I actually said let's see who is relevant faster, us or Portland - since they blew it up at the deadline at the same time we acquired Camby and attempted to make the playoffs and stay competitive. (not gonna' try and dig that old post up though) Tanking in TODAY'S NBA is just not smart. Way too much movement, way too much "player control", and way too low of odds of truly landing a franchise player. Did a LOT of things have to fall into place? Obviously. But, the odds of doing what Morey has done are a lot better in today's NBA than tanking and actually GETTING a superstar player. Those that can't see that just hate "change" and refuse to see how different things are now. Morey has proven that he's extremely innovative and that the game has changed. I honestly believe some of his "one way to get better is to get worse" comments were made as a way to almost give him an out to some degree if things failed or took longer than they did. As I said back then, I'm PROUD to support the team that stayed competitive and bucked the trend of tanking TO GET BETTER. Props to LES and Morey. NEVER TANK!
The people in the beginning of the thread were pretty wrong. Hindsight is 20/20 but saying that the Pacers would be stuck at 4-8 in the East without making a major roster move looks pretty bad considering today they are the 2nd best team in the East. The Rockets had a GREAT day, but they need to make more moves if they want to win a title. Gotta make this Asik/Anderson++ trade happen. We can't/won't start both Howard and Asik. Anderson next to Howard with this team works very well. Gotta get Garcia and Delfino back. They are holes that need filling. We can try and find something for Lin (Darren Collison perhaps?)
We can argue alternate scenarios all we want, but the truth was, prior to poaching Harden from the Thunder, we were more than likely looking towards tanking away that season. Think about it; we missed out an any big trades after gathering a bunch of first round picks. We were looking at starting the season with the following players: - Chandler Parsons - Jeremy Lin - Omer Asik - Greg Smith - Jeremy Lamb - Terrence Jones - Royce White - D-Mo - Patrick Patterson - Kevin Martin When the best player on your team is arguably a three way tie between Lin, Martin, and Parsons, it doesn't inspire a lot of faith. Now could this team have made the playoffs? I would say I don't believe so. If anything, we were headed towards another lottery year, hopefully one much higher than the ones you get in Purgatory.
I will just keep my thoughts to this article by the Houston Chronicle: If we keep our team together and just add talent, while taking away the malcontents (Asik), then there is no reason we can't grow like they have over the years. There HAS to be a commitment to excellence and playing the game the right way though.
Gotto give props to DaneB for really good foresight. Few people in January 2012 would have used the Pacers as their go-to model for success, and without changing that core that he mentioned they have managed to become arguably the 2nd best team in the NBA. Granted it didn't hurt that Paul George flourished into a LeBron clone.
Working hard and getting playoff experience early in a career is my guess to a successful career. Players with nba playoff experience have an advantage. years Celtics is one example. Not a team with a lot of raw talent but those guys know how to win from their deep playoff runs. The euroleague is another example. The nba players with playoff experience do well. The high lottery picks without playoff experience struggle.
Tanking is obviously not for everyone.... and we are not in that situation anymore but if a team is to blow up the team, then going through is the only and best way
You do realize that the Rockets went into full tank mode prior to acquiring Harden right? They traded Lowry for a pick, let Dragic walk, and amnestied Scola. It just so happens that the tank instantly turned into Harden. And we very likely don't even get Harden if we don't ship Lowry off for a pick.
What rep? We were going into full tank mode prior to getting Harden. Martin or Asik was our best player prior to the Harden trade. Just because we never actually got the chance to tank the season, doesn't mean that Morey wasn't finally allowed to try.
Eh, the Philadelphia experiment has sort of redefined what 'full tank mode' means. Keep in mind, Hinkie was working for us at the time. We held onto Martin and signed Lin, Asik, & Delfino for $50MM+. It was probably going to be a rough year, but if we were truly going for the #1 pick, Morey probably would have done things differently.
Prior to Philly, the definition of tanking was to blow up your team, sign a bunch of young talent, let them play and figure out what you have while you bank on getting a high draft pick at the end of the year. Injuries help with that too. Now, people probably think tanking means trading any resemblance of talent save a couple of cornerstone young role players and sign a bunch of scrubs to purposely lose as many games as possible without outright telling the players to lose.
