[CHRON] Ariza wants a chance and a blurb about our hunt for a center

Feigen with an Ariza article, but also gives a blurb about our hunt for center help towards the bottom :

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/sports/bk/bkn/6510699.html

Ariza wants chance to improve with new team
Rockets keep
eyes on potential
for future moves

By JONATHAN FEIGEN Copyright 2009 Houston Chronicle
July 3, 2009, 9:46PM

The Rockets offered Trevor Ariza the one thing the Lakers could not.

The Rockets did not offer a greater salary than the Lakers or Cavaliers and came in with an offer almost $9 million less than the Raptors’ bid. The Rockets cannot claim the immediate chance to chase another title that would come with a return to Los Angeles or jump to Cleveland.

But the Rockets could offer the one thing he needed most. They really, really needed him.

“I’m not a greedy person and the Lakers know I’m not a greedy person,” Ariza, 24, said. “You can see it in the way I play. I just want to play for a team that wants me, the team that gives me the chance to improve my game.

“I’m excited about it because I’m getting an opportunity to play. They were the team that showed the most interest in me and that was all I wanted.”

The Rockets could give him that. With Ariza’s decision to accept the five-year deal worth roughly $33 million, the Rockets and Lakers effectively swapped free agents, with Ron Artest going to Los Angeles and Ariza going from triumph with the Lakers to opportunity with the Rockets.

“I’m a champion,” he said. “And I’m a Houston Rocket.”

The Rockets offer the opportunity for Ariza, a 6-8 forward, to grow into the star he believes he can be. At the same time, there is a larger history of players who were never the same when leaving limited but important support roles with champions.

Ariza’s youth, physical abilities and improving skill set would seem to indicate he can offer more than the Lakers needed, but playing with Kobe Bryant did create scoring chances for Ariza.

If nothing else, he seemed to fit in. Neither Yao Ming nor Tracy McGrady is likely to begin the season on the court, but Ariza seemed as undaunted as last season’s Rockets were when he and the Lakers faced them in the Western Conference semifinals.

Competitive spirit

“Yeah, I don’t know what’s going to happen with them,” Ariza said of McGrady and Yao. “But that team played hard. They always compete and that’s the way I play no matter who is down.

“That team fought without T-Mac and without Yao and I’m a fighter too. I’ve always been a fighter and I’m going to roll with them, with the Rockets.”

The Rockets would rather not have to continue to gamely battle short-handed, but that likely seems to be their lot for the foreseeable future and a major part of the planning behind every move they make.

At least until Yao can safely put his left foot forward, the Rockets will not think short-term. As much as their moves have been to bolster what had been a crumbling roster, the Rockets agreed to sign Ariza because of his potential to grow with them during the five years on his contract.

With the Rockets one or two stars short of their plan to build around two stars, depending on the contributions of Yao and McGrady, the Rockets will seek only players who can be considered the sort that helps stars win championships down the road, rather than stopgap fill-ins.

In their case, they want young, athletic, two-way players who preferably can play an up-tempo style. And they want to make sure they don’t lock themselves into contracts that can never be moved if necessary to get those stars.

Ariza would seem to define those characteristics. Finding a center who can fit the profile, and at the price they can pay, will be more difficult.

Signing Ariza will push the Rockets slightly past the luxury tax line. They could receive a disabled player exception, worth a mid-level exception, to spend for a center if Yao’s injury and surgery choice force him to miss all of next season.

But not only is it premature to know whether Yao will choose a surgery that will keep him out for so long and begin the protracted process to receive that exception, the Rockets are unlikely to surge that far into luxury tax territory for a stopgap center.

They viewed Marcin Gortat as a backup-level center and would not increase their offer beyond backup numbers.

Even if they had the money available (they have a trade exception worth in excess of $2 million that would allow the Rockets to add a player through a sign-and-trade more expensive than other teams’ minimum exceptions), they are not likely to spend it unless it is for a player who would be a long-term fit and value.

Centers of attention

That way of thinking should slow things, at least in the pursuit of a center.

Rather than hoping to win a race for the centers available — led by Zaza Pachulia, Antonio McDyess, Ryan Hollins, Theo Ratliff , Channing Frye and Chris Wilcox — they likely will be willing to wait for the asking price for the free-agent centers to come down while they look for a trade.

As with their pursuit of Gortat, they likely will seek someone who can protect the rim on one end and can run with Aaron Brooks and Ariza on the other end.

For now, this week’s free-agent “trade” demonstrated how they have begun to change, moving from Artest to Ariza, from the presumed final puzzle piece to the first in this summer’s rebuilding.

jonathan.feigen@chron.com

 

I could have done a Carl Herrera and posted his per 36 minute numbers, proclaimed him God, and created a sexual reference of a title. Think that would've worked better to clear things up?