You think Eric Piatkowski, a 32 year old 20 minute player for the 27 win Clipper team, at $2.67 million is cheap? He's a career backup and a career backup is worth how much? He's not worth anymore than a Lucious Harris who signed for about the same money with NJ. I don't mind losing Posey if we had a halfway decent player at SF. We don't. People seem to think we can play Piatkowski and Griffin at the same time at SF. We can't.
Franz Kafka: thank you VERY MUCH for your post. posts like that (truthfully) are, to me, the best part about cc.net. i love the inside trade rumors and all of that, but the inside knowledge about a player's game from people that have watched him play to me is what it's all about. i love it. thanks. Panda & tierre_brown: yes, AGruff was very good his rookie year with boston, namely because of his gruff attitude, endless hustle, and straight up hardnosed play. he's the type of guy that you never plan to stop (since he doesn't have the numbers), but somehow contributes to his team winning. he is the shotgun in Tony Montana's back at the end of Scarface. you just never see him coming. oldman: you mentioned that no one said anything about AGruff before, yet now that we have him we're saying he's just what we need. you're right. i can't speak for anyone else, but my reason for not mentioning him before was because i honestly did not know that he was available. somehow i overlooked him... MacBeth: yea, i kind of chuckled after i wrote it, too. but you get what i'm sayin'. RIET: what, to you, defines a "legitimate nba starter"? was kenny smith a legitimate nba starter? to me, kenny smith sucked the fat one. however, i realized then - as i do now - that it is all relative. he was a legitimate nba starter for houston because he provided what houston needed. that's his contribution. was mario elie a "legitimate nba starter". on most teams, no. but on the rockets, a team built around a dominant center and good shooters, he might have been the 3rd or 4th most important person on the team. he provided the grit, the salt if you will. look at the team JVG is assembling. he has a developing dominant center. he just acquired a great shooter (pike). he has a dominant guard (francis). he has a very good shooter (rice). he has a high scoring, potent weapon (mobley). what's missing? the grit. the salt. the Gruff. RIET, meet AGruff. and now that we still have the remainder of the MLE, we can still a) sign a backup point guard, b) trade mobley for a starting PG and move SF to 2 guard, or c) package mobley with whomever for a power forward all the while maintaining good balance on this team. give credit where it is due....JVG is doing a fantastic job thus far.
yep. i sure do. you know why? because of his role with THIS TEAM. on this team, his role (hitting the open jumper) is worth more that $2.67M. if he can stroke the open j at a consistent clip, temas will be a little more reticent to double yao or steve. not saying that they'll stop, just that it becomes more difficult. when you're playing with a big man, spreading the court is imperative. pike helps us do that, and it is worth more than $2.67M. and when you add in being able to acquire a player (AGruff) that is, imo, a better defender than james posey - at a cheaper price than james posey, AND having some MLE left over... good lord, that's a slam dunk.
I still don't understand how Piatkowski is a pure shooter and AGriffin is as good defensively > Posey. You are comparing 2 players to 1. They can't both be on the floor at the same time. While Piatkowski is draining the 3's, we have a defensive liability on the other end. While Griffin is guarding his man, we have an offensive liability who can't score. Can you imagine both Griffins on the floor at the same time. That would be ugly. Posey is a very a good defender who can also score. He improved his shot to 44% without having the benefit of playing a full season within the offense. If Van Gundy decided to instill more of a transition offense, Posey's strengths would've been magnified. Posey still has upside at age 26. You don't get that with Griffin. To me this is not an apples to apples comparison unless we can have 6 players on the floor.
Verse, Some people just don't get that sometimes the sum is much greater then it parts. The '94 team is an excellent example. Pike and AG were excellent pickups, and personally I don't think they are done yet. It's nice to see that some people get what the Rockets are trying to do. BTW, you know that the people b****in about losing Posey would be the first to complain about his being overpaid in a few years.
is there anything that prevents this situation from happening?: starting: PG: francis SG: mobes SF: pike PF: griff C: yao assuming we agree on that, we could sub in AGruff for pike, along with motay for EGriff. that leaves PG: SF SG: CM SF: AG PF: MT C: yao essentially, you're starting with offense @ 3 & defense @ 4, then flipflopping to defense @3 and offense @ 4. or you could sub in our soon to be acquired PG for mobley, & do it this way: PG: tba SG: francis SF: pike or AGruff (*depending on the pg's individual abilities) PF: MT or EGriff (** depending...) C: yao * if he has a good J, you put in AGruff. if he doesn't you put in pike. ** if pike's in, leave in griff. if AGruff's in, leave in motay. griff helps to cover for pike's errs. motay augments AGruff offensively. where's the problem?
thanks. oh, and there's a good chance a trade will go through today, before 5pm. why else is CD holding off on his decision to resign posey??? there's no way they match the $24M to add posey after they signed pike/AGruff. imo, there's a very good chance mobley could be packing his bags this afternoon.
You think? That would be MAJOR. I think Cat is a very solid player so I hope if a trade does go through, we get equal value.
