There was a surprising moment at halftime Saturday night as the teams headed to the lockerrooms. Houston assistant coach J.B. Bickerstaff, expressing appreciation of his team, stated something along the lines of, “this is the best group we’ve ever had” and what I recall as “they listen to what we say.” A reader clarified that he had said “they have bought in to what we want to do.” I wish I had been recording at the time, but unfortunately I was not.
In any event, the statement perhaps was not so surprising in light of what we’ve seen so far this year, but certainly eye-opening with regards to what we thought we knew of the team last season. Recall that previously, conventional wisdom considered Chandler Parsons the team’s “glue guy.” I, myself, had written consistently that while I did not think Parsons was worth $10million, in a vacuum, he was worth that pricetag to the team in what he brought (I thought) in leadership and chemistry. I guess there was more going on behind the scenes than we knew about.
This all makes sense incentively. In a unit, if all men have been adequately compensated, there is no reason for jealousy or discord. But when two guys are making north of double-digit millions, another two are making $5million each, and another thinks he is as important as any of them, you can see how there would be problems, especially when the latter feels the only way to get paid is to play outside the unit’s interests.
Everyone on the current team is content, with Harden, Howard, and Ariza all having obtained the highest dollar figure they could each command. And the only guys still playing without security–guys like Beverley, Black, and Motiejunas–can only obtain that security by playing harder on defense. Chandler had to score to get the big bucks, and he got them.
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