Chris Paul to the Rockets

Post #401 » by **og15** » Tue May 29, 2018 11:40 am

No old man mega max, that's for sure, but even to have the best chance at winning it all he needs to take less somehow.

While Paul's stocky build is a big part of what makes him able to switch and defend and battle with much bigger players despite his size, he might really need to shed some weight if he wants to possibly help his injury reseliance. I'm not sure how much that helps with hamstring injuries, but if it does he might need to make that tradeoff.

Post #402 » by **thanumba2clippersfan** » Tue May 29, 2018 1:29 pm

I think only a bad desperate team would give him a max deal, maybe. If he's willing to take less I could see him leaving the Rockets to try to team up with LeBron possibly. Just a thought.

wco81 · Post #403 » by **wco81** » Tue May 29, 2018 5:02 pm

It would have been smart if he got some kind of assurances that they'd take care of him this offseason if he agreed to the sign and trade.

Rockets have to think that with the money committed to Harden, their window is now and they just had one of their best seasons (would have been best if they won and went on to win the title).

So they may double down.

Of course they could try to get Lebron but they'd have to empty their roster pretty much to get both him and Paul, unless they were willing to take like $15 million or less each.

Quake Griffin · Post #404 » by **Quake Griffin** » Tue May 29, 2018 5:15 pm

thanumba2clippersfan wrote:I think only a bad desperate team would give him a max deal, maybe. If he's willing to take less I could see him leaving the Rockets to try to team up with LeBron possibly. Just a thought.

CP3
Lonnie
Tobias
Bronnie
DeAndre

Shai Gilgeous coming off the bench as CP's under study.

2019 NBE Champs.

Vae Victus · Post #405 » by **Vae Victus** » Tue May 29, 2018 6:26 pm

CP3 still has alot of influence in the NBA, as evidenced by him singlehandedly adding the old man mega max provision/waiver. If HOU doesn't "make him whole", he might slander the ever living hell out of them and poison that destination to future FAs.

Truly a fitting end for the lil egomanical bastard

esqtvd · Post #406 » by **esqtvd** » Tue May 29, 2018 11:03 pm

wco81 wrote:It would have been smart if he got some kind of assurances that they'd take care of him this offseason if he agreed to the sign and trade.

Rockets have to think that with the money committed to Harden, their window is now and they just had one of their best seasons (would have been best if they won and went on to win the title).

So they may double down.

Double down or blow it up. Not much in between. Sounds like a familiar situation. :wink:

They're in up to the eyebrows on Harden [$40M a year] and he clearly needs a CP as much as vice-versa. Thing is, if they double down on Harden and CP, they're looking at an even bigger long-term mess than we were. But in the short term, it's hard to top CP.

Together, they equaled 49.0 points, 16.7 assists, 10.8 rebounds and 3.5 steals on a nightly basis. The tandem produced a 44-5 record and gargantuan plus-13.6 net efficiency rating when deployed together. Their fingerprints were littered across Houston's franchise-record for wins (65) and most playoff victories since capturing the 1995 title (11).

wco81 · Post #407 » by **wco81** » Tue May 29, 2018 11:31 pm

Like I said, there's a question whether CP3 can be a full time starter and have such a high usage rate at this stage of his career.

Good likelihood that he'll miss significant portions of the season as he has the last several years and break down in the playoffs.

I think the oldest you can give a player a super Max deal is like 28. But the problem is, you have to be in the league 10 years or something like that?

So the players who are eligible are around 30 when they start those contracts. Curry just turned 30 during this past season, his first on a $40 million deal.

I think Wall and Harden will be around 30 when they start their $40 million extensions.

Teams have to consider it compensation for past performance than future performance, especially as players approach their mid 30s.

esqtvd · Post #408 » by **esqtvd** » Wed May 30, 2018 12:44 am

Houston's problem is they're all-in on Harden but that's not enough. If CP can go, they might have won the whole thing this year.

So the question is, can you duplicate CP with some more durable combination of players for the same money? Probably not. That's the NBA conundrum. So they're looking at double or nothing.

Post #409 » by **og15** » Sat Jun 2, 2018 12:26 am

So we had a lot of ideas come out after this trade about the chemistry issues, etc. A couple months later, we know this from players own mouths.

That is basically everyone that was a core member for this team, they are either close with Paul and/or were willing to play with him again. The only one missing is Rivers.

