Well Morey coveted Harden for years and wanted to move up to draft him back in 2009, so he thought highly of him. KMart was making around the same ballpark, think like 11 million before he was traded.
He tried to build around Yao/TMac and got a 2nd round, potentially a WCF berth if TMac/Yao don't break down. We chose to not tank and stockpile on assets which eventually got us Harden and opened up the Howard signing.
If Morey doesn't have at least at one WCF appearance before the Harden/Howard era is over, then you can seriously have a discussion if he's not a good GM or should even be fired.
He tried to build around Yao/TMac and got a 2nd round, potentially a WCF berth if TMac/Yao don't break down. We chose to not tank and stockpile on assets which eventually got us Harden and opened up the Howard signing.
If Morey doesn't have at least at one WCF appearance before the Harden/Howard era is over, then you can seriously have a discussion if he's not a good GM or should even be fired.
By romreivahagn what your team?rondo > Isiah thomas
dallas will lost to nets dont they?
fuck rondo………..
The one thing that makes me wonder if Jahlil Okafor can become Al Jefferson plus passing in the NBA is that Big Al is a pretty decent shooter whereas Okafor is just terrible at shooting.
By IWMTB19The Wizards blew a 14 point lead heading into the 4th.Have they fired Randy Wittman yet? Could they do it during a game?
By unknownkyotos boy bargs is beastin currently
He's destroying the triangle though. He's never in the right spot unless he's doing the weakside give and go game. The team runs the offense much better with Jason Smith in there.
All these late shot clock situations are because he's ruining the spacing and not getting into position.
By VahagnHe will be gone this summerBy unknownkyotos boy bargs is beastin currently
He's destroying the triangle though. He's never in the right spot unless he's doing the weakside give and go game. The team runs the offense much better with Jason Smith in there.
All these late shot clock situations are because he's ruining the spacing and not getting into position.
Whiteside has as many 20 rebound games now for the Heat as Alonzo Mourning. Just put his number in the fucking rafters already.
By psychintellectSpo is a fucking idiotHe just played like 10 mins straight, he does need to rest every now and then...
Jesus Christ fire him
By vireWatch him play 4 mins in the 4thBy psychintellectSpo is a fucking idiotHe just played like 10 mins straight, he does need to rest every now and then…
Jesus Christ fire him
Watch
Lol beasley
By VahagnBy JonmThis is just a weird argument you are making. First off you have 8 out 29 GM's ahead of Morey. That still puts Moery as being better then most of his peers.
You keep moving the goalposts on what constitutes a good GM, first it is championships and then when you want to stack the deck against Morey you assert other GM's without chips are good GM's and better then him. Some with arguably less success. But then you throw out criticism like the number of trades? With no context as to why they are bad.
You also ignore a key factor in judging GM's: starting position.
GM's don't come into the same situation everywhere they go. The team may be at a different place in terms of competitiveness, market draw, the assets in their warchest, coaching, quality of ownership, ownership expectations, philosophical freedom.
So when you account for the rigid demands of the Rockets ownership, their plagued injury past, the situation Morey walked into and the fact that he managed to rebuild a team after losing it's 2 cornerstones, being in the dreaded late lottery hell that buries most franchises, and has came out with a top 5 Western team, the best SG in the league, and the 5th best winning percentage over his tenure, it is pretty damn impressive to me.
Would he be my number 1 choice to start a franchise? No. But I bet at least half the teams in the league would gladly have him over who they have now.
a) The 8 were just off the top of my head. Morey's mediocre at best. He's not elite, and he's not good. If I gave you 3 additional names, would that change anything?
b) I'm not moving goalposts. But when you're judging something like GM, you can't just blindly say "chip makes you the best". For some of the reasons you mentioned. What I'm arguing is that "maintains flexibility" "underpays assets" "stockpiles picks" don't really mean much if you're treadmilling and not actually building contenders. That's confusing process with results and being obsessed with new ways of thinking just because they're new.
c) Making 47 trades is bad because you lose any chance at building chemistry. Making 47 trades is bad because you ultimately trade away talent that should be kept. Making 47 trades is bad because eventually some players don't want to play for you. Making 47 trades and only landing one All Star in all that time is bad because one can argue that a monkey could hit those results. Ainge by comparison who is also in the midst of a multi year rebuild has only done about half that many trades.
d) Morey did not inherit a horrible situation at all. He inherited a playoff caliber team with two all stars. There are far worse situations you can inherit. His situation wasn't good or anything. But he went from a 1st/2nd round team to a 1st/2nd round team. How exactly has he outperformed the previous GM?
e) Half the teams in the league don't have a guy who's been in the job for 7 years. Several of them are rookies or second/third year guys.
