I understand that you are frustrated. As a fan, it's understandable and I think most of us feel that way. Morey seemed to feel that way as well. But I think it is unreasonable to pin the blame for where we are on him. The league is designed so that teams will go up and down. Very few teams manage to be on top all the time. The Celtics sucked for a while, then they made that big trade and won the championship. The Heat as well...the Spurs before they got Duncan...which was close to cheating, in my opinion. We are going through a difficult phase right now, but that's the way it is. What exactly would anyone else have been able to do better than what Morey has done? He is not God, but I don't understand the hate.
I want to point out that if (big if) Yao was healthy, the situation of obtaining a superstar would be on the opposite end of the spectrum. Probably could have gotten Carmelo/Billups? Point is, we took a risk with Yao, Mcgrady, Artest in the past. We were lucky and unlucky due to injuries but we had some good runs, especially 2 seasons ago. Fact is, we're just unlucky. Morey is doing whatever he can and it's obvious in his tone of voice and during the press conference. I'm sure him or any other GM in his place (well....not any other but you get the idea), did everything they could.
Dude, again...I'm gonna say this: I'm not trying to be an ass here. I know I'm coming off as one...but I seriously don't give a Sh right now. And again, I've almost always agreed with your points.....but Houston sports has me in a bad, bad place right now. SHi-ite is not good right now. That goes without saying. You know that, I know that...we all know that. I guess what it boils down to is this: I BLAME MOREY. You don't, I guess. Call me names, I'll call you a d-bag...this crap is going to continue for years...b/c...........we are going to suck for years. I blame Morey for this. You don't. Fine...we agree to disagree. I think other GM's could have done better. Morey had a plan and it has failed, miserably. We've been collecting assets, for what? 2 weak 1st rd picks, Thabeet and a backup PG? REALLY? THAT'S what we get for all this garbage Daryl's been collecting? Sweet. I'm not all about crying over a glass half full...but we don't even have a plastic cup. Our team LITERALLY has no identity. Who the F are we and where the F are we going? Can you tell me that? What's the plan here, oh disciple of Morey? I'd love to know.
Awesome. Yet another poster who thinks that one's stature on CF is the absolute when it comes to Rockets fandom. Awesome.
Are you drunk or something? You do know you just quoted the same person twice. Quit posting and go to sleep or something, no one is taking you seriously.
OMG! Are you serial? I quoted a post TWICE?!? I must be drunk, I completely missed that one. ...and CRAP! Nobody is.........TAKING ME SERIOUSLY? But, but...everyone else is taken seriously on this board! This isn't fair...I quit.
You can't say this forever. Lots of trades were made yesterday. The composition of a team with a GM who has been here for 5 years is entirely on the GM. This is a bottom line business after all. These are his guys, and if they weren't originally acquired by him, he's certainly had ample time to ship them out. What we have isn't working. Nowhere near working. To that mix we added a couple of lottery protected picks, a backup center and a backup PG. The Wizard needs to earn his title at some point. I'm not saying it's time to move on from Morey..but I am saying the clock is ticking.
And you have been and are totally wrong on this. You have been hating on Morey for quite a while, to a degree that appears irrational. We took a gamble on Yao and T-Mac - which was certainly not only a GM, but also and mainly an owner decision. Mainly for health reasons, that gamble did not pay off. When that happens, you cannot just flip a switch and get two other superstars in their place in an instant. To place the blame for this being what it is on Morey is just nonsense.
I agree with ATW on this issue, BUT I agree with Max in that it may well play out with his logic. For people who understand basketball, it completely makes sense that we've been getting worse. But as a businessman, you see us decline (and next year could be the worst yet, pending our summer), and you look at your watch and say "what gives, dork Elvis? You're more dork than Elvis here, and you're making a lot of money." But yeah, having McGrady and Yao fall apart is what happened. If Hakeem had fallen apart in 1991, we would have a very different history.
I don't think Morey has done the best possible. Now before I get bashed I will say this: "I have never and will never claim that I can do a better job otherwise I will be offered his job):" However, the biggest two trades other than the two superstars were for Wallace and Perkins. If you look at those trades, we had the assets for them. Regardless of what people think about those individual players, those are bigger caliber deals than what Morey did. Now you guys can attack
time to pick a draft where a superstar may pan out. chances are highly slim that we will trade/sign for a superstar.
The pressure is now on Morey. He knows that Yao is done and he now has to construct the team from scratch. I trust him to build a great team in 2 years. We are rebuilding folks. If you don't like it, go be a Miami fan.
I've made this point before, but seriously. You were given two max contracts of "superstars" that broke down. You were given a team where you have 2 stars and no one else that anyone would've wanted and you were asked to built around them. These stars broke down and you're stuck with crazy contracts. You're stuck with about 52% of the salary cap to work with whenever these stars are not playing. What are you expecting? You could only build so many ways and when you're putting a huge chunk of your salaries on players that are injured (that were not extended by Morey), you're sure expecting a lot.
The possible options before the deadline: 1. stay in that fringe of mediocracy that it seems you can never get out of, a #8 seed or the worst lottery pick. 2. dupe some team into trading your an all-star with your high risk assets, probably a high cost rental player. 3. Go all in on the high risk play, keeping unproven potential and collecting draft picks. You either grow into a team, get lucky with a low pick or if that fails, you finally get a top ping-pong ball (for the next GM). #1 is certainly not appealing, #2 you can't choose on your own. The path he had to take was the only option. And, it is the path that allows CBA flexibility and more importantly, leaves options to position the team for the 2012 free agency class, the next 'super team' shuffle. I am not currently thrilled. I could be thrilled if the kids blossom. Watching a real 'team' develop is ultimately more gratifying than band-wagoning on a team of short term mercenaries.
Great post, Dubious. Roxdoc, I think getting Wallace and/or Perkins at possibly an inflated price would have kept us stuck at option #1 that Dubious listed. It would have made us a little bit better, but what good would that have been? I think we just have to gut it out for a year, probably/possibly actually for two years, and have to hope that we get that big star, either through the draft or through another trade. Until then, we can't really do much more than developing our "assets" (yes, I know, over-used) by playing them. And that is what Morey is doing now. There has already been a paradigm shift: As long as there was hope to at least have Yao, and as long as our record and our on-court performance was close enough to give us at least hope that we could challenge to be in the playoffs and, with a lot of luck, to beat teams there, I think it was the right path to go with the approach to do everything to improve the team's chances to "win now". That would have meant keeping Battier, and possibly trying to get Wallace, and overpay for it with draft picks. But it is pretty evident that that would not be enough to put us over the top. Thus, Morey went into full rebuilding mode (I don't want to call it tank mode, but...). I think he was right in both instances: Both to try to "win now" as long as we still had hope and to go into full rebuilding mode at this point in time, when it is clear there is no hope in the short term. (Yes, in hindsight, maybe we should have gone into full rebuilding mode earlier already, but then Yao doesn't get injured and MadMax comes and says why are we not winning, get rid of this dorky GM.) Now, if we are stuck another two years, without hope of contending, I say something went wrong. But until then, we are just going through what we would have gone through with any other GM - only that some other GMs would have panicked already and would have handed out large contracts to the Mo Taylors and Catos of the world, hoping that they somehow magically get you to contention. Morey has not done that. I think every one of his moves so far was the right move at the time.
Dude I'm beyond frustrated, I yawn at the Morey & Chuck Hayes worship. It has gotten asinine really. But all we can do is hope SOMEONE figures it out. Because I really love watching my favorite team win. But I get your frustration.
