I'm 100% with you, wouldn't deal Knight, he's on a good deal, and is a solid backup PG which we lacked in 2017-18. Looking forward to seeing this new look Rockets team. Want to see how Chriss plays as well
He speaks about "mathematically" in different ways. For players to draft, yes, since you are nearly always drafting some type of flaw, you pick your flaws along with the strengths. By picking defenders (Bev, Demetrius, Payton, Melton) and Bigs (with defense), he is "mathematically" banking on actually improving their shooting with development coaches...along with assigning them to the corner three. But with veterans like MCW (who he expects contribution from quicker), he speaks about "mathematically" in terms of putting them in a position to be most efficient. That just means giving MCW more corner threes and wide-open threes. (We've heard him say this about MCW, as well.) The corner three is a proven and substantially better three via all analytics. I wouldn't mix the two approaches (development and system roles) to say Morey actually believes we can improve Corey Brewer's ('er, I mean, MCW's) shooting in a few months, versus the odds of the system getting him better looks... whereby, by eliminating his bad looks, the analytics will actually say he's an improved shooter. That's what I meant by MDA and the system has proven (this isn't really up for debate) that it can take you from: bad to ok (MCW's 3pt %, hopefully, due to better looks), ok to good (Raja Bell, Barbosa), and even good to great (Nash), great to greater (Harden). And it's maximized Luc, Capela and PJ Tucker in there somewhere....I won't bother categorizing.
A good benchmark for MCW is Gerald Green, but in reverse. Gerald could shoot (or more accurately, WILL shoot) but his defense was suspect. The Rockets did enough in scheming and coaching to improve him to OK. The same could be said for MCW's shooting. Perhaps he can improve a little, but you can guarantee that the Rockets will have him taking his 3s from the best spot on the floor for him, in the right situations, and with the right people around him. My bet is that when MCW is on the floor (which should be rare, baring injury), so is Gordon, Melo, Knight and several other combinations of very good shooters. If we can make him simply below average at shooting and finishing around the rim (as opposed to horrendously awful), then he might be another Gerald Green for us...someone that can fill in well enough if we have an injury.
MCW is likely seen as someone we can put on an opponent's hot shooter while Ennis, or another player, gets a blow. That's my guess, at any rate. He may not spend a lot of time on the court, but if he can give someone causing us grief a hard time, even for a few minutes, he could be useful on a fairly regular basis. We'll see.
Honestly I like him as a person. As GM he is trying to be cute and is successful at times. At his worst I blamed most of it on Les. And circumstances such as injuries.....
Haha I caught wind to that as well. I'm like when will he tell MDA to utilize a 10 player rotation, especially in the playoffs. That way we have fresh legs for the long run.
This is how I saw it...people are so crazy about trading this person or that person now that they're not even realizing when we get crazy value back. I agree with Morey that this team is better than last year's and I feel like too many people are sleeping on the guys we have.
If I recall correctly during his time in Phoenix they were running 10 men at you. The problem wasn't his unwillingness to play other people, the issue was we didn't have the depth that we needed come playoff time. Not being able to play Luc or Ryan Anderson hurt us a lot last season, now we have filled those slots with arguably better players.
I don't know if we have better players than Luc or Ryno (you did say "arguably"), but hopefully we have guys who'll be able to play when the time comes. Their absence from the rotation killed us in the playoffs. It seemed Luc either heard footsteps creeping up from behind on that oft-hurt shoulder and/or still had discomfort; and Ryan was just MIA (practically KIA).
@KellyUnchained on Morey's next move. I don't have a subscription to The Athletic so I am not sure what is said.
Curious at the cute label. Successful or not, I’ve always seen Morey as the most blunt GM in the NBA. He’s the opposite of trying to be cute if anything. He has his target player types and pretty much tries to force his way to getting them, almost to a fault really.
It's more directed at his PR/Twitter persona, blunt is a better word but yup he did not shy away from any conflicts on Twitter. He's built himself a fine reputation but if you cannot win it all, Morey might just be a more refined GM version of MDA who has not won it all himself and has had more years to achieve that.
I’m still not sure how being open on twitter makes him cute though. It just means he’s open. As for whether he should talk despite not having a ring... if the only People who can speak are those with rings, I’d stop following the NBA because most of the people I find entertaining in the NBA don’t have titles.