The 2015 NBA GM survey was released today by NBA.com, the 10th annual version of the list, and though the Rockets were strongly represented in some areas, they were also noticeably slighted in several others.
James Harden was voted the best shooting guard in the NBA, garnering 79.3 percent of the vote, which is a 15 percent increase over last season. And while he's the definitely the obvious choice, perhaps the most surprising elements of the shooting guard vote is that 10.3 percent of NBA GMs actually prefer Klay Thompson over The Beard, and that Stephen Curry also received a vote (on top of already being named the best point guard in the NBA).
It's a strange outcome that makes us at TDS curious to know if Golden State GM Bob Myers was actually afforded four votes in this year's survey or if some owners have just completely lost their minds.
Three non-Warriors GMs think Klay Thompson is the best SG in the NBA. There are some dumb people running teams out there
— The Dream Shake (@DreamShakeSBN) October 20, 2015
The Rockets were represented in the Western Conference team hierarchy as well, though one might argue they are, in fact, underrepresented, as they finished just fifth behind Golden State, San Antonio, Oklahoma City and the Clippers.
They received no notable consideration for the NBA Championship, which was somewhat surprisingly dominated by the Cleveland Cavaliers with 53.6 percent of the vote.
Another (negative) surprise is that Dwight Howard does not appear anywhere on the list of the NBA's best centers after finishing first for the last five consecutive polls. This year's list features Marc Gasol, DeMarcus Cousins, Anthony Davis, Tim Duncan and DeAndre Jordan. It's a solid list without Dwight, but I have a hard time agreeing that Duncan's mummified corpse is better than Howard at this stage of the game (whole career is obviously another story).
Howard also slipped entirely off of the list of the NBA's best defenders after five consecutive appearances and leading the list four out of the last five years, though he did finish fifth in the vote for best interior defender.
Another noticeable slight is Kevin McHale appearing nowhere in any of the six voting categories on head coaches, which doesn't seem like such an egregious offense until you realize that Jason Kidd, Brett Brown, Steve Clifford, Dave Joerger and Brad Stevens all received votes in various categories.
Where the Rockets did receive notoriety, however, were Harden snagging third overall in the MVP prediction, in "forcing adjustments by the opposing team," and in "which player would you most want to take the last shot".
Ty Lawson finished first in "underrated acquisition", second in "new acquisition with the biggest impact", fourth in "most surprising offseason move" and honorable mention for "fastest with the ball".
Corey Brewer received honorable mention in "which bench player makes the biggest impact when entering the game", and the Rockets as a whole finished a distant second behind San Antonio in "which team made the best offseason moves".
Make sure to check out the survey in its entirety written up by John Schuhmann of NBA.com and let TDS know where you think the Rockets were rightly honored and wrongly slighted.