Rocky Mountain News July 3 :Houston offers brent barry 4 year 24 million deal

MManal, I agree with everything you just posted. Skinner would be my first choice as well. Hopefully the Baylor connection will help.

 

He is a Rocket now so maybe you shouldn't disrespect him like that now.

 

He's not 1 dimensional yet but in 3 years, what can he really do?

He's a pretty good passer but by then he'll be such a defensive liability (even worse than now) no way can he be anything more than a Vinnie Johnson instant offense type off the bench.

He'll be raking in about $7 million by the end of his deal and we'll be begging people to take his contract like we did with Glen Rice.

Unfortunately, there's no DH in basketball.

 

Barry isn't one-dimensional. He is also a good rebounder, passer, and great fastbreak player and a solid slasher.

 

and a very injury prone player.

 

Well, Pike made 2.5M in his first season, just like Voshon Lenard. Voshon Lenard will make 2.5M again this season, while Pike will make slightly more - almost 3M. Why the extra cash? Because he will have been with us for a year and would be more adjusted to us. Personally, I haven't given up on Pike. I think maybe this change of supporting cast can help him a great deal.

Pike is not a problem. He's easily tradeable. It wouldn't be a fantastic deal since he just had his worst season as a pro, but it would be decent. Doesn't that say something to you? That this was the WORST season in his career? To me, that sounds like he can only go up from last season. Not a waste at all. Very very reasonable contract.

As for Barry, he's FAR FAR from one dimensional. One dimensional is Lee Nailon - someone who can score like hell but do absolutely nothing else. Adonal Foyle.

Brent Barry can pass, shoot, run the team efficiently, is a decent rebounder, has size, has smarts, has experience, and can be effective scoring 10 points or 30 points. He's not one dimensional.

I wouldn't pay Arroyo that money - when Utah fans call him erratic, then he must be a freaking moron with the ball. You only need half a brain to run Utah's offense. Hell, Maurice Williams did it for the early part of the season. he seems like the classic Utah Jazz system player that flops afterwards - Shandon, Eisley, Bryon Russell, etc...

 

One other point for the folks clamoring for Arroyo. Hypothetically, if the Rockets chose to go this route, they would have to sign Arroyo to an OFFER SHEET on the day the FA market opens (July 14th or 15th). This essentially means that the Rockets would not be able to do crap until the Jazz decided whether or not to match Arroyo. The Jazz would have a 15 day window. This essentially means the Rockets could come away with absolutely nothing for their MLE if the Jazz match b/c the players worthy of it would very likely be off the market by July 30th. Carlos Arroyo is a nice player and all but is simply not worth this kind of risk. The Rockets need to target players that are UNRESTRICTED which Barry, Fisher, etc are. This is no longer a long term re-building plan, the Rockets can be contendors immediately if they fill out the roster with appropriate talent.

 

This is a little off topic, but what happened to the Pike for Kevin Ollie trade? I guess since we acquired Tyrone Lue, already have Wilks, and plan on signing Brent Barry, we don't need Ollie. I am fine with that... at this point, it would be a pointless trade (excuse the pun).

But Pike was a major dissapointment last season. I'd prefer to give Boki all of his playing time... Boki showed some "fire" in the playoffs (knocking Karl "**** sucking" Malone on his a$$). With more PT, I am hoping he will develope nicely this year!

That being said, any chance we can package Pike and the trade exception for a quality, banging big man to back up Yao? Then use the Mid Level on a point guard?

 

I agree..most times Piatkowski...he would just jack it up. Seriously...I remember he did hustle..it's just that I don't know what the heck he was thinking. I guess he had great expectations to shoot 3's..

But anyways I'm really looking forward to watching the Rockets play this season..so exciting..it's great..our team is sort of like a fantasy team! I never thought we would get TMAC. WOW. lol.

I really like our team..down low we have Yao Ming, Juwan Howard, and Maurice Taylor.
Then on the perimeter..we have many good roleplaying shooters like Jimmy, Padgett, Pike, Barry hopefully...and I really think Nachbar and Gaines will develop into good players.
Then we have Tmac...amazing scorer.and creater..iso him or whatever..there are so many things we can do with this roster..including Barry.
Then we have Tyronn Lue off the bench who will provide energy and make our team faster.

I do hope we get another shotblocker/rebounder though.

 

yeah we shoudn't give up on pike. Hopefully he's 100% health-wise and so he can get back to his old self

 

Nobody would want Piatkowski. Why? Seriously. These guys are a dime a dozen. Heck, if you want this type of player, pay Steve Kerr and he'll come out of retirement.

It's not about the $$ but the length. Piatkowski sucked last year and if we get Barry, he won't play at all. We're stuck with him because we gave him 2 more years than he deserved. Leonard is year-year.

As far as Arroyo, you'd expect a little inconsistency for a 24 year old first year starter. It takes years for a PG to develop his skills.

Tony Parker is way erractic too and probably will be for a few years. It's all part of the learning curve.

Tell me how many minutes Barry will be playing as a 35 year old? 30+ minutes a game at $7 million?

 

Over the last 4 years he has played in 88% of his games. that's 362 out of potentially 410 games. Over the same stretch Kobe Bryant played in 361 out of 410 games. Steve Francis, 374 out of 410. He isn't anymore injury prone then other players.

 

Since joining the Sonics he's missed an average of 9.6 games a year (11.1 for his career)... That's not great, but I wouldn't say he's VERY injury prone.

 

Sorry i am glad you guys did the homework which i should have done...just saw him sit out a number of games past few years....

i will reduce my comment to injury prone and no very injury prone

 

My bad, that should have said over the last 5 years not 4 years.

 

The one that has played over 72 games per season over the past 5 seasons?

Francis played around 75 games per season while he was here.


Considering he'll have a very capable backup in Tyronne Lue, a starter last year, I'm comfortable with that. He'll take much less of a beating because he won't need to drive to the basket as much and will become more of a shooter, plus he won't play more than 30 minutes a game with Tyronne Lue backing him up and JVG in love with defense.

 

lol!

I really don't think he's injury prone, particularly the last 5 years of his career. He's had some bad luck, like most players have.

 

I give up...i stood my ground until you guys had to shoot me down...you guys and your vast knowledge of players medical history.

 

RIET, My thought is that if it is a REASONABLE contract, Utah will match. A decent young player already signed to a reasonable contract is great trade bait, rather they plan to keep him or not. The fact that there is interest in him as a FA shows there will be a market for him on a reasonable contract.

I feel the only way to pry him away is to overpay for him. Not a huge grotesque contract, but something above his current value. Something that introduces risk, so if Utah resigns him, with the goal of trading him later, he HAS to grow to bring back fair value in the trade. If Memphis had offerd Posey a mill or two less (gee - I sound like a polition spending some one elses money already) the Rockets would have resigned him.

BTW - I like Arroyo, but I am not sure we should sign him. It depends on the contract. I pretty much like all of the names I am hearing. I'd take whichever brings the best contract.

My main point is Arroyo, as well as most of the other FA's we are discussing will not be cheap. It is easy to throw out names, and it is easy to throw our numbers, but it is hard to match them up.

 

If we get both Barry and Arroyo, that's pretty sweet.

It's not either/or.




Get that, and let the defense try and stop us. They can't.

Yao/Skinner
Howard/Taylor
Tmac/JJ/Boki
Barry/Tmac/JJ
Arroyo/Barry


Smart, skilled, deadly. We will bury you.



End of bench - Spoon, Lue,, then Pike, AG, Gaines, Wilks - $hit. thats 16.

We have to cut some of them and try to bring in some solid vet minimum role players ala Padgett.