There is a thought that you need good players on rookie contracts to put around your high paid stars. A championship contender owning a lottery pick would seem like a perfect situation. But if the cap is set to go up significantly, that may not be as much of a consideration. You can still afford high production players not on rookie contracts.
We will probably trade the pick before the deadline, but could you imagine if we kept it and we somehow land Myles Turner
I don't remember exactly, does the pick have any protections on it? The more that NOP lose, the more valuable the pick becomes for us. I was honestly expecting them to be better this season. I am pleasantly surprised at their 7-8 start
Per RealGm: 2015 first round draft pick from New Orleans: New Orleans' 1st round pick to Houston -protected for selections 1-3 and 20-30 in 2015 -1-3 and 20-30 in 2016 -1-3 and 20-30 in 2017 -1-3 and 20-30 in 2018 -1-3 and 25-30 in 2019 -1-3 and 25-30 in 2020 if New Orleans has not conveyed a 1st round pick to Houston by 2020, then New Orleans will instead convey its 2020 2nd round pick and 2021 2nd round pick to Houston.
Maybe it's just me but I think a late lotto pick is way more valuable to the Rox than other teams. I know the popular opinion is to maximize the "short window" we have with HnH and go-all in, but the fact is going "all-in" pretty much locks you to that window, if you whiff on that you're pretty much screwed. The Spurs could've gone "all in" if they had traded a rookie Tony Parker and other assets for J-Kidd, instead they kept him and Parker basically extended the Spurs window by 5 years, even now when Kidd is retired and TD/Manu are about to hang it up Parker still keeps his team relevant. In the same way, Howard is just 30 and Harden is only 25, if we can get a nice building block with that pick I think we can lean on both Harden and that dude 4 years down the line when Howard is already declining. The bad thing with having a contending team is you always miss out on players with superstar potential, so once your current stars get old you basically have to build from scratch. Having this pick could be our chance to have a really long window of contention if we could get a really good rookie out of it.
Barring an injury to Anthony Davis, the pick will fall between 11-14. The Pelicans would make the playoffs in the East, so all seven non-playoff teams in that conference will be ahead of them in the draft order. There is no way they end up with a worse record than the Lakers, Twolves, or Jazz. That sets the ceiling of our draft pick at 11. OKC should blow past them shortly, but NO has a chance to pass both Denver and Sacramento. I don't think they'll finish better than Phoenix. Likely pick is either 12 or 13. Hard to package that pick for a star, but it should be able to nab us a contributor, either via trade or outright draft.
I wonder if you could flip it to a team in the east, include a mix of Capela, Nick Johnson or Canaan and get an even sexier reverse protected pick.
Hmmmmm, major star player beyond the ilk of Dragon and Anderson. Rubio? Lopez? Joe Johnson? Love? LaMarcus? Big Al? Rondo? Favors? Cousins?
We need to keep the pick. If we have a chance to take anybody coming off the Kentucky team we will be rolling.The Kentucky team alone makes it a deep draft.
Unless the Sixers are giving up their pick in the deal, I think that is a far too risky of proposal. You have no idea which teams are going to turn it on after the second half of the season and might end up with a worse pick than the NOLA pick. And Canaan is a contributor, and Capela looks like he might be in the second half of the season. People harp on moves they think waste another year of H&H's primes. Well removing contributors that can help this year and especially next with the hopes and dreams of gambling for a better trade asset would probably piss those people off even more.
Plowman, just a couple questions for you: Q1: Rank the Rockets trade assets. Would you agree with: 1. Pels pick 2. DMo 3 future first 4-6 Terrence/Canaan/Beverley/Kpaps in some order or another ?????????????????????????????? Q2: Do you think it is possible to trade for Dragic without giving up either one of the Pels pick or DMo?
The odds of landing a Tony Parker type player with a late lotto pick are so slim. The Rockets have had so many picks around that area in recent history and not a one of those players has even made an all star team. The Spurs already had Parker and had a pretty good idea that he was a good player. If they had to choose between a pick and Kidd back then I bet they would have picked Kidd. Howard's window is too small to risk it on a good player being available late on the lotto and the Rockets actually picking that player. Morey is smart enough to not go after a player like Josh Smith so whoever they get it will leave them with flexibility.
I don't think drafting any Kentucky player right now would help our team within the next 3 years. Possibly Towns or a post could help us, but the NO pick won't net us that.
Then get 'er done! If we can get Dragic without giving up either the Pels pick or DMo............dude...........let's go already. ....unless there's something better. Could we possibly get Rubio without giving up either DMo or the Pels pick?
It is a tight race right now between the NOP pick and D-Mo. After that you have Canaan (not much worth there sorry) and then you get into untradables. The Rockets are not going to surrender very good front court players to bring in a guard. Sorry. It should make no sense even to a fan. It would be impossible to trade for Dragic without including BOTH the NOP pick and D-Mo. Rockets fans tend to extremely under value other teams assets. This is not Rocket science.
Not immediately. But in 2016, yes. It comes down to how to best build the team out. I really think Dragic is going to get a max offer from either LA or possibly some other team this summer. That means to keep him you've got to give him a starting salary in the $18-19 million range with raises going up from there. That basically means no shot at Durant or any other max free agent in free agency in 2016 unless the cap goes up extraordinarily high, say up to or above $84 million....and that's also moving Ariza out. By the same token, Rubio will be on the books for $13.4 million in 2016, which is a lot better figure if we want to go after a 4th superstar while keeping Ariza. Also Rubio is around 4-5 years younger than Dragic. Rubio is already a better defender and distributor than Dragic. He's simply not the shooter that Dragic is, especially off the dribble. But in a season or two....that will likely become inconsequential in Rubio's career arc. That's my rationale for Rubio. The flip side is IF we can actually acquire Dragic now without giving up either DMo or the Pels pick...I think that is something we have to do. Because DMo and the Pels pick are appreciating assets. One or both of those assets plus expiring contracts could be flipped for a player like Aldridge (and others) either at the deadline, or possibly in the summer of 2015, etc.
