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Are the Rockets even interested in Scoot?

Discussion in 'Houston Rockets: Game Action & Roster Moves' started by HealthyHamstring, May 22, 2023.

  1. Arnel

    Arnel Member

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    Pretty sure there is nothing official on it, just remember hearing about speculations that rockets “tipped them off about Paulo” quite a bit . And like I said in my follow up post perhaps it had nothing to do with it at all, we’ll never know for sure.

    However, do you think it was smart for the Rockets to handle that situation the way they did? Are we at least in agreement that it was not a wise thing to do when you have other teams drafting ahead of you?

    For an extreme example, if a kid has a first pick for a toy out of a number of toys, and before they get to choose their toy they keep hearing from kid with the third choice about this toy that he REALLY likes and is really excited about, and how they can’t wait to get that toy and talks about some of the special features that other kids may not even know about (like true height without shoes on lol)…. Don’t you think there is at least a little bit of human nature in play there for the kid with the first pick to think “we’ll wait, let me also check out this toy to make sure I don’t miss out and chose the wrong one, maybe they’re right..” etc.

    just an extreme example obviously, but wouldn’t the kid with the third choice want to just stay the heck quiet until he is the next one up with his choice and then choose whatever toy he likes best. Without going on and on and spilling his beans in advance?

    Like I said, maybe it had nothing to do with it at all, but wasn’t it kind of dumb for the rockets to handle the situation that way?
     
  2. don grahamleone

    don grahamleone Contributing Member

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    I think we would both agree that Jalen Green, Alperen Sengun, Jabari Smith Jr, and Tari Eason are all going to be solid NBA contributors either in Houston or elsewhere. I personally think Usman Garuba is worth continuing to develop. Tyty Washington has not been given a chance and Josh Christopher is either underutilized or playing his way out of the league depending on his attitude. KPJ is showing plenty of potential to be an NBA player who can do things most others can't. He also has some things that seem to be sorting themselves out.

    We have three guys in Green, Sengun and KPJ that can be playmakers on the ball in the sense that the defense is setup in the half-court and with the ball in their hands, we have a decent chance of that ball going in with improvement clearly on its way. We're still missing a playmaker who can take the outlet pass or from an inbound, bring the ball up the court, set up the offense and generate consistent offense. There are two players at the top of the draft that could fall to us in Scoot Henderson and Amen Thompson. They both fill a need. It's not a shiny object, it's potential gap filler in a gap that's large and obvious on our current roster. It's the reason we were terrible. The other is rim protection.

    The NBA is full of imperfect rosters. Ours included. Bandaids are available all over the place, but there's a price. The bandaids are immediate, for sure they make us better, but none of them are giving us a shot at glory. Bandaids cost us that future development you've mentioned. Drafting whoever falls to us at 4 on draft day costs us nothing at the moment. Spend it on a bandaid and you have a bandaid. Nothing more.

    We went through a rebuild to build a squad. We have a lot of pieces and now we have an allotment of money, more than anyone else in the NBA, two first rounders, and you think a bandaid is worth more than a lottery ticket when you're trying to win it all in the future?

    This trade first mentality that you're implying might give us a shot next year, maybe the year after, but sticking with the plan, the anti-Morey plan... that leaves us with a shot at a dynasty with 9 first round draft picks that have yet to hit their potential, one 2nd rounder (KJ Martin) with unique ability that translates all over the court and a coach that is about to implement a system around them. A system that will improve what you and I have been watching on the court. Trade away all your shiny objects, and if you fail... you end up like the Nets... that's your plan?

    Going for broke is old, it's what Morey did, it never panned out. Making a run at it with an ill equipped team is just a waste of fandom. It's time for the real deal. Home grown.
     
  3. Arnel

    Arnel Member

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    Pretty sure there is nothing official on it, just remember hearing about speculations that rockets “tipped them off about Paulo” quite a bit . And like I said in my follow up post perhaps it had nothing to do with it at all, well never know for sure.

    However, do you think it was smart for the Rockets to handle that situation the way the did? Are we at least in agreement that it was not a wise thing to do when you have other teams drafting ahead of you.

    For an extreme example, if a kid has a first pick for a toy out of a number of toys, and before they get to choose their toy they keep hearing from kid with the third choice about this toy that he REALLY likes and is really excited about, and how they can’t wait to get that toy and talks about some of the special features that other kids may not even know about (like true height without shoes on lol)…. Don’t you think there is at least a little bit of human nature in play there for the kid with the first pick to think “we’ll wait, let me also check out this toy to make sure I don’t miss out and chose the wrong one, maybe they’re right..” etc.

    just an extreme example obviously, but wouldn’t the kid with the third choice want to just stay the heck quiet until he is the next one up with his choice and then choose whatever toy he likes best. Without going on and on and spilling his beans in advance?

