Are you being rhetorical? Bias died around a decade before Duncan came into the league. The Celtics did tank, and they had 2 picks that year, each of which was expected to be a top 3 pick. The word was they were tanking in hopes of getting Duncan and Van Hord, but they ended up with (off the top of my head) the 4th and 5th pick and got Mercer and Billups. So, I agree, tanking does not always work -- just fact checking you a wee bit.
LOL really? I always thought Bias was TD's class since he was also the 2nd pick. Well in any case the one thing I'm sure off is the Spurs were only the 3rd worst team, and beat the odds to draft TD. Looking at that draft class, seems like only the Spurs benefited from their pick, rest got traded, left in FA when they became good or became a bust.
Except you get more rewarded for being suck with a much, much better draft pick. That in itself makes it much easier to get to great than to get to great from good. That is a non-logical argument. It is like saying A turns B into C, so if we have B we can get A. However, the whole issue is that the catalyst is what is currently missing. Without that catalyst, you won't really get C. You may get something close to C, but it will never actually be C. And no matter how much you try B cannot turn anything into A. Of coures past returns are not a GUARANTEE of future returns. Nothing is a guarantee. However, past returns are the best way to predict the best odds for future returns. I see, we will be signing a Hall of Fame Superstar player. So who will that be? Ray Allen? Kevin Garnett? Jason Kidd? Eric Gordon? Deron Williams? Dwight Howard? Steve Nash? Tim Duncan? Wait, 4 of those players are essentially done being Superstar players. 3 of those players make your current best player irrelevant. And none of those players will be signing with Rockets. Today this is the deepest conference in the NBA. If they Rockets say start to rebuild now, maybe in 3-5 years when they start peaking most of those teams will NOT be that good like say...Lakers, Spurs, Mavs, Portland, Memphis, Phoenix. This has been the mantra for 2 seasons already. That is 2 seasons of NOT evening making the playoffs. Yes some of the players on the team have changed over that time, but this team is still only 9-7 and not much better than those teams.
We have a good chance of making the playoffs this season on the fact that we have such a young team. We can sustain those brutal 4 games in 5 nights and not have to sit out too many players for rest (i.e. boston celtics, dallas mavericks, san antonio spurs). That would be great and all, but I still feel like the draft has so much talent that a half hearted playoff run isnt worth it.
Depends on your perspective, I suppose. Hawks had a losing team practically since the Domonique days, they built a team that usually finishes around fourth in the East. They're a pretty long shot to win the East; but that has to be a lot more fun for the fans and for the organization than twenty years as a doormat.
No. It doesn't. For the reasons I have already explained. Draft picks are risky. Free agent signings are much less so. And the Rockets would be an attractive free agent destination after making the playoffs without a bona-fide star in the western conference. <insert pancake bunny picture> OK, here's a past return for you: The Lakers in 1996 traded for Kobe Bryant and signed Shaquille O'neal. And this was AFTER making the playoffs. That's right, they didn't draft *either* of their best players during their 00-02 dynasty, nor for ANY of their best players in their 09-10 chips. The Mavericks traded for Dirk Nowitzki in the draft, too. I don't know how I forgot about these examples before. Point is, there are MANY ways to get the job done, and trying to sabotage your own team is not one of them. If they don't, we can discuss this problem at that time. But yeah, Dwight would be the number one target. That's what people have been saying about the West for about 20 years now... ... No. Last year, the Rockets will still pinning their hopes on Yao possibly coming back healthy and filling our one major weakness: star power and lack of a center. That plan fell apart in December. So really, these Rockets have had about one year to rebuild, and we're ALREADY BACK IN THE PLAYOFF PICTURE after JUST losing our two superstars. I think people need to shut up and trust our management. They have done enough to prove that they know what they're doing, no matter how impatient some of their ridiculous fans are.
This. --- Didn't know that Kobe wasn't even drafted by the LAL. Had to look it up. Found out that he was drafted by the NOH, and he's not even in the top 10. He was #13.
No. No, they would not be. Here are a few other teams that fit your description of Houston (for argument's sake, I'm including the East as well) Grizzlies Blazers Pacers Nuggets Sixers These are all teams that, with the addition of a Dwight Howard or a Deron Williams, would jump up the standings and become borderline contenders. Do you honestly believe any of those places will be in the mix as places that those two want to go to via free agency or S&T? It's nice to think about a star deciding he wants to be Houston's savior and take our mediocre team to the next level, but it's not a realistic possibility. Look at it from the star's perspective. Would you choose to: A) Join a 45 win team that your presence may turn into perhaps a 55-win team, while putting them over the salary cap, possibly over the tax and leaving them no way to improve anytime soon and playing in a flyover city for the prime of your career OR B) Join other superstars in a huge, flashy media market, contend immediately and for the foreseeable future, and reap victories, attention, and endorsements? I completely agree. That's why, when Morey asked Les for permission (he was denied) to blow the team up this offseason, I consider it compelling evidence that blowing up the team is probably what we should have done.
People don't seem to understand that if we tank and loose that will make all of our assets (players) less valuable. If we want value for our players they have to play well.
