Chron: Rockets tuned in to Redick

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NBA NOTEBOOK
Rockets tuned in to Redick
Team undecided, but Duke shooter an option at No. 8


By JONATHAN FEIGEN
Copyright 2006 Houston Chronicle

When the remote control offered escape from the Rockets' frustrating season and sent fans from Rockets games to the alternative of college basketball, it was easy to imagine the latter providing a solution for the former.

Squint a bit and you could see J.J. Redick, Duke's sharpshooter and the ACC's all-time leading scorer, knocking down all those shots given to Rockets perimeter players by defenses forced to flock to Yao Ming or Tracy McGrady.

Redick is the best shooter the Rockets have a chance to land in the June 28 NBA Draft and offers a feel for the game and over-the-top determination. They desperately need shooting. It seems an ideal fit.

But with this draft, with even the top prospects coming with huge holes to also consider, nothing is so easy.

Redick, perhaps the draft's most interesting and most polarizing prospect, worked out for the Rockets on Saturday, and they would have to consider him with the eighth pick. But as much as anyone, he embodies how difficult their choice might be.

They need shooting. He is a shooter. But they need length and quickness, especially defensively. Redick is said to measure 6-3 1/4 with an unusually short wingspan of about 6-2. He is better athletically than many assume, but he is far from a Rodney Carney, Ronnie Brewer or Rudy Gay.

Redick could make himself more than a specialist but is unlikely to be a 36-minute guard who matches up with Kobe Bryant, Dwayne Wade or Manu Ginobili.

"People get caught up in talking about what someone can't do," Redick said. "I'm not going to drive and dunk on a 7-footer. I probably won't dunk on a breakaway. I think I can do some things. I can't get caught up in that and I don't feel the need to combat that. I want my game to speak for itself.

"There's always been doubts about me. When I was a freshman in high school, everybody said I'd have a down year as a sophomore because people knew about me. I wasn't going to play at Duke; I wasn't athletic enough. But I'm a competitor. I found ways to contribute to teams. I found ways to help teams win."

That sounds good, and it is irrefutable. Besides, it would be nice to not have to turn the channel to see open shots go in.

"They could use outside shooting," Redick said of the Rockets. "Richie (Frahm) and David Wesley are unrestricted free agents. There's no guarantee they will sign. I think they want a two-guard or an athletic wing. I feel like I'm in the mix."

He is, but he's not a sure thing, which is typical for this draft and the Rockets' choice.


Flipping out over a coach
Before we let the Pistons move on to their offseason, it's worth translating the rhetoric.

In the regular season, when the Pistons won 64 games, they told us it was not about the coach, whether they were led by Rick Carlisle, Larry Brown or Flip Saunders. It was about the players.

In the postseason, when they lost seven of their last 11 games, then it was the coach's fault.

The complaints about Saunders were so ridiculous it was amazing anyone did not see through them for the naked excuse-making they were. Rasheed Wallace railed against a brief use of hack-a-Shaq, but that is really about Wallace's continued anger with Mike Dunleavy for ordering the Trail Blazers to intentionally foul Shaquille O'Neal in the 2001 Western Conference Finals.

Tayshaun Prince suggested Lindsey Hunter should have matched up with Dwyane Wade longer, though Saunders was not about to bench Chauncey Billups or Richard Hamilton too long, especially when Prince was misfiring.

Most of all, Ben Wallace blathered about Saunders not practicing defense enough, though anyone close to the Pistons knew that Saunders runs far more defensive drills than Brown ever did and that if Wallace isn't complaining, he isn't talking.

The media went with all this anyway until Saunders said he felt like a piñata that had its load of candy beaten out of it.

" 'Take cover,' " Saunders said of the advice friends and coaching peers offered. "I've got a lot of people who have called. I've had some coaches call within the league and said, 'Geez, looking in the last 10 years, I don't think I've seen where there's been so much focus on a coach.' "


Pre-draft bait
NBA GMs, scouts and coaches will arrive in Orlando, Fla., for the pre-draft camp on Monday, giving them a chance to put the late first-rounders and second-round types through their paces. But the work that might be more important, especially for lottery teams in need of a makeover (the Rockets leap to mind) will be the chance to talk face-to-face about the summer deals.

For the Rockets, this could be especially valuable because they have trade exceptions worth $4.2 million and $1.67 million. Those can be valuable, but the team needs trading partners. This week's chats could indicate who is ready to change their roster and how, or in the Rockets' case, who might want the trade exceptions in exchange for free agents that could be leaving anyway.

For now, most of the players the Rockets would target with $4.2 million would expect full mid-level money or more, but if the Rockets can get a team to help with a sign-and-trade for, to name a few, Fred Jones, DeShawn Stevenson, Devean George, Vladimir Radmanovic or Matt Harpring, they might get an idea this week.

All might be long shots, but it is that time of year. And for the Rockets, adding a shooting guard or a perimeter shooting forward without dipping into their mid-level money could key their offseason maneuvers.


Draft maneuvering likely
Between the order of the draft and the players in it (and not in it), much of the top 10 is looking to move.

Toronto and Chicago, with the top two picks and each with a young nucleus more ready than the players coming out, would like to use their high picks to get a difference-making veteran. Minnesota, at No. 6, would like to add veteran help.

Portland, New Orleans, Golden State, Utah, Philadelphia and Orlando would like to move up.

Most teams have been unusually willing to show their hand. But in a draft with players with holes in their games to repair (or at least grow out of), one move or two could trigger a wave of changes.

"It's not as good as a typical top dozen," Rockets vice president Dennis Lindsey said. "You can throw out the usual high-risk, high-reward high school guys ... and at minimum it's three or four people less deep, and the consensus No. 1 pick is not available. But there are still good players available and that will be available to you."


Knicks remain a wreck
After so many times assuming that the New York Knicks could not get worse, only to see them top themselves with new lows, perhaps it is best to assume something will always top the previous low.

This week's spate of stupidity: With the franchise apparently ready to jettison Larry Brown as coach even as he continues to work out draft prospects, the Knicks used a show of police force to keep the media from talking to Brown or Isiah Thomas.

This led to the media waiting by the side of the road in hopes that Brown would pull over and chat. He obliged for three consecutive days, referring himself as a "dead man walking" on the first, but on the third roadside interview, Thomas nearly ran into Brown's car.

Of course, because these are the Knicks, he missed.

jonathan.feigen@chron.com