I can be upset at reed when I see things like this

Bruh if Castle turns out to be better than Amen, all Rockets fans should crash out. I kinda have, as I now root for the Spurs after being a Rockets only guy since Hakeem. Named my first born son after him and now I root for the team Sean Elliot and Bruce Bowen played for. Gross.

 

“Generational shooter” vs “brick layer”

 

even though I think Castle was the better pick, this cherry picking stat bullsh#t is bullsh#t. Castle had two full yrs of heavy minutes and a a ton more playoff games. Steven Adams stats should know better. But he thinks the rockets organization sucks like I do so I get the frustration

 

Context matters. I said I wanted anyone but Reed. I would’ve been fine with buzelis or castle because they had potential, whereas I viewed Sheppard as mostly a role player.

I’ve said it before, always draft the best player available, you never draft based on need. That’s the reason why Reed was drafted.

Look that up.

 

Well he shot 39.4% from 3 this year, which put him in the top 40 and ahead of Steph Curry. But I wasn't just talking about shooting. Reed would be more effective in the paint and at distributing if he wasn't surrounded by Ime's bricklaying crew.

BTW, there are open 3s and then there are OPEN 3s. If teams just ignored Reed at the 3pt like they do with Amen, Tari, Okogie, etc, I'm sure Reed would shoot over 50%.

 

Yes, you wanted Buzelis and have been consistent on Reed since the draft (or before) in that you didn’t like/want him (role player ceiling)

 

Can we also just accept that Castle came in with an NBA-ready body while Reed needs to put on some weight? I think Reed has a lot of upside left. I also think he'll put in the work. I just question whether anyone other than a HOF player like KD can look good in this offense.

 

Personally I don't think it was ever going to be Castle. I believe Clutch has even said that the plan was to trade back if Reed wasn't available at 3. I think the Rockets have always viewed Amen as their future PG and didn't want Castle to compete with him/duplicate him - they saw Reed as the better fit.

BTW, if anyone wants to be upset about anything, think about paying Amen $40M a year when Castle is absolutely better than him.

 

Yeah, I think its wrong to judge either player with any finality right now. You take each rookie class, judge them by the first 3 years, you're going to be surprised at who rises and who falls...a lot.

There is no guarantee that Castle looks like this on this team, with no spacing, and that Reed would have looked much better on the Spurs.

People can continue to downplay the importance of chemistry and coaching but until that is settled, anyone we get looks like the worst version of themselves meanwhile OKC makes every player on the floor look the best they can while we make them look worse.

 

Lmao, you do realize that being in the Spurs organization already puts him way ahead.

The Spurs might be going to the WCF the next years, that is better experience than Sheppard can even dream of.

Other people might be in denial but a knowledgeable guy like you.......

Pop is the real deal, Mitch Johnson a good replacement, Udoka is a bad replica.

 

Harper and Castle pushing each other in practice day in day out......sounds like a bad joke but sad truth.

Of course Reed would look better in San Antonio but they would still have taken and played Dylan Harper over him.....

 

if the rockets view amen as their future point guard it explains why they drafted Reed. They have no understanding of how important ball handling is. Sad.

 

I’d fire stone just after seeing this game

 

Stone and the team scouts.

Their job is to watch games all day and give their decisions to Stone.

I only watch the Rockets and the NBA, so I don’t have any idea who these college, international players are or how good they are but if you’re a scout and have been watching these players for years, I just don’t see how you can come to a conclusion that Reed is a better player than Castle.

We are not talking about 5 years later. It’s been 2 years, they are basically the same players from when they were drafted. To miss this bad as a scout…they have to be held accountable.

 

I think they don't care if you are the best College player ever, they care about what translates to the NBA long term.

Also strong and heavy at 210-215 pounds. I bet technically can play the 2 and the 3.

Steph Castle's measurements are already dope......Sheppard is a great scorer but undersized and tricked us with his 42 '' Vertical.

 

42 vertical is real but it really has no practical use since he's not a slasher. He does get block shots every now and then though.

It's a butterfly effect, we have no idea what would have happened either way, but Harper and Reed could have shared the backcourt any ways, but I'm very confident that Reed would look better playing on the Spurs regardless and I doubt Castle looks like he does when this team has next to 0 spacing.

I mean even their center can shoot threes, it makes a big difference.

Amen drives into the paint and is met by 2-3 dudes, Castle just has to beat his man or go at one big, it makes a pretty big difference.

Like there is a reason the team has to choose between Sengun and Amen, because they just both get in each others way unless one becomes a good shooter, the offense here will always be broken.

Both your PG (or ballhandler) and Center, ONE of these MFers have to be able to hit a three.

 

Yep, the reality is this organization is just broken right now, only some generational talent can make the likes of Ime and the rest of the FO look good...and the lottery balls missed us on that and instead of being able to get Wemby, we got Amen, who is a great player and I know many teams would love to have him but he's no franchise changing player.

Now the organization has to figure out how to build around these players...or blow it up. Hopefully they choose one direction and not try to do both at the same time.

 

I think what I have seen from Castle firsthand was his mental strength rather than his skills even, Harper is even more skilled....

 

There’s probably another thread discussion warranted about AI diminishing the role of scouting in sports, but I think the rockets are an organization that sees themselves as innovative with their scouting while really they are just being cheap and lazy.

With Reed I just could not get over the fact that it was almost as if the rockets had never really watched the guy play high level basketball before the way they talked about him. Like you need eyes on the ground to see that yeah these shots can work at this level but at his size are likely to be ineffective in the nba.

Also this notion that he was going to be a Steve Nash prototype is nonsense, and shows they were likely just using data and analytics with small sample sizes on his passing and ball handling when really you need to be able to see him play in high pressure situations to see hey… he obviously had a shakey handle under pressure and that mentality isn’t something that you can just expect to be developed. Great ball handlers are something you kind of need to see firsthand and the rockets projecting him as a point guard kind of shows they probably didn’t have a ton of eyes on him and just too reliant on highlights and analytics.