I blame Udoka above all. The players missed easy shots but I’ve watched basketball long enough to know that when a system requires way too much energy all the time, eventually you see players missing shots they’d normally make. We’ve seen this on the offensive extreme with MDA and the defensive extreme with JVG. You ride your players too hard and eventually you lose their legs, their confidence and their trust. Stone didn’t challenge Udoka on building this roster. I don’t blame him for hiring a coach who made a finals run in his first season, universally considered an elite coaching prospect. I do blame him for going along with this absurd idea of building a team where rebounders are prioritized to thrive. Of all the box stats, there’s none less correlated with winning than rebounds. I blame Stone for extending Udoka when he had only achieved regular season success. Any coach we hired after Silas and gave a budget of $100m per season would have won 45+ games. The marginal regular season success of Udoka did not deserve the contract he received. Udoka was perfect for the first 3 years of the rebuild. He’s great at teaching high effort habits, offseason work ethic and defensive improvement. These are the traits of a great assistant coach or the HC of a tanking team. In fact he would have been amazing in place of Silas. However once it comes to vets, he’s out of his depth. He’s flawed at more than half of basketball (offense) and egotistical. A terrible combo. Since Kerr wiped the floor with him in the Finals - where he played drop coverage on Steph Curry for stretches - it’s been all downhill. Kerr beat his second seeded Rockets despite the talent gap and no home court advantage. Now two more games of disgusting offense against a mediocre defensive team. Udoka is now 7-9 in the first round despite being the more talented team in all of those games. I think his time is up but we’re in a bind about his contract. I also believe we may have to decide between Amen and Sengun but I’m unwilling to let Udoka run that experiment. We have enough assets to re-tool and develop into a serious contender but someone has to do surgery on this team. It’s not Udoka and it’s definitely not Stone. Start with a new POBO who will get this program under control and let him make assessments of what’s worth keeping.
I didn't expect the Rockets to win a championship this season. Before the season started I said it was 50/50 that they win a playoff series. My question would be, why would you extend three players that are 33 years old and trade for a 37 year old if you don't intend to go deep in the playoffs? Why would you trade a lottery pick for a 37 year old if that isn't the aim. I agree there are expectations for players to improve organically as young players. In fairness to Stone, they have improved somewhat just not enough. However, who drafted those players? Who hired Silas and didn't put a focus on player development? That was the GM. Also - Stone isn't the first or last GM to always draft BPA, and that is why I say he has been "okay", he hasn't been terrible as a GM. Still, at the same time, guys that have a lot of experience from video scout and up, they look at it with more depth than simply "best player available". Also Stone is in charge of deciding how to spend the resources, an argument can be made that perhaps TF didn't give him enough resources but I haven't heard him complain of that. I know for example Morey for years tried to get Alexander to expand the budget for player development. This is the pickle - this is what happens when you put money and resources on older players. There is more of a sense of urgency when your best player is 37. You almost have to expend the resources to win now. On a cursory review it does seem sound - but when you look deeper, it isn't. The reason I say it isn't is because the Rockets were counting on FVV (32 years old with heavy milage), Steven Adams (32 years old with injury history and played 13 minutes a game last year), DFS (33 years old coming off an injury) and Durant (37 with a history of serious injuries and heavy use). The likelihood of these guys being all healthy is very low. Missing piece? To what? Win a playoff series? Maybe, but they were never going past the second round. The problem is that the team is loaded with older players that require winning now. Yes, I think that KD is going to fall off some over the next two seasons. He has already fallen off some from two years ago. We don't really have a war chest of assets going forward --- right now we are +1 on first rounders over the next 6 seasons and we don't have a pick in the best draft in years. That is kind of the problem though, isn't it? At this point, don't you think that there should already be a franchise level player etc.?
There's a difference between using all your assets to go all in an contender vs competing in the playoffs using vets to provide a floor competency while you evaluate your young core, no? No no. Stone is not the owner, he does NOT get to decide on HOW much money to spend on staff. He does not get to decide to spend MORE money on a larger scouting and developmental staff. Stop with that nonsense, that's not how the NBA works and you should know that. It's not a pickle at all. We still have a pretty cheap young core that we are trying to figure out whether to extend, keep, or trade. I think you keep confusing competing for the playoffs with going all in the for the playoffs..... There's a big difference. There's a big difference between FVV missing 20 games vs 82 games..... yes? Injuries are baked in.... but key players missing entire or half of seasons is not. And guess what? FVV and DFS come off the book after next season. Adams and Durant the season after. Will clearly the FO isn't going all in to win now despite you keep making that assertation about the older players. I think your cause and effect is off.... So quantify KD falling off.... what does that look like? Only scoring 20 PPG and shooting 40% on 3s in two seasons? Help me out. Just stop being so pessimistic.... We are literally going to be in the middle of every major trade in the offseason. Aside from Dallas and Pacers, who in the bottom ten is actually looking to use their pick to get a superstar? Just because Amen and Sengun don't fit well with this team, doesn't mean another team wouldn't want to take a chance on a player less than 25. Sengun is on a very good contract. Which is why Stone has shrewdly not over committed to anyone..... And yes, ideally we would have our franchise player by now but I think we've forgotten how hard it is get a franchise player.
