Regardless of whether it was asked or not, Morey answered it. "Ultimately it doesn't matter how I feel, Rob Hennigan is the guy whose opinion matters." He later said "it takes two to tango", but what he meant was that it takes three to tango. No superstar wants to come to a team where there is no foundation pre-existing. Stars will align with teams where a previous superstar is entrenched, and that only happens when guys are drafted onto a new team. So it's time to begin.
The offer sheets were irrelevant to the cap relief issue. Sure, the Rockets would have been ABLE to eaten more bad contracts without Lin and Asik. However, I doubt the Rockets were WILLING to eat that many bad contracts even if they were ABLE to do so. It seems that the Rockets approached this trade much like they approached their FA signings: They have price in mind and would rather not make a deal than to pay more than their price.
Likely all of their picks before the draft. I'm sure Morey got more value from them than Hennigan would have, which is why he wouldn't part with them afterwards.
I have a feeling that if there's a "shotgun at the head" conspiracy, it's not on Hennigan's head, but on Morey's.
Agreed. Orlando seems to have a double standard in this process, holding it against Houston that we COULD have offered: Martin, Lamb, White, Jones, Parsons, Motiejunas, TOR pick, Dal pick, Cha pick, future HOU pick, and TE for Howard, Turk, Richardson, Duhon ...and wouldn't. I'm convinced they had that in mind when they said: At the end of the day, you look at what's available in theory and what's available in reality and sometimes they aren't the same. Therefore, Morey must be punished.
Here's the thing about NBA teams: Many of them are owned by senile old men and/or their spoiled children. These people often have more ego than competence and make emotional rather than rational choices. I think GMs like Morey and Hennigan approach things rationally but it's their bosses, the owners, who have ultimate say. This is how we end up with all the stupid drama with the Knicks and Lin (and before that, with Knicks and Isaiah Thomas): The team owner is James Dolan, idiot son of the owner of Cablevision. I think this is also how we end up with the Orlando mess: the team is owned by 85-year-old Rich DeVos and run by members of his family. Those are guys who have had their asses kissed by subordinates for years and probably get mad when another team plays hard ball (even though, you know, teams are suppose to COMPETE with each other).
The point is if this approach was appropiated. It is awesome collecting assets and gain flexibility but eventually you will have to strike. When? I guess now we'll wait for the next superstar available renouncing to Al Jefferson kind of trades... The question it would be if by then something is going to change... Because this time he was ideally positioned, and still it was not enough. Things won't change by themselves, I wonder if he will change his approach. For now, current Houston Rockets situation keeps being a sum of great conditional things but nothing tangible.
As stevie said, he was corrected. I give him credit for saying it though. Obviously they wanted in this thing.
... or out of respect for Houston. From the beginning, Morey has always maintained that he has respect for the young Hennigan. I wouldn't be surprised if he had those same feelings for us.
IMO, Hennigan could have been covering for the Rockets. He knew that Rockets had no chance of keeping/extending Howard, and he did us a favor by making up a BS excuse to help us save face.
DeVoss is like 86 I believe. No way that guy can be competent enough to run the club. Poor Orlando fan base. Then this monkey, Alek Martens, comes out of nowhere and flubs it up. All the signs point to the non-basketball guy, Martens, as the reason this trade was done. Hennigan is simply not this incompetent. He's not. Morey gave you all a hint. He said Hennigan was a good young GM who will have a great career in this league (paraphrasing). That should tell us something. I'm convinced it wasn't Henny's call. Orlando has screwed the pooch so many times with players and front office mistakes going clear back to Weisbrod and even before that. And the Dwight trade was hopefully the concusion of those mistakes for the Orlando fan base. Now we'll get to see how involved Martens is going forward or whether they actually leave the bball stuff to Hennigan.
Believable. Dolan stepping on Walsh. Martens on Henny. Maybe it is Les who should step in 'at that level' to consummate a deal he would accept for the team he owns.
You know, in hindsight, wouldn't it have been interesting if Les had called Devos directly and tried to talk him into the deal after all the rangling back and forth. Probably the one thing Martens didn't think about to get him out of the jam with Dwight.............errrr....unless Devos was in on the know of the backroom agreement with Martens.
