-First, glad to the extent that you agree that Morey's done pretty good overall. Good. Also, to the extent that people think Morey is infallible, I disagree with them. Leaving aside Royce White, we can all agree that The Terremce Williams trade did not work out. -Next, express whatever opinion that you want, it's just not a particularly good look to throw a tantrum and call people "****ing idiots" or whatever because people point out that your opinion lacks factual basis. But act that way if you must. I was simply pointing out that it is ridiculous to to call the fact that Asik wasn't traded "egg in their face" caused by an "inexperienced GM move." The team made Asik available, the market wasn't willing to pay the price Houston asked for, so they didn't make a trade. That's all. This stuff happens all the time as most discussion don't end up in a trade. Morey's made more trades than almost every other GM over the last few years. He has probably has more trade discussions that didn't go anywhere than almost other GMs, too. -As for Morey's draft history being "questionable." It has in fact been well above-average considering where they picked each year. Given the number of prospects out there every year, one can almost always point to at least one in the dozens of prospects available at the same spot and say that this other guy would have been better-- this is especially true when somebody drafted late turns into a star or near-star player (Tony Parker, Eric Bledsoe, etc.). It makes little sense to say that a team is bad a drafting just because a guy drafted later worked out better. The better way to look at it is to look at the guys picked over a period of time and determine whether these guys out-perform the average player drafted at these spots. If we look at Morey's draft history, he has beaten the average outcome given the draft order. Late 1st and 2nd rounders don't work out too often, but Morey's got more than his fair share of productive players in Brooks, Landry, Budinger and Parsons. Among the mid-first round picks made from 2010 to 2012, we have Jones, DMo, Lamb, Morris and Patterson all currently being rotation players on above .500 teams and several of them have shown the potential to be significantly better. Weigh these against Royce White not working out and it's not a bad history. -Also, I am not sure that the "right picks" you and others blame Morey for not making are even that much better. Larry Sanders doesn't look like much of a valuable asset right now after being very good last year. Patterson is now doing more to contribute to a better team. For all the accolades that Kawhi got in the Finals last year, he isn't that much more productive than Marcus Morris is this year and Marcus is also playing for a winning team and is pretty solid defensively. With players in their first few years in the NBA, the perception of which draft pick is a success or failure can change very rapidly. - The "circumstances" that Morey faced should absolutely factor into the evaluation of his performance. The same should be said about evaluating every GM. One can't expect the GM for the Utah Jazz to have the same degree of success signing free agent stars as the GM of the Lakers do simply as a matter of location. The fact that Yao and McGrady were essentialy lost to injuries in the same year while their max contracts remained on the books was as serious a challenge as team can face-- you don't get the player's services, you don't get cap relief, and you also don't get to trade them for value. Taking 4 years to find 2 new foundation pieces is pretty quick turnaround compared to other teams in their "rebuilding" efforts.
Yea so many Gms are disregarding their present and future to stick it to the Rockets. If there is a GM like that in the NBA, with that type mentality, I feel horribly for that organization.
I don't know how credible the article is. It sounds mostly BS to me. But some of you seem to be exactly what the article is talking about "arrogance." "Haters gonna hate" "You mad" "Sour grapes" that sort of things. When you are successful, you don't say those things to your competitors. You stay humble and do your work quietly. I'm not saying that Morey said those things. Morey sounds like a down to earth guy every time he talks. But he does talk a bit too much IMO and draws a lot of media attention. I don't know if that's the thing this article is about.
This silly chatter is probably coming from either the Lakers, Mavs, Warriors, Bulls, or Knicks. Gee, I wonder why? I continue to believe that the main reason Assik hasn't been dealt is that most owners are reluctant to take on his poison pill contract unless the Rockets are willing to accept sub par assets in return, which Morey will not go along with.
You said ridiculous ---------, tomato, tomatoe it's all a wash. And it is egg in your face to proclaim a absolute deadline that Asik will be traded and it doesn't happen. This whole board stood here in anticipation of what rabbit Morey would pull out of his hat. And then nothing, my first thought was holy shiit, this is just stupid. And the league stood back and laughed at Morey's arrogance for making some stupid deadline to begin with. I get what he was trying to do, create some mythical deadline to promote a bidding war but in reality he just made a bunch of GM's laugh and just say no. That's just inexperience and creates a negative karma around the league IMO. The fact is Morey came into this job a newbie and has improved but he still has more to learn. Yeah his smarts give him an edge in certain areas. I have been the first to give him credit for that. But his people skills and areas were stats aren't so effective have hindered him. Disagree if you will but to say Kawhi is not clearly better than Morris is a joke. I like PPat but Sanders is a big shot blocker, those guys are hard to come buy. Henson was my pick over Lamb. And Royce White had more red flags than Jeffrey Dahmer at a private outdoor barbecue. That being said I think Morey's system and his research on basketball schemes is one of the best. No need to be glad I believe Morey has done an overall good job, I speak the truth whether good or bad. ANd that includes my favorite players like Lin, DMo and TJones. I was quick to say Lin did not deserve to start after he showed very little while Beverly was out. Which brings me to another problem that you won't agree with. McHale is very slow to implement a lot of the hard work Morey has done. DMo deserved more minutes a long time ago. He slowed down Dirk in the preseason far better than anyone else and earlier against Dallas Dirk torched us and DMo was never called on. Last night DMo showed why he should have been. And this he has be brought along slowly like a fine wine is BS. DMo played a great game against memphis and stopped Zach Randolph when no one else could. Everyone on the team said DMo was the reason they won and then he gets two DNP's after. Nothing no minutes at all. So that's not on Morey or not much on him but you argue that it's not McHale's fault either. Why can't you get that no one is perfect and your beloved heroes are fallible too. Nobody comes in with all the answers. Morey came in here very raw and stunk it up early on. he is much better GM now but he is still learning. I expect he will never make up some stupid mythical bull**** deadline that other GM's will mock his arrogance for. Right now Asik is worthless to us. He is in the worst case scenario that could have happen. Worse than I even imagined. Morey deserves some of the blame for that as he deserves the credit for signing Howard and Harden.
