91 replies to this topic

[Alituro]

Lyfestyle.. Thanks for bringing the actual subject back round again... I'm with you on being unfair to criticize Morey's work (as a drafter only) given the circumstances. As far as being a good, great or terrible drafter, we need to wait a couple years to make that assessment accurate... In the meantime, why do we need a different GM if we're tanking? Is anybody actually concerned that if given the chance at a top 5 after tanking that Morey would do something stupid and draft an Oden, Darko or Thabeet? I'm not. There's a lot worse GMs out there for the taking, and one is sitting on our bench now. All of the great GMs already have jobs, so if all we got is an average/good one, at this point, it could be worse.

[Cooper]

Oden wasn't a stupid pick you can't predict injuries. As for morey it's obvious he's an average gm look at the team. It's average players pick with average picks or traded for in average trades, he's responsible for building the roster and the roster is average so you can say he's done well or terrible it's just right Dow the middle he has had some misses and hits but nothing major like drafting Adam Morrison or trading Kobe for vlade divac. Let's see how monti, Lloul and this years picks turn it before we start a fire morey campaign the next few lottery picks we get will determine which way morey and the franchise are going.

[Sir Thursday]

OK, I think I'm just going to have to ignore RedStewie on this subject from now on. Sorry dude, but by your logic someone like Ernie Grunfeld is a better GM than Morey - he managed to pick John Wall! That kid's clearly more talented than anyone Morey has drafted, so he's done a better job, right? Wrong. Whatever you feel about Morey, there is no way that he approaches Grunfeld levels of incompetence.

ST

[Chichos]

I think the problem we are running into here is the same one players have when you evaluate their legacies. Taking issue with Morey for not drafting perennial all stars is like taking issue with Charles Barkley for not winning a championship. Barkley was a great player and I think Morey has a pretty great eye for talent at the end of drafts.

What we don't know is if he can draft great players in picks 1-5. I would say until he gets the opportunity we can only give him an Incomplete on his draft abilities.

What drives me crazy about Morey is the noise factor. ESPN tells me that the Rockets are contenders for every single deal and Morey has a finger in every NBA pie. But here we are starless and soon to be winless (and that is what we are hoping for!?!). It would be nice is he could do his GM thing with the volume turned down just a bit.

Being a rockets fan these past few years is like being an abused girlfriend. Just when you think everything will be great and the Rockets are changing they punch you in the eye and tell you to make some dinner.

[Zero]

Kawhi fuckin Leonard, I will not shut up about it till my dying day. What more proof do we need?

[amacbrooks12]

Kawhi Leonard ? We already have him on our team his name is Chandler Parsons . Both Leonard and Parsons hustled their asses off this season , both can rebound pass and defend , both are all around players , and both have very very bright futures . I hate when people say we missed on leonard , when we have a guy like Chandler Parsons already . Because if we drafted leonard instead of marcus morris then either leonard or parsons wouldnt of had gotten minutes ( just like marcus morris ) . So drafting leonard wouldnt have helped us any bit and we would still be the same average 9th place team with the same problems .

[sircharles]

i think a lot of the problems with morris's minutes and lack of development can be blamed on the lock out and no pre-season last year. hopefully everyone getting a full pre-season with mchale will help the team out a lot more this year.

[Ostrow]

I think the Morris pick was more of a hope that he would develop. I think Kawhi is clearly better now but I don't know whether or not he has much upside. Not an elite athlete or shooter. BUT he does work his tail off. That being said I think Morris has more potential to become an all-star. Better scorer, bigger, I think a little better athlete but it is close. The fact that we were able to get Parsons in the 2nd and Morris I think has a lot of value. Now if we don't develop Morris than it's a waste of a pick but we can be hopeful that we were get some development.

