I really don't know what you are expecting. The guy makes great draft picks. The guy gets great value out of trades. He is terrific at cap management. He is great at negotiations and finding a way to underpay players. The goal is not to "make the playoffs". Being the Indiana Pacers, the Portland Trailblazers, the Atlanta Hawks, the Memphis Grizzlies, etc is not good enough. The guy has a clear goal, which is to make us a contender, a true contender, not some perennial good, but not great team that has no legitimate shot at winning a ring. He already put the pieces together once in 2008, but bad luck crushed that run. That alone warrants our patience for him to rebuild a team. As for McHale, who cares how good or bad he is. We aren't playing to win right now, we are essentially floating until we can get a legit foundation in here. We have a couple of raw big men in Hill, Patterson, Morris and D-Mo and now one of the best big men of all time to help develop them. Thats all that should matter right now. How we perform this season is mostly irrelevant. We all knew this was lost season, even before it started. Put your pitchforks down already, our franchise is in good hands, I promise. If you want to complain, complain about our owner, who is meddling. You cannot rebuild on the fly. If you have a core, we can reload, but we don't have that. The sooner he realizes that and lets Morey have free reign, the sooner we will be able to be relevant again.
Yup, I think all of the problems with this team can pretty much be directly traced back to Les and his unwillingness to accept the reality of rebuilding. It has forced Morey to take wild swings at things and make moves that don't really make sense (aka Dalembert).
-Great Draft picks. Joey Dorsey Maarty Luenen Jermain Taylor Sergio LLull Patrick Patterson Marcus Morris Chandler Parsons Aaron Brooks Carl Landry Please show me great in any of that. Brooks isnt even in the L any more and once out of Houston (playing for a mediocre team) he struggled with the Suns. Landry has been a decent player The rest has been utter garbage. Not that you expect much, but please show me where in any of that he did an EXCELLENT job. -Great Value out of trades Was spending several million dollars for second round draft rights excellent value? Was trading Tmacs enourmous cap hit away for Jordan "super bust" Hill and other scraps Value? We could of just let his number fall off the books instead we took that garbage on. How is Hasheem Thabeet for Battier working out for us? Jonny Flynn? Twill? Wait what about Brad Miller? All garbage moves that inherently did not make our team better. -Great at underpaying And we wonder why FA's don't even consider Houston anymore? Seriously lets think about this for one second. He hosed (if your a pay the minimum type person then your ok with this) Carl Landry. Then he went out and overpaid for Luis Scola. Scola is awesome and all, but not worth what he got. He gets railed and wonders why players feel crapped on when he refers to them as assets. And we really can't figure out how Houston went from most FA's always think of Houston to, we can't get anyone to even remotely think about Houston. You say tOmato I say tomAto.
This. I wonder by which standard do people compare Morey's moves. Many posters say that he has done "great drafts, trades, etc.," but what does "great" really mean? If he has done great (by NBA standards) things then why are the Rockets in the position they are in? You listed the players that Morey chose for the Rockets and one has to wonder which one of them even approaches greatness in the NBA.
Averaging out our draft position since Morey took over in 2007 gives us an avg draft pick of 19.8.(This is with both picks this year averaged out to a single pick) Players of note taken after our draft position in the 1st round: 2010- Patterson drafted and no players of note drafted after 2009- no picks in first and no notable players after 19.8(avg pick) 2008- Nicolas Batum drafted; Darrell Arthur drafted after Batum 2007- Aaron Brooks drafted; no notable players drafted after 2nd Rounders: 2010-No second round picks 2009-Jermaine Taylor, Sergio Llull, and Budinger drafted; no players of note in second round 2008- Joey Dorsey and Marty Luenen drafted; Deandre Jordan, Omer Asik, and Dragic all within our draft range 2007- Carl Landry and Brad Newley drafted; Marc Gasol and Ramon Sessions within our draft range The misses that Morey has had have all been in the second round. Nothing obvious that sticks out without using hindsight. Second rounders tend to be crap shoots and digging out Landry and Budinger were gems at the draft positions. Some will scream about Asik, Jordan, and Gasol; but, their draft position would indicate that their were plenty of nonbelievers throughout NBA clubs. Based on draft history, there weren't better players available at our draft positions and shows that Morey has been effective in the draft. There were no superstars available at any of our draft positions. That only leaves trades. I don't think anyone can deny that Morey is one of the most active GMs in the league on the trade front. With all of this along with the Yao and McGrady situation, Morey's head is being called for by some on this board. Again, with the cards that he has been dealt, I feel Morey has done more than an adequate job at trying to assemble this team.
Outside of Marc Gasol and Deandre Jordan, there has not been a player available that might be able to approach greatness. Can't make a point out of nothing. He has done great by NBA standards by taking the best player at our draft position consistently.
