This is funny. WB, Harden, Greene, Durant...the thing you base Presti's performance on are all top 10 lottery picks. The last top 10 pick we had was the Rudy gay pick, not sure why you're complaining about the lack of talent when we only had 1 top ten lottery pick to work with the past 6 years. We only had maybe like 2 years of having 2 legit superstars. Yao Ming was always injured and Tmac totally gave up after a while. Not exactly sure why that would be a better situation than what Presti had, a complete blank canvass where he can do anything he wants to do. DM oth was stuck paying 70% of the cap to two guys who never really delivered.
So you think it a coincidence the GM who was so stingy he lowballed Landry in his rookie year would suddenly have a change of heart and give 6M a year to a 35 year old center?
Who gets signed and for how much is Morey's job, he's the GM. He's a big boy, treat him like one. Everyone rushed to praise every single thing he did that worked out, be fair and blame him for the things that don't go well. No matter how much Adelman did or did not want Brad Miller, it's Morey's job to sign players and assemble the team, you can't put asterisks next to Daryl Morey's job performance forever.
The original post on the first page specifically mentioned Presti as an example of a good GM but to your points, I think popular thinking is Presti is a great GM, but I don't think he is as flawless as you thin. First, it's becoming pretty clear now that OKC whiffed on the Hardin pick and as much as I like Westbrook, let's be clear here - he will never be a top 5 PG while Dwill, Paul, DRose, John Wall, and Steph Curry are in the league and that's leaving out a bunch of other decent young PGs(Jennings, Rondo, Tyreke, etc)...He's a solid player, but with a 4th pick in the draft you would hope you would get more than a solid player although it's not Westbrook's fault there are so many great PGs in the league right now....Kevin Love, and Brook Lopez both looks like they could be top 3 guys at their position for many years to come(and both are character guys no less). Ibaka was a good pickup so late in the draft and Jeff Greene was okay in terms of a pick because that draft was so weak but neither of those guys are any different than Landry/Cbud type picks - in essence, career role players. People have a love affair with Presti/OKC right now similar to what people thought of Portland/Pritchard a few years back. It's just the bandwagon though - no one has proven much on that team(outside of Durant) and similar to Portland, OKC has actually regressed over the summer. ... but getting back to Morey, I just don't see these "mistakes" your talking about. Specifically what are the mistakes? I'm sure Morey could have one of several 2nd class stars right now if he wanted(Iggy. Tayshaun, etc) but I don't see how those guys make us good enough to win a title so what's the point? What balls does he lack by NOT pulling off trades that make us perennial contenders but never serious contenders? I don't see too many people hanging out with the guy with the big balls who bet it all in Vegas and ended up empty handed. The people who make money there do it by playing it smart when the opportunity isn't there and only taking a risk, when the gamble is truly worth it. None of the guys we have heard rumors about have been worth it except maybe Melo and really the ball is Melo's court on that one. I just see a bunch of people on this forum who look at our record and the lack of personnel inactivity and are panicking just like what poor GMs do.
....it's completely a Morey move. He's about the market setting the value of a player. With restricted free agents, it's easy - you just hold on until someone makes an offer and then you compare that against how much that money could get you in the market today. With unrestricted FAs, it's a bit more difficult but still Houston paid Miller around what he was worth for a backup Center in this market and actually a decent value considering Miller will probably finish playing more minutes than Yao. 3rd string players for the minimum but a 2nd string C costs considerably more money. Hell, Jermain O'Neal almost makes the same amount as Miller and I would MUCH rather have Miller than O'Neal.
We can all think what we want but you and i will never agree on this at least....Westbrook can become a top 5 pg if not already. HardEn is a much better player than you give him credit for-how on earth can he average more points if that's how you base his value, when you have KD, Westbrook, and Greene usually playing at the same time? He's one of those "battier" type player full of "intangibles" just doesnt talk as pretty yet. Any single one of their nucleus (Durant, Greene, Westbrook) would instantly become our best player if were a member of the rockets and you can quote me on that. Dont ask me to answer the rest of your rhetorical questions because if you dont know the answer to those, then you are either a clutchfans robot or simply dont bother reading what others write ahead of you. Oh and lastly, if you dont gamble you will never win jack especially not in Vegas.
Fortunately I didnt get a chance to watch the entirety of tonight's game and THANK GOD but nevertheless serves well to prove my point- Morey is accountable but Les is getting to be an old cheap fart that can't think long run cuz there is none or at least for him. Sorry for the insults just dog gone pissed off......