[Cooper]

Morris isn't a better athlete than Leonard and Leonard wasn't a good shooter in college but he shot well over 40% from 3 this year. He is an elite defender as well. Morris just isn't that good

[Ostrow]

Ya, I know he shot well last year but you draft people from college and that's what people were looking at and he didn't shoot well. Also I doubt he created more than 10% of his shots last year. Then they are equal athletically maybe Leonard is a little more athletic (laterally not vertically) but Morris has 2 inches? on him. And again, Leonard is clearly better right now but I will still argue that he won't improve all that much (not saying Morris will). And the question in my mind is do you think he is better than Parsons. And, if so, is he better by Morris' ability? I don't think that he is. You really can't have Leonard and Parsons on the same roster. They are just too similar. Although the Rockets seem to like to have identical players sooooo, you never know.

[Sir Thursday]

It's too early to draw conclusions about Leonard and Morris yet in this context, IMO. Certainly Leonard came in more ready to play (and as others have said San Antonio are unmatched in the league for their ability to quickly make players productive), but that doesn't mean Morris won't turn out to be better.

I firmly believe that the lockout had way more impact than it appeared to have on the surface. The teams had almost zero time to prepare their rookies for the NBA, tell them what they wanted them to work on, etc. When players were told to replicate the roles they played in college, they were capable of doing so. But for someone like Morris, it was more difficult - part of the Rockets taking him was predicated on getting him ready to play the NBA '3', which was not the role he'd played in college. And he had basically no prep time to do that, so with hindsight it wasn't particularly surprising that he didn't succeed.

As far as I'm concerned, I'm willing to write off any apparent stalls in our young players' growth over the past season. The environment they were playing in just wasn't conducive to showing improvement. I will be treating next year like Patterson's sophomore season and Morris' rookie season take two (and if Budinger had still been here I would have extended that amnesty to him too).


ST

[DaDakota]

At this point, I am unsure if Daryl Morey is a good GM, much less drafter.

To me it is either one of these two.

1. He is bad at executing his plan
2. His plan is bad and hard to execute.

Either of those are on him.

DD

[Cooper]

Ya, I know he shot well last year but you draft people from college and that's what people were looking at and he didn't shoot well. Also I doubt he created more than 10% of his shots last year. Then they are equal athletically maybe Leonard is a little more athletic (laterally not vertically) but Morris has 2 inches? on him. And again, Leonard is clearly better right now but I will still argue that he won't improve all that much (not saying Morris will). And the question in my mind is do you think he is better than Parsons. And, if so, is he better by Morris' ability? I don't think that he is. You really can't have Leonard and Parsons on the same roster. They are just too similar. Although the Rockets seem to like to have identical players sooooo, you never know.

Parsons doesn't create his own shot either an I don't think Morris will either bu maybe he will improve in summer league and with more practice time this year. Im pretty sure Leonard and Morris are both 6'8. Neither are super athletic but Leonard is Better laterally and moving defensively. Morris isn't an above the rim player he's kinda like sullinger your not sure how he gets his points and rebounds but he manages to get em, I am definatly willing to give him a shot to play. If we drafted Leonard we probably wouldn't have drafted parsons they are both similar Leonard might be a little better but basically the same.

[Ostrow]

Pretty sure Leonard is 6'7" and Morris is 6'9". Don't compare him to Sully. He is a much much better athlete than Sullinger. Also, I was not saying that Parson did create his own shot. Someone mentioned that he shot well last year and my point was that Morris can create his shot better than Leonard can, even if it is just in the post, and I do not believe Leonard would shoot very well if he had to create his own.

[blakecouey]

If Morris had been drafted by the spurs, he would have played last year. Unlike Morey, Buford doesn't draft or stack up multiple players at one position

Last I checked the Spurs have 4 SG's, seems like a bit of a stack to me. Denmon was drafted this year, but they already had Anderson in the D-League. One thing you say is the Spurs don't draft players and then not use them which is an untrue statement as Anderson was drafted in the 1st round in 2010, yet has played very little in the NBA.
Leonard fit their system and as a NBA ready player when drafted-Morris was not. For any team that won more than 22ish games last season Morris would've been relegated to the bench/D-League for the majority of the season as he just wasn't ready. We wanted to attempt to contend(failed...but it's in the past) and that is why Morris didn't get PT with us, Parsons being the 2nd rd equivalent to Leonard provided him PT as he was ready for a career(even if his ceiling isnt high).