Or if we do it perfectly right, we can earn the right to spend 60% of our cap on 2 guys that have won a total of 2 playoff series together Like the Thunder
Here is thing. Sure the Rockets may be an attractive place for a star player to come to. But it would be a fairly risky bet. That star player would playing their prime years on a team with a number of players who have not been on a real championship contender (exceptions to Lee 1 year, Scola 1 year) nor have much playoff experience (same exceptions). No one knows how they would respond to that pressure and situation. Also, this organization. no matter how "well they are run", have not been a true contender for nearly 15 years. Yes, the T-mac/Yao years had promise. But how much promise is there with multiple 1st round exits and only 1 appearance in the 2nd round? Instead, that star player can go to a team/franchise that has been a champion or legit contender fairly recently or one that already has another star player possibly with strong playoff experience. In other words, the Rockets option might be a decent bet, but there are much better bets out there. Which one would you really take if you had 1 chance and no opportunity to change your mind later? 1. Shaq signing was by FAR the exception as he was the ONLY superstar prior to Lebron to ever sign with a new team that did not already possess a superstar. Having said that, there were numerous factors here: Shaq wanted to be in Hollywood. That does not exist in Houston. Shaq wanted to be part of the Lakers mystique. While it would be awesome, I do not see any player wanting to revive Hakeem's Rockets. No Mystique here. That was a time in Free agency when there was no salary caps and no forceable loss of salary if you left your original team. Neither of those apply anymore. Do you know how good the Lakers were when Shaq signed with them? They were #4/#5 quality team. Right now the Rockets are fighting to try to be a #8 quality team. 2. Kobe was top 5/6 player, but he was coming out of high school. That was one of first drafts in which high school players really changed how the draft went. As a result, a few teams did not want to take that risk (which would not be the case today but is mute since you have to go to college now.) Furthermore, it was well known at the time that Kobe would ONLY play for the Lakers. He had already signed an agent and talked to an Italian team to play in Italy for a few seasons if another team drafted him. Hornets picked up only for the sole purpose of wanted to force the Lakers to trade them Vlade Divac. So if you fully researched the situation, you would see that opportunity (finding a diamond in rough high schooler that others didn't really count) no longer exists, and Kobe would only play for the Lakers. No one as talented as he was would last past the #6th pick now. 3. Mavs had the 6th pick that year. 6th!! and would have taken Dirk there, but they wanted both Dirk & Nash, so they traded that pick with the Bucks back in a 3-team trade to do so. So two things, They still needed at minimum a Top 10 pick, but in reality a Top 6 pick. Again, we are dealing with a situation of finding a diamond in rough because teams then did not thoroughly scout Europe then. How many teams have drafted a Euro big with a top 10 pick since Dirk? How bout Top 5? My point here is that you are picking out mere exceptions that are super rare and trying to say that playing well plan is less risky than the method that has worked much, much more often. It does not work that way. Both plans have risks and low odds, but getting high draft picks is definitely works more often. Even if you do want to work a trade, or more specifically a draft day trade, you have to have something as valuable as what you are trading. That would mean another HIGH pick, a prospect that has a very high ceiling, or another player who is at least a 2nd tier star. Right now the Rockets have none of those trading chips. But this is not a new problem. There have been a number of stars leaving teams as free agents or via trade over the past 3 years and none of them have truly considered the Rockets. Even ones who had ties to the area decided to go elsewhere. If after all that we don't discuss the problem, then when will we talk discuss that problem? Then while you wait to discuss that problem, you miss out on getting that high pick and potentially drafting or getting a true trading chip to get that cornerstone. But those teams have generally been changing, which is my point. 20 years ago the best teams were the Rockets/Jazz/Sonics. All those teams god bad and got good cornerstones to try again in Yao/Deron/Durant. Then the Spurs got Duncan, Laker's got Kobe, T-wolves got Garnett & Dallas got Dirk. Eventually, Phoenix got Amare, so forth. It will be difficult to climb to the top every year. That is the NBA. However, the best teams typically cycle through. Sure there are teams that never take advantage and stay in the dregs, i.e. Clipper & Warriors, but most of the teams that climb back up do so by getting high draft picks and making the most out of them. The best franchises are not able to avoid never having bad seasons. They just simply minimize the number of them they have by making the most of the picks they get when they happen.
This is pretty much the same team we had last year. We switched out Chuck for Sam and Bud for Parsons. Each of those two players might be an upgrade but not big enough ones to take us from a 9th seed team to a contender. After 17 games through this season, which is a little more than a 4th, we are once again a 9th seeded team with the Lakers right behind us who are very likely to jump us before its all said and done. This team is just like the team we have had the past two seasons. We can and usually will beat the bad teams in the league but we struggle to beat the good ones. We are 4-7 against teams with winning records this year with one of those wins coming against a Spurs team without Duncan and Ginobli.
Thank You. I am so glad that somebody is pointing out that the Kobe at 13 situation would not happen in the NBA today. Anybody that really thinks that Kobe would have slipped to 13 if he had went and played a year at Duke is a fool.
Yeah...no not at the 8th seed. I really don't see Dwight Howard saying "Man look at those Rockets. That 8th seed team is going to be something!" The problem with trying to sign a star in free agent is this. It's very likely this star player is a free agent because he's looking to go to a better team. All of these superstars have snubbed us. Bosh. Melo. Dwight.Paul. We were on none of their lists. I think it would have been different if Yao were healthy but making the 8th seed is really counter productive for a franchise unless you have a young budding star that just needs the experience....like the early Rose-led Bulls or Durant-led Thunder that were low seeds one year, got that experience, then really blossomed the next...so like a team like Minny. Getting the 8th seed would be huge for them... For us though...I dunno. Lowry is good but is he a superstar? I don't think so. He's a all-star level player but superstar players take over games against big time opponents. That's really what we have not seen from Lowry. No one is saying the team should go out and lose on purpose...I think most pro-tankers just hope the team loses...especially with the shortened season I think it would have been nice personally... With how this front office operates I think our only chance is pulling off draft deal. It's obvious this team is too good to tank. I'm hoping we get into the 8th seed now....hoping our vet guys show up big and maybe some young team that has a bad record and good pick will be willing to to start actually building around their young stars with some nice veteran pieces.