Ironically, Tmac was more courageous than Udoker, he at least was ready to be accountable, just too much accountability..... Tracy was inept while Udoka is stubborn and really unlikable.
It's gotta be Stone. Screwed up the Harden trade and didnt get back a good player like Jarrett Allen. Instead we got Oladipo. Tanked for 3 years and got no star players with the picks from the Harden trade Thought he was onto something with the KPJ/Jalen Green backcourt Called Dashien Nix a lottery level talent Scapegoated Silas with that trash roster he forced upon him with no vets, even forcing John Wall to sit at home while collecting a $40M+ check Squandered a boat load of 2nd round picks to get rid of players like TyTy Washington and Usman Garuba. Prematurely thought this team was ready to compete for a championship and traded for KD to cover up the mistake of drafting and then extending Jalen Green. He said last offseason this is no longer a development team and thought he was set with the so called 'young core' choosing to sit out the next few drafts and forgo drafting more young talent. Didn't acquire another guard this offseason or by the trade deadline after FVV got injured. I could've done a better job than this on NBA 2K.
I think Udoka is the most to blame for this season, we shouldn't be this bad offensively. I had thought he was merely a mediocre coach, but I was wrong as he is a bad coach. Coaches grow and learn to so I understand why Tilman paid for the extension but he just hasn't grown at all. Coaches can be let go at will so Tilman could eat the contract. Not really sure if Tilman would want to pay up for a better assistant coaching staff (he definitely preferred cheaping out on assistants) for next season or just remove Ime and the coaching staff to use that money for an entirely new staff. Hopefully the latter. To the bolded, I don't agree about the cause and effect. I don't think we intentionally drafted a bunch of players that can't shoot (Jabari was supposed to be an elite 3 point shooter) but in order to make up for the shooting deficiency we went with maximizing possessions for the time being. It's not just rebounds but turnovers, which is part of the thesis of FVV.
Ime - your job as a coach is to get the MOST out of what you have, he makes our team worse. He trades away talented players because he doesn't want to deal with strong willed offense first players. He is a blight on this franchise, and glad to see people coming around.........took you long enough. DD
Who hired Ime? Stone. Who hired Stone? There's your problem. Fertitta is the one that ran off Harden, if you recall.
The commissioner. We all know the draft is rigged, he just doesn’t like us enough to give us a franchise player. Not a coincidence Wemby, the French phenom went to the spurs to follow in Tony Parker’s footsteps. Or Flagg went to the mavs because of the Luka trade. Unless the commissioner decides the rockets need to be relevant again, we aren’t getting a franchise player
I'm not a Stone apologist as he's had his problems ...but your list is full of situational things and decisions that have inherent risk. It's sports. Sometimes things work out and sometimes they don't. Are you giving the Spurs credit for drafting Wemby. Do you give GS credit for hitting on three massively unlikely picks with Curry, Thompson, and Green? That was a just dumb luck. In sports, sometimes it just is what it is. The Rockets were massively unlucky that they never got the #1 pick for three years. That isn't bad GMing. Conversely, many teams get top picks that were busts. The ONLY flat out mistake I see on your list was your last one.
Funny how the Lakers turned into the best defense in the league despite playing Luke Kennard heavy minutes. Going against an Ime Udoka coached team has benefits
The NBA is a zero sum game. Most of the blame goes to the other teams. I think the Rockets have generally been getting more talent since Stone became GM, but the team is not complete. Despite this year as a setback, the Rockets team is slightly better than the team he received, and has plus draft capital instead of skirting the Stepien rule. There are issues I have with Ime, but they don't generally align with the constant whining about Ime. Mostly, I think Ime has an incomplete team that doesn't fit. I don't think the Rockets have the personnel to run 4 guys who aren't non-shooters at a time without the defense falling apart. I think he's a good defensive coach.
