Battier's 1st 2 yrs in memphis they sucked big time on offense and defense.His 3rd yr they brought in hubie brown and posey and shane went to the bench and they won 50 games. The next season hubie left after a few games and fratello coached most of the games and posey,miller,wells,and shane basically split time at the 2/3 spot and they won 45 games. Posey,Williams were traded, wells signed with the rox and fratello started eddie jones and shane at swings and brought miller off the bench. The team won 49 games. The next yr Pau was out 22 games, shane was traded, jones was hurt and the team stunk. Thats whats unreal is that everyone wants to give battier the credit for the defensive turnaround in memphis and the collapse after he left.Cxbby wants to say coaches arent that important which is bs. How can shane go to the bench, they bring in posey and hubie and in 1 yr the team turns around?Since coaches arent important, how can with basically the same roster, the rockets go from giving up 92ppg and 43% shooting to giving 88ppg and 41%. Coaches teach concepts and have rules about how to play defense. With rudy t, the big alsways opened the "gate " for the guard to come through. Thats why pg's like kj used to kill the rockets, but the benefit was dream closing the paint down. JVG likes the big to show hard whcih gives the defender time to recover. The downside is yao's stamina to show and recover really hurts him. Adelman went back to the "gate", but just like under Rudy, yao is in no mans land. Different schemes by different coaches.
samcassell, lets just look at like this, there were twenty players this past year who scored 20 or more points, out what 150 starters. Now that's an over simplification but still, its not that easy.
Maybe we are on the same page, then. Because I think Rudy's scoring 20 a game means that he's a pretty good scorer. I don't think he's anywhere close to star level, and I think Aldridge is better, but he does one thing (score) well. You could probably get similar production out of Von Wafer, actually. No, no it didn't. Pau Gasol joined the Grizzlies the same season that Shane did. And he played every game of those first 2 pathetic seasons. And when they went back to being pathetic, Pau was still there.
And that list of 20 didn't include your guy, Gay. There aren't enough shots to go around for every starter to get 20 per. Teams will have one, maybe two, maybe none. 20 ppg Gary Payton and 20 ppg Karl Malone joined the Lakers in 03-04 and scored less than 15 ppg each, because there weren't enough shots for them to get 20 along with Kobe and Shaq.
Hey leebigez, we are just going in circles and I don't think anyone is convincing anyone else anything otherwise. I would love to respond to every point but I am resigned to the fact that we are just going to have to agree to disagree. However I would like to point out something curious about your post. This is what you quoted me saying: The very first line is, "Coaching is obviously important". That was just funny to me. If thats not twisting someone else's words I don't know what is.
but he is number twenty five, and yes it doesn't include him maybe because he got a guy on his team that if weren't for rose's incredible year would have competed for rookie of the year. that's actually a compliment to gay who still shot 45% and 35% from three point land I'm not totally satisfied with gay's game, I thought he would be more of a playmaker but his scoring isn't something to be taken lightly because he is extremely talented, and he uses his talent to do what he can do well. oh yeah, he also rebounds well for his position again, don't understand your point, battier never has come close to 20 points a game, hooping on terrible teams, with stars, starting or not. that's not a code of honor. props to battier for sticking around in the league with what he does well, but he was worth the price. especially now, it would be nice if the rockets had a player we KNEW could put up 20 fairly efficiently coming in this season. and that was another huge problem I had with the trade, you traded your future for a role player. Battier payed off nice in these playoffs against Portland, i have to give him that and he made the rockets proud with his hard work on Kobe, but its still not worth in the long term.
Shane Battier, like Lebron James, took a couple years to adjust to the league and get a better supporting cast. Not everyone is lucky like Tim Duncan.
After CD became GM (if you go with '96 which I guess is the consensus here), the Rockets went to the conference finals. Under Morey the team made it to the second round. So no, the team has not done better under Morey. Once CD became GM, multiple franchise players were declining and soon retired, forcing the team to rebuild. Rebuilding usually means sub-par records. Morey hasn't had to rebuild yet, so we don't know how he will do.
Lots of poor posts to respond to in this thread; impossible to reply to each one. So many of the moves made under CD that are presumed to be bad are not that at all. Let's start with Cato. That move didn't hurt the team at all. He was included in the McGrady deal. How was the team going to get a player as good as McGrady had the Rockets not signed Cato? Not signing him wouldn't have improved their chances of acquiring a better player. Instead, he was seen as enough of an asset (even if just to match salaries) to acquire a franchise player. The other big one is Eddie Griffin. First off, it was and still is a good trade to this day. The chance to get a top talent like that doesn't come along often. Mid-to-late first round picks are much easier to come by and don't lead to greatness as often. Not to mention who knows if the Rockets could have even afforded or wanted to sign 3 first round picks at the time? No one ever talks about that. But the main reason why the move didn't really set the team back is that any player taken instead of traded for Griffin that was any good at all would have hurt the team's chances of landing Yao Ming. The team won around 28 games that year, which means whomever had been taken would have most likely helped the team win more games, which would have led to less ping pong balls and no Yao Ming. Shandon Anderson was not a bad acquisition either. He played well for the team his first year where they had no business winning 45 games. They then signed him to a 6 year deal but traded him for Glen Rice who only had around 3 years left I believe. Again, no serious negative repercussions involved. Mo Taylor's contract was bad but he sustained a serious injury after signing the deal that he was never the same after. Shortly into CD's tenure, Olajuwon, Drexler, and Barkley all retired. Most championship teams that ran into that type of situation were terrible for years - look at Boston, Chicago, Detroit. Under CD, the Rockets had one bad season, 34 wins in '99-'00. They then challenged for the playoffs the very next year, winning 45 games, at the time the most ever from a non-playoff team. The next year tons of players were out with injury, which wasn't his fault. The next year with healthy players, they challenged for the playoffs again and ended up making it the year after that. The whole unable to draft assertion is crap too. Even in the year with Drew and Turckan, they hit on 2 of the other picks in Dickerson and Mobley. Dickerson and Harrington were traded for bigger value in Francis. That's 2 mid-to-late picks by CD turning into a #2 pick. As good as Morey is, let's see anyone he drafts turn into more value than that.
