Evaluation of Rockets front office moves Not letting Hakeem rob us for another 3 years: Grade A * Hakeem was looking to bag the truck and collect a check, Good job Carroll of seeing through the smoke screen. Signing FATO to a $6 mil per year deal: Grade D- * We were rob and it continues every year FATO picks up a check. Not an F, because he made an attempt this year. However, he should enroll in weight lifting class with the quicks. Glen Rice: Grade D * Overpaid for an aging superstar that has been injured. His lateral movement is shot and will hit the jumper on occassion. Definite liability on D with a team not known for playing defense. MoTaylor: Grade C- * Give him the benefit of doubt due to 2000 performance, however, the boy needs to leave the chronic alone. League suspension waiting to happen. Very poor work out habits, doesn't rebound on both ends, and defense is horrible. Moochie Norris: Grade C Scores clutch buckets. However, if goes under another screen deep in the lane and let's the other point guard shoot a wide open 3, I'll scream. Too much money for the production on a consistent basis. Not signing Webber: Grade A++ Would have helped on the offensive, however, he is the twin of MoTaylor with better rebounding. He loafs up the court on D and only runs on offense when he's sees a wide open opportunity for a dunk. MoTaylor's jumper is definitely better. Steve Francis: Grade A+ I don't care what DaDakota's writes. Steve w/improvement on D is an Annual starting All Star participant. I can't wait for the Big D and H-town to square off in the finals. Turn off lights and watch Steve torch Nash on the floor and in the post. They will switch Finley to Steve and then watch Cat go to work. I have not included draft picks like Bryce Drew, Zerg Swikker, Turkscan, Collier, Dickerson (loved his desire/game) Overall, the front has done some good and bad. I do like the direction of the team if we're able to trade some dead weight like Rice and Cato.
Big D and H-Town are in the same division, they can never square off in the finals. All that being said, I agree with most of what you say. DD
Ignorant post of the day... Are you saying that we are better off without Webber? I know that we have Eddie Griffin, but he will be very hard pressed to ever be as good as Webber. Griffin will most likely be a solid 17 and 9 type guy. And spare me about how Webber would have take a lot of the salary cap. So would Francis... We will be over the cap for a long time anyway, once Francis gets his extension.
We're better off without Webber. He can score, he can rebound, he can pass, but he can't win. I'm happy to not have to cheer for him.
I can't believe this is Webber. How could you possibly say Griffin MIGHT become Webber? I'm certain he'll eclipse Webber. He may never be the passer Webber is, but Webber will never be the shotblocker. Nor does he have the desire to go into the post.
Clyde Drexler A Kevin Willis A (the first time) Charles Barkley B+ Scottie Pippen C- (would've been lower, but we only gave up Roy Rogers) Charles Jones A (the Defense) Matt Maloney B+ (the pickup) Matt Maloney F (the long-term contract)
This should be an F because look at what we got to get rid of him. Cato the Wiz plus additional crap.
kidrock ...you hit the nail on the head...I cant understand how some guys think that NOT signing Webber was a smart move. All they say is how he disappears in the playoffs..etc etc etc ...Why? Because he doesn't have a ring? A lot of guys don't have rings...does this mean Nowitski disappears? how about Malone? Wallace? Mcgrady? Newsflash...in order to "disappear " in the playoffs, you have to make the playoffs. IMO, if you put Webber on our team, we just might be talking about last nights 2nd round playoff game instead of how average Kenny Thomas is.
Calling heads instead of tails in 1984 - A Or was it tails instead of heads?? Oh well, I guess it doesn't matter...
