Houston Rockets: 10 Reasons It Isn't Time To Blow It Up and Rebuild
Entering the season, the Rockets were picked by many experts as dark horses to be the one team in the Western Conference to challenge the Lakers in the Conference Finals. These analysts cited a healthy Yao Ming, an improving Aaron Brooks, and Kevin Martin's playing his first full season as a Rocket as reasons why the Rockets could move from lottery to contender.
Through 21 games, the Rockets can only be characterized as a disappointment. Sitting at 8-13, the Rockets have failed to defend, to close out games and to stay healthy against some strong opponents early on in the season.
With this disappointing start, many are calling for the Rockets to rebuild, proposing that they trade Luis Scola, Shane Battier and even Yao Ming. While times are tough in Rocketsland, these recommendations are premature.
The Rockets are clearly not championship contenders, but they are too good to rebuild. All it takes is one trade for a star player and the Rockets could be almost as good as anybody in the Western Conference.
Here are 10 reasons why they should wait before jumping the gun on a rebuilding effort.
10. Huge Expiring Contracts
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The teams in the most dire straits often find themselves in such a horrible position because of a lack of talent and a lack of financial restraint. Because of poor decisions that hamstring their cap position moving forward, teams get stuck with who they have and are unable to upgrade their talent.
For instance, the Cavaliers overextended themselves financially last year, hoping to build a team around LeBron James that would keep him happy. However, in doing so, they brought in Antawn Jamison who left them with an obscene three years left on his contract at the time, which translates to nearly two years and $28 million remaining on that deal. Given that the talent-starved Cavaliers cannot even fit him into their starting lineup, it's obvious that it will be difficult to move the once-impressive forward to another team.
While the Rockets are struggling just like the Cavaliers are, they do not have the same problem to face with regards to bad contracts. In fact, with three contracts expiring in excess of $7 million this offseason (including Yao Ming's monster $18 million expiring deal), the Rockets appear to be in nearly ideal cap position heading into a potential new collective bargaining agreement.
For this reason, there is absolutely no urgency to rebuild by purging bad contracts right now. If the Rockets continue to struggle, they will have the flexibility to rebuild via free agency at the end of the year. For the first time in years, the Rockets will be in a position to make a real splash in free agency. With gobs of cap space, a talented core of Aaron Brooks, Kevin Martin and Luis Scola, and a tremendous front office, the team has a pretty solid pitch it could give to any potential free agent.
If they instead chose to rebuild, they would almost certainly throw out any possibility of landing a marquee free agent.
9. Premium Draft Position in Future Years
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Another way teams can paint themselves into corners is the trading of future draft picks. Often, for an immediate gain, teams will mortgage their future by trading away draft picks, often leading to disastrous circumstances.
The Knicks were notorious for this in the Isiah Thomas era, and gifted the Rockets with the option to swap picks in 2011, and their first rounder in 2012 (and Jordan Hill) solely for the burden of taking on Jared Jeffries' contract even after Thomas left the Knicks.
While a rebuilding effort usually involves an effort to acquire draft picks to replenish the young talent reserves, the Rockets already have one of the league's best draft positions over the next two years and will improve without the need for any trades.
With the Knicks appearing to be off to a great start, Rockets fans have been concerned that the team will not even get to take advantage of swapping picks with the Knicks; however, this concern is not merited. While the Knicks are 13-9, they have played by far the easiest schedule in the league, and have only had two impressive wins on the season, against the Hornets.
Raymond Felton is off to the best start of his career, but a great deal of his upped scoring can be attributed to a hot stretch from mid-range, as he has hit on 49 percent of shots from that distance versus his career average of 37 percent (according to hoopdata.com). Is it possible for a player to improve his shooting? Yes, but any major improvement like this has to be taken with a grain of salt.
If the Knicks do in fact cool off over the next two years, the Rockets could be in possession of two lottery picks over the next two seasons, crucial picks so they can acquire cheap, young talent.