For those of you that are displaying arrogance about this franchise on this thread.... What for? What exactly has this team ACCOMPLISHED in the last decade??
What? 6 pgs of this and no gif of Morey's head on the 'haters gonna hate' strutting bodies... Yer better than that, Clutchfans..... lol
Saying a group of people are being ridiculous is not remotely the same as calling a person a "****ing idiot". You should try to control your temper. This stuff isn't that important.
-I am not sure how a good performance in preseason is definitive proof of readiness for real competition. Remember Kelvin Cato? Preseason, like practice, have some value in telling you how good a player is, but it isn't definitive. You factor this stuff into your decision but it's reasonable to gather more information before declaring a player ready to start and help a team win. - Motiejunas did fine in the recent games, but it's not like he is some hidden superstar suddenly making the team so much more deadly. In fact, they pretty much played at the same level before Motiejunas got into the rotation (and with some combo of Jones, Smith, Casspi and Asik getting these minutes) as they do with him in the rotation. At best, he has so far shown himself to be a somewhat competent guy who may be better or worse than the other alternatives on the roster depending on matchups and other factors. It's not like the team was giving minutes to Rick Brunson and costing themselves game after game when Chris Paul (or Kyle Lowry) is sitting on the bench.
The deadline had a logic behind it, to trade for a player (s) who could be traded again before the deadline. Still, given a time machine, I wonder if Morey would have pushed harder (or accepted less) to get rid of Mr Pampers before the season began?
OMR, I agree with the point that Morey overplays his hand and it hurts the rockets. Many on here claim that Morey isn't immune from criticism but still treat him as such, and portray other GMs around the league as toddlers behind the seat. That being said, I think your point would have been more effective had you left out the symbol profanity. You are a respected poster so your posts are always given more weight. Herrera and the peanut gallery can be annoying but it is still better to maintain an atmosphere suited for discussion.
Morey doesn't leak much, especially about other teams players. Notice how there wasn't any info whatsoever about Atlanta despite the media all postulating Millsap? We got tons of info about Boston because that's what Boston does.
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Morey is probably the only GM out there who rebuilt his team without ever having a losing season or jeopardizing the integrity of the team by tanking. He also did it in 4 years, in the extremely competitive Western Conference. The most valuable draft pick he had during the rebuild was a 12th pick, and he turned it into James Harden. It's fine to criticize Morey, he isn't immune. The problem is I don't know if there are any better alternatives out there than Morey. GMs make or break your team, and all you need is a crappy GM like David Kahn for your team to be stuck in mediocrity for a million years.
--So, what exactly did Morey cost the team by not trading Asik before the "deadline"? That teams now know that Morey is not totally serious sometimes when he declares a deadline? Big deal. Teams publicly declare things that they don't mean all the time while posturing for their own benefit. Will teams willing to give up a certain package for Asik no longer want him because they are offended at Morey's "people skills"? Hardly. In fact, it's been specifically reported that Boston still wants to work an Asik trade even after the first "deadline." -- Of course coaches (and GMs) make mistakes even given the uncertainty and gambling inherent in every decision. To me a mistake by a coach is where his decision goes against almost unequivocal evidence and costs his team something important. For example, when Rick Adelman in 2010-11 kept giving Jordan Hill (and post-injury Aaron Brooks) more minutes even though the opponent would go on a run whenever either of these guys were in because of their play. These stretches cost the Rockets who narrowly missed the playoffs. Another example is when Scott Brooks kept playing Kendrick Perkins vs. Miami in the Finals. Again, all the statistical and observational evidence say that this doesn't work and sticking with this cost OKC. For things that are 50/50 and where there really isn't much data on the question, I don't blame coaches for just trying something out and see how it works.
No, the deadline was stupid. Teams are not obligated to trade for Asik. Why would the GM desperately tryna trade his disgruntled offensively challenged center give teams a self imposed deadline? Teams are not obligated to deal with us, I guess Morey never got the memo. All you guys celebrating this will be the same ones crying foul when Morey's not able to get a significant trade done. I can imagine the excuses, "I feel sorry for Morey, he's been screwed over by the league". Arrogance is not a good thing to have when your running a basketball team
This is why the Executive of the Year award shouldn't be voted by other GM's, Morey will get robbed no matter what he does.
