Because HOU didn't give up a live player to the Knicks, only McGrady's expiring contract when he was out of the rotation already. What they gave the Knicks was the ability to dump Jeffries' salary, which gave the Knicks the ability to take on two max players (ended up being Amare in free agency and Melo by trade). What the Rockets got in return ended up being Jordan Hill and Royce White. The other half of the deal was Landry for Martin-- which was a live player for live player deal with both guys being experienced known quantities at the time.
And TRob may well do the same after leaving Houston. Sometimes these guys who struggle out of the gate take multiple years and multiple changes of scenery to finally figure it out-- good for them personally but little comfort to the teams that had them before they become productive.
What's your point here? Using the awesome power of hindsight you can show pictures of players that turned out to be busts? Furthermore, Harden was the result of shuffling around players, taking risks on players, until has amassed the perfect hand played at the perfect time. Come on you are smarter than that. You are coming off as a person who got their feelings hurt, this trade wasn't personal.
The point is that "someone else's unproductive lotto pick" is not a very good bet. It is fine to make trades, even frequently, but some trades just don't have a positive expected value. I have said it many times: I am fine with dealing Patterson, this particular trade does not look good. As I asked in the post, can you name the last unproductive lotto pick who became productive after being acquired by Houston?
I wouldn't say it is a good bet, there are very few good bets in the real world. But I would say it is a good move to remain flexible while taking a gamble on higher lottery picks that didn't work out originally. Why? We haven't even finished the season. Became productive directly or perhaps indirectly through the flexibility and capspace we got?
funny how Trevor Ariza, Jordan Hill and Earl Clark were both deemed busts, and they go to the Lakers are turn into above average role-players
What I find funny is how all of a sudden everyone forgets that the team had tough stretches with Pat playing PF. Everyone suddenly thinks Pat was the greatest thing since sliced bread. You know what the Rockets had when they had Patrick Patterson? They had a no rebounding Power Forward that was not good enough to help Houston get to the next level. Pat was a good soldier that could hit the mid range shot. Thanks Pat but we needed a lot more and his upside was not much. Anybody care to guess what the following games this season all had in common: vs. NOH 79 - 88 loss vs. BOS 91 - 103 loss vs. Philly 100 - 107 loss vs. LAC 109 - 117 loss vs. DAL 100 - 105 loss vs. IND 95 - 105 loss vs. MIN 79 - 102 loss Besides all of those games being part of our 7 game losing streak earlier this season PPat was the PF that garnered most of the minutes in those games and guess what? He sucked just as bad or worse in every single one of those games as either DMo or TRob during the last few games. Stop acting lack PPat was this great PF that the Rockets just traded away. DM said that he made it a little harder for the team to make the play-offs this season. DM is playing the long game and making moves to help the team return to contention not just return to the play-offs. PAT was not contributing to the long plan.
What flexibility and cap space? Robinson costs more money than Patterson does. Houston did not gain any cap space or extra consideration from this trade. So, this is a bet on Robinson and, unlike the Thabeet deal, not an instance where you take a draft bust mostly to make contracts match in a trade for something else. This team simply does not have a very goo track record for turning around the career of lotto picks who didn't manage to be productive before joining the Rockets.
Don't move the goal posts. You asked which players had been successful, I asked you a question, then you make it about Robinson specifically. Since you now made it about him specifically, Morey has made it clear Robinson was someone they liked in the draft (obviously more so than Patterson). This move is about Morey getting a better piece (in his mind) in exchange for moving a piece that in all likelihood was not going to be on this team next season. I believe Morey realizes that Patterson is better and more useful overall now, but believes Robinson will be better in the same amount of time as Patterson had.
Lately, when I see your posts all I think about is this. Lighten up. We are 7th in the West still. Be sour if we actually miss the playoffs. Life is too short to be so sour and dour.
Perhaps the sample size is too small (Thabeet/Flynn/Hill/Williams/Aldrich/Robinson) If they gamble on 10 underperforming lotto picks and one becomes a star, that might be worth what was given up. Not to mention we were able to try all these guys out without any long term damage to our cap. My guess is Morey could go out and find a dozen players with Patterson's skill set whenever he wants. The cost of all these low probability/low risk/high reward moves is the dependable but limited rotation players you have to give up.
LOLOLOL true. Morey is a computer nerd looking at stats analysis and such. So far its not working to well but Les gave him 4 more years to try it.
Let's go back farther in team history, then. This kind of resurrections are just rare. And they do happen, it may well happen for the player's third or fourth team (Thabert looking non-sucky this year does HOU no good). Chances are that HOU will give Robinsin a year or so to work it out and then trade him for whatever they can salvage (like they did with TRob 's friend, Marcus Morris). This front office isn't exactly known for patiently developing a player.
just wanted to add , this trade with the kings could have easily happened in the offseason instead of in the middle of playoff run. PPAT was the only consistent midrange shooter just like scola before him. In this league midrange jumpers take alot of skill but morey doesnt value that. He likes houston taking 30+ 3 pointers a night and such. THIS ISNT MIAMI ITS HOUSTON MOREY
Thank you. There was a Patterson thread while he was here, instead it was the opposite. It was about posters posting their frustration of Patterson. Patrick Patterson was FAR from consistent, in fact if he were more consistent he'd likely be untradeable. PF was our weakest position and still remains so. Patterson was not going to be here much longer any ways and was a 'alright' player. On a good team he's a guy that comes in off the bench and plays great in limited minutes. The Rockets are trying to build a championship team, not a competitive 8th seed team.
Maybe, just maybe, the Rockets, who said they really liked Robinson coming out of the draft this year, liked his talent more than they liked Patterson's talent. Maybe, because of this, they felt it would be beneficial long term to develop Robinson instead of Patterson, who the Rockets felt had peaked.