8. Brutal Early Schedule
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Up to this point in the season, the Rockets have played one of the hardest schedules in the league. After a brutal stretch early on in the season, the Rockets have played the seventh hardest schedule in the league, playing a difficult .526 opponent record up to this point. Additionally, they have played 12 games on the road compared to nine at home, and they appear to be improving as the schedule eases up.
Great teams are able to beat difficult opponents, but the Rockets have failed to get off to a good start because of that schedule. After a heartbreaking loss to the Lakers on opening night, the Rockets got into a terrible funk that they were not able to get out of for weeks.
Had they had an easier start to the year, perhaps they would've gotten off to a better start and would not be in the position they are right now.
While debating the merits that sending the Rockets on a West Coast back-to-back to start the year is wasted energy, the Rockets undoubtedly are not as bad as their record may indicate because of this brutal schedule.
7. Fluke Injuries
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While the Rockets have had horrible luck when it comes to injuries over the last decade, this year has seemed to be particularly unlucky for injuries. Perennial suit-wearers Kevin Martin and Yao Ming have been injured throughout the year, but the normally durable Aaron Brooks and others have been struck by a deadly injury bug that has swept the team.
Just 21 games into the regular season, Brad Miller, Chase Budinger (twice), Kyle Lowry, Aaron Brooks, Kevin Martin, Chuck Hayes, Jordan Hill and Yao Ming have been limited by ankle sprains.
Losing Aaron Brooks for four-to-six weeks after Manu Ginobili stepped in front of him on a half-court heave was the straw that broke the camel's back for many Rockets fans.
Whether there is something the Rockets can do or not to improve the taping of the ankles or not, the Rockets will surely improve as the team finally gets healthy.
It all starts with Yao Ming. If he can come back healthy and play well inside, the entire Rockets offense will be revitalized. The guards will feast off of the open shots, and the entire team will work in harmony.
The Rockets cannot bank on Yao staying healthy, but they can certainly count on better luck with other players.
6. Large Contracts in Productive Players
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Big contracts can often hamper a team from rebuilding as they are unmovable at times. Gilbert Arenas and the aforementioned Antawn Jamison are holding their teams back from continuing to rebuild because of their monster contracts.
However, for the Rockets, the only large contracts they have are put into extremely productive players Kevin Martin and Luis Scola.
Signed to a large five-year contract this offseason that was largely criticized because he is 30 years old—
and that is typically an age where undersized power forwards begin to decline—Luis Scola has averaged over 20 points and nine rebounds on the year, silencing many doubts about his contract.
Kevin Martin, signed to a deal that pays him over $10 million a year, comes in at second in the league in scoring per minute and has done it at an extremely efficient rate.
While both are defensive flakes, if the team goes downhill and needs to rebuild, they will have no problem moving those big contracts and freeing up even more cap space moving forward.
5. Improving Defense As of Recently
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While the Rockets struggled to stop anybody—failing to hold any team under 100 points until the sixth game of the season—the defense has looked significantly better as of late.
With youngsters Courtney Lee and Jordan Hill playing tremendous defense recently, the Rockets played much improved defense in the last few weeks.
The pinnacle of this improvement was a game against the Lakers on December 1st, where Jordan Hill locked down Pau Gasol for the 28 minutes he was on the court and held him to eight points while Shane Battier stopped Kobe Bryant for crucial possession after crucial displacement as the Rockets won a crucial game on their home court.
Every great team has a stellar defense, and early on the performances simply were not cutting it for any team hoping to move on to more than just mediocrity. The Rockets have demonstrated an ability to pair their impressive offense with at least an average defense, and that must give the Rockets hope for the future.
4. Weak Western Conference
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Had the Rockets started the season 8-13 last year, they would have been miles out of the playoff picture just a quarter of the way into the season. However, this year, the Rockets find themselves merely 2.5 games out of the eighth seed in the playoffs because of a significantly weaker Western Conference.
With Phoenix losing Amar'e Stoudemire and replacing him with disappointment Hedo Turkoglu, Portland losing Greg Oden for the year once again as much of their supporting cast grows older, Oklahoma City failing to take full advantage of a tremendous cap position this offseason, the Western Conference is significantly weaker than it was expected to be this year.
