Nice thought. I still think the way to roll is to have Amen as our starter by the deadline next year. Depth was our problem this year more than any other issue. When you have such a young team and lose two starters, 3 if you include FVV, and your 6 man, there is just no way to make the playoffs.
Not to beat a dead horse, but I just watched Franks video on Rockets chop shop and heard Fertita talking about phase 2 and it reminded me of this conversation...Fertitta literally said part of phase 2 is returning to the playoffs...It's around the 1:30 mark..
Well, yeah. Phase two = returning to playoffs. Phase three = competing for championships. While it would be great to make the playoffs this season, phase two is going to take longer than a single year, and I’m fine with them not burning through assets that could help in phase three just to potentially accelerate phase two.
He absolutely said that. During Phase 2 we're supposed to get back into the playoffs. But Phase 2 is not supposed to be only a year long. He never meant we get to the playoffs the first year after Phase 1 (tanking) is done. Even Fertitta isn't stupid enough to expect a team that averaged fewer than 20 wins three consecutive years to double that in a single year and jump into the playoff race.
This. This this this. Let me also say that I would love it if we made the play-in this year, now that we've passed the trade deadline without making any moves that would mortgage our future. It's stupid to make a carefully constructed multi-phase plan that covers many years, then bail out before you're halfway done because you get itchy.
Ownership, Stone gave up on this year and it looks like the players have given up as well This is the group that can't shoot straight.
Listen, My intention isn't to try to decipher what Fertita meant. What you initially said was that fans had interpreted him literally saying "being competitive" to mean making the playoffs. That's "literally" not what he said. What he said was that "phase two was making the playoffs and this is phase two". He didn't specify a timeline for phase two (you did that), but he specifically mentioned playoffs and then Ime backdoored that by saying he has never not made the playoffs indicating his expectations are to make the playoffs this year. My whole point was that expecting this team to actually be competing for the playoffs or be in the playin was not something the fan base pulled out of thin air. The Rockets used those terms. As far as a tanking team turning around and making the playoffs the next year after winning around 22 wins we already went through a few examples of that. It's not far fetched. If your point is that the Rockets are right where they expected to be right now and have the future outlook for the season that they do, I'm going to disagree. They didn't go out and sign two guys for 200 million and load up on vets to be a bottom 4 team in the west and give OKC a top ten lottery pick.
We're not that far apart in our beliefs about what was expected, to be honest. The team was absolutely vague (and continues to be) regarding what they thought Phase 2 would look like, apart from "we make the playoffs" happening sometime in that unspecified time frame. So of course many fans would take that to mean everybody expected the playoffs this year. But that's just marketing. No sane owner is going to say publicly, "Don't get your hopes up just yet." Like you said, big turnarounds can happen. Not often, but the beauty of sports is that you never know. I would argue that this year the main focus was on resetting the culture. And our free agent acquisitions bear that out: FVV, Brooks, Uncle Jeff. If the FO had really been hell-bent on the playoffs this year, they'd have gone after better FAs. They had the money and the cap space.
Minor (nitpicky) correction: Fred doesn't turn 30 for a couple more weeks, he's about 2.5 years older than Murray.
Do you truly believe it gets easier from here, other teams are proactively doing something, other young teams..... Being in the lowly seeds of the Playoffs does not accomplish much either.....if you have no plan going forward. I do not friggin care about friggin Fertitta and having to interpret his words. Stone looks like he is stalling for a world class Super star but guess what the Thunder have all the assets, not the Rockets.
I think people aren't parsing the communication approach of the Rockets. All the "phase 2" and "competing for the playoffs" statements from Fertitta/Stone/Ime. The goal of this season was to change the culture from that of a tanking team and organization into one that values trying to win every game available to us. You don't make that cultural change by telling the players the obvious truth that "we're still on a developmental path" or "winning 32 games would be a successful season". You do it by reiterating all the time that the goal is to win games and make the playoffs. It's what you have to say to create a serious team culture. They've done that. If this team wins 32-35 games and finishes 11th in the West, I 100% guarantee you that this is viewed internally as a very successful season. The Rockets front office are not idiots. Ime is not dumb. Obviously our roster has less current basketball ability than 10 other teams in the West. They knew that from the beginning of the season. You can't take what NBA front offices say literally.
I think at the beginning of the year they were optimistic. I think the way they started off playing was the way they expected to play all season for the most part. I think after injuries occurred, and Jalen not taking the leap they thought he would have, the expectations were reset at some point. The trade deadline was a clear indication of what they think of this team moving forward for this season. Right now we are at 23 wins with 30 games to go. Looking at the rest of the schedule and the way they've played recently I see 5 -10 wins. I think realistically they win about 6-8 more games. That'll put them around 30ish wins and IMO, based on what they did in the off season and how they spoke about this season I believe they were expecting around 40ish win and to at least be knocking on the door or the playoffs. Only finishing with around 8 more wins than that disaster of a team last year after bringing in a "much better coach", your young players being a year older, signing proven vets, giving a max contract to Fred and Signing Dillon to a healthy deal...I just don't believe that a marginal jump is what they expected. And really, thank goodness for the good start to the season because if they'd been playing like this all year there would be no jump at all. You expect the team to get better as the year goes a long and they are regressing big time. Again, I just do not believe this is what they initially envisioned and I expect big changes this off season in personnel and maybe in front office staff as well because they've failed. They are not going to go into the off season thinking this year was a success if they continue on this current trend. You know what builds culture? Winning. When you are constantly getting beat and coming up short morale dips. You can say the right things and do things "the right way" but if you suck no one cares and they tune you out. People only talk about and care about culture of teams that are really bad...Or teams that are really good. It takes buy in and optimism and belief in what you're doing to build culture. The way the Rockets are playing is not building culture.
Again, as I said in my post, phase two is obviously going to be several years long with the goal of retuning to the playoffs.
I don't know about "disaster". We've had a lot of injuries this season. But my high(er) hopes have certainly been dashed the last six weeks or so, watching the team revert to fumble-f**ery.
Sorry, this is just out of touch prisoner of the moment thinking. I’m not even a Stone fan, I think he’s pretty mid. No front office gets fired after increasing their win total by 10+ wins. No front office gets fired with a positive point differential, 6 out of their top 8 being <22yo, and no bad contracts on the books. The 23-24 Rockets are perceived around the league as a major success story. Again I personally don’t think Stone is particularly good, but he’s closer to winning executive of the year than being fired. Udoka, FVV, Dillon, Amen, Whitmore. 5 biggest GM decisions last summer. All perceived as W’s.
You don't think that last year's team was a disaster? The only context I used that word in was to describe last years team.
Hey, not being rude but I'm just not gonna respond in the future if you're not actually reading and understanding what I'm saying. I didn't say anything about a "front office getting fired" or Stone being fired. I said "maybe changes in front office staff" . Also, There's a maybe in there as in "perhaps or possibly" not as in "for sure" or even "likely". And it was a minor remark in my post and you built an entire reply about it. I'm not going to go back and forth about stuff like that.
If your goal is to tank above all else, then last year's team was a resounding success. It was only a disaster if you're actually trying to win games. It is what it is. The FO decided to tank and brought in the right coach for it.
Now you're getting into something else entirely. Frankly, I couldn't care less whether anyone considers last years team a failure or success. Has 0 to do with anything I've said. Only reason I even responded to @ROXTXIA post is because it sounded like they thought I called THIS YEARS team a failure, which I did not.