    Like I said, maybe it had nothing to do with it at all, but wasn’t it kind of dumb for the rockets to handle the situation that way?
     
  4. DaDakota

    DaDakota If you want to know, just ask!

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    Well said, but I think you can fill those holes, with proper NBA players - Free Agents, guys that are 19 are a risk, it is why I want to trade the number 4 pick as part of a package for a proven player instead.

    I do like some of the players in this draft, Whitmore, Lively, Murray, Black to name 4, but they will all be there at 4 and later, so would rather move down if we can't trade out.

    Gatlin suggested like 4 and KMJ for 6 and 11, I would do that in a heartbeat.

    DD
     
  5. don grahamleone

    don grahamleone Contributing Member

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    Okay, I think we may be more aligned than I thought. I thought you were saying give up the future of the guys we have for a shot at one chip. In other words, I thought you were saying we had nothing so trade Jalen Green for a piece, Jabari for a piece, etc. until we had a shot at a championship next year.

    I don't think Whitmore is a Ime type guy. He's a black hole and Udoka doesn't seem to be okay with that. Team ball seems to be his thing. Murray might be available at 20. Lively is someone I'm a fan of, Black too. If we did Gatlin's trade, I'm not against that. But if we believe in both Scoot and Amen, we believe we have a shot at either, then trading out of the fourth pick is outrageous to me after tanking to get the very thing we tanked for. The next 28ish days should give us more information about what we want to do. Who knows... the combine games might have us going after Black at 4 like OKC went after Jalen Williams. That dude looked like the best player at the combine games.

    Black, Lively would be a nice take. I'd say let's go 4, 20 for 6, 11 though. KMJ is worth something. Maybe to us.
     
  6. saleem

    saleem Contributing Member

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    As expected. I dread what will this lead too. We have had enough of the consequences of the Westbrook trade.

    PS:
    @Clutch
    Sorry, please delete this or transfer it to the appropriate thread.
     
  7. DaDakota

    DaDakota If you want to know, just ask!

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    I don't like Scoot or Amen......I like Black more than both at PG....tbh....

    DD
     
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  8. robbie380

    robbie380 ლ(▀̿Ĺ̯▀̿ ̿ლ)
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    Problem is Amen doesn't have any kind of shooting from anywhere. Scoot isn't a great 3pt shooter now but he has a solid mid range game to build from. Also, even with Amen's height he isn't a great defender. He won't be guarding power forwards with his weight either.

    I don't know why you would be worried about Scoot's height. He's 6'2" and the average height for a NBA PG is 6'2" but his wingspan is nearly 3 inches longer than the average PG wingspan.
     
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  9. Ancient Moabite

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    folks be sleeping on that bad boys 2.0 team, they had like few lotto picks who bounced around but they were lotto picks and T Prince was a underrated steal of his class who had a stretch where he was versatile and somewhat elite defender, and even though B Wallace wasn't a lotto pick he turned into a multi DPOY and baby Rodman on the boards which was HOF worthy (defensive superstar) for a 4-5 year stretch

    Billups/R Wallace were like top 3 picks and RIP was top 7 pick and they had solid coach initially with Carlisle then turned it over to one of the GOAT coaches in L Brown with his defense scheme that was second to none, which took them over the top and almost back to back ships

    Though he was aged by time he got to Detroit, Rasheed was superstar-lite with the Blazers, unstoppable on the block and could stretch it out to 3 land, it was just his focus and temper that kept him off pivot, but he had superstar star game/skill no doubt when locked in

    big shot Billups was clutch like a superstar in the postseason, but I get exactly what you mean because nobody labeled them a 'superstar' by traditional media standards
     
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  10. Hemingway

    Hemingway Member

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    No, you had it right the first time. He has been advocating for the trade of Jalen, Sengun, and/or Jabari and/or the 4th pick. Maybe you changed his mind with you well reasoned argument. I don’t have any problem on bundling up this year’s pick and future picks if it nets us a couple of vets that can be added to our core young players and still be in their prime while we are pursuing a championship. Youngish vets like Bridges or Smart if you can get them without giving up our young core. DD is right in that we don’t need a bunch of new guys to develop and it would be helpful to have some vets to help the core come along. He is not right to want to include any of them in a trade, unless it netted us Doncic, Lamello or the like. Even in that scenario I wouldn’t give up more than 1 with draft packages.
     
