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

I actually don't see any non-restricted free agents in 2025 that I would rather have than VanVleet. So it really comes down to whether or not somebody shakes loose in trade that we would like. I will be so mad if they send picks and young players away for somebody like Kevin Durant or Jimmy Butler though. Those are moves you make if you're a Kevin Durant or a Jimmy Butler away from a Championship, and we haven't even made the play-in. They don't have a lot of tread left on their tires so I don't want to mortgage our future for a short term rental.

I really think that we have to hope and pray that a Luka, Ant, Shai or, more realistically, a Ja or Zion shake loose. And with Zion, the organization would have to be extremely confident that they can manage his health, weight and defensive effort. And I doubt anybody is all that confident about that.

I honestly see very few sub-thirty year old stars that I could see becoming available, but I guess sometimes things unexpectedly go off the rails. Maybe Jayson Tatum will bang one of the owner's wives and get suspended for the year. One can only hope!

 

I agree with most everything you said. I think the 2 mostly likely targets are Booker and Giannis. Booker is the best fit, but in the 2nd or 3rd tier as far as stars go. Giannis is dependent on him demanding out.

I think that is a distinct possibility as the Bucks window has closed in my opinion. The question is would he force his way to Houston or OKC that would clearly be able to furnish the best package for the Bucks or will he do the NY or California or bust route. New Jersey might also be a competitor for his services.

 

The Pistons are paying attention.

 

I mean the reality of it is - the reason Houston has started to shine in a way that only OKC has in their rebuild is because they have mostly nailed their draft options, they have been financially responsible prioritizing the long term even if it cost them more money in the short term, and they were thoughtful about WHY we are adding those players.

The sneaky parts:
- FA contract: The value of the FVV and Brooks signings were that we overpaid them for long term flexibility...and now we are reaping the rewards of that strategy because it makes us a dangerous team both in terms of cap flexibility and in terms of trade flexibility. See the thread about FVV being the contract signing that will haunt us for an example of how this point where over a lot of people's heads at the time because they were focused on the initial cost and not the cost over time(amortized cost of an asset in financial terms).

- FA strategy: The other important point to note here is that the overpayment(because we had to meet a cap floor anyway) was also an investment in development. I think we saw significant growth from our rookies than we had in year's past just by giving the team the structure to work on the things that matter rather than hoping they would figure it out based on instruction(the Silas days). I said at the time that one of the reason's Silas' system looked so bad was because there weren't a lot of players on the court that knew how to do the little things - for instance if Jalen Green was supposed to get a down screen from Tate and then pop out and make a decision based on how the defense responded, if Tate didn't know how to set a good pick, how was Jalen supposed to work on his decisioning if the screen provided little time for Jalen to even make the read because the play was already 'busted'. That's why guys like FVV, Brooks, and Uncle Jeff were particularly valuable because they knew what proper execution looked like and could demonstrate it night in and night out in a way that a first or second year players wouldn't know. See Detroit's continued rebuild for an example of this.

- Draft: Combine all of that with multiple top 5 picks over the last 4 years(a little lotto ball luck with the jump into the top 3 for Reed) plus some great pick ups a little deeper in the draft(Cam, Sengun, Tari) and you have added asset value to the organization even if you didn't necessarily get the best player each year. Honestly it's bonus if you can nail the right player with your pick but the place where Houston has really shined is adding players who can do at least one thing on an NBA level for their position and that's just asset value that we can throw into trades for upgrades elsewhere using the contracts of guys like FVV or Brooks along with hopefully minimal future draft picks.

 

Thanks for sharing, sir! This is the first ESPN+ article I have wanted to read in a loooong while.

 

On Cam, I was more referring to he doesn't create for teammates. He mostly cuts when there is an opportunity much like Amen and Tari. If his teammate sees him, he gets a basket. Other than that, he really isn't involved in plays. Teammates create for him when the play breakdowns, but it did not seem like FVV and Green were breaking down defenses with the goal of Cam being the 1st or 2nd option.

 

I don't even think Detroit drafted that poorly, it's just that after Cade they picked at #5 or later. The top prospects were off the board. We also had many more picks than Detroit. Excluding the just drafted 2024 class Detroit added five first rounders since 2021: Cade, Duren, Ivey, and Ausar, Sasser. We added nine: Green, Sengun, Garuba, Christopher, Jabari, Tari, Tyty Washington, Amen, and Cam.

 

Crazy you think this is a regular common rebuild.

 

The Pistons choose to send a pick with Wood to the Rockets instead of keeping Wood and the pick. They could have traded for Wall and the pick as they had better contracts than Westbrook. They could have been the ones trading their pick and the John Wall compensation pick for Sengun. If they had kept Wood, they could have been the one trading him for a 1st round pick that ended up as TyTy and a couple 2nd rounders. They are the ones that choose to draft a young project center when Tari (him and Aj Griffin were the top 2 prospects left, IMO, based on draft day evaluation) was still on board.

Choices made by Detroit's GM are why it isn't Cade, Sengun, Ivey, Tari, TyTy, Cam, and Sasser as their haul.

