How the Rockets landed Dwight without tanking (And a flow chart!)

[Kuberski1]

This makes sense to me, and no, not all teams do it.   Just take a look around at the FA signings thus far, and you'll see a lot of teams spending 8 figures on guys who may get them another 5, perhaps 10 wins a season, and a notch or two up in the standings.

Luck does matter, but I think the key is being able to put yourself in a position to take advantage of luck.  We were lucky in a sense to be able to acquire Ray and KG 6 years ago, but we also had the pieces to do so (and unlucky to land 5th in that draft).  Morey was lucky to get Harden, but had the right assets for Presti to bite (how does Presti sleep at night with that one?).

What the likes of Morey and Ainge are less likely to do than others is spend big money on the raft of second tier FAs floating around, or "go for broke" in making an average team better than average, i.e. advancing a round or perhaps two in the POs, but not having the snuff to really challenge.

In doing so, you'll see guys like Ricky Davis and Wally Z float in and out, but if they're dealt wisely, then so be it.  I would expect the same of the ex-Nets, Bass, and probably Lee in the coming season.