seriously, i don't get why people whine about the battier trade so much. he was brought in as a championship piece, unfortunately the rest of our team wasn't good enough to get us through even the first round. captain hindsight to the rescue
I think this is something that people should really start thinking about before bringing up this trade again. I would much rather have a crappy old Battier that comes off the books this summer than be stuck paying max dollars to a non-franchise player like Gay, because that's what it would have taken to keep him with all the money that was thrown around this summer.
Rudy Gay has yet to play a playoff game in his career. I wouldn't even consider the trade a bad one at this point. Gay wouldn't have contributed any more to this team winning in the past few years than Battier did, and going forward, he's not a franchise player but he sure is getting paid like one. You're delusional if you think the Rockets have been anywhere near as inept as the Grizzlies in the past four to five years. The Battier-Gay trade isn't even the worst trade involving the Grizzlies in the last four years.
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I don't think the Rockets intended to draft Sefalosha with the 8th pick. I think they would have traded down and picked up Sefalosha + something else. They were thinking short term, banking on Yao and McGrady being superstars that year.
I never thought of battier for gay..but I can believe some people feel gay for battier is right for the rockets today
What part of "win now 4 years ago" did you not understand? If the goal was to get a player who will your team out in the short-term, then obviously that player will look bad in 5+ years. We can trade Jermaine Taylor for KG, and in 6 years when KG is retired and Taylor can still go up and down the court then obviously that deal looks horrible. The redeeming grace for the trade is obvious: we got a good roleplayer and used him up until his prime is over, and next season we either clear his salary off the books or sign him to a cheaper contract. With Grizzlies, they ended up losing so many games because of Gay, and now that he's decent they have to pay him 20M a year. How is that the worst trade in NBA history? Rudy gay's numbers are nice but its nowhere near what it has to be to justify his max contract.
