Morey never expected Thabeet to make an impact here. He alluded to it more than once, but he never straight bashed the guy -- I think Adelman might have though.
When I started calling him Thabust, a guy said I had already "judged" him. What a joke! Thabust didn't have much talent at all and he didn't "dominate" in college. Anybody remember when he was crying like a baby against DeJuan Blair? That was the first, huge, red flag for me. Thabust had his moments but they were because of his size. Once he got to the NBA, size wasn't enough by itself. His complete lack of motivation to do anything other than enjoy being a millionaire was the problem. Blaming the Grizzlies for his failure is just silly. Their failure was drafting such a loser at #2.
coachbadlee still believes in him ;-) He and DD pushed so adamantly for this guy to play and were just so seemingly baffled when he didn't. Although DD wanted to play any and all young guys. Coachbadlee on the other hand...actually believed in him and thought he could/should play and hold down the five spot along with Greg Smith and Jordan Hill. Rockets put that quickly to rest by signing Dalembert. I'll always remember Rick saying "I don't know what I'm supposed to do with him?"
Garbage! Waiste of god giving hieght. What a Loser! I met him once at Blu lounge in Sugar Lands Town center. He even dressed like a dork and had no females in his crew. Looked like a straight up nerd. I asked him where is he displaying his art work? Then he got all talkitive. Asked about his offseason game and just walked away.
Hasheem can always go to the Euro leagues and dominate that competition, those guys can barely dribble over there. DD
I'm not going to pretend that I'm a draft savant, but guys like Morrison and Thabeet had BUST glowing in neon when I watched them in college ball. Thabeet was a perfect zone center in college, but plenty of evidence was there that he had no idea what to do with his back to the basket and that good centers had a field day with him 1-on-1. Morey was playing craps with Thabeet and Williams - when he made the Battier trade, he stated that there were only so many ways to land a good center in the league. He swung a low risk trade in hopes of coming up 6s with Thabeet. Morey absolutely did the deal crossing his fingers that Thabeet would beat the odds and morph into at least a Kelvin Cato.
Nah, I think that was just posturing, I mean, Thabeet was a freaking Rocket at the time, you cant blatantly diss your players. Battier's contract was games away from being up, he wasn't going to be retained, we got what we could for him. Thabeet's future-expiring contract was valuable. Adelman was never going to play the guy.
It was Morey treating him like an asset, that and not being given 30 minutes a night despite being terrible. Just like the people that are keeping T-Will down.
Both guys were high on Thabeet. Coachbadlee thought he would be productive if we threw him in the rotation for some reason. DD wanted to play the young guys and tank, but he definitely thought Thabeet was an NBA player. Everyone else knew he was garbage.
I still think Thabeet is an NBA center, but he needs a lot of work and someone to get him to try..... DD
Someone else has to get him to try? For cripes's sake, even someone as stupid as T-Will has sort of gotten it together after being kicked off the Rockets. Thabeet's had three years of doing nothing, being an abject and total failure, and just generally not giving a crap. If at this point, on his third team in as many years and at age 25, he's not going to put it together, then he isn't. Go enjoy life Thabeet, and don't waste your 15 million or however much you got from being tall.
You think a person who has no basketball fundamentals, little to no concept of team basketball, will dominate in the Euroleague where they focus heavily on fundamentals and team basketball? You're thinking of the D-league, too bad he didn't dominate that either.
You can Darrell Arthur, OJ Mayo, Mike Conley, and welcomed the very talented (yet troubled-team killing) Zach-Randolph with open arms (fans were cheering him at the airport when he first arrived to the team).
