Morey: http://67.72.16.166/kilt2/2147726.mp3 Gerson Rosas: http://67.72.16.166/kilt2/2147720.mp3 Rosas in Spain. A short interview, spoke about Eliayau. Mentioned Splitter twice. Karnisovas was supposedly seen at a Vitoria game in December. Rockets are keeping a closer eye on Eliyahu because of Casspi's success? Or they're interested in Manu ("trying to find an all star level talent to get back. either a current star, someone developing or declining") and Splitter?
Thanks for the recap. I personally would like to see Dorsey get a few minutes and to be a spark off the bench alongside the Bench Brigade. DM thinks he is doing well.
Would be interesting for the Rockets to Scola away Splitter from SA. Would be good if Eliyahu improves enough to either play for the team or be of value in a trade. (Hey Rod Thorn, you want some fans to fill your Brooklyn Arena? We got this Jewish kid who can play.) But I think Rosas is just doing the usual due diligence rather than going there with trade or what not lined up. And yes, Manu would be my top guy in the "declining" star list.
I'm not sure if it was mentioned yet but did anybody catch Morey's comment about 85% of the Rockets' revenue being tied to wins and losses? Some people seem to think Yao is more responsible for team revenue than is actually the case. I've even seen some people make the ridiculous argument that the Rockets would fold as a franchise without Yao-related revenue. I'm not sure how Les benefits from Yao beyond the scope of Yao's basketball abilities but, strictly in terms of basketball-related revenue, Yao doesn't appear to be a cash cow. I'm not sure where the other 15% of revenue comes from but it probably also has little to nothing to do with Yao Ming. I'd love for somebody to put together a thread based on pure, unadulterated fact about "The Myth of Yao Ming the Cash Cow" at least as it pertains to the revenue he directly creates for this organization as an NBA player.
Really, that stat doesn't surprise me - even if the revenue being counted were from overseas/China as well as stateside. Think about it - people want to see wins, and aren't interested in a losing team - just ask the Nets or the Sixers...something psychological about associating ones self with a winning team makes one seem like a winner as well? I'm more interested in the 15% that isn't, and wonder what he meant by that. Season tickets being purchased by big businesses regardless of win/loss?
Unless you have actual financials of the Rockets, such a thread is impossible to make. We are able to make threads to at least speculate about salaries and cap implications because these numbers are known. Amount of Rockets income broken down by source is not available.
Well that's not really fair, you want to keep it "strictly basketball-related." The problem with this, I would assert, is that Yao's impact on the revenue has a lot to do off the courts (ie more media attention, hype, ect). If you want to measure a players affect on the revenue strictly on the court, then yeah, of course any player's contribution would be the result of how much they helped the team win. However, I feel like Yao's presence and the increased revenue is, if not undeniable, supported by the numbers. A teams value is based on their new value vs. the value of the team going into the season before (meaning a player's impact on the revenue is seen with next year's numbers). After Yao was drafted the Rockets made the single biggest revenue increase in Franchise history. The team value increased by a third (from 278 to 389 million). While the wins were nearly identical looking at the 02-03 season to 03-04 (43 wins vs 45 wins) the operating income for the team more than doubled from 15 million to 36 million. The revenue jumped from 82 million to 125 million. While the Rockets have made money each and every year since Yao (a testament to the savvy of the brass), it has taken the last 6 years to match that kind of revenue increase (we now sit at 160 million in revenue). With the whole win/loss business, sure that makes sense, nobody pays to see a loser in a fairweather city. But the rockets made the same increase in profit margins the year Yao and Tmac went down and we ended up with a lottery pick as we did the year before when we took Dallas to 7 games in the playoffs (the fact being you make more money with playoff games). That would mean we made more money in that losing regular season than we did in a winning regular season plus playoff games. This is what leads me to two conclusions; there is more to the 85% of revenue being tied to wins business (ie income comes from sources that we can't simply attribute to wins-losses) and that Yao probably does make the Rockets more money than you are willing to give him credit for. -V
From the interview: Caller: I was just reading this morning that, uh, Larry Bird is offering Danny Granger, Troy Murphy, and... Morey: No. Caller: ...Mike Dunleavy for Tracy McGrady and Brian Cook, etc. Host: And Larry Bird is offering himself, circa 1986.
I think that revenue jump had everything to do with the new Toyota Center, not Yao Ming. There is probably also a lag effect on the impact of winning/losing. If a team is good for a few years and on an upswing, it will be expected to be good for several years. If the team performs badly one season due to injury or whatever else, the revenues will probably remain steady since expectations are still high. If the team has multiple losing seasons in a row, that is when I think you see the revenue effects of losing. Single year anomalies probably don't have much impact. It's the winning/losing over several years that probably needs to be looked at.
