Our defensive rating has dropped during his absence. We won a lot of games during this time mainly because of Jalen's offensive surge.
I've stated this before. I think Amen starting is important, because the first 8 mins of the game is against the other team's starters and the tone can be set, both offensively (Jalen seems to play better with Amen) and defensively (Amen can guard their best scorer 1-4). It also establishes a faster pace, because he gets so many defensive rebounds and runs up the court. It also solidifies FVV's role as off-ball which is the biggest factor in our better offensive play.
Sure, I can see your point. But again, it's not like we weren't also having success with Jabari in the starting lineup. We've been really good all season long. The point differential was also slightly better with Jabari than without, for whatever that's worth (maybe to be expected when you lose a starter's contributions entirely though, having him off the bench might still bring the differential right back up).
Thank you for understanding where is was coming from. I can do some research later when I get home. I'm sure there are more cases.
Amen in the middle of his rookie contract being this impactful makes him the least likely to be traded on this team if I was to chose one player. Rookie contract high impact player is a dream contract for a gm.
I would argue that you're sick for eating all of that lead paint as a child.... so where do we go from here?
There's realistically zero chance any of core 7 + FVV + Dillon are traded in season. On a human level, not gonna happen at this point. Plus Stone has no incentive job-wise - in fact he's disincentivized - from "starting the clock" on this team's expectations by moving real assets. If he were to make any significant trade, he would be judged on this playoffs as "the Rockets really going for it" instead of "the Rockets are just happy to be there and get some playoff experience". That's starts the timer on his job security one year earlier. He's not gonna make a rod for his own back. On the low end, I anticipate they're open to an experienced on-ball combo guard to give another option to Holiday/Sheppard minutes, either via the buyout market or moving Landale's contract. Brogdon makes sense if he's bought out. At C, it depends on whether Steven Adams is open to extending his contract by 1 year. If not, I think Adams could be flipped and Robert Williams could be in play -- the FO will really want someone under contract through this summer so they'd be tradeable and we keep the salary slot. Otherwise there are no minutes available for anyone new.
Yes, for basketball I came up with Giannis most recently that many thought would be a dynasty but haven't. CP3, John Stockton, Ewing, Barkley
