There were a lot of people higher up with the Rockets that were not happy when Stone was hired. He was viewed as a backstabber, partially blamed for Morey leaving (Stone and TF were close, and TF had Stone making decisions that Morey should), and was viewed as not the most qualified for the job withing the organization. He got the job because of how he negotiated getting the sale of the Rockets to TF finalized, and he bonded closely with TF. In fairness to Stone, he hasn't been incompetent. He has made some solid draft decisions and navigated the actual Harden trade "okay"..... he just seems to be "meh" at this point.... he is also lucky some of the moves he wanted to make never happened, like the Oladipo extension.
Who do you think we are, New York? Only (sports) media member who will ask the “tough” questions (as tough as you’ll find in this town anyways) is Chron columnist Brian T. Smith (and he’s occupied with the other sh’t show in town). Stone umm isn’t really uhhh comfortable umm answering questions uhhh you ummm don’t uhhh say.
Would you say that Luhnow was fine with the tank job knowing what we know now regarding the Astros? Pretty safe to say it worked out great after enduring those 3 straight 100 loss seasons. Luhnow from my memory recall enjoyed dealing with the media, and Im not sure Stone is wired the same. Porter was never intended to be a long term solution. He's never been more than a position coach since his stint as skipper here. Not sure he had the clout he thought he did if indeed he was out of pocket for requesting anything while babysitting that club.
The tank job was the brain-child of Luhnow. Back then teams didn't tank in baseball. He plotted and planned the tank and when Porter and some of the older players complained, they were fired or traded. As for Porter, I don't know that Luhnow thought of him as a long or short term option.
This is the gist of it, everyone knows the team wants to lose and the brass, most fans, and local media understand that. They can’t say the quiet part out loud lest the league gets involved.
This would explain why Stone is not proactive in trades and instead is reactive. Afraid of making a mistake.
You do realize we're talking about the Houston Rockets and not like, the war in Ukraine, right? I don't really care if the Rockets reporter is throwing soft balls to maintain the relationship with the organization. That's fine. Also, it could be they all expected this (as did I) and you're the one who is surprised and wants answers.
Good point and, I agree with you. He is very cautious because of his background, who he works for and his lack of experience and job security. Credit to him, he will make trades when he has no choice (Harden), but he also waits too long and was exposed by the Oladipo mess. Supposedly WOJ wasn't terribly happy that he was lied to. Stone is also the GM that Morey was alluding to, he discussed offering too much to Stone to see if he would discuss moving Gordon - and he didn't. Maybe he will grow into the job, he has overall done okay in the draft but I am not as confident when it comes to the people he surrounds himself with and the head coach - he is very concerned about having someone with more experience or success taking power away from him.
Didnt Stone net a 1st rounder back in the Oladipo trade? Not sure I follow the 'mess' when Stone flipped a used car for a brand new one. Not like Vic is a difference maker for MIA or suddenly emerged as a frontline player - he's a rotation guy (when he's not injured).
So do some Rockets fans not want a chance to get Victor Wembanyama or Scoot Henderson? Serious question. Let's start being more critical next year. The Rockets should be trending upwards starting next year.
Actually, being the worst team in the league for the 3rd straight year was not expected. Has never happened before. It also wasn’t expected for Jalen to regress, along with the entire offense. Or for us to still be the worst defensive team in the league after adding Jabari and Tari to the rotation. For the millionth time, we expected losses — nobody is worked up about the record. It’s about the lack of accountability, structure, effort, and execution in games that’s hurting development.
The Rockets are a multi billion dollar organisation with thousands of fans around the world who are dedicated to supporting and following the team. To answer your strawman, no this is not life and death, but neither should there ever be a a general acceptance that local media should do nothing more than to be mouthpieces, fed stories by the team or by agents and players without critiquing these things. If you don't care that is entirely your perogative, and I studied journalism and have worked in investigative journalism and so I have natural tendency to think about these things, its an area of interest and curiosity to me. But it wasnt always like this, the bar wasnt always on the floor, and media organisations didnt always ask for your hard earned money for endless puff pieces and pointless trade machine machinations. Is it the biggest issue in the world? Of course not. And we can all shrug our shoulders and say well what do you expect, but I think it might just be worth pointing every now and then that sports journalism is a mostly failed industry and few are doing their job right. And when you dont have people in place holding sports teams to account, their mistakes go hidden, unreported on, and unchecked, with possibly more and more mistakes following. Edit to add - you dont need 'hard' questions. Some of the questions I envisage asking if I were in the press pool are not hard. I dont want or expect a reporter to badger Stephen Silas and get all up in his face or anything like that. You can ask real basketball questions and learn and inform. But no, lets ask the same old ****. I've actually found it hilarious that we're starting to get some inadvertent truth, as beat reporters make a habit of asking visiting players and coaches about Jalen and KPJ so they can write out their polite, fawning answer of 'well they have a bright future!' and they can copy and paste for the next coach to roll into town, only recently its been met by an unexpectedly honest answer by Austin Rivers who actually spoke his mind and gave an honest assessment. Bet the reporter didn't expect that.
The media knows what’s up. We’re tanking. Tilman wants to lose. But, next season there will be no reason to tank. Maybe then the media will ask a few questions.
@Clutch himself is a member of Rockets media and has access to press conferences and post-game interviews IIRC, why not press the head honcho himself on why you believe he's "afraid to ask hard questions"? Can't be afraid to ask the hard questions to those who are afraid to ask the hard questions, even as a guest in their domain.
