Swift: Negative trade value

Seriously, if management was thinking, "get rid of useless overprized contracts", the first name that should've popped to mind.....



Juwan Howard

 

Unfortunately, the opinion of the BBS and the opinion of Rockets management towards Juwan Howard seem to be polar opposites. JVG has given numerous public statements supporting Howard as "hardworking and hustling".

 

Where are the minutes going to come from? Does Mike Fratello have some sort of offensive coaching system that will bring out these "tradeable assets" in Stromile Swift? Jeff Van Gundy may be stubborn and ultimately wrong for the Rockets, but I can't fault him for wanting to get rid of Swift. He's a dud. The Swift and Eddie Griffin experience are two great reasons why I support this trade. Going the sensible route and getting a young vet who brings it every night and fills needs over unmotivated "potential" is an encouraging sign by the management. The dare-to-be-great thinking was assembling a roster with Yao and McGrady in the first place. They are legitimate superstars who need teammates who are smart, efficient and dependable. Battier fits the bill.

 

Memphis is fools gold for Moneyball GMs.

Has any player performed their 48 minute expectations once they leave the Grizzlies?

 

If he is not an asset to Memphis, maybe they ought to move Stro to Seattle. I bet they could get an expiring contract such as Fortson in return. Seattle could use Stro as a replacement for Wilcox, who they apparently have cold feet towards paying his free agent asking price.

 

West also drafted Vlade and Nick Van Exel with VERY late picks. The Shaq trade wasnt bad either. He by no means perfect but I would take him as the GM over any other person in the league

 

We will see Stros value when West trades him which I think will happen before the season starts. So West will end up with Gay and ? for Battier.

 

They discarded him because of his chronic pink-eye injury

 

Maybe this deal was more about getting rid of Swift than drafting Gay who they didn't think was worth the 8th selection. It doesn't mean they didn't think Gay didn't have a lot of potential. Without the injuries that we suffered this year I don't think Swift gets his 20 mitnutes a game. He just didn't seem to ever to come around on the defensive scheme. JVG is so defensive minded that he just couldn't take Swift any longer, and this was a means by which to solidy an area of need. Chuck Hayes was taking minutes from and getting more rebounds than Swift, and that shouldn't happen.

From all the dogging we gave Swift last year I am glad he has been moved for Battier. If they don't pursue a solid, rough house, big man PF, though, I will be still be disappointed as in years past.

I like Battier, I didn't like Swift, and I would have liked Gay over time. But JVG is the coach like it or not (I am in the latter more than the former), and he is high on defensive specialist, and Swift never made the cut.

 

It's tough to tell with Swift. Sometimes I wonder if us fans value Swift as an asset more than NBA GMs? I dont know.

To me it appears Swift did have negative value when you consider the trade. Who has more trade value on the open market right now, Swift or Howard? Swift is younger and has one less year on his deal. To me he is more moveable. I guess we will find out when/if Howard gets moved and what happens with Swift in Memphis.

To me, it seems like JVG just got frustrated with Swift and wanted to move him and be done with it. Kind of knee-jerk reaction to me, much like when they deduced that Sura would be out for the season and they rushed to make the Alston/James trade to get a PG that is a "passer."

Tunnelvision.

 

I know. Someone like Stro who at worst will always be a PF/C backup and is effective most of the time should not have negative trade value.

 

Juwan was the best PF on this team, SS was a bust. Not that I wouldn't want to move Juwan for someone like Chris Wilcox but SS was a mistake. Glad he's gone because I was absolutely tired of hearing "He's been a huge disappointment" every time I watched a Rox game.

 

Nice post Don G. Many of us believe the same thing.

As far as Swift is concerned, I get tired of the argument that "he never got the minutes." This guy was the 2nd player picked in his draft and could never earn the minutes? He was a 6 year veteran who never lived up to his potential and played himself out of minutes. Going back to Memphis almost has a sort of symmetry.

What do you call the #2 pick in a draft that after 6 years in the league is averaging 10ppg and 5rbg and not getting playing time?

 

I thought McGrady was gonna make Swift a star.........

 

It seems to me that Van Gundy mostly creates additional negative value for his players or he rates them too highly before they get to us. We always seem to be in a negative deficit, when he has been signing players.

I believe when we take on Battier, after a while, he will be unliked by Van Gundy and Battier will become a more undesirable asset.

He allowed the same thing to happen to Swift, Anderson, James, Bowen, Francis, Mobley, Griffin, Ward, Weatherspoon, etc. These guys were let go with their value at an all time low. With Griffin in particular, if they knew he had problems, they should have traded him earlier.

 

Sincerely, do you really believe Stromile Swift is effective "most" of the time?

For an undrafted and undersized forward like Chuck Hayes to have taken minutes from him in an injury-riddled Rockets season does not speak well at all for Slowmile. Chuck, like Shane Battier, is the Anti-Stro. For that matter, I'm holding out faith that Novak will also bring more effect and efficiency to our team. I rather enjoy the prospects of Hayes getting more run, Shane playing the 4 in certain situations, and Novak picking and popping with T-Mac.

People say Stro would be better suited for Phoenix and NJ. The Phoenix and NJ teams don't use dummies (except for Cliff Robinson). The athletes on those teams actually have very high bball IQ unlike Swift. Her game (and I say "her" because I've never heard of a 2-3 week bout of pink eye) is more suited for the YMCA.

Slo underperformed with regard to his contract. I was actually on fire when they signed him, but he sucked so bad last year that I actually shook my head in embarrasment whenever he would have his every-other-game dunk moment.

