Terrence Ross says Lowry smartest player, natural leader on Raptors

Lowry is a whiner. His act got really old. Dragic is the guy we should have kept.

 

I have a question: maybe you already have answered it in one of your articles.

Do you know how much Dragic's decision was based on the Rockets not telling him on July 1st that they were trading Lowry (due to irreconcilable differences with Coach), and plan to give the starting position to Dragic? Or did they?

I always wondered why Dragic didn't wait a few more days to sign with the Suns. Maybe I'm naive, but I think we have a better chance signing Dragic, if Lowry wasn't in the picture still. I also always wondered whether Les gave Morey an directive to clear the deck and sign Lin, asap. And Morey did, because he probably took so much grief from Les for letting Lin go in the first place.

 

I've always thought Dragic left after Lowry was traded. But my memory timeline might have been wrong. The official reason for Dragic's departure was the player option 4th year. And I think in the recent interview with Dragic at the all star weekend, he sort of mentioned about the contract situation when asked if there was a chance he would have signed with Houston.

 

Lowry already has 10.0 win shares this year, that's insane (more than Rondo has ever gotten in any season, 6th in the NBA, only behind Curry amongst PGs, who has 10.3)

 

For what it's worth, a ridiculously in depth article about the Knocks letting Lin go reported that Lin received calls from three teams at 12:01 am July 1, 2012, when free agency opened These included Dallas and the Raptors. Houston was not among these three. Lin did fly down to Houston on July 4 for meeting but Lin's family has said that although Houston eventually reached out to Lin, Lin was not aggressively recruited by Houston. And Lin did not leave Houston with an offer after the meeting although he did expect to receive one.

It was widely reported by many media outlets on July 5 that Draguc had reached terms on a deal with the Suns.

This is not the sort of time line you would expect if the Rickets wanted to keep Dragic but wanted Lin more.

They would have spent more time negotiating with both.
Players could not sign contracts that year until July 11.

 

My quick Google search shows the Lowry trade and the Dragic signing both happening on July 5th.

But it doesn't really matter. My point is you have to tell Dragic on Day 1 (July 1st) that you are trading Lowry to clear the starting job for you. If you wait to tell them (he and his agent), it's too late.

 

Make no mistake. Lowry was a whiner when he came back from his infection thing while Dragic just soared.

Lowry got traded, not to get assets, but because of irreconcilable differences with Coach.

 

We knew this when he was here. Things happened and well......

 

It didn't matter which one out of the two. Either would be better than what we have now.

 

It was also possible that the Rockets FO was not 100% sure whether they would trade Lowry until a deal was happening.

Here is a fairly reasonable scenario (pure speculation, of course):
Morey told Dragic that he was working on trading Lowry but he could not guaranteed that it would happen. Dragic than answered that he would not wait for the result and went out to shop for the best contract he could get.

The knock on Morey now is that he undervalued Dragic. If he knew what Dragic would become, he would have signed Dragic to Dragic's satisfaction and deal with Lowry later.

I have mentioned it elsewhere during Lin's big slump. Dragic's great performance as a Rocket during Lowry's sickness was very much Linsanity-like. Before that burst, Dragic was an inconsistent backup PG. After he signed with the Suns, he was pretty mediocre for the first season, just like Lin was in his first season as the full-time starter after an unlikely high level stretch of performance.

So the two guys didn't really separate themselves from each other until this season when Dragic blossoms into all-star material and Lin remains up-and-down.

I think it was not unreasonable at the 2012 offseason to believe that Dragic and Lin were about the same level kind of players.

 

Lowry was a head case in Toronto last year. This year it was the new GM who had a heart to heart with him and along with Kyles natural maturity he has transformed himself. He is now a leader.

He's an all star calibre pg and worth a 12 mil contract IMO.

 

Dragic wanted 3 years and a player option. Lin was OK with 3 years. Morey wanted flexibility to sign a superstar as we didn't have Harden or Howard at the time.

Morey is allergic to player options.

 

Lowry was a massive piece in getting Harden. Hence he's off the books.
With everything considered it'd be Dragic/Harden in the backcourt.

He made it clear it was between him and McHale and the Rockets rightly kicked him out

 

I have a feeling that Lowry and Harden would not get along. Don't know why...it's just a feeling.

I think Harden and Rondo COULD get along (because Rondo could have 0 points and not give a ____) but Lowry is going to get his shots.

 

if lowry came back, he would suck worse than lin did when he had that back injury...such is the magic of coach mchale LOL

 

There was that one time: http://scores.espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=311231010

 

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