Free Agency Has Not Been Kind to the Houston Rockets

One thing I want to make clear is that while I classified certain moves as ‘failures’, that does not mean that I think they were necessarily bad moves. The intent was not to prove incompetence, but rather to identify a trend of high failure rate with these acquisitions.

I wholeheartedly agree with the comments above considering the distinctions between the parties involved. While I classified Morey’s three acquisitions as failures, I think they were all very good low-risk acquisitions. They were only failures in the sense of not succeeding.

My purpose was not to make this an assault on Rudy, but looking at the body of evidence, it is very clear that he was the main offender. It is my opinion that Dawson was never in charge during his tenure despite wearing the title of general manager. This is highly substantiated by the sudden, distinct shift in organizational financial policy upon the hiring of Jeff Van Gundy. His first move was choosing to not retain James Posey, instead choosing to split the same amount for Piatkowski and Griffin. This is not something Rudy would have ever done, IMHO. Of course this shift in philosophy could have been ordained by Alexander but I highly doubt this. Thus forward, except for Swift, the team only made low-risk, low-cost signings.

While few of Van Gundy and subsequently Morey’s signings have worked out, I still consider them good signings on the basis of their nature in being low-cost. Conversely, regardless of being failures, Rudy’s moves were just overall disastrous signings. Of course, this is a highly subjective opinion. Even more interestingly, the signings by Rudy that hurt the franchise the most (Cato, Maloney, Moochie Norris) were the ones which I had to leave off of the list because they did not fit the criteria of being actual acquisitions.

1. There is probably some correlation between our low success rate and the fact that our signings are low-cost. However, due to the examples you presented, I would choose our model every time, even despite our low success rate. More importantly though, I think the greater point is that free agency is not a dependable avenue by which to build a team. I personally think that the draft is the most preferable method because the cost of obtaining a pick is much less than the cost of acquiring the same player at his actual value. Obviously there is the risk of an unknown commodity, but if you trust your scouting department, it is much easier and cheaper to trade for the #26 pick than it is to trade for or sign Aaron Brooks the player. Again, of course there is the risk, but there is also the added benefit of having that player under cheap club control for 4 years.

2. Regarding Francis, despite a similar pick being purchased, I still consider the move a failure because we have no idea what the unforeseen ramifications were to the trade. Would we have still purchased Taylor and Llull while also using the Memphis pick? The Memphis pick was considerably higher than the slot at which Budinger was chosen so that would have had a marginally greater chance of becoming a contributing player. Would that $2.5 million if unused have made Les less reluctant to dip into the luxury tax? We don’t know the answers to any of these questions, so I have to deem the signing as costly.

I have to disagree with two things. First, the team has had significant cap space TWICE in the last 12 years and managed to squander it both times. Pippen was disastrous, but more importantly, it was the summer of 2001 when the team chose to trifle away its cap space on re-signing Mo Taylor, Moochie Norris, and acquiring Glen Rice via Shandon Anderson. I would go so far as to argue that the summer of 2001 was the most damaging and disastrous offseason in Rockets history. Not only did they waste precious cap space, but this was also the year Eddie Griffin was acquired in the draft. I have spoken before why even in hindsight, I still think that was a great trade, but there is no doubt that its effects were absolutely disastrous for this franchise. Losing Griffin essentially meant going the next four years without what would have been 3 potential young rotation players. In fact, Eddie Griffin not panning out may have been the single most harmful episode of the entire post championship era. Ironically, while the team twice had significant cap space, they also TWICE had three first round draft picks in the same draft and only have Michael Dickerson to show for it. Of course, Dickerson was the principle in acquiring Francis.

Secondly, regarding the CBA/D-level acquisitions, it was certainly the case that the Rockets had cornered the market on these types during Rudy’s tenure. However, over the years, this dominance has leveled off as only Chuck Hayes and Von Wafer have been notable contributors. Furthermore, I would imagine that if examining the entire league at a macro level, one would find that every team has had a similar number of successful bargain basement acquisitions from the lower tiers.

I would agree. Francis was a homerun. I felt Swift was a very good decision. Even both Mo Taylor and Shandon Anderson were good acquisitions in theory. The problem was that it was the subsequent re-signing of them that was disastrous. And this re-signing was unavoidable because the initial agreements were constituted upon an understanding of later compensation. Regarding Ariza, agreed completely.

I had considered this however decided against it because the effects are too dubious and far down the line. Furthermore, one could argue that the two draft picks included in the Artest deal were the principle elements of that trade. You could even make the claim that losing those 2 picks made the Artest trade bad, though I would disagree.

 

I have stated in the thread that trading for Steve Francis was an absolute homerun move.

 

This is actually a great point that I hadn't considered. I wonder what the overall success rate is of the MLE. I wish Hollinger or someone would look into that.

 

Well, first of all, would you agree that the sudden shift in policy coincided with the hiring of Van Gundy (as I delineated above with the summer of Posey)? If we are in agreeance on that, and taking Jeff at face value, to what would you attribute the sudden shift?

EDIT: BTW, I know you and I have been fighting about this for 10 years now, so I'm not trying to be a dick. I'm just curious to know your opinion on the entire situation.

 

Morey was named assistant general manager on April 3, 2006.