Am I the Only One Bothered by the Concept of the "Asset?"

its a sport, the only assets are the players, they are the product

 

Well I find it hard to feel bad for people making 100 times what i'll make in my lifetime for playing a game they love to play. The NBA is a business, and i'm no accounting major, but ASSETS play a major part in business theory.

 

I don't feel bad for 'em either. Most of the time, I'm just way too high.

Don't forget, Jeff, that as massive as ClutchFans and the rest of the Internet are, they represent only a small fraction of basketball fans. The guys I watch games with couldn't tell you who New York's GM was if you put a gun to their head. It's just we shameful few here who are obsessive enough to refresh the same thread 500 times a day.

The atmosphere around here lately has been a far cry from the fun of last season. That's what happens when the team looks bad. If you look around, though, you'll notice that for every post begging to get rid of "McGrady's contract" (McGrady the person no longer exists), you've got another post begging not to trade Scola, or Brooks, or Landry, or even Shane Battier. Personalities still matter a lot, even to cynical Rocket fans.

Just not, y'know, McGrady's personality.

 

I think Swoly's head exploded with all the potential "That's what she said" moments in this thread...

Welcome back, Jeff.

 

somewhere asset manager DD faints

 

Jeff's words per post count just spiked.


Contract year?

 

This emphasis on assets is due to the bizarre nature of the salary cap and luxury tax, and the idiosyncrasies of the current CBA. So those, like our crafty GM, who are comfortable with valuation, investment and risk, have a leg up. If a simpler CBA gets approved after the forthcoming lockout, I think Morey will actually have a tougher time.

At least the NBA isn't as bad as football, where players are milked until they reach their late 20's, and then when their bodies are broken or brains addled everyone except a very very small fraction of stars gets dumped on his ass.

 

They better not trade him!

 

Well put, and we have $23 million in one asset that isn't doing anything for the rockets at the moment.

It's trades, it's assets, it's money, it's futures, etc. etc. If this was a game of pickup baketball I guess things would be different.

 

That's a nice, thoughtful post, Jeff. Welcome back.

As to your point, capitalism devalues people. Everything is quantified and for sale. Even people. Professional sports uses loyalty, history, feelings and our sentimentality as marketing features of their product. We are complicit and prey to this. It sucks.

 

excellent post, but after what TMac pulled last year, i think the question answers itself: n'existe pas. he showed the rockets no respect, he deserves none of our loyalty.

 

Wow,
the return of Jeff!

 

The NBA is a product. It's only right that they be considered assets.

There is a human element in fan attachment still existent today, however. I am quite attached to Luis Scola and Kyle Lowry, and every trade scenario I've considered this year always included re-signing them in the off-season. It's a given, IMO.

Are you trying to say such fan attachment to particular players is dwindling and folks only see players for their skills/contract? If so, I'd say you're only focusing on the negative aspects of a lot of these threads, especially around the trade deadline. How about during the playoffs last year? You see a ton of appreciation threads with fans appreciating the players as players, not as assets.

You can't go into the trade deadline not wanting to let go of any players on your roster because "they're people, too!" You'll quickly form losing teams (see: Houston Astros) of overpaid "good guys." If a fan doesn't want to lose any of the roster's current players because they love them (e.g., my fiance), they're not really being a realist -- you cannot win that way unless the players you love are total superstars. I don't think there's anything wrong or bothering about people being realists around the trade deadline.

It just depends on your timeframe as to when you see discourse go in one direction or another. Right now is the peak of the see-players-as-assets time, so of course it looks bad right now. Observe threads from last year around the playoffs, or this year if we make the playoffs and you should see a completely different outlook on our own players.

 

just for the record I would never pass up on a date with jessica alba

 

Your right..........it is very sexist.

when people "feminize" Tracy's name is it because they feel he is weak, lazy, untrustworthy, and too talkative.

They refer to him as a "female" indicating that this is how they feel about females in general.


But of course nobody ever calls them on it.

 

The term is also used for those that risk their lives for our country; both military and non-military (covert operatives). I never liked the term, very dehumanizing. In the context that I mention, it is a way of sanitizing otherwise "messy" situations.

 

Good post.

I agree to an extent, but I think we have to separate ourselves from the team on the court and the team on paper. We can root for them like they are our own children during the games, but so long as our roster is incapable of winning a championship, they're all assets or non-assets to me.

Once we finish rebuilding the core, we can then remove the asset tag from most of the core (rotation) players, assuming the team is a contender. At some point you have to unplug the phone and say "these are the guys we're rolling with".

 

I'll be honest I'm still quite attached to T-mac because I haven't forgotton what he went through all the years been with us. In my opinion the struggles he went through the year before cancle what happened last year. But people on this forum aren't so humane, they are just discussing and cussing the fact that he makes $23 million. I don't think I've seen this forum treat players as human beings for a while

 

Better go ahead and slap a franchise tag on Def Jeff, before he tries slipping out on the market again.

 

I also find it funny that you associate this with the internet age, you think people didn't want players traded in the sixties/seventies.

airplane is one of your favorite movies right, what do you think about the scene when kareem goes off on the kid because of what the kid says his father thinks about kareem? same story, different day