at this point than anyone posting on Clutchfans. Rockets aren't lighting the world on fire but the team was attractive enough to entice KD to want to join. That wasn't the case in 2016 when he would have actually transformed his legacy and this organization. They aren't a title contender, they didn't get the #1 pick in any draft and as much as I don't love Jalen over Mobley in hindsight, Mobley wasn't fixing this team. the biggest mistake in this rebuild was that they held onto Harden a season too long. They should have taken the OKC sliding door and traded him for SGA and the picks. Instead they traded for a dud in Westbrook and made everything a coin flip. That wasn't a Stone decision. this is THE SEASON. If it doesn't work out, i'm sure there will be wholesale changes, I hope it works out. I think Stone is fine if not above average.
What are you looking forward to in SL? Seeing the young guys play. Quadir & Bruce, first time seeing them in Rockets colors. Hopefully they enjoy the process. Excited to see what it looks like. What did you see in Bruce? To me, he’s the ultimate winner. That’s really what we saw. He’s got a unique build, which I actually like. His physicality is interesting. His shotmaking is kinda crazy. He takes care of the ball. He’s a really, really good basketball player. Can he translate it to the next level? We obviously think he can but that’s the test for him. Franchise Fred and the development of Bruce. It’s on Fred, it’s on our coaches, it’s on our whole organization. It’s a group effort to try and make all these guys as a good as they can be. Fred’s been great for all of our point guards, all of our off guards, all of our centers. Fred understands the game so well. He’s definitely a crutch for all of us. Marcus Smart? Very excited. I’ve loved him as a player his whole career. Feels like a Rocket so I’m glad we could finally make it happen. … I feel comfortable having Marcus play anywhere. If he’s guarding fives, I’m good. He’s just really versatile. His ability to handle and pass is underrated. Excited to have him in. Smart, Tari, Amen defensively. Jabari too. We definitely envision our defense, even Kevin, as being versatile, switch everything, really put a lot of pressure on the other team. Kevin’s age & managing the season We were unsuccessful at that last year so whatever we did, we didn’t do well. You want to be smart but you can’t take every game off and be ready to play. It’s a hard balance and we’re trying to figure it out. I definitely want to take some of the load off Kevin last year. I do think he played too many minutes and he does too. We also want guys who want to play and we want to win every game. That competitiveness is important. It’s not an easy switch to turn on and off. Reed Sheppard? He had a great year. He really came on for us. In the 2nd half of the season, he was consistent and good and found his footing in the playoffs. It’s hard when you come in at 20, everyone is hunting you and you’re small. He’s put on good weight, a bunch of muscle. He competes. He has a couple of special skills. _______________________ “We wouldn’t have made the Durant trade if we knew Fred would get hurt.” “Is it just not our year?” … let’s punt the season/deadline away because Fred. Rockets view Fred in the LeBron tier. Irreplaceable. "Transformative." "They can't replace Fred in terms of his play.” “They viewed Fred as their best player.” “Fred is a crutch for all of us.” I see why Fred be subtweeting and feeling disrespected. How you gonna call me the franchise player, our season is over without me, but not offer me a “long term” contract?!
Fred was subtweeting fans not the organization. the discourse on twitter has gone off the rails and everyone sounds like I did when Fred was actually available and not traded for KD. The guy missed a season and rehabbed intensely the whole time and now the fans turn on him. Rockets not making any big moves right now is pragmatic and I respect it. If you want to trade Sengun for a haul don't do it after Ayton just ate his lunch. If this season doesn't work out for the team, you can still build his value up, get him another all star game and then trade him for 4 FRP 2 Swaps and a Young Star that fits with Amen better.
I do not want Amen to be the main initiator... I want the dude roaming and disrupting... i want him getting behind the d and cutting to the basket to finish at the rim... if he develops a shot - great... but until then he has a great ability to worm his way to the rim and go off from the dunker position... dude needs to be run like a forward - not a guard. Reed needs to be a situational sharpshooter - until he develops better d and handles... and i dont think he needs to be in actual game scenarios to develop these skills... some guys need actual game time to learn to deal with the pressure... imo Reed is about developing the skillset to be a pg... he doesnt need to spend time w RGV shooting - he needs to spend time running the offense and his d....
He did as much as I did last season after Fred went down. Even a 3-year-old could see we needed reinforcements last year. The majority of us predicted a disaster in the playoffs, and we were right. If that is “above average,” I don’t know what dictionary you’re reading. The guy watched the season collapse and did not make a single move just like the rest of us, except he actually gets paid millions to sit courtside and do nothing.
The Rockets were hard capped. That was his fault that he didn't leave more wiggle room to address potential injuries, but there wasn't a magical trade to be made. They kept Tari instead of trading him for Coby White or Ayo Dosunmu. Neither of those guys would be Rockets still at the #s they received from their new teams. The Rockets knew this, that is why a trade didn't happen. They didn't think Coby White or Ayo Dosunmu for 30 games were worth losing a guy they drafted and love having in the building for. I didn't like not getting a minimum guy or not convincing CP3 to come join but something like this requires nuance. The team didn't want Reed's minutes to get usurped more than they already were, i think that's clear. The Rockets just weren't good enough without Fred and the team knew it. Marcus Smart fixes that issue theoretically. They decided to roll the dice on Tari rather than trading him and there was no magic player that would have beaten the lakers in free agency. KD got hurt, Adams got hurt, Fred got hurt. Those are predictable injuries and the depth was bad. Rockets added Bruce Thornton, Marcus Smart, Bogdanovich and have some more roster spots to fill. DFS was useless last year and now he's gone, they fixed their mistake, it cost a lot. Capela is a much harder contract to move and was a huge blunder. If that's your biggest blunder of a signing, you're doing okay. The Rockets are under the tax and can add more players while staying under. This extends the window to avoid the repeater tax as currently constructed. We just saw Boston trade away a great player to avoid the repeater. We are seeing the Nuggets do everything they can to avoid it. Its a fact of the CBA. The Rockets additionally have tax exceptions to pounce if someone they like at that # shakes free. I wouldn't count on it, but the flexibility is back. This is Stone's make or break year, see how he does and then make up your mind.
I think he’s making decisions to extend his tenure as a GM cause this is probably his first and last gig as one. He’s not gonna commit to a risky move like trading KD - that’s an actual commitment to a specific vision and a risky bet. KD gets injured or starts declining? Gives him an out. KD keeps banking his numbers? They will blame the young guys or say this takes time or last offseason capped them from a roster building perspective or whatever. If he and Udoka managed to weasel their way out of being held accountable this year, don’t see how anything short of a disaster next year (another 1st round exit would qualify as one imo) puts them more in the hot seat.