Is he better than a decent chunk of GM's? Sure. But that doesn't make him a good GM. It makes him average in comparison to a bunch of 30 year old rookies who have less basketball knowledge than he does.
It's like we're forgetting that he got Harden because ownership made him get a star. If left to his own devices, does he pay a max to Harden when he's already got Kevin Martin for much much much less money who back then was an analytics lovers wet dream?
You're all over the place again. It really seems that the only constant in your argument is that you don't like Morey.
You say factors other then chipping matter, then you criticize him again for not chipping. You say he hasn't built chemistry yet he has the 5th best league record over his tenure. You knock his number of trades but ignore both the context and result of where it has led his franchise. Which is a rather telling fact.
You just stepped around the fact that the two allstars he inherited became arguably the most injury plagued players of any superstar duo in history. That kind of puts you in quite the shitty position wouldn't you think???
I mean its not even like you get the chance to trade them away ala Melo, Howard or Paul when they are at their peak. Or you have a team that without them will be able to tank for the next 3 seasons to try and rebuild through the draft. You are literally left holding a bag of shit while your ownership is telling you they want to find a way to keep winning. So exactly what exactly would you have done in that situation?
You are left with few options to rebuild: hoping to hit in the late lottery(which they typically always did), trying to find value by identifying diamond in the ruff players, trying to accumulate more assets by trading high and getting the better end of your deals to slowly build up your warchest and poker chips for larger moves, and through FA. Am I missing some other avenue? I guess fire everyone and blow it up but the ownership didn't seem receptive to that idea if memory is correct.
I mean how would you have re-built Hosuston under the circumstances he was given? You lost your two best players, aren't bad enough to tank, ownership wants to keep winning. What do you do differently that gets you to a better place?
The fact that less then 4 years removed from his cornerstone player announcing retirement and getting only pennies on the dollar from his other superstar because of injury he is poised to be the 3rd best team in the west with the best SG in the league and one of the best big men just doesnt seem to hold any weight with you.
If you told me today that my Pelicans would lose Davis to career ending injury but in under 4 years we will have the best SG in the league and arguably the best Center in the league I would hope ownership would throw everything they had at that guy.
By virewww.firespo.comWhat'd I tell you?
By JonmBy VahagnBy JonmThis is just a weird argument you are making. First off you have 8 out 29 GM's ahead of Morey. That still puts Moery as being better then most of his peers.
You keep moving the goalposts on what constitutes a good GM, first it is championships and then when you want to stack the deck against Morey you assert other GM's without chips are good GM's and better then him. Some with arguably less success. But then you throw out criticism like the number of trades? With no context as to why they are bad.
You also ignore a key factor in judging GM's: starting position.
GM's don't come into the same situation everywhere they go. The team may be at a different place in terms of competitiveness, market draw, the assets in their warchest, coaching, quality of ownership, ownership expectations, philosophical freedom.
So when you account for the rigid demands of the Rockets ownership, their plagued injury past, the situation Morey walked into and the fact that he managed to rebuild a team after losing it's 2 cornerstones, being in the dreaded late lottery hell that buries most franchises, and has came out with a top 5 Western team, the best SG in the league, and the 5th best winning percentage over his tenure, it is pretty damn impressive to me.
Would he be my number 1 choice to start a franchise? No. But I bet at least half the teams in the league would gladly have him over who they have now.
a) The 8 were just off the top of my head. Morey's mediocre at best. He's not elite, and he's not good. If I gave you 3 additional names, would that change anything?
b) I'm not moving goalposts. But when you're judging something like GM, you can't just blindly say "chip makes you the best". For some of the reasons you mentioned. What I'm arguing is that "maintains flexibility" "underpays assets" "stockpiles picks" don't really mean much if you're treadmilling and not actually building contenders. That's confusing process with results and being obsessed with new ways of thinking just because they're new.
c) Making 47 trades is bad because you lose any chance at building chemistry. Making 47 trades is bad because you ultimately trade away talent that should be kept. Making 47 trades is bad because eventually some players don't want to play for you. Making 47 trades and only landing one All Star in all that time is bad because one can argue that a monkey could hit those results. Ainge by comparison who is also in the midst of a multi year rebuild has only done about half that many trades.
d) Morey did not inherit a horrible situation at all. He inherited a playoff caliber team with two all stars. There are far worse situations you can inherit. His situation wasn't good or anything. But he went from a 1st/2nd round team to a 1st/2nd round team. How exactly has he outperformed the previous GM?
e) Half the teams in the league don't have a guy who's been in the job for 7 years. Several of them are rookies or second/third year guys.