We also have the reports of Blake being difficult to approach and not being able to discuss disagreements with him which changed after (Austin gave us this). So circling back to the chemistry issues, there's been some suggestion that the dividing line was that Paul came in and basically became more of the face of the franchise and the guy people saw as more of the community guy, etc, and Blake though we expected him to was never really able to take the reigns either on the court, as the leader, or even in off the court related things. Originally it wasn't a problem, but it worse on him. It was also reported that the punching incident stemmed from Blake being mad cause he was getting teased about the team being better without him that year, and it seemed to be after 15-16 that things truly got more serious and this is work than friendly and fun. It also seems to flow with Blake becoming more open, etc after Paul left because it then put him on top of the hierarchy with no more competition for the "glory" you might even say.

A lot of stuff came out slowly, but examining it all, that really seems to line up with a lot of things.

esqtvd · Post #410 » by **esqtvd** » Sat Jun 2, 2018 1:22 am

https://clutchpoints.com/clippers-news-weird-relationship-blake-griffin-chris-paul-told-austin-rivers/

“The dynamic with Blake and Chris was weird,” said Austin Rivers. “I don’t know why. It was just strange. No one knew who the leader was, and if you had something to say, it would turn into an argument. I think people were sometimes scared to say something to Blake, because you didn’t know how he’d react.”

https://clutchpoints.com/clippers-rumors-blake-griffin-didnt-care-chris-pauls-chirping/

“Blake and Chris had their ups and downs but … you couldn’t even tell.

They didn’t argue on the court. They didn’t sit apart from each other off the court. Lots of teams have issues, but it was magnified with us because we lost in the first round.

Before Paul arrived, this was Blake Griffin’s team. Insiders knew Griffin didn’t care for Paul’s never-ending chirping. To Griffin’s credit, he kept it to himself.”

And of course Big Baby hates everybody, LOL

https://www.clipsnation.com/2016/6/9/11899470/glen-davis-chris-paul-los-angeles-clippers-blake-griffin-deandre-jordan-doc-rivers

"He has his way about himself. 'I'm Chris Paul, give me the ball, I'm gonna dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, dribble, might pass, if it looks good or I'll shoot.'"

Post #411 » by **og15** » Sat Jun 2, 2018 7:10 pm

Also that season was when Blake's name first surfaced in trade rumors, and that's certainly not something we ever heard about Paul, there was never any rumor about trading him. There was a supposed talk between the Clippers and the Nuggets about a Blake trade, so that is added to the mix.

esqtvd · Post #412 » by **esqtvd** » Sat Jun 2, 2018 11:00 pm

og15 wrote:Also that season was when Blake's name first surfaced in trade rumors, and that's certainly not something we ever heard about Paul, there was never any rumor about trading him. There was a supposed talk between the Clippers and the Nuggets about a Blake trade, so that is added to the mix.

But we could have got quite a haul for Chris, to be sure. But you trade your HOFer and you get, well, the 2017-18 Clippers.

wco81 · Post #413 » by **wco81** » Tue Jun 5, 2018 8:18 pm

Woj apparently talks a bit about CP3's contract status with Houston.

“When the Rockets made that deal for Chris Paul, knowing they would re-sign him [once he hit free agency], they made a conscious decision that they were gonna have to live with [paying him] $46, $47 million a year salary when he’s not nearly the player anymore in his late 30s, but, ‘we’re gonna make a run at it now, we wanna win a championship now.

“We’ll deal with it [Paul’s contract] later.’ We’ll see how that plays out in their contract talks [with Paul] here in free agency. Chris Paul didn’t turn down $200 million from the Clippers because he thought that somehow the Rockets were gonna talk him into saving them luxury tax money. I don’t imagine it playing out that way.”

Vae Victus · Post #414 » by **Vae Victus** » Wed Jun 6, 2018 5:58 am

I'm like 95% sure HOU will give CP3 his deal.

It reminds me of when HOU didnt activate Chandler Parson's team option after failing to get Chris Bosh.

It made no sense, why decline the cheap ass 1 mil option. They ended up having a "breaking point" in whatever contract Parson's got on the open market, so why bother letting him go seek a FA deal.

Then apparently it seems like Parson's camp was instrumental for DHo to choosing HOU. I'm guess despite HOU unable to seal the deal in getting Bosh (in retrospect they're lucky they didnt lure Bosh), they likely had a under the table deal where if HOU gets DHo then Parsons gets his freedom to get a big deal. Naturally this is a HUGE thing for Parsons and his agent, who then get paid early rather than waiting another year working for peanuts.

