I don't trust you. Rockets shouldn't want to trade Harden for a guy who is gonna "make it." Simmons DOES NOT HAVE GREAT HANDLES. He has decent handles for a tall guy. We had James Harden all this time, how many true shooters we put around him- none. When comparing Herro vs Simmons, there more potential for Herro. Ben simmons is a overrated role player. You will see, when Simmons signs his 3rd contract it will not be super max.
It's not easy to find a guy like Tyler Herro because the entire NBA is out there looking for one. And even if you do find one, you need to invest time and money to turn him into a potential role player that Herro already is which the Rockets don't like doing. The second these guys show potential, we consolidate 2-3 of them to a better role player. Even then, FA targets get stolen from us like Ariza did. Absolutely nothing is easy.
After he hits RFA it's not going to be a small-ish cap number if he's not a star player, which I don't think he will be. That's the problem. If the best thing we've got on the roster in 3 years is Tyler Herro on a max deal I think that means we'll be winning 25-30 games a year right when the Thunder essentially have our pick for 3 years. That's a bad outcome. But yeah, Wall makes trading for Simmons more challenging. It's crazy to bank on Wall's health in whatever we are doing. But the best non-Harden stays outcome for a rebuild is probably to have Wall play really well this year, then flip him for real assets in the offseason.
I never said it was easy. I'd love it if we had Tyler Herro right now. But if the best thing we've got on our roster in a couple of years is Tyler Herro I think we are in deep, deep trouble.
That's why you place more bets than just Herro. You'd have bets on the players/picks that come with him. You'd have flexibility to invest in other bets with the cap room cleared. Simmons is the throw it all in bet. If he bails in UFA, you really are left with nothing.
with all the digging around I’ve done, Heat fans are the most rational by far...many want James Harden and would gladly give up Herro there are way too many Sixers fans coming up with Tobias for Harden trades...
man, some of these pro-Ben Simmons takes are terrible and misguided 1. No one thinks Herro plus parts is equal value for Harden. There is no such thing as equal value for James. Neither Simmons or Herro will ever be on Harden’s level. They most likely will never be anywhere close. 2. “you’re trading Harden for some dude who averaged 14 points”...This isn’t good reasoning. As has been pointed out, Booker averaged only 14 points as a rookie. Sh*t, Jayson Tatum only averaged 14 points as a rookie. The guy has shown he can produce at a good level for a finals team in just his 1st year. How he looked on the court is more important than what he averaged. He has shown that he’s skilled and fearless. He’s already a very good shooter. Now, will he be a star in this league? That is the main question. I have no doubt he will at least be very good. Sure, Ben Simmons is already star, but he is 1 of the most flawed stars in the league. Trying to build around his flaws isn’t all that exciting to me. He doesn’t need only shooters around him, he also needs some high level bucket getters around him as well. Simmons and a bunch of shooters = fun regular season and a postseason ass whooping. Herro and Simmons are both complimentary pieces if u ask me, but 1 is still on his rookie deal and can shoot. Simmons not only can’t shoot, he doesn’t even attempt to. Simmons has pretty much been the same exact player from his rookie year till now
What you said was getting Tyler Herro is apparently making it a harder path forward. I don't think there's a path forward post-Harden that's easier than the next option. This is not an obvious thing as you make it out to be, and the two options are closer to each other than what people make it out to be. Simmons might be refreshing to see from the defensive side of the ball, but nobody is really ready to see how terrible he is at shooting. He's also on a monstrous contract. You can't shove aside the shooting aspect of his game, you just can't. It will be frustrating to witness no matter how you try to say he can work on it. Yes, he can work on it, but he's been there 3 seasons and he's at 0.1 3PAs per game on 28%. He's already earning max, who is going to motivate him to work on his shooting? Media? Girls? God? Who? Simmons on the Sixers is totally different from Simmons on Rockets. The Rockets are hated by the media, and if you have thin skin, you're not going to last at all, and will want out. I still remember T-Mac crying in the post-game. Objective evaluation is how Morey did it to get Harden and this is how we should approach it. At the very least, we need the shooting aspect of the player back in the trade. If this was the 90s, I wouldn't care at all. This is post-internet, no-touch foul-calling era. We need shooting.
