I am not ignoring anything. The people who care about which road is traveled is everyone. Riley doesn't get anything done. He doesn't draft well, he doesn't manage his cap well, he doesn't trade well. He was in the right place at the right time and it led to a couple rings. It is in no way indicitive of his ability as a GM. Pat Riley is a dinosaur living off a reputation he doesn't deserve. Top 3 basketball mind.....
Kobe Bryant is awfully big piece. Rockets had no one like him. Morey's efforts are more impressive IMO.
He might have done that but he definitely overpaid for all the trades he made. 2 First round picks for Mozgov? he was bidding against himself. And what did it cost them to resign them all? Wiggins is now making 6 million less than Shumpert..
Keeping Kobe in his prime is not "blowing up the team." TheRealAllpro is right, but described it wrong. You're right, too, but only based upon a wrong description of a historical rebuild by Morey. Rockets completely turned over their roster since Morey's first year, and rebuilt without falling below a .500 team. The only team that's done that that I can find is Portland in the '90s after Drexler to 1999 WCF. Lakers always had a HOFer, Superstar in his prime. That's not the definition historians use to describe rebuilding eras. The definition isn't did you fall out of the playoffs, it's did you cross eras without rebuilding via suckitude/tanking/your draft picks. The Kobe Era never ended. They arguable had the best player in the league still (or second). Besides, they only missed the playoffs once, a year Kobe missed 18 games.
The Big 3 had a lot to do with the 3 players wanting to play together and Pat Riley put his team in a position for them to play there. He made sure he had the cap space and flexibility for it to happen. The same way Morey gets credit for landing Dwight Howard. It was Dwight's choice, but Morey the team in a position to sign him. I'm not sure what your point is about LeBron's success in Cleveland relating to this. Obviously he is a great player. He is in win-now mode, which is exactly the reason that Miami didn't develop any first round picks. The ones that they didn't trade away to help form the big 3 were very late picks that would not have contributed as much as a veteran player, so the picks were all moved. The Cavaliers are doing the exact same thing now. It's the right play - as you can tell by NBA Finals appearances. On top of that, Miami was extremely limited by the salary cap in the Big 3 era. They had Wade, LeBron, and Bosh taking up nearly all of their space so no, they couldn't make many more trades, but they didn't have to - as you can tell by NBA Finals appearances. Morey has done an excellent job. He's definitely a top 5 GM, but you have to admit Riley has a much more impressive resume even if Morey is working harder.
Yeah, yeah, they were on his ass last time he made a big trade, said he was a relic, yada, yada, yada, we've heard it all before. http://www.nba.com/heat/news/heat_acquire_walkerwilliamsposey_050803.html Then he won the title. There's really no argument when you just win the titles. I've literally seen Mark Cuban rest a lawsuit using that tactic.
The Indiana Pacers did the same thing during the same time the Rockets were doing it. Morey even commented on it once, but I can't find his exact quote. Going by your descriptions, the Pacers had a 'Reggie Miller' era and were in the playoffs nearly every year from 1990 to 2005. Then Ron Artest happened, breaking up a 61 win team. Pacers were the 9th seed in 2006-07, 2007-08, 2008-09, and 10th seed in 2009-10. Then they got back to the playoffs and became a contender again. Like the Rockets, they rebuilt without a high pick (Rockets were 9th seed 3 straight years also).
So you can only be a talented coach if you win a title with a bad roster? He drafted Dwyane Wade, traded role players for Shaquille O'Neal, and won a title. He then managed the cap to free up space to sign and trade for LeBron James and Chris Bosh and won a few more titles. He's since pulled off trades for Goran Dragic and drafted Justise Winslow. But sure, he was just in the right place at the right time when he won a championship as a player, 5 times as a head coach, 2 strictly as the executive, picked 3 times as coach of the year, once as executive of the year, and was chosen by the NBA as one of the top 10 coaches in NBA history. What does he know about basketball?
Get real. Morey is the best GM in the league, I would not hire anyone over him. I used to think Presti may be a competitor but he has the disease shared by many analytics minds: inability to look outside the numbers, something Morey does so well. I would genuinely be frightened if we lost Morey.
I don't think Howard is a good analogy to Bron-Bosh-Wade. FA signings happen all of the time, based on mutual interest. Players colluding to form super squads don't. I'd be interested to hear a feasible explanation of how another GM could have lured all three of them to his team. Otherwise, it was luck on Riley's part. Allen-Garnett-Pierce is a better example of a GM making the dominoes fall correctly. Not the South Beach super goons.
Not sure if you remember, but the general consensus at the time was that a super team was going to be formed in New York. They had the most cap room and rumor had it that their endorsements would rise in a market like New York. The Nets had the next most cap room. Then the Bulls. Then the Heat. Here is a nice article on the situation at the time: http://espn.go.com/nba/dailydime/_/...ow-much-salary-cap-space-team-nba-free-agency
DM lacks the hardware Riley and Buford have. For that reason, I'm fine with ranking him top 3 or 4. Anything below that is insanity. Ask R.C. Buford how many trades he's agreed to with us since the Scola heist. DM is the type of GM I would purposefully blackball if I were an opposing GM. Odds are if he's trying to acquire somebody you have, he knows something that you don't. Hang up the phone.
Remember that time when Sam Presti was considered the best GM in the league because he NAILED a few drafts but not any more since he has faltered repeatedly at managing the talent on his roster(trading Harden, keeping Perkins, etc)? Welcome Bob Meyers - the NEW Sam Presti. No argument with RC Buford and Pat Riley - both guys who have remained at least a darkhorse title contender year after year after year on the strength of sneaky draft pickups, trade targets, and FA acquisitions. That being said I would place Morey ahead of Bob Meyers. That's not a knock on Meyers either - it's just that Morey hasn't just drafted well - he drafted well, signed well, and traded well. So far Meyers record on impactful FA acquisition and trading is limited to signing Iggy & Livingston and Trading Lee.
Also to add - Mitch Kupchak is a great GM too. Aside from sticking by Kobe longer than he probably should have(I don't think this was his decision either by the way), he has mostly done fairly well as a GM. The Lakers will still make money as long as Kobe is on their roster and in the meanwhile they are going to keep picking high in the draft and hoping they land that homerun of a Free Agent(Westbrook anyone?). If Russell or Randle turn out to be pretty good or if they are only decent players and the Lakers land a big FA, they will be well on their way to being a contender again. They just have to make themselves respectful because they are going to get the FA boost from their location.
Yeah, I'd agree with Indiana. Now that you mention it, I do recall Morey using IND (Larry Bird) as an example of doing it the hard way; albeit they hadn't fully succeeded at that time by re-achieving contender status until later. Pre-Harden years was when Morey was talking about Les' mandate to rebuild "the hard way". I last researched pre-IND regaining contender status. Morey's right. Pretty rare. I'd place POR in that list, too. You might be having trouble finding the quote, because it was an 610 interview, first, right? Search specifically on this site. Clutch definitely wrote a front page article about it as well.
Several of those years, the Pacers were well below .500: 2009-10: 32-50 2008-09: 36-46 2007-08: 36-46 2006-07: 35-47 That isn't nearly as impressive as the Rockets' turnaround without ever going below .500 in the WEST!
Yes, the Rockets did it better, but that's not the point. Indiana also rebuilt by refusing to lose and that's respectable. Both of these teams were built the hard way.
I don't think it's that impressive to decide to rebuild without losing. It's a lot more impressive to actually do it.
