Shams: Jalen Green I’m told is having productive conversations with the Rockets officials. He has a decision to make. We’ve seen him be a trendsetter his whole career. He was first to play on the G League ignite. Him and his agents are pursuing a potential structure, shorter team deal that maximizes his long term career earnings. There is a deal potentially here that is the first of it’s kind.
VERY interesting. My interpretation is Jalen is taking a lower number over ~3 years, and his agents want to frame it as "potentially maximizing his career earnings'" by giving him the opportunity to be UFA sooner than if he took 5 years. Probably some front-loading / incentives happening as well. Or some unusual option structure. I wonder if we see <$100M in guaranteed money.
What does this mean? I guess a 2 yr max? lol Not sure how this is an advantage for the Rox maybe they have flexibility to dump him if he underperforms but then he is gonna cost even more to keep long term.
If he does a Jalen Brunson and then just disguises it as "maximizing his earnings" he's gonna go on my all time Rox list.
Given Green's large cap hold, working out a deal before FA doesn't hurt cap space as much if it's below max. I'm just not sold on Green after 3 seasons of mostly flatline performance, would love nothing more than to be wrong.
I doubt it. I bet he's just offering to sign a 4 year max rather than 5, which would get him a supermax contract earlier if he qualifies.
This Jalen news is interesting but if the goal is to generate max cap room next offseason, I don't see what they can really do. The whole thing is contingent on delaying Sengun and Green's extentions till after they sign new players into that cap space. If there was a way to restructure the contracts and give them 1 year max contracts this season I'd love to do that but it's obviously not possible. Edit: from when I started writing this to when I hit post he signed a contract. Good deal though, I guess the plan for cap space next year would have to be by declining FVV's PO.
Green's cap hold was 31 mil. That's much of the point -- he extends for a figure similar to his cap hold so it doesn't impact our cap space too much.
Yeah I saw. If it breaks down to where his next year is actually exactly that 31M it would be an incredible move from the FO. Also huge kudos to Green for not adopting the "max or I walk" kind of mentality that a lot of these top picks seem to have.
I think it's a good deal for both sides. Jalen can prove himself, the Rockets are not married to Green for more than 3 years. At that point, he still has the potential label and someone may be willing to take him off our hands as an expiring contract (if he doesn't work out).
Talks are ongoing with representatives of Rockets center Alperen Şengün, the person familiar with negotiations said, though the deal would be different from Green’s unusually short extension agreement. https://www.houstonchronicle.com/sp...-green-alperen-sengun-extensions-19851303.php
Alp about to get the max rookie offer, cementing him as the one and only Rockets franchise player. @Os Trigonum @AroundTheWorld
At this point I wouldn't mind just giving him the max. Looking at the list of FA's, I don't even know who I would want taking minutes from the young core. Ingram? Butler? If we need to we can probably just work a sign and trade for FVV anyway. The MLE will probably be enough to improve the team for next season. It would be interesting to see a fired up Sengun fighting for a max contract all year but he seems like the kind of guy who goes all out regardless. https://hoopshype.com/lists/2025-nba-free-agent-rankings-the-best-players-available-next-summer/
With Green locked up to a solid contract, I would max Sengun, then, when able, work to rework FVV's contract to replace his opt-out year with an extension and aligns with Green. There's no FA I would prefer over this scenario.
