How exactly has Les Alexander run the franchise into the ground? The Rockets are on the upside and every move they've made in the offseason has been positive. You must be the only person on this board who thinks the Rockets are not going to be really really good this year. Tell me again how Ive reinvented Bob McNair's tenure?? We were an expansion team. Charlie Casserly was a well respected football person. Unfortuntately that didn't pan out. McNair has never pretended to be a football expert and he relied on people in the league to direct him to the right direction. Other than hiring Casserly, what exactly has McNair done? He brought football and excitement back to the city when no one wanted to touch it. Talk about Revisionist history.
the pittsburg steelers are a model franchise, imo, obviously another sport. but they remain competitive, they have a clear model, and the owners support the coaches and don't get involved. in basketball as much as i hate to say it, obviously the spurs are a model franchise. in baseball its a little harder to say, especially for me because i hardly keep up with any american league and nl west teams but I would argue that the cardinals are a good franchise.
I'd say there are a few... Atlanta has some high paid players and mixes in very well youth from their system. They've done very well in keeping their minor leagues stocked with real talent. They've been in perpetual cost cutting mode since Time Warner/AOL took over and have still been in the playoffs every year but 1. St. Louis has done well to stock from within and from free agents...even by signing lower tier fa's. Does Cleveland even have what would be considered a major fa signing? They are almost completely built from within. Anaheim & LA also have done well to mix free agents with homegrown talent. In other words, the models are out there. It can be done. The common threads with all of these teams is a talented gm.
Mariners? Isn't getting to the WS one of your criteria? They've never been and have been to the playoffs 4 times since 1995 (compared to the Astros 6 times). They also refused to pay Randy Johnson and Ken Griffey Jr and Alex Rodriguez (3 Hall of famers). I'd probably agree on most of the others although I'd rather have the Astros past 10 years than the Dodgers (but the Dodgers future looks better at this time). But probably several more? Are you serious?
I could be wrong, but over the past 10 years, I believe the Astros have more playoff appearances and have been competitive in more years than any of these teams except for the Braves, despite a smaller market and fewer resources than most of those. I'd agree with the Braves being a model franchise. The rest have been successful for a very short period of time.
On par with the Astros would be the Twins, A's, Indians, and of course the Yankees I didn;t mention earlier for obvious reasons.
2004 - 63 99 2005 - 69 93 2006 - 78 84 no playoffs since 2001, but they are having a fine season this year...
reread my post, RIET: a hands-off owner who stands idly by while his hires run the franchise into the ground... because he kept his hands in his pocket and let the "basketball people" he hired do their thing (whcih was destructive), he deserves a thumbs up? i find it remarkably convenient how forgiving you are to alexander and the rockets. they haven't been consistently good for 10 years; they've made horrible personnel decisions over and over again; and they haven't won a playoff series since 1997. but drayton mcclane is a bad owner? i can't fathom how you're drawing that conclusion unless you're just being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian. this has nothing to do with the discussion, nor did i say such a thing. the texans are the worst expansion team since the afl/nfl merger and you want to talk about super bowls and excitement..... it's ridiculous. and drayton hasn't done this with the astros? the only difference is that the astros have actually earned that excitement by, you know, being good. i’m done – i can’t believe for one second you legitimately subscribe to any of this slop you’re throwing at us, so i feel like i'm wasting my time. and if on the offchance you really do believe even a shred of it, then i’m still wasting my time because you exist in an alternate reality that i will never understand and certainly have no interest in visiting.
did they not win 116 games after losing rodriguez. yes the mariners then 93 the next two seasons which would have gotten them there in the stros division.
1. The Texans were an expansion team. What does an expansion team mean? When Drayton bought the team, we had a farm system, we had players, the team had gone to the playoffs and almost made the World Series twice. Once again, Bob McNair failed in hiring Charley Casserly. He did not dictate who was to be drafted, who to sign, what trades to make. That was an umitigated disaster. He did not cheap out on scouts or personnel. He hired the best people he could from resources he felt were knowledgeable. McNair understood his mistakes and Casserly and Dom capers were fired. To pretend he's made a series of blunders is ridiculous. He hired the wrong person to manage the team. He's spent the money and lets the football people make the decisions. How has he been a bad owner??? Id much rather have him than Jerry Jones who thinks he's a football genius. 2. CD brought this team championships, something nobody else had done. At what point was Les supposed to say, sorry, you should be gone? To say the Rockets have not won a playoff series is not telling the whole story when everyone knows the difficulty of the western conference. It's arguable that the Rockets were better than most teams in the East. 3. Answer this: How many playoff appearances would the Astros have made if they didnt change the system?
Then they were a sub-.500 doormat for three years. You said, "and remained a playoff team in one of the toughest divisions in baseball." They did not remain a playoff team; they remained competitive for a couple of years before sucking balls for three years. That ain't consistency. I'd take the Astros 2001-2007 over the Mariners 2001-2007 every time.