Fact is, next summer Morey finally gets to put his real footprint. He inherited Yao ming, and the business pressures from the franchise/china , you have to build around him, and thats qhat he did, he made a lot of solid pieces come that many gms couldn't have made happen. With the injuries that happen, its tough to blame him. Next summer Yaos contract is out and he gets to decide how he wants to build this, and thats when he really gets to show his stuff and gain or loose job comfort IMO
It's not just 1 horrible trade or pick..it's several that made this team worst. Their assets have been getting worse each year because every decent player has been traded away. Daryl lost key assets and made the team worst and currently have nobody to trade away after losing the tradable assets. Since he's MIT graduate and likes calculations but doesn't realize the players we lost gelled well under adelman and intangibles factor in with the team. Now they're stuck with a bunch of players who can't gel under adelman or a bunch of duds of aging players. There's gonna be a millions of counter-arguments or denials..but the record speaks for itself. Key players acquired are unsatisfactory: 1) Jordan Hill (average at best) 2) Patterson(wasted #8 pick but sucked in the nbdl and has ugly shooting form!! how could rockets scouts missed this?? don't they tell him to do shooting tryouts? another major thing that morey failed in..how could you survive in the nba as a power forward with that jumper and lack of an inside game?) 3) Lee (good against nonshotblocking teams with weak defense for alley-oops but other than that horrible) Liabilities with sizable contracts(most don't need explanation) 1) Jeffries 2) Shane Battier 3) Kevin Martin 3 more years of no defense with a sizable contract and knowing he was injury prone and trading him for Landry was another huge mistake. simply doesn't gel well with the current team and disappears in the 4th. Lost assets: Landry, Artest, Ariza (decent contract and decent player traded away for a money-saving move?!?! knowing the team is injury prone and trading away a key part of last season's success (almost made the playoffs with a winning record) for Lee is another huge mistake.
A PG who averages 24ppg and 8 assists in just his third season on a 10-4 team is more than just a "solid player."
Threads like this add to the reason that the Clutchfans forum is taken less and less seriously every day.
Put the pipe down. Steph Curry's not fit to shine Rondo and Westbrook's shoes, and it was damn near criminal putting him on a pedestal with CP3, D. Will, and even D. Rose. The Baby-Faced Assassin a top 5 PG... child, please.
I've wrote this before but Morey really can't be judged until he makes that big trade which will bring in the franchise player to take McGrady's place and play alongside Yao and beyond. That might not sound fair given how difficult such a trade is, but IMO nearly all the smaller trades and deals he's made in the past few seasons have all been about gathering the "assets" to make that Big Deal, or else maintaining status quo until such a deal happens. It's the strategy he's implemented, and he's been pretty blatant about it. If Les Alexander is going to fire Morey, it will happen if Les doesn't believe in Morey's strategy to acquire the franchise guy. It won't be because the current roster is on a losing streak and may not make the playoffs this year.
Morey has zero tradable assets according to the faithful so he did a terrible job. According to them we cant trade for any Superstars or upgrades. Every trade idea is shot down because a player is their favorites or according to them has no value to anyone. Untradeable. So everyone technically should agree with you OP since Morey has done a horrible job of gaining anything of worth to trade for an upgrade. If he did? We would be talking about when and how. Not wait and see.
Don't believe everything you see on sportscenter. Believe it or not, there are really good players who don't make the highlight real and Curry is one of them. The guy is a younger version of Steve Nash who is a HOF PG despite not making the highlight real unless he is passing to a thunderous dunker. People may be more familiar with Westbrook and Rondo because their freakish athleticism lands them on the highlight real more often but your seriously seriously sleeping on Curry. I didn't think much of Curry either till I started specifically watching GS games(thank you, NBA League Pass) and the kid sees the floor like the greats and has a deadly shot to boot.
The point wasn't to say Westbrook isn't good - like I said, he is a solid player and he is very good...but not good enough to be better than DWill...Chris Paul...John Wall...Derrick Rose...Rajon Rondo. I mean, there is a chance Westbrook won't ever be one of the top 2 PGs in his conference let alone one of the best in the league. The guy can average 24 and 8 and still not be elite. My original point was in reference to Presti. I would rather have an elite player at one position than a very good player at another position. What good is having Westbrook if he could feasibly be outplayed by anywhere from 5-8 other team's PGs? Meanwhile, Kevin Love and Brooks Lopez represent the best of a much shallower talent pool(bigs) that surprise surprise OKC needs. Look at how the Lakers dominated them inside last year in the playoffs. Ibaka was a nice pickup late in the draft for them, but I think they made a mistake taking Westbrook when they did. Had they drafted Kevin Love instead of Wetbrook and picked up Curry the following year instead of Hardin, they would be a far better team. I'm just arguing that Presti isn't the gold standard of GMs and Morey isn't as bad as people here think.
Morey also gave $4.5M to a backup PG. You think Adelman can make Morey paying $6M to get someone? He could not even get paid that much for himself. If Morey had a plan and knew his players, the Miller signing wont happen.
