How? what is your salary cap math? Or are you just saying it in general. IIRC, The Rockets have a path for close to 2 max deals next season, and for the 14th time, THE CAP IS GOING UP in a few years anyway. What are you saving this money for, more superyachts for tllman? This isn't 2012 - cap space is not the premium you think it is. And yes, to take minutes away from worse players is absolutely why we should bring a better player like John Collins. If those worse players are rookies, so be it. He's better than they are and he also is hardly old. Oh, and news flash the rockets don't control 2 out of the next 3 drafts after 23 so they get no benefit from sucking - I don't know how many more times this needs to be said
At least we would have assets to trade this summer if we get Wemby. To make a Championship team you need three stars. I see Green(Robin), Sengun the third Star and either Wemby or Scooter(Batman). I do know what to say about Jabari…I’m confuse about him
3 Team: PHO - ATL - HOU PHO: Gordon (HOU) + T. Martin (ATL) ATL: Crowder (PHO) + Tate (HOU) + Garuba (HOU) + 2023 PHO FRP (top 10 protected) + 2023 MIL FRP (via MIL) (lotto protected) HOU: Collins (ATL) + Saric (PHO) + Krejci (ATL) Who do you flip Saric for?
HAHAHAHHA sure Oklahoma city is salivating to add one of the single worst high usage players in the entire league and one of its single worst perimeter defenders and plug him into Lu Dort's place, "they'd take that in a heartbeat"
They would trade for Jalen Green because he's easily the better offensive player TODAY...RIGHT NOW...and has potential to do more. You act like GMs only think about the now and not 5 years from now that they never think about potential and are just looking at who could help the team win right now. Not everyone is on this "What about now!?" mindset you have. I haven't seen any one credible, media, player, coach, whatever, even hint that Jabari and Green are busts. I swear I only see that here and some random reddit poster that gets laughed at for also rushing to judge a young player. Like, we're acting like GMs don't ever consider potential just "Oh, this guy is a good 3 and D guy right now, no, I wouldn't trade him for the 20 year #2 pick that randomly drops 40, that guy is a bust."
Yep, because OKC understands what 'Potential' is and that Green has more potential than Jalen Williams. This is hilarious that we're even arguing this, that you think they actually are the same level of prospect just proves you have grass is greener syndrome.
If we trade anything serious for John Collins, I am hanging up my fandom until the Stone era ends. Literally makes zero sense to me why we would want him. Unless he is a phenomenal defender then I see zero point in acquiring him.
We know right now who the free agents will be. My question is: who are we saving our cap room for? We need guys like Collins (especially in a buy low situation) not just to help the development of our your players, but to give us flexibility going forward. We currently have no superstars on this team, so if one comes available, everyone should be fair game. If we decide to send Jalen out, we have to have players to match salary. If a superstar were to come available this summer, we couldn’t even get an audience because we can’t match salary. We need to add significant contracts. And Collins is a prime candidate to increase his value, and ultimately the return that the Rockets get for him.
Light discussion/exploratory talks is all that has taken place. Until it has legs, I am not too interested one way or the other.
Sure, but what about John Collins? I don’t see the need to trade for him right now when we don’t even know who we’re drafting. If we did by the grace of basketball jesus get Wemby, Collins would have been a pointless trade and we’d be eating the rest of his contract for no reason
It's hilarious that you think the NBA teams value players based on Draftexpress.com rankings from summer 2021. Again, been catalogued before, but go back and read some of the redraft articles and evaluations that have come out in these last few months in the Athletic, ESPN, elsewhere - the same commentators (the national guys) that pumped up guys like Green and Smith are now saying "meh, maybe it's just Houston and they suck, but maybe these guys jsut aren't quite as good as we thought". I mean, I've quoted the "hey, looks like Jabari Smith has a really slow release, we should have noticed that!" piece by Sam Vecenie many times on this board. NOt that they're the be-all end-all of authorities, but they, like me, and like OKC and others, are updating their beliefs based on the evidence that we see, which, for the Rockets recent draftees (excepting Sengun), is net negative. Again, you can speculate about Green's hypothetical trade value, but I hardly think the Thunder (who more or less have the anti-Green in his place in Dort) are thinking much about it, given that they got who they and many others consider to be a superior player a few picks later. If they're regretting anything it's probably trading Sengun, but they have Chet anyway so it doesn't really matter.