Morey's whole MO is acquiring assets, correct? So that's pretty much via the draft and trades since he really doesn't sign anyone to big bucks as a FA. As far as "his" picks, Brooks is OK (and out of the league at the moment), Patterson is TBD, Marcus looks legit, D-Mo is TBD, Landry is a good reserve on a solid team and Chase is, at best, the eighth or ninth best player on a solid team. For someone whose rep is acquiring assets, he sure has acquired a lotta nothing. His trades? Horrible. Thabeet was horrific, so was T-Will, the McGrady one was good simply because it got T-Mac off our hands but I'm fairly certain he could have gotten more, and the Lowry one was genius. So he's done so-so. All I'm saying is in his fifth season, this team has shown no sign of progress or a future. Sure, it seems like Morey has a "game plan" but the execution is subpar, to put it best, at the moment. Look at our roster. Aside from Scola and Martin, no one is really attractive to anyone. No one really gives the Rockets leverage in a deal, which means our waste will be traded for - wait for it - more marginal players and a couple of draft picks, probably on the low end. See the cycle coming our way? I admit I don't know who could be better. I just know Morey came in with a lot of hype, with this decorated background and reputation, and he has done a whole lotta nothing. And please. Do not even place Presti in the same sentence as Morey. Presti eats Morey's proposals for lunch.
Morey has done the best with the hand dealt with him. You can always critique moves in hindsight. No GM is perfect. But he has done what he was brought in to do from a personal standpoint and you can't blame him for that. T-mac and Yao having their careers basically shattered was beyond his control. I say, at this time, better to stick with him than try to find someone else who will have to go through a learning process.
You're accusing Morey of being bad and getting raped, and wanting to keep the GOOD players that MOREY acquired? How do you think Scola and Martin GOT here?
He couldn't draft those players but why are you and people saying he was "great' at drafting? Who are those 'great players" that he drafted?
Why did Morey try to trade Scola and Martin for a declining Pau? Why can't Morey keep a good core of players after doing more than thirty transactions in two years? This is his fifth year with the Rockets, why is the team still in a rebuilding mode? Is that a sign of a good, never mind good, an average GM?
Scola and Courtney Lee trades. Good in principle about job flexibity. Though what NBA GM has ever QUIT (I'm not talking about the Rudy T type "resignation"/force-outs) Agree FULLY about the TIME to deal. It does NOT matter how shrewd a GM is, when making trades its all about dealing a player at PEAK VALUE right before they decline to get MAXIMUM return. McGrady should have been dealt the year before or during '08-'09 (before he torpedoed his own trade value announcing knee surgery). Battier made an NBA All Defensive team. You maybe trade him for a Wesley Matthews/Thabo Sefalosha/Trevor Ariza type. Or try to find another Arron Afflalo, Courtney Lee, Lowry type undervalued by their own teams. Probably weren't going to get a midlevel or low lotto pick for Battier because the teams that'd want Battier were probably DECENT teams with low picks.
Its more just the irony/contradiction of putting down the GM for being terrible, but then at the same time coveting the guys he brought in Not much more to it. Its like saying "This strip club manager here brings in NOTHING but UGLY CHICKS! " Then the strip club moves out a couple strippers for a possibly better prospect, then you say "Noooo don't give away THOSE strippers!" You just indirectly complimented the manager for bringing in likable product lol.
And this is what irritates me. Did the Rockets ever really bust their balls to find Yao a backup. Deke wasn't going to last forever. Deandre Jordan Marc Gasol You can't miss out on guys like that, especially if you are boy genius.
In order: Sam Presti Danny Ainge RC Buford Donnie Nelson Kevin Prichard Kevin O'Conner Pat Riley Mitch Kupchak Undoubtedly some of the best GMs in the league has had in the past few years. All of them passed on Marc Gasol at least once in the second round. Clearly they should all be fired. As for DeAndre Jordan, I want to point out that many, many posters are misremembering the Rockets' situation at that point. In 2008, the Rockets were a dark horse contender, having just put up a 22-game winning streak; half of those without Yao. Tracy McGrady was getting shoulder surgery and would be healthy for the first time in years, the Rockets finally had bench depth with Landry and Brooks. You can argue one way or the other whether Morey already had the Artest deal in his pocket before the draft and picked Greene for Sacramento, but with that rental, they were clearly pushing for a banner. The one huge hole on the roster was backup center. Deke at that point was unofficially retired; only being persuaded back at midseason. Keeping in mind that with Yao and T-Mac's injury woes, you might have only a single season window and need a rookie to play 10 good minutes a night in the playoffs, do you draft the 4 year senior who anchored the defense on a team that would have won (and then vacated) the national title except for poor free throw shooting? Or do you draft the freshman who couldn't start for his team that got knocked out early and was as raw as they come? Dorsey was a bust, but the thinking behind the move seems to make sense to me. Maybe if he didn't become an alcoholic, he actually plays and helps the Rockets win a chip in the alternate dimension where Yao's lower body is as durable as Kareem's.
