Have you never left a company your entire life for a higher salary or position? It's honestly weird the standards people put on others they never apply to themselves. Lebron, KD and Harden left cuz they wanna win and unlike MJ and Curry they didnt have power teams built by their GM. If staying on a single team is so celebrated where are the parades for Damian Lillard? Kobe for example ran Shaq out of town even if Shaq was the guy who got the team their 3 peat. Is that honorable? lol
Yeah I've genuinely never understood people who have a beef with that. Some players want to be a 1 team player, good for them. For most people there's no such thing as "loyalty" to work unless it's either your family business, your own business, or you've been there so long that it might as well be, that's longer than anybody plays any pro sport tbh.
Well, this is a Rafael Stone thread and he did work for only one Company named the Houston Rockets so far. His players have not...... And if you have to include beef and companies, then yeah, it would be if Michael Jordan first verbally hand shook with Adidas or Reebok and ran away to Nike in the last second..... (Movie: AIR a little altered.) (In the Movie his Mother was the negotiator)
He’s always been a horrible GM to me……the Cam trade just sealed the deal for everyone else to see. At age 37 and declining/injuries certain to occur, don’t be so sure that we ripped Phoenix off with Green, Brooks, lottery pick, and 5 seconds. Losing Green, Brooks, Whitmore, and a lotto pick for basically a net of a 37 year old is no guarantee.
Stone did good by undoing the bad bet on Green's extension for KD. Capela was a head scratcher, but that might be at Ime's request (not sure). Losing Whitmore (guard/wing) is one thing but probably should have gotten another guard. For the record, Presti won GM of the year (2024-25 - voted in by other GMs of NBA).
Yeah that is a good amount when you really think about it. The ultimate slap in the face would be if somehow Jalen green becomes consistent. And I say this being a person that wanted green gone.
I don't think Stone is horrible, but he's definitely over-rated as the "draft-genius". All of his high picks were consensus picks (Green #2, JSJ #3, Amen #4, Reed #3). I won't fault him if Green/JSJ/Reed don't pan out because those were the consensus picks, and I won't credit him too much if Amen turns out to be super star because most people would have taken Amen #4 in the draft too. I'll credit him for the Alpy pick (even though it was Eli Witus' idea but Stone has the final say so he gets the credit), and the Tari pick (even me, as a causal fan, predicted this pick before the draft so it's not something too crazy but still a positive one). I'll call him just an "Average" GM, always takes the safe (easy) way, only homers would even start the GM of the year conversation.
FVV got an off-season injury and now people are throwing stones at Stone. He's a better Gm than Morey.
Morey following Yao and T-Mac career ending injuries took 3 years to get back to the playoffs and 5 years to get to the WCFs. Stone is in year 5 of post-Harden rebuild and has 1 playoff loss to show for it. He's objectively behind Morey in terms of team success in their rebuilds, and if he doesn't make the WCFs this year, then he would be way behind Morey in terms of team-building success.
Yes, and i'm afraid that even if they drafted Grimes in the 21' draft they might give up on him too early, given Stone's love for KPJ/Nix. (waiting to see how the Whitmore trade pan out)