Kidrock, check yourself before refering to a post as ignorant. We seek to communicate on this sight. If you want to bash don't reply. Let's look at Webber, he makes a ga-zillion dollars, as a result, he should post the numbers. Sacramento record was better without Webber in the lineup. Stojokavic performed better and the team played better D. I challenge you to watch the Dallas series and watch how he shoots jump shot after jump shot. Also, watch the lack of hustle up and down the court. Dirk is beating him up and down the floor at will. On defense, they hide Webber and put him on Najera (give me a break, MoTaylor can light up Najera). Also, combined Kenny Thomas and MoTaylor numbers at the 4 spot and we have Chris Webber numbers plus saved $5 to $6 million.
Just because the Kings actually have enough talent to play without their superstar for a while (unlike a certian local team), doesn't mean they are better off without Webber. I can't imagine you really believe that. Have you been paying attention to Dirk? Dirk is kicking EVERYONE's butt. If Dallas faced San Antonio, they sure as heck wouldn't have Duncan covering him all the time. Does that mean Duncan sucks? No, its all about matchups. NOBODY matches up with Dirk right now. You just find your tallest, quickest defender and hope he doesn't get used. I believe we were 0-4 against Sacremento this season. Webber only played in two of those, but his averages were very good: 27 pts 7 ast 10.5 reb 2.5 steals 1 turn over 31 min For the season, KT averaged about 14 points, 7 rebounds and just under 2 asts. Last season, Taylor averaged 13 pts, 5.5 rebs, and 1.5 asts. Are we better right now without Webber? No way. We gambled that Griffin will be a superstar and we gave up any real chance of being good any time soon. By the time the Rockets are a real force in this league, most of the current Rockets will be gone one way or another. --Drof
Well, with all due respect....that is ridiculous. If you truly believe that Sacto is better without Webber, you are nuts. As far as the KT/MoT vs Webber comment...thats like saying, 'we beat you, you beat them so we could beat them easily'. With Webber, we would be in the playoffs.
With Webber as our star, we would never win the championship, so what's the point? And we wouldn't have been in the playoffs this year. Peja could get us closer than Webber ever would.
Thats not entirely the point. For the most part, unless Shaq is your "star" you probably won't win the championship. What you are saying is that you'd rather be in the lottery every year without Webber that perhaps go a couple of rounds (perhaps even the West Conf Finals) with him. Peja could get us closer? Yeah right. Because the 3's n the west conf are so much tougher to play against than the 4's. At least with Webber, you match up with any 4 in the west evenly with the exception of Duncan...and I'd take Webber and Francis as a 1-2 punch over Duncan and Parker any day of the week. Using your logic, we should just be happy in the lottery unless we get Shaq or Duncan.
We wouldn't sniff the title with Webber not because he isn't Shaq or Duncan, but because he is Webber, ie a total puss in the playoffs. Webber matches up well with other 4s? pfft, the dude could barely do anything against Ostertag. At least Peja attempts to drive it to the rack and is justified shooting jumpers being that he is one of the best shooters in the league. We should be happy in the lotto til we either get someone who elevates his game in the playoffs, or until the players we have mature into great players.
Guys, I just have a question. Webber would have been asking for the max or dan well near it, correct? If we would have signed him to the max, could we actually have afforded to sign Francis to the max? I don't understand how all the salary cap stuff works, but with two max contracts, Cato's contract, and Mobley's significant contract, could that have even been done? One of the reasons they may have passed on Webber is because they wanted to make sure they had the means to resign Stevie to the max contract when the time comes, and I would certainly agree with their line of thinking. Also, I think they were worried that they would have gone into some long bidding war for Webber only to eventually lose; meanwhile, Maurice Taylor woud've resigned with somebody else and we would have been left with nothing. I think not going after Webber was more of an objective decision than a subjective decision. Anyways, I know for sure that if we signed Webber to the max contract, we would've never drafted Eddie, who I think will be at least as good as Webber. And the fact that Eddie is younger makes him more valuable. I think the Rockets made the right decision not going after him.
Right...and Ostertag is sitting next to Malone watching the same playoffs you are What does that have to do with the price of tea in China? Like I said...you are happier in the lotto without Webber than competing in the playoffs with him
