Doctor Robert: How can you make a statement like"The only players in the NBA that are less valuable than Moochie are guys like Matt Maloney and Brent Price.". What does that mean? The only players (point gaurds or any position?) in the NBA that are less valuable (earn less $$? deserve less $$? play a lesser role on their team? have less upside? have less talent? less ability?) than Moochie are guys like (point gaurds?) Matt Maloney and Brent Price(deserve less $$? play a lesser role on their team? have less upside? have less talent? less ability?). It sounds like you are saying The only players in the NBA that are less valuable than Moochie are players that are less valuable than Moochie. How profound. The only difference is how much they make. I don't see how that helps your point. There are "players" in the NBA that have less "value" than Mooch, but are payed more $$ "Who is the lowest paid and least difficult player to replace on an NBA team? THE BACKUP POINT GUARD! Player desirability increases with size and talent." What planet are you on? If Mooch signed for 2mil he would not be the lowest paid Rocket. If he signed for 1mil, he still would not be the lowest paid Rocket. Finding THE BACKUP POINT GUARD that fits the team could be more difficult than finding THE BACKUP SWINGMAN, BASED ON SHEAR NUMBERS. There are many factors that determine desirabilty, size and talent are only 2. Quite possibly, not even the most important.
I don't think Fegan is a bad agent. He's an annoying one. Anybody who could get Shandon Anderson a 42 million dollar contract, and an aging, on his last leg Dream a 16 million dollar deal must be doing something right! I'm curious Freak, when did Houston "trap" any of their players into taking less money? Did they "trap" Dream? Nope, because nobody was willing to pay him the money but Toronto. Did they trap Shandon? Nope, they signed-and-traded him for MORE money then they were willing to pay him, they DIDN'T have to do that, they could have just kept the cap space! Did they lowball Cato? What about Cat? Not only was Cat willing to take that money, he STILL is getting paid big money! Did Hakeem get lowballed his last contract in Houston? What about Mo? What about Maloney? I know you hate Rockets management for trading Dream, but give me an example of Houston lowballing players, or "trapping" them into staying in Houston? Dream only got 3 million dollars more in Toronto then he would have gotten in Houston! Did they trap Bullard!? Nope. In fact when Houston found out that they couldn't keep Bullard they helped him get a nice deal in Charlotte! They paid Barkley big money for taking a less deal to get Pippen, who by the way was also overpaid by Houston! Where is a case where Houston is penny pinching, and lowballing their players and trapping them!? They don't want to pay Moochie 4 million per year, well who ELSE is going to pay Moochie 4 million per year! And if there is another team that is willing to pay him that, more power to them!
When they can, they do. Cuttino Mobley (the most glaring example), Othella Harrington, Kevin Willis. The Mo Taylor deal, believe it or not, is a safe deal for the Rockets (but probably the best he could've gotten though). These are all in the past few years. They've also traded players away that would help them, because they couldn't get them on the cheap (Hakeem, Sam Cassell). The Maloney deal was just dumb, but for a starting point guard (which I assume they thought he would be), it was a bargain--same for Brent Price (7 yrs, 18 mil for a starter? cheap). These two guys weren't "trapped", because there was no market for them, but the Rockets signed them because they didn't think they could get Cassell to sign for cheap. A bunch of the other guys you mentioned, like Shandon, Hakeem, and Bullard, didn't sign with the Rockets, so they're not relevant to my statement. Again, this is smart business. But I only brought up these tactics because the Rockets often take the same extreme Fegan gets bashed for. And I don't "hate" the Rocket organization, come on. At least let me sulk about Hakeem for the rest of the summer...is that so much to ask? And shanna's post was right on. Smoke too.
Well I can agree with you definitely on the Othella and Willis situations. Those are some great examples. I'm still kind of hesitant about the Cuttino signing because I don't know if that was a solely a home town deal, or if it was something to help the cap. I can definitely see your point though. *Sigh*, I'll let you stew over the Dream situations. . .for now!