 

. . .so many teams passed on him . . .blah blah blah

this Imo is the stupidest argument I hear around him

goodness. . .
didn't kobe go at 11
Rockets past on Tayshaun Prince at like 15
I think we could get a whole list of stars that were passed on
so
why bring up this bullsh*t argument?
Strangely enough bottom feeded teams at the top of the
draft makes mistakes and continue to be bottom feeder team

if this is the main argument against the guy . . . it is pathetically weak

Rocket River

 

*chuckle*
yea. . I remember that one too

Rocket River

 

Much like Major and others in this thread sharing his opinion, I am slowly coming to realize that this trade was a good one. At first, I was upset at (a) passing on Rudy Gay and (b) giving up so much for Battier, even though Shane has been one of my favorites players in the NBA for years.

Some things to take into consideration:

(1) ON THIS TEAM, Stromile Swift had negative value. While I was very excited about getting Swift last summer, I quickly came to realization that he is quite possibly the dumbest professional basketball player on the planet. Like others have said, he would constantly get lost in the team's defensive and offensive schemes. All he had to show for his year with us were a handful of Sportscenter dunks and blocks, along with ten times as many botched plays on both ends of the floor that hurt this team.

(2) Mark Twain once said, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics." I am hereby sending out the call to all Rockets fans to get their noses out of the box scores and fantasy numbers. I don't understand how those who readily note that a lot of players can score 20 ppg on a bad team are the same people who point to a player's statistics as the "be all, end all" of defining a player's value.

With that said, Rockets management has come to one fundamental conclusion: Stromile Swift is incapable of making "winning plays" for this team; while it is widely accepted around the league that Shane Battier routinely makes "winning plays" and is a winner. While I know this point does not directly address the trading of Rudy Gay, it does explain the Rockets' reason for trading a high draft pick. The difference in impact on the game that Shane Battier will have over Stromile cannot be understated; it is a substantial swing from a negative into a positive.

(3) According to reports we are hearing (including from Jerry West himself), the Rockets were NEVER interested in Rudy Gay. If this trade had not been made, the Rockets would have either selected another player--according to Jonathan Feigan, the Rockets were more interested in Ronnie Brewer and Thabo Sefolosha--or traded down in the draft. While neither Brewer or Sefolosha has that "potential star" label that Gay has, both were likely viewed by the Rockets as both "safer" picks or players that could more legitimately fit into the Rockets' system. That being said, I'd rather have Battier than take a (more calculated) gamble on such lower draft picks.

(4) Unlike Stromile, who many viewed as a perfect fit for the Rockets last summer, Shane Battier is a proven winner and the ideal "Jeff Van Gundy player". JVG is known to lose patience with his players, but it is pretty much always in the context of players not being dedicated enough or losing focus. That describes Stromile Swift to a tee. Such a thing has never been said about Shane Battier in his entire life, I bet.

(5) His contract aside, Juwan Howard has a positive value to this team. While maybe I'm wrong, I feel that the primary reason for his terrible "plus/minus" rating is simply due to the fact that he is routinely overmatched as a starting PF in the Western Conference. He has to match up most nights against Tim Duncan, Dirk Nowitski, Pau Gasol, Kevin Garnett or Elton Brand. He is the victim of the fact that the Rockets do not have anyone better at PF. Remember, Juwan came to this team as a "throw-in" in the McGrady trade, as a long-term contract the Rockets had to take on in order to get a superstar. That being said, he has put forth a good effort and has been a tremendously positive locker room influence. He is uniformly regarded among the players as one of the team leaders and has been singled out be JVG as one of the most dedicated and focused players. If JVG was really stupid and went with Stromile as the starter, the Rockets would have gotten killed in the first quarter of games even worse than they did this past season; and fans would probably feel that Juwan should play more and would generally have a more positive attitude towards him.

Bottom line: don't hate Juwan for being put in the unenviable position of being the Rockets' only real option at PF in a "PF-rich" Western Conference.

(6) Injuries are the primary reason why the Rockets regret making the Mike James - Rafer Alston trade. If T-Mac and Yao were healthy all season, this team would have been better with Rafer Alston as the Rockets' starting PG than with Mike James. Watching the (too few) games in which the Rockets fielded their mostly-full team, I saw Rafer do a terrific job at the PG position. Honestly, I thought that Rafer Alston ran this team as well as any point guard the Rockets have had in the past fifteen years. I truly believe that Rafer played a small part in Yao's emergence last season. Alston was able to get Yao the ball in optimum position, something that no other Rocket (possibly short of McGrady) has been able to do in Yao's career. His point guard skills are superior to those of Mike James. Period. Ask anyone in Toronto, and they'll tell you that James was clearly padding in stats late last year after another lost Raptors season in an attempt to score big in free agency this summer. That being said, I hope the Rockets can afford him as a great addition in the role of a third scorer.

Mike James was a vastly superior scorer, and his scoring punch off the bench was sorely missed by the Rockets when T-Mac went down. If the Rockets had fielded a healthy T-Mac and Yao, however, I don't think James's impact as a starting PG in Sura's absense would have been as great. As a 6th man, absolutely. But the Rockets desperately needed a starter, and Alston was the better fit at the time. Although I think James will demand a starting role if he's going to come back, I'd ideally like to see Alston start next year with James as a 6th man and primary scoring threat when Tracy and Yao hit the bench.


Okay, that's enough from me for now. Guys, have a little confidence that the Rockets management has a clue as to what they're doing. This team will be much improved in 2006-07, largely because it will be a "smarter" team.