free agent Centers (only)

[wadero]

I wanted to start a topic on what centers will be availble for the Rockets. Please list only Centers that we can acquire.We all know that the Backup Center is a priority. I will start it off.

Kyrylo Fesenko 7'1 300 he is 22years old and Utah may let him walk next friday. He would be perfect he is young cheap and could maybe grow into a starter down the road.

[moofs]

I haven't seen him play, but if they cut a center prospect who makes under 900k from his team option, he's probably not that good. His stats would seem to back that up, though I do like his BS rate, but at that low of minutes, it is distorted.

[TMU]

Utah will have Okur, Koufos, and Fesenko at C. It's a deep rotation but like moofy said Utah is likely to exercise Fesenko's team option at 900k.

We're more likely to address the need of a backup C through free agency even though there aren't many that we can afford: Collins twins, Scot Pollard, Michael Doleac. I won't be surprised if we end up with either Collins, though I would much rather have Jason over Jarron.

[BaYBaller]

Fesenko would be a good option (good mix of size/potential and more importantly can be had cheaply) but I too believe Utah will use their team option on him.

[KiDdFrESh]

Just like I said last off-season, Chris Anderson would be perfect for this teams 2nd unit.

[PocketRockets]

Birdman will want too much and I'm sure he'll want to stay with his homies in denver. Doesn't Fesenko have a decent mid range jumper? I can't remember, but he sounds slow. I don't think size is much of a factor b/c with the us usually going small with the 2nd unit, a C/PF with a little bit of speed would be more advantageous. But, you can't have it all, so I wouldn't mind anyone to backup Yao other than hayes. I like hayes but he puts us at a really big disadvantage when he's on the floor.

[moofs]

note: from viewtopic.php?f=16&t=909317&start=30

Ok, I'll go over them one by one.

Zaza is a tall Chuck Hayes - no blocks from him either. Slightly better rebounding. Worse defense I'm sure.
Mikki = old (34), frail, and not very good.
Rasheed is a Petrified chucker
McDyess is old but still effective and not cheap.
Magloire = Wasn't someone suggesting we should get Eddy Curry the other day?
Williams is a downgrade from Hayes
Collins = I like the Collinses for some reason, but nah.
I gave you Wilcox, but he's not cheap either.
Isn't Ratliff retiring? I'd take him too, thought he was a LOT older than 35-36
Gooden... he reminds me of Vin Baker. ... in a bad way.
Swift sucks royally.

i.e. either none of those guys can be had at a bargain price relative to their value, or none of those guys are an upgrade to our current backups (Scola/Hayes)

Look, I know this board gets stuck on getting a guy that's 6'10" to back up Yao. Anyone living will do, any price will do, just SO LONG AS THEY ARE 6'10" OR BETTER, like that's the ONLY criteria. I just don't see much point to any of those guys.

daam you are one terrible hater or something, sheeeznuss.

that isnt the best list for backup centers, and i would rather look at another list, lol, but when you are talking about a backup center...wat the hell comes to your mind? rasheed is a legit starter how the **** is he not a legit backup center? slash power forward? drew gooden was 10/8 till chicago, and they have a crowded frontcourt there, i doubt he cant put up those numbers again. zaza has size, scoring, reboudning, defense, makes his fts, of corse he has worse defense then hayes, if you know hayes you know that he's a top 20/30 defensive forward.

plz tell me wat you think a backup center is.

A big, goofy-looking guy that can stand around in the post?

For starters, I think "hater" is a really stupid term. When you're looking at management things, you can't be an optimist, you have to determine both your costs and your benefits. I may not be the best at it, but it's what I try to do. If you only present the benefits, or only the options, I'm going to look at the costs first, especially if I don't know the benefits and do know some of the costs. Convince me that the benefits are there, that they outweigh the costs, and that the proposition can actually be attained somehow (i.e. it somehow has to make sense for the other guy, too), and I'll agree with you. Looking at the costs first may not be the way to go, but I'm also not formally trained in business practices.

Rasheed is 35, and shoots almost half his shots from outside the arc. Before I looked at that just now, the thing I was thinking about was that his FG% had gone to hell (.419), but I hadn't previously checked his percentage of 3p shots taken (which comes back to a whipping point of mine - FG% is the dumbest stat in basketball - so easily misleading, and I wasn't double checking). His rebounding last year was also better than I thought it was (seemed like it dropped to like 5 rpg), and I wasn't aware that he was still averaging a block and a steal per game. That said, I've also read that his defense has slipped rather badly, but that may be with regard to his being the anchor of a defense as opposed to a piece of one. He WILL come with a price tag, whether it's deserved or not, which was the first thing that came to my mind, the second being ".419".

Drew Gooden averaged about 12/8.7 during his time with Cleveland and they hated him, iirc. Why would that be? He's also been with 6 teams in 6 years and had his salary quartered once his rookie contract was up. I don't know all the details, and at face value he does look good, and I was actually a fan of his after seeing him in preseason his rookie year, but there are warning flags all over him.

