[ESPN/Pelton] Why the rest of the NBA should be paying attention to the Houston Rockets' rebuild

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Rafael is a a growth mindset person and all these is by-product of it. We're so lucky to have him. He works with his staff and lets them have their input as well

 

The Rockets had the best possible organization to ask about this sort of rebuild down the street in Jim Crane and the Astros. Credit to Stone and Tilman for the Ime hire and re-building the right way. They've stayed the course and largely avoided the pitfalls that teams like Detroit and Cleveland have made. Maybe Tilman learned from the Westbrook disaster.

No win now moves. The Ime/Dillon/Fred/Uncle Jeff moves were very smart. Also helps to live in Houston which is a desirable city for NBA free agents and free agent coaches. I'm sure Ime is on cloud 9 here vs the dregs he had up in Boston or the big ole women in San Antonio.

 

I don't really know how the Rockets are any more or less interesting than a typical rebuilding team. Other than the fact that OKC pick obligations forced them to have a hard deadline for the end of the rebuild, it is basically how you expect any team in their position to go about it. In the end, whether the Rockets succeed or fail this rebuild depends on how the prospects turn out. Just like most every other rebuilds.

 

Almost all the bottom feeder teams in the league have been on rebuilds longer than the Rockets. Hornets, Pistons, Blazers, Spurs, Jazz, Wizards etc.

How often does a rotation of 6 out of 9 dudes 22 or under win 40+ games?

 

High income persons get the best pick of the litter when it comes to women. Regular joes like me and you had to settle for them big ole big backs in San Antonio lol(not that im complaining )

 

I am actually paying attention to the number of chips Wemby is going to win or he is going to lose out on.

As the next best Big.

 

50 Wins this year and playoffs! Lets go!

 

SIKE! he gonna become injury prone

 

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Why the rest of the NBA should be paying attention to the Houston Rockets' rebuild

The Houston Rockets might be the NBA's most fascinating team to watch over the next 12 months.

Four years removed from their last playoff appearance with James Harden leading the way, the Rockets climbed back to .500 last season by putting the right veterans around a core of young talent featuring six first-round picks since 2021.

Last season marked the beginning of "Phase 2" of Houston's post-Harden rebuild. Phase 3 could be even more remarkable. With only Dillon Brooks among their veterans under guaranteed contract for 2025-26, the Rockets could create sizable cap space next summer. Or they could use those expiring contracts and a stockpile of draft picks to trade for a star.

As those plans are playing out, Houston must also decide which of its budding stars to pay as their rookie contracts expire -- guard Jalen Green and center Alperen Sengun are both eligible for extensions now ahead of restricted free agency next summer. Those may, in turn, be informed by the play of the Rockets' more recent picks, including promising rookie point guard Reed Sheppard.

Let's look at what's developing in Space City -- and why the rest of the NBA should pay attention.

Rockets as a player development model
Excitement about Houston's future was far less palpable 15 months ago.

After finishing the 2022-23 season with their second consecutive 60-loss campaign, the Rockets' young core hadn't yet coalesced into anything approximating a winning basketball team as they finished 27th in offensive rating and 29th in defense.

Following a crucial 2023 summer, Houston turned the corner by complementing homegrown talent -- Green, Sengun and Jabari Smith Jr. -- with proven veterans in free agency. The Rockets spent big on guard Fred VanVleet and wing Dillon Brooks, who slotted into the starting five alongside Houston's recent first-round picks.

All three holdovers surged, with Sengun finishing third in Most Improved Player voting, Green averaging 27.7 points per game during a 13-2 March run -- highlighted by an 11-game winning streak -- and Smith boosting his true shooting percentage from .514 to .571 in Year 2. The veteran presence, plus new coach Ime Udoka, helped lift Houston all the way to 10th in defensive rating last season.

Aside from their defensive improvement, the Rockets' shooting upgrades have made them a model for developing young players on a rebuilding team. Houston went from 30th in 3-point percentage and 29th in made 3s in 2022-23 to 14th in makes and 23rd in percentage, with VanVleet making a team-high 227 triples and Brooks shooting a career-high 36%.

The Detroit Pistons seemed to be following Houston's path this summer, signing a pair of vets who can shoot (Malik Beasley and Tobias Harris) and adding another (Tim Hardaway Jr.) via trade to give recent lottery picks Cade Cunningham, Jaden Ivey and Ausar Thompson more room to operate on offense after Detroit finished 29th in made 3s last season.

