He didn't acquire either of those two players and couldn't move them without Les' approval - as I recall they did discuss moving McGrady last offseason with Detroit but if I'm correct, I think Les may have nixed it. But anyway - you've only got so much room to spend on the salary cap, so it's quite difficult, if not impossible to both complement your franchise players AND find not-so-cheap replacements waiting in the wings. That means that where you have $15 mm committed to a positoin on the court, you can't spend more than a few $$$ to replace it. This is probably why Yao's backups were Mutumbo, Dorsey, Scola on occasion, Hayes (Respectively: Something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue- (collar/UK)) As far as McGrady - from Artest to Ariza and Wafer to Wells, the Rockets have acquired no less than 4 short- or long- term replacements during his tenure, which, at least last year, worked out well.
Good point. The stricter salary/luxury cap, limited number of roster spots, lack of minor league flexibility and on court importance of franchise players gives little roster flexibility for a basketball team. Things are much more black and white, at least for franchise players in basketball - injury prone=bad, injury free=good. In baseball there are more applications of "injuryball", as knowing exactly how injury prone an injury prone player really is can help identify under valued players. The majority of Red Sox FA signings this season have been low risk high reward signings of players with bad injury histories signed to performance based contracts (Saitou, Penny, Baldelli, Smoltz). So far Saitou and Penny have been significant contributors, Penny and Smoltz not so much, but on a baseball roster you can get away with that.
All of that plus the squandered First Round picks of past years and trades that cost the team First Round picks. The <i>Sins of the Past</i> by Rudy & CD have taken a while to rectify. Even though Portland is noted as a young team with huge upside, they spent millions in cleaning up their roster (Randolph -> Steve Francis buyout) and stayed for a while in the Lottery. Morey didn't have the Paul Allen type of funding to play with and needed to have the team in the Playoffs.
Another thing to say in defense of having replacements for McGrady and not Yao - not only are swingmen easier to find and more versatile, but the Rockets have shown, in 2008 as well as in prior seasons, that they're pretty capable of surviving with Yao-free lineups.
