Morey appears to take jab at Westbrook over collecting cheap rebounds
The Houston Rockets just can't seem to leave Russell Westbrook alone.
General manager Daryl Morey appeared to needle Westbrook once again on Wednesday in a discussion with Rockets analyst Matt Bullard over the tricky politics of uncontested rebounds.
It started with Morey sharing an unflattering piece from popular basketball analytics blog Nylon Calculus, which sarcastically named an award after Bullard celebrating bigs who can't rebound. Morey rushed to Bullard's defense by pointing out how he would yield boards to Hakeem Olajuwon.
@bull50 not your fault that @DR34M was getting all the boards https://t.co/37MSy6oPkk
— Daryl Morey (@dmorey) April 19, 2017
Bullard confirmed Morey's theory, citing a common practice as old as basketball itself in which role players would allow star players to get their numbers.
Dream made it crystal clear that I should get out of the way and let him get all the rebounds. And that's exactly what I did! #thanksdream https://t.co/27LcWI8MeA
— Matt Bullard (@bull50) April 19, 2017
But that's when Morey seemed to take a dig at Westbrook, who led the league in uncontested rebounds in his dogged pursuit of a triple-double season.
@bull50 sounds like some other superstars...
— Daryl Morey (@dmorey) April 19, 2017
Westbrook's average of 10.7 rebounds was indeed buoyed by 8.5 uncontested rebounds per game, many of which were collected off missed free throws wherein his bigs would box out to allow Westbrook to have the stat. This became a talking point since so much of Westbrook's MVP candidacy was built upon his counting statistics.