The challenge for Detroit, and other teams hoping to emulate the Rockets' rebuild, will be upgrading veteran talent without blocking development of young players. Houston was lucky the anticipated signing of veteran center Brook Lopez fell through. With Lopez on board, it's unlikely Sengun would have had the opportunity for his breakthrough campaign.

The willingness of Brooks and VanVleet to take on smaller offensive roles gave Houston's draft picks room to shine. VanVleet's 20% usage rate was his lowest since 2018-19, while Brooks' 18% usage was a career low. It's important to find veterans who understand how they fit a young team. That could make the Rockets' model difficult to replicate.

Houston as the West's free agency threat
Two years after making a splash in free agency, the Rockets have a chance to do so again next summer, in part because of how they structured VanVleet's contract. In exchange for guaranteeing VanVleet the max for two seasons, Houston got a team option on the third and final year. Add in a non-guaranteed 2025-26 salary for backup center Jock Landale and a team option on guard Aaron Holiday, and the Rockets have minimal guarantees beyond this season.

Houston could clear $80-plus million by shedding all of those salaries, plus a team option on the final year of forward AJ Griffin's rookie contract and their 2025 first-round pick. But realistically, the Rockets could be in the neighborhood of $30 million in cap space with cap holds for Green and Sengun as restricted free agents.

As ESPN's Bobby Marks recently broke down, cap space will be scarce next summer. Only the Brooklyn Nets currently project to have more than $30 million, and the Nets figure to spend one more year rebuilding after reacquiring rights to their 2025 and 2026 first-round picks from Houston earlier this summer.

That leaves Houston as a potential spoiler as teams consider extending their star-level potential free agents. In particular, the Denver Nuggets must keep an eye on the Rockets, who could make a run at forward Aaron Gordon if he doesn't strike an extension ahead of his 2025-26 player option.

Houston's options in free agency also affect negotiations with Green and Sengun. Like Philadelphia 76ers guard Tyrese Maxey, Sengun has a relatively low cap hold ($16.3 million) compared to the raise he'll command on his next contract. That could make it wiser for the Rockets to forgo an extension now, then use Sengun's Bird rights to re-sign him after spending cap space, as Philadelphia did with Maxey.

Since Green's cap hold ($34.4 million) is in the ballpark of the projected max salary for players with less than seven years of experience ($38.7 million), there's less incentive for Houston to hold off on an extension. In Green's case, the challenge is finding the right value for a deal, particularly with more Rockets due for new contracts in future years -- Smith in a year, 2023 lottery pick Amen Thompson and Sheppard down the line. If Houston uses cap space, this group could quickly get more expensive, making it important that Green's next contract doesn't prove difficult to trade.

How well Sheppard plays as a rookie will also help determine whether the Rockets feel comfortable letting VanVleet go and spending that money at another position. If Sheppard looks capable of starting by his second NBA season, that route becomes far more realistic.

 

Houston as a trade destination
If the top free agents available either sign extensions -- like Denver guard Jamal Murray did last week -- or don't look like fits for the Rockets, they can also pivot to becoming players for the next star to hit the trade market. Houston's combination of young talent, expiring contracts and draft picks means the Rockets can make virtually any kind of deal.

VanVleet's $44.9 million team option looms large, too. If a deal comes together next June, Houston can exercise VanVleet's option and include him with draft picks or cheaper contracts as matching salary. The Rockets can't compete with the Oklahoma City Thunder or Utah Jazz when it comes to draft options, but they do have control of all of their picks starting in 2027, plus first-rounders in 2027 and 2029 picked up from Brooklyn this summer.

Most notably, Houston potentially controls Phoenix's first-round picks in 2025 (swap), 2027 and 2029. That could make the Rockets the Suns' first call if they ever decide to trade Kevin Durant or, down the road, Devin Booker.

As a destination for max free agents such as Dwight Howard and Chris Paul (via opt-in and trade) in the past, Houston figures to be a more attractive landing spot for a traded star than Oklahoma City or Utah. And the Rockets have more to offer in a trade than the desirable landing spots in the East, which might mean the Texas rival San Antonio Spurs are their most formidable competition when it comes to landing a star.

The potential of Houston including one of its cornerstone young players is an interesting wrinkle. San Antonio has far less proven talent around 2023-24 Rookie of the Year Victor Wembanyama to offer. Specifically, the Rockets could consider dealing Sengun, a possibility ESPN's Tim MacMahon pondered in the spring. Sengun wasn't part of Houston's March run, when the Rockets shifted styles by playing Thompson and Smith together in a switch-heavy frontcourt that's not possible with Sengun on the court.