heavily flawed All-Star...the type that gets exposed in the playoffs because of his complete lack of shooting
I believe Herro is a better shooter. I think if you get all that extra stuff Andre, Kelly, Duncan and Precious. Only one you keep is Precious. Use the others as trade fotter with Gordon and Tucker
With Simmons he is a man with out a postion. He isnt quite a PG but can play it. Doesn't shoot good enough to be a SG. Same with SF Really lite as a PF and C but can play all 5 spots. He can create and dish and play DEF. Shooting is suspect. With Herro he can play the SG postion can swing a 3P . But his def is Questioned. So what do you have around him to help him? One theory is add a PF and SF who can play Def to help him. In comes Aaron Gordon. Js it would be a smart play
no... you guys pushing back on this equal value thing aren’t getting my point... which admittedly is lost in translation since I used the word equal instead of fair. the idea isn’t getting back a Harden for Harden... OBVIOUSLY. If that’s what you wanted... you just keep Harden. The idea is getting back fair value. and there’s virtually no historical trade where a player like Harden is traded for a package centered around a player like Herro as the main piece... because it’s not equal value or even close. which is all the more obvious when you look at random hypotheticals from history. Heck you can go back one year and say would a package headlined by Jamal Murray and MPJ be fair and the answer is still no... even though today you’d be like “sign me up”. we can’t predict the future... only can judge trades based on fair value. Harden is locked up for 2 more years. If you don’t get fair value... you do t do anything for now.
Let me caveat it all @YOLO by saying if a Herro centered Heat trade goes down, getting back a ton of other potential meh or potentially nice assets, I’ll of course root my hardest and won’t be too pissed. I’m resigned to the course change... or not.
I'm definitely not on the "if Simmons can just learn to shoot..." train. That's never going to be part of his game if it hasn't happened yet. But unlike Russ, he's 6'10", a great defensive player, and a great passer. He's a tricky player to build around if he's your number 1, but I think you can build a solid playoff team around him even with his flaws. Shooters still slip through the cracks where you don't need a top 5 pick to get one. Players like Simmons rarely do. I'm not that worried about Simmons' deal vs. Herro on his rookie deal right now. The only way we can use big cap space without overpaying will be if we've already got the star in place. Having some space would be nice to take on bad deals and pick up an asset, but the real hard task is going to be finding a number 1 or even number 2 caliber guy after Harden. If you are really, really buying into a Wall/Wood/Boogie (assuming we clear some room and he resigns for a discount) core, then I guess I can see the appeal of adding Herro and some assets over someone like Simmons. But I'm really worried about where that leaves us in a few years. That's why I kind of like the idea of something like a BKN/Denver 3 team possibly better than either option where we roll the dice on MPJ, who I think is a number 1 caliber player lottery ticket, and a couple of picks or swaps from BKN in the 2024-2026 range where OKC has our picks and BKN could be bad then.
We literally just saw pg13 get traded for SGA, gallo, and picks. I already posted about that. Okc who is rebuilding (key word here) looks absolutely great after that trade and giving up pg13. as usual most of yall laughed at it. Not so funny anymore and a lot of yall want to settle for the kawhi for derozan type swap. with harden for simmons etc. No thanks for me. so stop with the getting equal value talk. nobody here is remotely saying anything close to that well this is just obvious, to keep harden. Pretty sure that's the most preferable choice at the end of the day. Too bad that's not the scenario being discussed here.
I honestly don’t even see Simmons as a top tier Robin...he’s too flawed, and doesn’t score enough Philly was only a contender when they added Jimmy Butler, and Simmons got moved down to the 3rd best player...in the playoffs, they decided to have Jimmy become the main playmaker, and Simmons basically became the clear 3rd wheel...guy was averaging just 9.7 shots in 35 minutes a game that postseason Harden, please just stay...none of the players getting mentioned will ever be able to even hold your jockstrap