Is he better than a decent chunk of GM's? Sure. But that doesn't make him a good GM. It makes him average in comparison to a bunch of 30 year old rookies who have less basketball knowledge than he does.
It's like we're forgetting that he got Harden because ownership made him get a star. If left to his own devices, does he pay a max to Harden when he's already got Kevin Martin for much much much less money who back then was an analytics lovers wet dream?
You're all over the place again. It really seems that the only constant in your argument is that you don't like Morey.
You say factors other then chipping matter, then you criticize him again for not chipping. You say he hasn't built chemistry yet he has the 5th best league record over his tenure. You knock his number of trades but ignore both the context and result of where it has led his franchise. Which is a rather telling fact.
You just stepped around the fact that the two allstars he inherited became arguably the most injury plagued players of any superstar duo in history. That kind of puts you in quite the shitty position wouldn't you think???
I mean its not even like you get the chance to trade them away ala Melo, Howard or Paul when they are at their peak. Or you have a team that without them will be able to tank for the next 3 seasons to try and rebuild through the draft. You are literally left holding a bag of shit while your ownership is telling you they want to find a way to keep winning. So exactly what exactly would you have done in that situation?
You are left with few options to rebuild: hoping to hit in the late lottery(which they typically always did), trying to find value by identifying diamond in the ruff players, trying to accumulate more assets by trading high and getting the better end of your deals to slowly build up your warchest and poker chips for larger moves, and through FA. Am I missing some other avenue? I guess fire everyone and blow it up but the ownership didn't seem receptive to that idea if memory is correct.
I mean how would you have re-built Hosuston under the circumstances he was given? You lost your two best players, aren't bad enough to tank, ownership wants to keep winning. What do you do differently that gets you to a better place?
The fact that less then 4 years removed from his cornerstone player announcing retirement and getting only pennies on the dollar from his other superstar because of injury he is poised to be the 3rd best team in the west with the best SG in the league and one of the best big men just doesnt seem to hold any weight with you.
How am I all over the place when I'm refuting your points one by one? Besides, judging a GM means judging someone on a variety of factors. So stop making nonsensical comments.
I don't need to analyze whether each individual trade was good or bad. When you make an assessment that he's one of the best GM's in the league - do you analyze every trade every GM has done? So why are you complaining about me making broad statements? Making that many trades has it's negatives, I'm pointing them out, you're blindly pretending they don't exist.
He hasn't built the 3rd best team in the West. He's built first round fodder entirely reliant on one guy to stop from being blown out by 15 or 20 every night. Pick ANY guy on any other playoff team and have him sit, that team will be more competitive than Houston without Harden.
Someone that makes that many trades doesn't value chemistry. It's not the team building process that the Mavs or the Spurs exhibit. Argue that chemistry is overrated or whatever you want, but don't argue that making 47 trades and turning over the majority of your team every two years helps build chemistry, irrespective of record.
Masai Traded Bargnani. Ferry traded Joe Johnson. Plenty of people have traded over paid fuckups. It's not easy. But it's not unprecedented. Those guys took over worse situations with worse albatross contracts. You're too busy giving Morey excuses instead of realizing tons of GM's take over tough situations.
His team has made the first round ONE TIME since the cornerstones he never acquired left. So pick your damn goalposts. Either understand that he's got no playoff success to his name, or blame him for his inability to manage the Tmac/Yao core more effectively.
But don't give him a free pass during those years, and then pretend he's always been competitive.
He's doing tons of shit that's basically just a guy trying to re-invent the wheel. And he's accomplished no post season success through it. Stop crediting him for being clever, and start looking at results.
Factors other than chipping do matter. That doesn't mean chipping doesn't though does it? More than one thing can matter. Homeboy over there actually tried to argue that Dallas and SA are worse this year than Houston and that's a reflection of their GM's but ignored that they just recently chipped. I wouldn't criticize Morey 3 years after chipping for being worse than the (insert team name here). He's not a good GM, he's just a guy throwing 3 times more darts at the board than anyone else and experiencing some small measure of success because of it.
And your "5th best record" in over his tenure as if that matters? During that tenure the Lakers won 2 chips and made 3 finals. Does it matter one iota that they have a worse record? The Suns made multiple Conference Finals does it matter that they had a worse record? The Celtics, The Magic, The Cavs, etc etc. You're prizing all the stupidest things and praising a guy for steadily treadmilling
God he's wide fucking open
Whiteside is the best fucking player. Stop treating him like he's fucking birdman.
Whiteside is the best fucking player. Stop treating him like he's fucking birdman.