One key question: How aggressive will Houston be with its timeline? Landing Durant, who turns 36 later this month, would make the Rockets competitive now but would limit their ability to upgrade when their young stars reach their prime years. Adding a star in their 20s would give Houston a window to contend. However, those players -- like Booker -- are less likely to be available any time soon.

For now, the Rockets are in a unique position. They lead the NBA with eight players on rookie contracts, yet unlike the teams in a similar position (Detroit and Washington, with seven), Houston is in contention for a play-in spot right now. With the hiring of Udoka in 2023, the additions in free agency and a number of promising draft picks, the Rockets nailed Phase 2 of their rebuild.

The decisions Houston makes over the next year will determine whether Phase 3 can be as successful, with ripple effects felt throughout the league.

 

Gordon is an interesting thought exercise, and you'd be able to acquire him while retaining both Sengun and Jalen. We know the Stone-era Rockets liked him in 2021, when Orlando put him on the market. You'd obviously be losing FVV to clear $30M in space, but it's theoretically doable — Gordon's player option is for $22.8M, so he'd be incentivized to take that type of deal for more years, and Denver clearly has at least some financial limits. We saw that in July when they let KCP walk to Orlando for no compensation.

Case against it: FVV is a really good player and a great fit, and I don't think it's a given that Gordon is better. With FVV now in his 30s, you might could leverage him into a contract extension for more years at less AAV.

Case for it: Gordon is bigger and has more versatility, and if Amen and/or Reed look ready by this time a year from now to take the reins at PG, you might not need Fred as much as you currently do. Gordon is also a couple years younger (28 vs. 30).

IMO, a lot of it likely depends on Amen. If he's primarily an off-ball guy, then I dunno if it's worth investing much into Gordon when you already have Amen, Tari, and Jabari in fairly similar roles. But if Amen becomes more on-ball, it might work.

Also, another thing to keep in mind: Agents for potential vet FAs may use Houston as leverage to get extensions from their current teams. Case in point, very few teams are expected to have significant cap space in 2025, and would anyone really expect Brooklyn or Washington to invest heavily in a 29-year-old Aaron Gordon (very good role player, but certainly not a building-block star)? Answer is probably no, so that's not good leverage. It makes more sense for a team like Houston, though, which is why the Rockets make for better leverage.

Not saying for sure that's what's happening here, but useful to keep in mind.

 

What is interesting is that Aaron Gordon has more mileage as a 28 year old (10 years) vs FVV (merely 8 years) due to FVV being undrafted and coming into the league at 22 years old.

 

I'd say the Rockets and Thunder rebuiding strategy has been more extreme than most previous rebuilds with the maybe exception of the Process.

The Rockets have 7 young players with potential, a well-maintained payroll, and interesting draft capital (one extra FRP and likely getting good picks while having a good team). Considering the hole of draft capital that Morey left Stone, the turn around in value of draft assets (i.e., draft asset management) has been amazing.

A lot of people did not see the Rockets coming and didn't think the Rockets had a good path forward until the past 6 months. A lot of people did not see the moves leading up to creating salary cap space in 2023. Even with the Brook Lopez debacle and KPJ, the Rockets crushed the 2023 offseason. All a lot of what people saw were the Lopez and KPJ debacles and overestimated how much that they hurt the overall plan.

The Rockets might not have a No. 1 guy yet, but I can't remember the last time ther Rockets had 7 interesting young guys along with still having a ton of draft capital.

 

I mean...... we had the worst seasons in franchise history and got relatively lucky in the draft (along with some shrewd draft picks).

Not sure if it was intentional.... but our draft picks really fit together positionally which is the opposite of Detroit.

 

The Rockets drafted without looking at fit. I don't think the Rockets young guys fit all that well together. They are just better for the most part than Detroit's picks (i.e., Detroit's shooting troubles are going to cause probelms regardless of their teammates). Amen picked up a ton of value while Sengun was hurt. Also, Amen and Tari played similar roles, but at different points in last season. Not sure those 2 can play together. Jabari should fit with almost anyone as he gets better. Green looked better with a more open court. Cam didn't really seem to fit with anyone. He just made things happen on the court, but didn't seem to involve much teamwork.

On the kucky in the draft, I'd say the Rockets created a lot of chances for themselves to have luck. Getting the picks involved skill as much as the selections themselves.

 

Cam's scoring profile is at a 30% unassisted rate on fgs made. He's heavily reliant on teammates to create for him. I don't think he "made things happen" outside of transition buckets where his speed and strength made him a one man fast break but we have two other guys who are like that. But when it came to anything outside of the open transition, he attacked closeouts outs and and made his spot up attempts at least pre all-star break.