The hate for Howard is ridiculous. He's a hard working professional veteran and has been important to the success of our team.
Nets would probably want to pawn off Jason Collins in exchange, whose contracts years are the same and dollars are nearly same, but half the player Juwan is. The only other real option is McInnis, Boki, and Miki Moore for JHo and Lucas. Anything else would be a 5 for 1 type trade. McInnis might solve the backup PG problem, but the 4 gets weaker still, and Sura would need to retire.
I say get it done no matter what we get in return. Dumping the contract is well worth it in my opinion. I hope CD can pull this off.
Ill be more clear. I would love it if the Rockets got a expiring contract for Juwan but that sounds more like a dream.
i dont really know who the nets would give up that is actually better than howard. cheaper, sure, but rockets need someone to be a decent backup at pf. but i guess its the 'in' thing to hate on howard
Did you just have Philadelphia trading AI and Kyle Korver for Jeff McInnis, Mikki Moore, Al Jefferson, Sebastian Telfair and Theo Ratliff?? That would be AWESOME! I think Stephen A. Smith's head would literally explode.
We won't be under the cap with Yao and Tracy on the books. But it would be a cushion away from the luxury tax which Les has tried to avoid.
With the chemistry on this team I'd hesitate to pull triggers. Sure, possibilities for improvement may exist but Howard is effective in his role right now and his veteran status should not be undervalued.
Sorry to tell all ya'll Juwan haters....BUT....he's a veteran leader in the locker room! we need that guy in the locker room and a few mins on the court. He lifts up the team from time to time. (Love the news about Bonzi)
Despite his *slightly* improved play lately, I still despise Howard. He's really the first Rocket I've ever truly hated. He's a cancer as far as I'm concerned. I think he only started improving a bit lately because he realized that Hayes was robbing all his minutes by actually playing tough, to the best of his ability, on both ends. Howard knew he had to stop rebounding and defending like a little girl if he wanted minutes, but he's still a complete liability on offense if you ask me. I cringe in fear everytime he gets the ball anywhere near the post or the baseline. If NJ will take him, I'm all for dropping him like a bad habit. For anything - expiring contracts, draft picks, cash... Just get him out of here.
Which means we might be more likely to use the MLE next year, I guess, if the player you get in exchange is on the last year of their contract. Which would mean, next year is the target year to try and win it all. Part of that problem there though is that big men, even when they aren't that good, tend to get at least the MLE, occasionally more. You certainly couldn't get Juwan's production from December on the MLE alone...but then, Juwan won't give you that all year anyway. Personally, I'm not on the trade Juwan just to dump a contract bandwagon...Maybe in the offseason, but not in the middle of the Rockets best start in years...and definitely not when Juwan has been playing so well lately.
Do ya'll have any sense of Howard's value to this team? Actually, the question was rhetorical... don't bother answering... it won't make sense anyway.