The Rockets don't need a PF/C. Halfcourt ball handing, passing, shooting and defense are their needs.
Get us a real point guard and/or someone who defends the 3 point line. Go fleece Atlanta for Dyson Daniels, something, but AD........no need.
I keep forgetting about DFS. Since you mentioned him, I checked on when we might be able to expect him back on the court and Google told me:
Not particularly this year, but they would lose Tari for sure and I’m not giving up that 29 pick for Kyrie. If they want to keep him and not get rid of anybody they will have to pass on extending Reed and convince Amen to take less than the max to stay under the 2nd Apron. Kyrie makes 39.5 next year and 42.5 in 27/28 and is an injury waiting to happen.
I think they could convince Kyrie to waive his PO as part of the trade. Plus KD has an option that year so my guess is they'd it work to contend. . I also don't think we can keep Tari and Bari long term anyways. They are too redundant to play $40MM+ combined and especially when you can really only have 1 of them in a closing lineup with Amen. But the main reason I do it is I think the Rockets win it all with Kyrie this year and maybe next.
If kyrie is free from injury, definitely prefer kyrie than harden. Kyrie's steel nerves and mental toughness is of a champion caliber (proven) while harden many times disappears in clutch moments. (Play offs, must win games, game 7 etc.)
https://www.cbssports.com/nba/news/mavericks-trade-rumors-anthony-davis-kyrie-irving-cooper-flagg/ Trade 2: Kyrie Irving to Houston Rockets get: Kyrie Irving Mavericks get: Fred VanVleet, Dorian Finney-Smith, 2029 first-round pick (second-most favorable of Mavericks, Suns and Rockets) Irving's trade value is a total mystery. Even when younger and healthy in Brooklyn, interest was tepid. He's a mercurial guy and there are teams that just wouldn't risk bringing him into their building under any circumstances, especially if they knew he didn't want to come there. The torn ACL and three-year contract don't help either. Yet the advantage Dallas has where Irving is concerned is that it doesn't need to trade him. He's been a great organizational soldier since arriving and they can simply hold him out this season while they tank and bring him back presumably at full strength next season. They're not going to trade Irving just to trade him. They'd have to get something of substance. The number of teams willing to give that to them is going to be small. Irving may not be on a max contract but he's old, expensive and plays the most crowded position in the NBA. We're not doing another round of Lakers rumors. Austin Reaves is too good to justify bringing in another high-level guard whether LeBron James and Luka Dončić are interested in reuniting with their old sidekick or not. Maybe Miami or Milwaukee would be interested, but they're both playing well right now. There's no need for them to rock the boat. Portland is probably the team that would stand to improve the most by getting him, but the regular season matters to the Blazers. They can't take the health risk. There's really only one team that makes sense and that's Houston, where he could reunite with Kevin Durant. The Rockets are already winning without a starting point guard in VanVleet and Dorian Finney-Smith hasn't debuted yet, so they wouldn't really miss him in a trade like this. They're so loaded with picks that they could afford to give up a lesser one to grease the wheels here. In 2029, Houston gets the two highest picks out of their own, Phoenix's and Dallas'. We'll have them send the second-best of those picks back to the Mavericks to make this deal. If you assume Dallas will be better than Phoenix in 2029, this functionally gives Dallas control over its own pick back at that point beyond lottery luck scenarios. One possible hiccup here: VanVleet has the right to veto any trades. However, Dallas is arguably a better fit for him in 2027 than Houston at this point. The Rockets are winning with Amen Thompson at point guard and they could credibly argue to VanVleet that Reed Sheppard -- still a mess on defense but playing quite well on offense -- has usurped his place in their long-term plans. If the Rockets are telling him that he'd be returning to a bench role, well, the chance to start in Dallas would hold some appeal. Irving has a trade bonus, but it's usually easy enough to get a player to waive it when he's going to what he considers a better situation. Case in point: Anthony Davis waived his trade bonus when he came to Dallas last February. As for Houston? Well, they'd immediately become Oklahoma City's biggest threat to win the championship provided Irving can return in February or March. They might already be there, yet they'd still hold onto their three best draft assets, first-round picks from Phoenix and Brooklyn in 2027 and the best pick out of those three in 2029. Things would get a bit tight financially in 2028, when Durant, Irving, Thompson, Alperen Sengun and Jabari Smith would all be on the books for a lot of money, but there are potential solves there, like Irving opting out and lowering his cap figure in exchange for an extra year of security. Besides, it's only one extremely expensive year and the second apron probably doesn't scare Houston much anyway. They have so many external picks that their own dropping to No. 30 eight or nine years from now isn't especially damaging. Significant improvement now that doesn't cost major future assets is an easy win for the Rockets.
I propose we trade Jabari for a vet Jabari that will be better in playoffs + 2 draft picks to draft some new Jabari’s.. then sign a Jabari for half the $ with the MLE next year..
Not for this team. We are no. 1 in offense right now and will finish at least top 10, way better if we abandon the double bigs most of the time. Why destroy our balanced offense with another isolation specialist that is worse at defense than all our starters and is really pretty terrible as a perimeter defender. He just doesn’t fit and we have years of evidence that Harden’s offense is not suited for the playoffs.
I'm not making any trades at this point .... maybe that changes closer to the deadline but this group is putting everything together .... and if Reed is gonna play like he has the past week or so, we're good as is.
I would rather have Kyrie than Harden. I don’t agree with the choker moniker for Harden. I just think his game is constrained in playoff basketball. He is mauled, grabbed, and absolutely screwed by the refs. His game is predicated on getting to the line frequently. Playoff basketball unfortunately is reffed so much differently than the regular season. It is one of the most frustrating things about NBA basketball.
