Sorry. I don’t understand what you are saying. Can you explain? How can he force us to pay him anything? His option is a team option. We can let him walk and let the market decide what he is worth. Hopefully they pick up the option and trade him for Durant, but I doubt it. The Rockets seem determined to bring him back as our starter, which is incredibly stupid.
I am just making the assumption that they wouldn’t let him walk. If he doesn’t want to sign the contract, I think the rockets could get more value by picking up the option and trading him than they would by letting him walk. That’s what I meant by forcing them to pay him. He’s got a little leverage if the extension offer is too low.
He has leverage because he's a good player, and the Rockets don't have a mechanism to replace him if they let him walk. I doubt Stone and Ime are ready to let Reed run the show Game 1, Amen/Holiday trying to plug gaps as the backups, and lose a contract slot that they could use to trade for a better player.
I agree with this line of thinking. My suggestion would be that we separate it into two separate deals. Swap the draft picks before the draft. Then in July, trade Jalen to the Nets for Cam Johnson. Dillon Brooks is a better overall player at this time than Jalen Green. He's also an important part of our culture of toughness and intensity. Amen would then play more at guard for us. Cam Johnson would upgrade us offensively a lot. That should also free up enough cap space for us to use the full MLE. Ty Jerome would then be the target in free agency. Malik Beasley, NAW and Caris Levert would all be good backup plans. This would greatly upgrade our spacing and give us a lot of draft equity should a true superstar guard come available in the future. It would improve our depth as well. Cam Johnson is also on one of the league's best non-rookie contracts.