DHo and Parsons shared the same agent.... yea clearly HOU had to come through for Parsons despite their own failure in luring Bosh, thus the non-sensical non activation of the cheap team option.

Morey wont likely welch. If he promised CP3 he's gonna max him, for helping engineer the opt in and trade, then Morey is gonna max him.

Goddamn imagine if Bosh DID join HOU. Then Parsons gets his deal, which then gets matched, since that was the whole plan. Making a Big 4 (Harden, DHo, Bosh, Parsons) of the West. Eessh, HOU lucked out, cuz with all the injuries that happened woulda sank their title chances and unable to make moves until they somehow got rid of Bosh/Parsons.

Post #415 » by **QRich3** » Wed Jun 6, 2018 9:54 am

Yeah, Paul renounced $10M so they could trade for him this year, he could've easily gotten the max from us or any other team, but opted in to a contract $10M less than that so he could be traded to the Rockets. You don't see a paycut that size often, so they kind of owe him.

And as Vae Victus says, personal relations are important, if they had an agreement that they would give that back at the end of the next contract, they will have to make good on that promise.

Quake Griffin · Post #416 » by **Quake Griffin** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 9:24 pm

Bump.

Apparently some former Clippers are on their #MeToo flow and have used Rondo calling out Chris Paul as their opportunity to vent their frustrations with Chris Paul, the teammate....Big Baby and Ryan Hollins specifically.

Chris Broussard said a Clipper Exec echoed those sentiments this morning on Undisputed.

Do we care?
Are we moving on to the SGA era?
Def don’t wanna give a non-Clipper another thread, so I figured I’d continue it here ITT.

Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

esqtvd · Post #417 » by **esqtvd** » Wed Oct 24, 2018 11:08 pm

Quake Griffin wrote:Bump.

Apparently some former Clippers are on their #MeToo flow and have used Rondo calling out Chris Paul as their opportunity to vent their frustrations with Chris Paul, the teammate....Big Baby and Ryan Hollins specifically.

Chris Broussard said a Clipper Exec echoed those sentiments this morning on Undisputed.

Do we care?
Are we moving on to the SGA era?
Def don’t wanna give a non-Clipper another thread, so I figured I’d continue it here ITT.

Sent from my iPhone using RealGM Forums

I find it interesting in the larger context of the construction and deconstruction of narratives. There have been a lot of fingers pointed at Doc or Blake for the failure of Lob City, but if a fish rots from the head on down, I've always thought that CP3 was the real head of Lob City. He was the HOFer, he was the one with the ball.

Read on Twitter

OTOH, it's a bit like the Jimmy Butler thing, stuck with teammates who don't want it as bad as you do. I understand that too.

“I’m sure I’m a tough leader,” Paul finally says. “But if I’m so bad to play with, then how come Luc and J.J. wanted to be here with me?” (Says Redick: “Is Chris tough to play with? Yes, in the sense that there’s an edge to the way he plays, and if you have a different personality, it can grind at you a little bit. I always liked it.”)

Thing is, I'm not sure that's leadership.

Post #418 » by **QRich3** » Thu Oct 25, 2018 12:00 pm

Eh, who cares, that's just gossip. First, whatever Big Baby Davis and Hollins have to say about anything is not all that important, and second, we don't need them to tell us Paul's a dick, we knew that since he started playing in the league. Didn't deter all of our good players from giving their all next to him.

Some dudes lead by being nice and friendly like say Nash or Duncan, others by being egocentric dicks like Jordan or Kobe or Paul. Doesn't change a whole lot about how well their teams play next to them, it's just different approaches from different personalities.

Personally I couldn't care less, I would want Chris Paul in my team 10 times out of 10.

Galloisdaman · Post #419 » by **Galloisdaman** » Thu Oct 25, 2018 12:15 pm

All the other stuff aside CP is already 33 years old. The Rockets would be smart to see if there was any possible way to sign Paul to a shorter deal or a deal with some option years.

wco81 · Post #420 » by **wco81** » Thu Oct 25, 2018 9:36 pm

Galloisdaman wrote:All the other stuff aside CP is already 33 years old. The Rockets would be smart to see if there was any possible way to sign Paul to a shorter deal or a deal with some option years.

He just signed a 4 year deal this past summer didn't he?

Only way to get rid of that would be someone willing to take that contract on when he'll be making way over $40 million when he's 36 and 37.