In no way is it buy low. Not even close. They're giving up premium assets, EG, KMJ in the proposed trade. That's entirely way too much for a ok player who's extremely injury prone yeah i would love to get a star that becomes available maybe down the road. Is that John Collins? Definitely not. Easy pass why is he a prime candidate to increase his value. He has a fat 3 years remaining and the Hawks have put him in trade talks for a couple years now and they still can't get rid of him. Someone who can't stay healthy isn't increasing their value
Potential trade for John Collins? I’ll defer to somebody much more eloquent. @larsv8 gave a fantastic breakdown of why a team in our position shouldn’t be adding expensive rotation players with so many unknowns. Call me crazy, at this point in the season I care much more about Jabari and Tari’s development than I do about adding some ordinary rotation player into the mix and getting marginally better. Do we need better defense? Yes. From top to bottom. I’ll support any reasonable move to address that issue that doesn’t hinder the timeline. Hell, we’ve barely made any roster moves at all this year. I’m all for a smaller deal or buy-low proposition. This falls outside of that standard, though, and has minimal upside. Decent player, silly move.
Don't see how Collins is gonna move the needle. The team is a **** show. The reason the Hawks want to trade Collins is because of all the drama he's caused complaining about his role. I don't see how adding a player, who at best is a marginal improvement over what we have, is going to improve this team much at all. It's just going to add to the **** show. Add some high character vets to this team that'll show these kids how to be a professional and how to compete every game on both sides of the court.
Those draftexpress rankings are based on how the GMs feel about each prospect. Green didn't go #2 because Draftexpress thought he was a #2 prospect. He went #2 because nearly every team thought he was the 2nd (or 3rd) best prospect that year. They don't forget that in one year. Criticizing these players is a lot different then completely writing them off like you've been doing. "Maybe it's just houston..." is implying that they would be fine elsewhere. I don't think the Thunder having Dort would be very relevant in such a trade, this hypothetical is Green for Williams, they are replacing Williams with a better offensive player. You think they don't feel like they can coach up his defense and hide it and then get the spoils of his offense? Green's trade value is high, as is any top 5 pick with not even 3 seasons under their belt. GMs and other teams are always thinking a player can do better under them. Its literally what Houston did when they acquired Harden from OKC. If you look at any trade the past years that involve a superstar player you will find that teams are seeking players with potential because teams always think they can 'fix' said player or that they will be better under their system. OKC wouldn't think they are getting a chucker. They are thinking they'll teach him better habits and integrate him into their system and watch him grow and since he has more potential than Jalen Williams that they won't miss Williams at all. Dort is not some untouchable lol or some player that is going to figure that much into how they are building their team. Come on now. That's like saying Rockets won't draft Scoot because they have KPJ or something. They'll acquire Jalen and also play him with Dort and hope Jalen even learns from Dort on defense.
We can’t be ridiculous. KJ is a solid role player, there’s no way he’s off limits. We gotta stop getting attached and getting overrating players. This is silly
I don't think so, those predraft rankings are personal rankings of the commentators rather than the result of any survey. He went #2 because one team that was picking #2 thought he was #2 (or better). Seems so far that they are wrong, sadly. Considering they just signed him to a huge contract, bringing in a replacement for him who is uniquely bad at all of the things he is good at would seem very relevant. Let me tell you what, Oklahoma city's rebuild is ahead of schedule. It's way more advanced than ours. THat's something I would not believe this offseason, but it's undeniably true now. They have better players across the board than us, and they haven't even unveiled Chet yet. And they have our draft picks (which will be enhanced unless we upgrade with players like...John Collins, eg) Speculating that "OKC would LOVE to have our disappointing players, I JUST KNOW IT" just seems sad man. They probably wouldn't - they're better than us! IT's the state we've been reduced to with this failing rebuild, and I don't think it's the thing you fix by swappign out Stevie Silas for Frank Vogel. I definitely think there's talent issues as tough at it is to admit.
