Rockets showing interest in trading for Ricky Rubio?

I totally agree with you and have posted as much in regards to the point that in the history of the Rockets the point guard position has never been a priority position to upgrade. But in regards to Ty Lawson the mistake was not the trade, a trade which James harden wanted. The problem was not Lawson, it was the fact that Lawson was never allowed to run the offense. A trade for Lawson and or Rubio also requires Harden to not have the ball and that is the big problem. Everyone wants a point guard that can shoot, but not necessarily for the right reason. Harden needs to play off the ball for this team to ever win a championship. He is not a point guard and neither is Beverley.

While neither are the ideal players for this system, Lawson was never allowed to play as the point guard of this team either. Coaching may have played a role with this as well, but he was just a spot up shooter. Not being a good shooter effected the team that said when he played Dwight Howard was a better player. Harden has to grow if he wants to win and be less ball dominant. MDA and Morey have to stop stroking the ego and tell the truth. Rubio would never fit on this team for what ever price if JH dominates the ball, then PBeverley makes more sense. That said that strategy leads to a 41 win season. James needs to grow up and learn to play off the ball and we need a more dynamic point guard than PB, maybe not Rubio, but for me even Tyus Jones is an upgrade. In his case he is a really good shooter but is also a playmaker for others and is cheap enough to be had as a starter or a bench player.

 

Despite Harden's flaws, I think as fans & to an extent the FO/Coaches need to make their plans based on their star player not changing at this point in his career and instead put the effort in to make sure they uncover every opportunity to put him in a successful situation.

The good news is this isn't a player that puts up good stats on bad teams only. We've seen Harden go to the finals as the #1 playmaker when his best teamate was a great off the ball scorer (Durant), and the other PG was best when getting his when Harden was on the bench (Westbrook).

Despite Westbrook and Durant growing as players & especially as playmakers the past couple years, people forget that Harden really drove their halfcourt offense. So we know for a fact that success can be had with Harden as the primary playmaker if you have the right pieces around him.

We don't know if he will EVER be a Reggie Miller or Rip Hamilton off the ball scorer.... and I'm not sure we'd ever want that anyways.

So it's okay to criticize Harden for his flaws, but I'd tell Rockets fans if they listened to me (which they obv. don't) to hope for decisions to be made to anticipate him NOT changing.

If you HAVE TO have a sure fire championship contender with Harden I think its obvious that you got to have an off the ball superstar next to him. I actually think the Melo pursuit was about trying to replicate a Durant situation even though they couldn't replicate Durant. They knew that Harden + off the ball scoring 3/4 star worked in the past and that's why they went all out to try and get Melo but wouldn't go crazy spending to get Kyle Lowry.

Point is there is probably no easy solution, and those who think we are a Ricky Rubio away from contention are completely delusional. I think we are best to adjust our mindframe to consider this team as a fun loving D'Antoni hyper offense/no defense fringe playoff team, and all hopes of being a superteam like everyone dreamed off went out the window when Durant signed with GSW.

 

We need a off the ball point like Jamaal Crawford (not the one in the LAC) or M. Chalmers. Like you stated a true PG would never work with Harden right now. Maybe at the tail end of his career. But prime Harden no sir.

 

I wouldn't say we were wrong. Reason being is, we didn't know how mentally weak Lawson was. I know a lot of us gave this man some heat but Lin did his thing next to Harden. Therefore, with Lawson being better than Lin one would think Ty would have the better success. Unfortunately his head was never in the game and the coaching staff didn't make any better.

 

omg this thread! how?! it just....keeps....going!

 

Yep - he's not available for trade, i.e., we are going to trade him but want to operate from a position of advantage.

 

I'm sorry, but people who think the mistake with Lawson was not giving him command of the offense must not have been watching him last year.

He looked completely dead. I don't know if he will get it back, but looked completely detached from basketball when he was on the floor, regardless of who was on the floor with him and it didn't get better when he went to Indiana.

 

Yep, this is obvious. He sucked with Harden on the court, and sucked with Harden off the court, and sucked in Indiana without even having to think about Harden.

Ok, ok, he was slightly better in Indiana.

But the problem wasn't Harden. It was Ty himself, but also coaching. It's pretty obvious that the coaching plan was "Harden's great! Ty is a really good offensive PG in this league. Just throw them out there, it's got to work!!". Because that's basically how McHale coached and is his general philosophy about basketball - put great players out there, great players will just play great, and make it work. [from his player view as a great HOF player that played with other great players... but in a system that was in place, with great chemistry and just work]

Regarding Rubio, at this point, SOLELY because of this thread alone, you almost have to be pulling for a Rubio acquisition just to see how it would work.

I suspect his lack of a jumpshot is just too big a burden. How does a movement offense work if the defense can just not guard a player? I mean, the greatest offense I've ever seen lost the Finals because the Cavs effectively decided to just not guard Harrison Barnes during his shooting slump, and that worked.

But he does bring great defense and passing, with relatively low usage. One has to assume he's put in as much work as possible at this point. Which is probably disappointing for him. A consistent 35%+ three pointer and 45%+ two pointer, and he's a top PG.

 

I mean honestly, that's what Eric Gordon is at this point.

The perfect offense match for Harden is Blake Griffin. He's a much better offensive Draymond Green, though not the defender. But that's a pipedream.

I guess offensively, that's why they picked up Anderson.

He doesn't create threes for himself. 92% of his threes last year were assisted. But only 44% of his two's were assisted... a lower number than I anticipated. Lower than Blake Griffin for example. But Blake can obviously create off the dribble and for others, whereas Anderson can't.

 

Is there an echo in here?

Paying it forward.

 

Getting the Nets to take Pek would be very interesting. Would allow us to dump Brewer. Something like Dmo/Pek to BKN with Rubio here and other parts to Minnesota? Maybe DMo/Brewer plus 2017 first to minny for Rubio/shabazz.

Running on hope and change. Keep this thread alive.

 

I would like to throw Anthony Davis into that discussion. The beard and the brow. Things would get hairy for opposing teams!

 

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="el"><p lang="en" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Twolves?src=hash">#Twolves</a> FO had another personnel meeting today. Bottom-line: the current 15 isn't the 15 they envision in a few months. Wing, PG = targets.</p>&mdash; Darren Wolfson (@DWolfsonKSTP) <a href="https://twitter.com/DWolfsonKSTP/status/755890663426711552">20 Ιουλίου 2016</a></blockquote>
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Why would they want another wing it's beyond me.

 

And another PG..

 

Maybe they just want to add a couple of veterans

 

They want another PG and Wing huh? How about

FOR

 

I'd take Shabazz off their hands too.

 

My source reiterated last night about how Rockets would only want Rubio to be their 7th or 8th man and play a bench player's minutes. But you could say this for dozens of players in the NBA; not just Rubio.

My source also confirmed that Minnesota does not look very favorably on Rubio despite what they've recently said. "He's not good at basketball," Thibs has been heard saying to whomever will listen.

This is why even though they could really, really use a veteran PG on their team, they want nothing to do with 5 year vet Ricky Rubio.

As always, fluids everywhere.

 

It seems like his only problem is shooting, and that can be improved with a lot of hard work and good coaching.

But I want this thread to die.