While the Western Conference took 50 wins to make the playoffs last year, the eighth-seeded team will likely need just a few games over .500 to make the playoffs.
For this reason, the Rockets should not rebuild unless they are truly terrible come February. A deep playoff run can absolutely revitalize a team and the Rockets would be giving up a prime opportunity to take advantage of a rough year in the Western Conference and make the playoffs if they choose to rebuild. For a fan base that was disgusted with the missing of the playoffs last year, it would be difficult to bear.
3. Ridiculously Close Calls Early in The Season
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Sitting at 8-13, the Rockets find themselves five games under .500 and well off their early season goal. Still, they can take solace in the fact that they were a free throw away from winning two games this year which would've brought their record to 10-11 had they been able to close out those games.
Some would point to these late free throw meltdowns against Spurs and Bulls as examples of the Rockets' failure to close out games. However, those were games in which the Rockets came back to take late leads only to lose them in the final minute on fall away contested threes by opponents.
While great teams have shooters who can knock down late-game shots, to be snake-bitten twice in twenty games is almost laughable. While they clearly would not have been in that situation had they knocked down their free throws, they defended those shots as well as could be possible.
Great teams do not allow late leads to go away like that, but the team the Rockets put out without Aaron Brooks and others (Kevin Martin went out against the Spurs and Yao missed the game against the Bulls) is simply not a great team at this point. With healthy players and improvement from the young players like Jordan Hill, the Rockets have the potential to be a very good team.
A great team? Perhaps not, but with just a few changes they could be there quickly.
2. Lack Of Sample Size and Growing Team Chemistry
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One of the great knocks on the Rockets before the season was that the team, as constituted, had never played before. Experts were unsure of how all the pieces would fit together and whether the offense would be able to work in harmony.
Through 21 games, the Rockets are still working to build team chemistry, as injuries have precluded them from executing many of their preseason plans. With Kevin Martin playing alongside Kyle Lowry and Chuck Hayes instead of Aaron Brooks and Yao Ming, the Rockets have been unable to utilize a dominant inside-outside offense that pushes the ball into Yao and surrounds him with shooters.
Just as the loaded Heat squad faced growing pains as they learned how each other played, the Rockets have been experiencing some of these same problems. They have encountered times when the offense completely stalls, have had similar stretches on defense and struggled immensely closing out games to start out the season.
Just as the Heat rebounded to a stellar stretch of basketball, the Rockets appear poised for a winning streak. With weak teams and players coming back from injury, the Rockets will be able to their lost identity and build the team chemistry that they had been missing before they started playing better as of late.
All Rockets fans should hope that they begin working like a well-oiled machine because this team could be very good quickly if they do.
1. The Talent Is There
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While a slow start has caused basketball analysts quick to label the Rockets as lacking in talent, they simply are not. The fact is, the Rockets have enough talent that if they add one piece, they could instantly become contenders. A team that is one piece away should not be tearing down and rebuilding.
With two young point guards capable of starting for many teams in the league, an incandescent scorer in Kevin Martin, an up-and-coming athletic swingman stuck in a slump in Chase Budinger, and rising big man prospects Jordan Hill and Patrick Patterson, the Rockets have a stellar base of talent 27 years old or younger.
Solidified by a veteran supporting cast of Yao Ming, Brad Miller, Shane Battier, and Chuck Hayes, the Rockets are clearly a very talented team.
The only problem is that the Rockets do not have that one prospect that they can pin their hopes on to carry them to a championship. Jordan Hill and Chase Budinger appear to be becoming great rotation players that could play on a championship team, Kyle Lowry looks like a championship point guard especially now that he is making the outside shot, and Patrick Patterson showed huge potential in the Summer League, but these players are not the stars of a championship team.
That will have to come from outside. Whether it is the draft or a trade using the Rockets' huge assets, the Rockets have put themselves in prime position to find that next star that can unify this tremendously talented team and carry them away from mediocrity.
Are the Rockets as bad as their record states? No, but it is becoming evident that they might not be as good as they had hoped in the preseason. Still, the team is far too talented and in far too good a position financially and draft-wise to start a rebuilding effort.