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  11. Scarface

    Scarface Supremely FocASSed
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    Without revealing where I heard this from anymore so than they are someone well connected and a former poster on this board, we are not looking to trade up…
     
  12. Caesar

    Caesar Member

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    Don't forget Yao Killer, Memo was their stretch C off the bench.
    Lindsey Hunter was also an elite pg defender off the bench.
    Corliss was a big strong defender.
    Elden was a big defensive vet
    Mike James and Darvin Ham weren't yet getting min. but they ended up being solid bench guys

    On top of that, they still could have had Melo instead of Darko and Melo's legacy could be completely different. (not to discredit Melo was a national champ and turned the Nuggets around from lottery to playoffs (with the vastly underrated Andre Miller also added) as a rookie. Melos career went downhill when teams stopped building defense around him to compensate for his lack of it. Ai and Melo? Post injuries Amare and Melo? Westrbook and Melo? PG hadn't been a defensive stud since Indiana as well. Dame and Melo? Harden and Melo? What were teams thinking?

    Why am i wasting time talking about Melo? Because if Green doesn't improve defensively and it's forever his weakness, we need to build strong defense and high effort around him the way you needed to with Harden.
     
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  13. Ancient Moabite

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    Amen to what you added

    And Melo was a pure collective NBA decision, because the Nuggets needed him way more than Pistons did during those climes n times

    Melo just didn't put forth the consistent quality effort on other side and just relied on off. prowess, that's all Green has to do is just put in proper effort / awareness and study film of the opponents he will be guarding, but if he doesn't they will have to use your blueprint

    The key to defense is team being on one accord, it will be interesting to see the D scheme implemented by Udoka
     
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  14. SamFisher

    SamFisher Contributing Member

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    Again - Windhorst wrote a long article about this last year.

    The Magic settled on Banchero a day or 3 before the draft. There was no "smokescreen" to deceive the Rockets or any other team - they had the first pick, they intended to use it, they did.

    I don't think Stonetitta are geniuses but there's pretty much nothing they could have done to get Banchero.

    Now, if you want to criticize them for relying too heavily on big board rankings and thinking Jabari Smith Jr was a top 3 talent - that's a valid line of argument so far.

    Guy looks like a nice role player someday but frankly the Rockets could have traded down and picked up a similar or better player - so far.
     
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  15. saleem

    saleem Contributing Member

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    My gut feeling is that everyone apart from Jalen Green and Jabari Smith are on the trading block along with the 4th pick and perhaps one of the Nets picks to the Hornets for Scoot Henderson as a last resort.
    @Nook
     
  16. pmac

    pmac Contributing Member

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    I was initially high on Scoot after seeing him play. But, since I've had time to look at more footage and other prospects I'm not as impressed. The main issue I have is that he doesn't seem to have improved much from year to year.

    22 season exhibition games:
    14.7ppg, 46%/25%/78% shooting, 4.6rb, 4.8ast
    23 regular season:
    16.5ppg, 43%/27.5%/76.4% shooting, 5.4rb, 6.5ast

    For reference Daishen Twix gleague numbers:
    21 regular season:
    8.8ppg, 38%/18%/71.4% shooting, 5.3rb, 5.3ast
    22 regular season:
    20.6ppg, 48.6%/40%/59% shooting, 5.9rb, 7.7ast

    Jalen Green 21 gleague regular season:
    18ppg, 46%/36.5%/83% shooting, 4.1rb, 2.8ast

    I've heard some people say that he's been coasting this year knowing he'll be drafted #2. To be honest...that's a worse sign that just not showing improvement for basketball reasons.

    Scoot is still a good prospect I just don't expect him to come to the league and dominate from day one. And, I agree with others that view him in the same tier as other prospects below Wemby.
     
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  17. Hemingway

    Hemingway Member

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    Your gut is wrong on that one. They won’t trade Sengun for the #2. You can disagree with that, but I think the top 3 are pretty much untouchable in a trade to get an untested rookie. One of them might be used (doubtful) in a trade for a star vet, but I think that would be Tillman jumping in more than an Ime or Stone preference.
     
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  18. PatBev

    PatBev Member

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    I just don’t Stone or Ime giving up KPJ, Green, Jabari, Or Sengun just to move up for Henderson. It just doesn’t make sense to spend assets to receive a g league rookie if Amen or Ausar are on the board at 4
     
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  19. daywalker02

    daywalker02 Member

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    That would be quite a news on Draft night.
     
  20. saleem

    saleem Contributing Member

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    Fine. Who do you think that star vet might be? I do agree with you it's likely to be a Tilman move. I don't think he has learned anything from the Westbrook trade.
     

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