Its a good thing your not the GM.... This is the same kind of emotional, knee jerk reaction that got us Mo Taylor, Kelvin Cato, Moochie Norris....need I continue? Morey is following the San Antonio template.. Hope your scouting is good and then you bring in fringe guys for modest money and hope they pan out and turn into a better player. Right now both our stars are out, the last thing you want to do is panic. The worst case scenerio is we are a middle of the pack team and drop T-Macs albatross contract after this year or sign and trade him away. Yao is a sad story but there are to many unknowns to knee jerk and jump ship. You need to get the best opinions and make educated decisions. Next summer is universally thought of as the best free agent crop in the history of the league. Some of its probably hyperbole but there will be a fair amount of talent up for grabs and we are in a prime position to throw big money after the right player....and maybe, God willing, Yao will be back at full strength by then.
First, I think Ariza has way more upside then Gortat. You can bash me if you think I'm wrong but I think what you see in Gortat now, is pretty much what you're going to get down the road. He runs the floor well, hustles, is good on the glass and finishing inside, he's just solid and I think he'll continue to be just solid. Ariza on the other hand, is 24 years old and is still developing in what my eyes see a very SPECIAL player. As a great sized wing, he's an excellent defensive player, his outside shot is every improving, and is a menace in the open court and attacking lanes. He just has these intagibles where he's constantly making plays happen on both ends of the court. If we were to spend our entire MLE on Ariza I would be perfectly OK with that. Second, I'm not concerned with Morey's approach one bit. He knows the reality of the situation, RIGHT NOW our team is in shambles. T-Mac and Yao are pretty much done next year and we just lost our last remaining star, that pretty spells the end for us next season. But I truly feel after stomaching next season we have the resources to do a quick bounce back. Now if McGrady's and Yao's contracts were running for 3 or 4 more years, the panic button would be hit and smashed in. But the fact that we seem to have a ton of money freeing up in one of the greatest free agent classes ever, I feel pretty good. What I've been hoping for since the bad Yao news is that our team doesn't take a "quick fix/ruin the future" approach, and so far they haven't done that. If you look at a great contender, the way they were built is like a puzzle. The pieces all don't fall into place at once (minus Boston) it takes time. Right now we are in a transition period where we're trying to collect our pieces to begin our "puzzle" starting with the 2010 season. If all we do this offseason is sign a guy like Ariza then GREAT, we have a nice looking young player to add to the puzzle. With all these guys being out, next season is an AMAZING opportunity for our younger guys to get massive amounts of playing time. An opportunity to get real NBA game experience to develop their games. If guys like Scola (not young but whatever),Brooks, Lowry, and Landry can each take their games up to the next level and one of our rookies steps and shows they can play, then we've got more pieces to play with. Battier I can go either way with, keep or trade for someone younger of equal value. If we can find our legitimate backup center anywhere between now and before the 2010 season, then we have our supporting cast to surround whichever star or stars we can sign next sumer
Everyone keeps making the assumption that Gortat chose Dallas because Morey didn't offer the full MLE. I suspect that the money was pretty close between all of the offers he got. I think that there were a few other deciding factors: 1 - If he comes here and Yao returns healthy - then he is back to a bench player and fighting for a roster spot next year etc. 2 - if he goes to San Antonio - he is clearly the "other big guy" behind Tim Duncan. 3 - Dallas has had their inside guys for a few years and never been happy with them - he goes there and chances are he not only gets the starting spot but doesnt have to worry about looking over his shoulder. Can't really blame Morey for that.
The fault I see is that Morey wont do big trades. He should have stopped building around Yao two years ago. TMAC and Rafer should have been traded one year ago. The Artest signing is totally unnecessary. late picks, small tunes wont mount anything big.
I'm not saying this is Morey's fault in any way. Just concerned about the rebuilding process so far. Here's the deal, everyone just assumes that because we may have money to spend next summer we will get one of the key free agents. Several of the key free agents probably won't be on the move. What is going to make Houston such a destination? Yao? Why would anyone want to come play with a guy that can't stay healty if he's supposed to be the reason they are coming? We need to have some guys on this team that a star can take to the next level without Yao. Kobe and Lebron are the only two that I see could do that, but not without a decent center. I love our guys and our team, but this aint the group that is gonna attract that level of talent.
I don't know why people care so much about those late 1st rounders. The talent is about the same as early 2nd rounders like Taylor. And you have to commit garanteed money for 3 years on them. I'm pretty sure Les has no-trade clauses on both Yao and T-Mac(before this year at least).
Come on guys, it's only because of Morey that we're in such great position to reload after this suddenly gloomy upcoming season. Think about this...what if Yao's bad news had been discovered after signing Artest to a multiyear contract at $8 mil or more. Then we're stuck with a so-so team this season, and worse than that, kills any chance at a major FA signing in 2010. Long term we'd have Artest, who knows what kind of Yao, and whatever we could get for TMac's contract. Instead, we're lucky we knew of Yao before signing Ron. Now, because of Morey's roster handling, we shouldn't and won't have Ron's contract, we have more options on TMac's contract, and maybe even someone like Ariza going into next summer. Bottom line is you need stars to win and Yao/McGrady is over. Morey's got us in a good position to get at least one more star by next season. I think it's amazing that we just have to get past this season and I wouldn't want any other GM right now to get us reloaded for the next version of Rocketball!
This group of role players is exactly the type of support a star would LOVE to have! You gotta look past this next season. If I told you that your contending team just lost it's 3 best players probably forever (depending on Yao), you'd be devasted, right? But how many GM's would have their cap situation set up so beautifully, along with a great set of role players to have a great shot at being right back to contending after one down year?! Dude, glass is way more toward full than empty!
Can someone please give me Morey's birthdate? I was looking and all I saw was 1972 in Baraboo, Wisconsin. I can't find anything online either. Thanks.
- http://www.nba.com/2009/news/features/david_aldridge/07/02/artest.lakers/index.html The uncertainty of Yao's foot becoming known right before the free agent season is clearly hurting us. It's gonna be a tough offseason, and probably not the season all of us Rockets fans were hoping for after taking the Lakers to 7 games. The Ron Artest trade was a good trade, like many on here said, Morey couldn't have predicted microfracture surgery for Mac or a Yao broken foot that's not healing.
