Daryl Morey is an American sports executive. He is the current general manager of the Houston Rockets

Houston Rockets

The Houston Rockets are an American professional basketball team based in Houston, Texas. The team plays in the Southwest Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association . The team was established in 1967, and played in San Diego, California for four years, before being...

 of the National Basketball Association

National Basketball Association

The National Basketball Association is the pre-eminent men's professional basketball league in North America. It consists of thirty franchised member clubs, of which twenty-nine are located in the United States and one in Canada...

. He was named Assistant General Manager on April 3, 2006 and succeeded Carroll Dawson

Carroll Dawson

Carroll Dawson is a retired American assistant coach and general manager in the National Basketball Association. He worked for the Houston Rockets franchise for twenty-seven years until announcing his retirement in 2007....

 as General Manager on May 10, 2007. Morey came to the Rockets after serving three years as Senior Vice President of Operations and Information for the Boston Celtics

Boston Celtics

The Boston Celtics are a National Basketball Association team based in Boston, Massachusetts. They play in the Atlantic Division of the Eastern Conference. Founded in 1946, the team is currently owned by Boston Basketball Partners LLC. The Celtics play their home games at the TD Garden, which...

. While with the Celtics, basketball operations was a key part of his responsibilities, including the development of analytical methods and technology to enhance basketball decisions related to the draft, trades, free agency and advance scouting of opponents for the coaching staff. His hiring follows the recent Moneyball trend of adding more advanced statistical-based analysis to the tradition use of qualitative scouting and basic statistics. Several teams have hired executives with non-traditional basketball backgrounds, but the Rockets are the first NBA team to hire a general manager in this vein. He continues to be the chairperson for the annual MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference

MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference

The ' goal is to provide a forum to discuss the increasing role of analytics in the sports industry. Founded in 2006, the conference is co-chaired by Daryl Morey and Jessica Gelman who oversee MIT Sloan students The ' goal is to provide a forum to discuss the increasing role of analytics in the...

.

Early life

Morey received a bachelor’s degree in computer science

Computer science

Computer science or computing science is the study of the theoretical foundations of information and computation and of practical techniques for their implementation and application in computer systems...

 with an emphasis on statistics from Northwestern University

Northwestern University

Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....

, as well as an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management

MIT Sloan School of Management

The MIT Sloan School of Management is the business school of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Cambridge, Massachusetts....

. Morey also served as the professor for the MIT Sloan class, “Analytical Sports Management.”

Career

Morey has built a Rockets team that has won about 59% of its games over his first four seasons as General Manager, 2 playoff appearances and 1 playoff series win. The Rockets had won about 55% of its games in the four seasons prior to his becoming General Manager, with 3 playoff appearances but no playoff series wins.

His ability to manage and bolster the roster earned him Yahoo!

Yahoo!

Yahoo! Inc. is an American multinational internet corporation headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, United States. The company is perhaps best known for its web portal, search engine , Yahoo! Directory, Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Groups, Yahoo! Answers, advertising, online mapping ,...

 "Executive of the Year" accolades in 2008-09. He received 1 of the 30 votes for the official 2008-09 NBA Executive of the Year award

NBA Executive of the Year Award

The National Basketball Association's Executive of the Year Award is an annual award given since the 1972–73 NBA season, to the league's best general managers. Before 2009, the Executive of the Year is presented annually by Sporting News, although it is officially recognized by the NBA. Since then,...

. Morey was named “Top 55 Most Influential in Basketball” in 2009 by HOOPSWORLD. Morey was also recognized in 2009 as one of “The 10 Most Creative People in Sports” by Fast Company magazine

Fast Company (magazine)

Fast Company is a full-color business magazine that releases 10 issues per year and reports on topics including innovation, digital media, technology, change management, leadership, design, and social responsibility...

.

External links

• The No-Stats All-Star The New York Times. February 13, 2009.
• How Do You Know ... This Game Isn't Rocket Science? ESPN The Magazine. October 22, 2008.
• Houston’s G.M. Is a Revolutionary Spirit in a Risk-Averse Mind The New York Times. January 28, 2008.
• Rocket Science: Daryl Morey Brings Hard-Core Statistical Analysis to the NBA Houston Press. November 1, 2007.
• 10 Questions with Daryl Morey ClutchFans. May 22, 2006.
• Numbers game: Rockets hope GM-in-waiting turns out to be money Sports Illustrated: Marty Burns > Inside the NBA. April 25, 2006.
• Rockets see exec Morey as extra edge Houston Chronicle. April 16, 2006.
• Featured Alumni: Daryl Morey, MBA '00 MIT Sloan School of Management Alumni Network.
• Daryl Morey Playlist Appearance on WMBR's Dinnertime Sampler March 3, 2004
• MIT Sloan Sports Analytics Conference This year's conference is being held on March 6, 2010