I wouldn't be surprised were Zaza to want upward of the MLE. We'll see if he can get it. His effectiveness looks to have been limited, on a per-minute basis, when he didn't get much PT. Some guys aren't great backups. Honestly don't know much about this guy, but again, he looks to be a minor upgrade over Hayes at best, and also looks like he'll cost a lot more for that (roughly double, at least).

Again, the things I'm looking for are how much of an upgrade is each option, how much will they cost us, do we have room for that, what do we have to give up to get them, what other ways does this affect our financial situation, and will they hurt our defense and/or generally fit into our system? If that's the list, you can probably expect either a reasonably significant trade, or that we're looking elsewhere (we'd be doing that anyway).

From a basketball standpoint, if we are indeed looking for a "real" backup center, we're looking for someone to take some combination of Scola's minutes at C, and Hayes minutes at 3rd string C. They need to provide better production for the system that we want in place with Yao out in some way, and maybe even be able to trump Scola/Landry at spells when Yao's in. Between the two of them, the costs for next year are $3,375,600 + 2,111,750 = $5,487,350, and whomever we add will likely be put on top of that unless Hayes and/or Landry is traded, and that's with the cap and tax threshold going down, and us already being at 64.6m next year with Artest and Wafer unsigned, which also leaves us with a huge, and imo more important hole at SG/SF that they may or may not fill (but if they are signed to be put in that hole, leave us with little financial leeway). Considering that we do have that huge hole, and that Scola and Hayes have managed to platoon the middle against other backup C/Fs rather nicely, tell me who fits best, and how the luxury upgrade at backup C warrants a trump over our other deficiency, barring the change in state that a nice, large trade would create. ("large" in this case being roughly 5-6m+) There may also be other options than free agency - foreign talent pools, draft picks, and trades - to name a few.

Now work from there and tell me how they're a good fit

[FoDrizzle]

I think Marcin Gortat will be a FA.

[moofs]

I want a video of Gortat in parachute pants doing the hammer dance immediately.

I think he'd do it, he already did http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RPJ2MtDA ... re=related and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mowy0KQQaAk

U can't touch polish hammer.

[KWSN-Men]

This article confirms the earlier Greek articles that Morey met with Bourousis.

http://www.talkbasket.net/blogs/san-ant ... ousis.html

He did not start playing basketball until he was 18 years old. Like Tim Duncan he began his athletic career as a swimmer, but he grew too big for the sport and just like Duncan because of this switched to basketball. The development of Bourousis since then has been quite impressive as every single year he is noticeably better than the previous year. This season he led the Euroleague in rebounding and he was the league's most efficient player per minute. He also led the Euroleague in PER. Those great stats led to the Houston Rockets GM and so-called "stats guru" Daryl Morey setting up a personal meeting with him. Bourousis was named the best center in the Euroleague, ahead of the highly touted and coveted Spurs draft pick Tiago Splitter.

[moofs]

If Bourousis does indeed sign with the Spurs, might I toss Maaaaarty Leunen's hat back into the name?

Let me get it out of the way for you, "great, another undersized post player."

I'd see him and/or Landry manning the post behind Scola at C. None of them have great size, but the combination of 2-3 decent sized guys might trump that lack.

[Guy986]

This article confirms the earlier Greek articles that Morey met with Bourousis.

http://www.talkbasket.net/blogs/san-ant ... ousis.html

He did not start playing basketball until he was 18 years old. Like Tim Duncan he began his athletic career as a swimmer, but he grew too big for the sport and just like Duncan because of this switched to basketball. The development of Bourousis since then has been quite impressive as every single year he is noticeably better than the previous year. This season he led the Euroleague in rebounding and he was the league's most efficient player per minute. He also led the Euroleague in PER. Those great stats led to the Houston Rockets GM and so-called "stats guru" Daryl Morey setting up a personal meeting with him. Bourousis was named the best center in the Euroleague, ahead of the highly touted and coveted Spurs draft pick Tiago Splitter.

Yes! A Greek Ducan!

[langer]

http://www.realgm.com/src_playerfile/678/josh_boone/
get him, pls~~~

[PocketRockets]

Yeah, from everything I'm looking at, it'd prob be best to try to draft a guy and develop him. All these other C's are old as hell or shouldn't even be considered C's (swift, mikki, etc). An overseas guy wouldn't be bad either b/c they usually adapt to the game quicker than 1 and done college players.

Side note: Did anyone read those articles about kobe and 30 mill/year net?!!?? If I was him, I'd leave for one year. He'd make sooo much money from endorsements and his contract, plus they'd pay for his children's college fund, get him a personal chef, etc, etc. I'm pretty sure Nike, Gatorade will be pushing for him to leave too. For one year. Then Stern would really be scared and would give him a similar type offer to bring him back in hopes to create more storylines like..."The best ever has come back to take the throne" or some bs like that. Even Jordan went away for a while, and we all know who Kobe wants to be like.....