The Rockets had a lot of picks because Stone traded for a lot of picks. I wasn't too enthusiastic at the time, but the Nets pick and a swap for two picks and 2 swaps is another in a long line of moves that Stone has made that increased the number of FRPs the Rockets had/have.

 

I'm not backing the truck up to give any of the 2025 players max deals but speaking of sub 30yr olds, if we could get Myles Turner for $30mil or less, I would consider that deal. If Miami blows up and starts trading their guys, I would be interested in Bam Adebayo as well. Basically a center who is either dominant defensively or has some stretch capabilities are what we need if Sengun is supposed to be our offensive playmaker.

 

Disagree about positional fit, which isn’t the same a skill fit IMO. We currently have:

Reed-guard
Green-guard
Thompson- wing
Cam- wing
Eason - wing
Jabari - forward
Sengun - center

Obviously we hope the shooting and playmaking will improve but we have a lineup that fits if player(s) improve in that context.

While we did tank, so did Detroit but we got some luck.

 

The 4 dregs teams the Rockets were picking around the last few years were Orlando, OKC, Detroit, SAS.

Obviously the Rockets are better off than Detroit;

Not even close to OKC;

Arguably on par with Orlando (you can argue east v West here, but I'd still think even with that ORL is in better shape);

better on the floor than SAS but there is a 7-4 caveat there that pretty much means the Spurs are literally set for the next decade in a way that nobody else is.

Lot of this is just luck though.

 

I just want to see this team play. I always look forward to Rockets basketball, but this is going to be a particularly awesome year.
Add Tari, Reed and Steven Adams to this bunch?
They are going to wreck shop.

 

I would disagree. The Rockets aren't doing anything that is all that revolutionary in sucking for 3 consecutive years, hoarding picks, and not signing big name FAs. Just going back over the past 15 years or so:

2010 - 2013: Less than 1 year after trading the #5 overall pick for Mike Miller in a win-now move, and 3 months after Abe Pollin dies, Washington salary dumps Caron Butler, Berendan Haywood, DeShawn Stevenson, and Antawn Jamison to tank for John Wall. Consecutive picks of #6, #3, #3, before they get back into the playoffs in Wall's 4th year.

2011 - 2014: While LeBron went away for college in South Beach, the Cavs keep their cap sheet clean and accumulate tons of losses, as well as #1, #4, #4, #1, and #1. Not hard to imagine an Irving/Waiters/Wiggins/Thompson core being at least mediocre and pushing for a #8 seed in an alternate universe.

2013 - 2017: The Process in Philly.

2019 - 2023: OKC breaks up the Paul George/Russell Westbrook core, gets much better than expected results in 2020 by accident, and responds by letting CP3 and Billy Donovan go to tank harder for 2 years.

2020 - 2023: Orlando dumps Evan Fournier, Nik Vucevic, and Aaron Gordon for picks and tank until Paolo/Franz drag them to contention a year early.

2021 - Present: San Antonio trades Dejounte Murray and Jakob Poeltl for picks, trades out the #8 in 2024, to try and suck one more year to get a 2025 blue chipper alongside Wemby.

Pretty much at any given time, you always have at least 1-2 teams attempting this strategy; I'm not even going to include Detroit here, but they're an example of how this strategy can go horribly wrong with some bad draft luck...

 

Great post!

 

I don't think a team has ever been rebuilt like the Rockets have, what teams have had this type of draft capital and return in consecutive years? The only team I can think of is Philadelphia (maybe GSW), and although they ended up w Embiid, the other guys are not that great or out of the league. The Rockets may or may not have a super star, but they have some very good players that are playing well in their 1st, 2nd, and 3rd seasons, and all will be NBA players, Okafor is only 28 and ended up in China a while ago. They also have a ton of draft capital as well. I think maybe Utah has a chance to rebuild in a similar way, but they still need to make the picks, Detroit tried it and they didn't make the picks. The Rockets did not even get incredibly lucky either (no #1 overall picks and no Wemby), and didn't draft perfectly, and I don't think that was the anticipation either, i think they wanted to get as many chances as possible. I would be curious to see what teams have a roster made up of the most self drafted players, I would guess the Rockets are at the top of that list and that is unique in itself. The Warriors dynasty was built from selff dratfted picks, they had 8 at one point, this is not common.

 

Comparing the Magic and Rockets is an interesting thought process. I don’t think it’s clear which is the better set of young players.

I also think it’s way too early to relegate the pistons as failures. They have a ton of young talent and likely at least 3 of the players will end up being good and then just put some shooting around them and they will me at a minimum a playoff team.

 

AK da dawg! Big dogs gotta eat. Woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof woof!!!

 

I think his point was we didn’t write a new playbook. We just didn’t deviate and held course, unlike so many other teams who keep finding themselves in rebuild-mode.

We traded big names for draft capital, we played young guys a ton, we signed some veterans that would help the young guys instead of carry them, and we didn’t gamble on a star, yet. That’s kind of the plan for any rebuild but most teams either get antsy and make a trade or they draft poorly.

so I agree that Houston’s rebuild shouldn’t be “copied” by anyone. We copied it from Rebuild 101. We just drafted better than teams in similar positions.

 

Team of dawgs

U-dowga