A bunch of gross exaggerations and some personal attacks on a Rocket legend thrown in for good measure. If I could take back any rep I ever gave you I would.
TheFreak I agree overall that the given that the Rockets pretty much were tranistioning from a championship roster, that the overall results weren't bad. However there is no defending Cato's contract. Because he was included in the McGrady deal was a numbers situation, not because he had any value. That's silly. As far as Morey is concerned, he's hit on Aaron Brooks and Carl Landry, I'm sure if you packaged them in a trade they would bring back a very good player.
The Freak Not to bash CD since he has done much for the organization, however those things you listed are not justifications for his mistakes as a GM. And that is exactly what they were, mistakes. You can't say because eventually they lucked into becoming something good, they weren't initially mistakes. And since managing a team can often times be as much luck as foresight, the only thing a good GM can control is the his own decision-making. Not the outcome. Some good GMs will make the right decisions, but the result may not work out, some bad GMs will make the wrong decision, but with some luck it turns out ok. However over time the GM consistently making the right decisions will always win out. This is true for any game or situation involving some aspect of luck. Again, I hate to say this about CD since I love the man, however the key difference between him and Morey seems to be: Many of CD's moves were initially well received, however later leaves one scratching his head. Many of Morey's moves initially leaves one scratching his head, however later proves correct. This shows an incredible amount of foresight, as well as the cajones to go against popular opinion. The sign of a great GM.
This thread wouldn't be complete without TheFreak celebrating the Rockets late 90's/early00's glory lottery years under Rudy. bwahahahahaha. bwhahahahahahahahahhaha. Too bad Howard Eisley wasn't available.
What you've said just isn't true. There aren't enough big moves made in the NBA to overcome the luck factor. And every transaction involves so many other factors, from the cap to the other team to injuries to a player's attitude to their expected growth curve as a player over time. The Rockets took a risk by drafting Griffin. That risk didn't pay off, and looks bad now, but that doesn't mean they were necessarily wrong for taking it. They took a risk in trading for the draft rights to Francis, and he could have been an all-time great player if he'd matured a bit in his decision making skills and avoided the injuries. Does that make him a mistake? Yao Ming was a great draft pick, but again, injuries have taken their toll. T-Mac was the right move, a guard with good size, 25 year old, 2 time scoring champ with hops and court vision and shooting range? Hasn't worked out the way we would have hoped, but that doesn't make him a poor choice. Sure, a GM gets alot of credit or blame for a roster. But the bottom line is, you need a coach to get the most out of the players you've provided him and you need the players to stay healthy and play up to their ability. The GM isn't in control of any of those things. You can bet on red 10 times and have it come out black every time, and that 10th time it's just as likely to come out black as it is red. Luck doesn't always even out.
There are a lot of factors going into drafting a player, and luck is an aspect that determines whether he pans out or not. In that sense you are correct, because we have no idea what criteria they were looking at before drafting Griffin, so even though he didn't pan out, we weren't necessarily wrong for picking him. However once you take into consideration CD's entire draft history, the picture is clearer. There is no denying that over the years our picks have not panned out, save for the times we had a top 3 pick. One or two isolated instances means taking a risk that didn't pay off. A consistent stream of bad picks means there is something fundamentally wrong with your draft strategy. I wouldn't call any of those mistakes. I was more talking about Mo Taylor, Moochie Norris, Kelvin Cato, and the numerous bad contracts we handed out. The bottom line is, you need both. A good coach without a good GM providing him the talent to win won't be going anywhere either. C'mon, this is a bad example. Even though the 10th time it is just as likely to come out black, after the 1000th time, you will be even. Assuming there is no house edge of course. Bad analogy aside, my point wasn't that luck will always even out, but that you can't count on luck. The only thing you can control is your own decision-making.
I thought Griffin was worth the risk, who knew he would have such personal problems. I guess there were signs at Seton Hall but dude still produced.
So if every big move he's made has been an OK risk that didn't turn out, he's done a good job. Cato's contract, MoTay, Moochie, Shanderson... you're looking at basically a short window in the post-championship years where he overpayed some role players. Definitely some questionable moves. Each of those guys was a pretty decent acquisition, imo, but the re-signing of those guys to long term contracts ended up being a poor choice. Still, those are all bad contracts signed when Rudy T was clearly running things on the personnel side. And you're going to blame CD? And what if your coach is calling the shots on personnel matters and getting the guys he wants to bring in? What then? Rudy T was the guy making the bottom line calls for the Rockets back then, bottom line. And when he left, JVG had alot of say in the construction of his roster. No, you won't. And CD didn't make 1000 meaningful roster moves as a GM, since basketball teams only have 15 players of which only 9 are in a given rotation, and generally you're only bringing in 3 or 4 new players a season. Over the course of a decade, then, you're talking 30 or 40 new guys brought in, some of whom didn't pan out. But not every move failed, and bad luck can account for many of the ones that did.