I like it, though I think Griffin will be starting. With Cuttino, Steve, and Yao, we have enough scorers. Our defense is shaky with Steve and Eddie though. They can then bring in Piatkoswki for either Cuttino or Griffin, depending on matchups or other factors. Piatkowski would probably work better with Mo as well, since Mo plays on the low block more than Eddie does.
RIET, I understand completely what you mean about Pike and Griffin can't play at the same time, but all I can sy is this, that's the problem when you give a backup powerforward starter's money on top of Moochie's contract. The Rockets' starter salaries are on the bench, even though Mo may eventually be a starter, they have to make some sacrifices. On top of that, there are a lot of teams in the league with players who probably shouldn't be starters, that's just the logistics of expansion. Is LaFrentz a legit starting center? Is Bruce Bowen a legit starting Small Forward? There are very few teams that have a "good" player at every starting position, Sacramento comes to mind. Also Portland. Sacramento has done it through good personnel decisions, but Portland has done it by out spending everyone. Mark Cuban has tried to do the same thing, and even he can't put a "good" player at ever position. If Eddie Griffin has a decent season grabbing 8 to 10 boards, then the Rockets will have two stars, two good players, and a so-so player in their starting lineup, which isn't that bad even by Western Conference playoff teams standards.
not really. You have this way of just claiming rights to gloss over logic. Your logic say Posey is not only a legitimate starter, but some 36mpg legitimate starter, who presumably doesn't need to be platoon. You logic is trying to say they Platooning our SF position is worse than Posey. RIET...we *have to* platoon with Posey, too! Signing Posey means we continue having a sucky bench. We are comparing the importance of a bench vs one player....and that player is arguably your worst starter. Posey is not worth 40 mpg. Posey is worth about 28-30mpg, tops!! Dude only had one 30+ year on !Denver! and 28mpg with us. He is not a Doug Christie quality defender, who can play Christie's stellar defense for a full 36mpg. So, you need a second player, anyhow. Especially if you are going to play a JVG defense. Who were you going to field, Posey and Nachbar??
I have the same feeling. I also found it a little interesting that CD was reported going to ATL. What are you thoughts on SAR?
Simple: Posey played 28 minute in 55 games but could easily have played 32 after 1 full season with current teammates. Assuming Posey played 32 minutes. The remaining 16 minutes would be absorbed by Glen Rice. 16 minutes for Rice is not bad. Now, we have Piatkowski playing 2 positions. Let's assume he's good for 30 minutes (which is more than he's ever averaged). About 1/2 would be at the SF leaving Adrian Griffin 17 (similiar to what played in Dallas). That leaves Glen Rice 16 at SF. Piatkowski playing 2 positions and Griffin, a 15 minute player would average just about the minutes Posey would play as a full time starter.
Posey vs. Griffin.....I dont feel like going back 145 post and copying all of them and quoting all of them, but come on folks, we were down on Posey last year, **** I dunno what the buzz was in Houston, but everybody I talked to back home, and in Cali, Me and my friends loved the guy, and thought he was a pretty good pick up....Miss Kenny Thomas "loads"....but Posey is good, and was good for our team, and just because he is leaving now, everybody is telling him "see ya", when if the Rockets would have signed him to a long term deal, those same guys would be all over his nutz.....A. Griffin may be a decent pick-up, but if Posey is a poor mans Shandon Anderson, then Griffin would be a poor man's Blue Edwards
not real wild about SAR. reef, to me, is the kind of guy that'll have 17/10, but it'll be the quietest 17/10 you've ever seen. never getting the *crucial* board. never getting the *crucial* block. never scoring the *crucial* bucket. guys like that, imo, are not worth near max $$. that said, i do like the fact that his contract is up in 2 years, and if we could trade motay + contract filler (*cough*moochie *cough*) for him, i'd do it without hesitation. after 2 years, i'd drop reef like a bad habit, be out of 2 ridiculous contracts (motay & moochie), and pray that griffin is ready to be a MAN.
no. i think posey is shandn andersn with a work ethic. he's a fine player. and, i think AGruff, is a the guard/forward version of eduardo najera....aka: mario elie v2.0. aka: bruce bwen with more drive, less 3s. i also think gruff/pike/remaining MLE > james posey.
lets think for a minute.....if we kept posey and didnt sign griffin or piatkowski, how much of a difference would it really make next year. is posey THAT much of a difference maker? i dont think he is. think about who we are talking about here. james posey. he couldnt even be the leading scorer when he was on the nuggets. in the end, what matters is the W-L column, and honesly, how many more W's is posey going to get us than griffin/piatkowski. my guess would be 0. yeah, when we play memphis, he will probly play really well and everybody will be like see i told you, but 2 or 3 years down the line when we sign somebody thats actually important with the money we could give posey now, i think we'll all be happy.
I agree with your assesment of reff, BUT I would like to see what he could do with a real supporting cast where he didn't have to be "the man". The only reason I brought him up was the whole CD in ATL coupled with the fact they tried to get him several years ago when he was in Van.
