The Western Conference Finals are depressing.
Some Rockets fans are watching them for keys to the future. What do they have that we don’t?
What if the answer is “just about everything”?
Beyond Rockets fans, NBA observers love to watch the Finals in search of the new “meta”. Slow bigs are out. No, wait, they’re fine, but small guards are out. No, wait!
Well, Jalen Brunson, much to Becky Hammond’s chagrin, is heading to the NBA Finals. Isaiah Hartenstein is as traditional a big man as one can be.
The truth
is much simpler, and much bleaker. As the NBA optimizes, it veers towards the singularity. You need a top-10 player. You need depth at every position. You need it all.
Someone let Rafael Stone and/or Ime Udoka know that you also need multiple ball handlers.
Rockets must add backcourt depth this summer
Although they surely know that. Needing something is different from getting it.
The available free agents seem either undesirable or unattainable. The Rockets should have the taxpayer’s Mid-Level Exception (MLE)…I think?
That shouldn’t be enough for Anfernee Simons, Coby White, or maybe even Quentin Grimes. It’d likely fetch you Gabe Vincent or Bogdan Bogdanovic, but it’s hard to say if either cracks the 2026-27 rotation. There isn’t really a free agent guard who finds that sweet spot between good enough to play and too good to pay.
That said, the trade market is a bit easier to navigate.
Let’s assume, for argument’s sake, that Rafael Stone isn’t looking to blow up the team or fork over his best assets. He’s looking at marginal gains. If that assumption holds, he’s probably looking at trading Dorian Finney-Smith and/or Clint Capela, along with second-round draft capital, for a meaningful reserve guard.
That could create its own issues. The Rockets may be hoping Finney-Smith can regain some form and bolster their wing depth. Fair. Surely, they see that Capela wasn’t a feasible rotation option in the playoffs, so at least trading him should be on the table.
The trade market is different from the free agent market. We don’t know who’s on the trade market. We do have educated guesses. Continuing to operate on the assumption that Stone isn’t willing to move a first-round pick, the list of reasonable candidates is somewhat slim.
If he’s willing to move Finney-Smith, Malik Monk has become a popular target. He can create his own shot and make plays for teammates. This is the type of lead guard the team needs, even if his defensive effort will infuriate Udoka on a routine basis.
The Hornets fell out of love with Tre Mann this year. I won’t pretend to have watched enough Hornets games to understand why, but I do know that Mann can play. He can handle the ball and shoot off the dribble. Reviews of Mann’s defense have been mixed, but there seems to be an understanding that he plays hard, which might be enough under Udoka’s tutelage.
Here’s one more name: Jaden Hardy. He scored 12.3 points per game while shooting 42.0% from deep during his 23 games with the Wizards. Sure, he dished out a comically low 1.3 assists per game, but the Rockets need a guard who can generate offense by hook or by crook.
Jordan Hawkins? D’Angelo Russell? Marcus Sasser? These are all guys in Capela’s salary range who would be upgrades over Aaron Holiday. That’s the (limited) criteria here. One thing is clear: The Rockets need a guard.
As it stands, the Rockets have a third-year (and functionally, a sophomore) guard in Reed Sheppard, Fred VanVleet coming off a potentially career-altering injury, Amen Thompson (who is a guard in the same sense that the shadows in Plato’s cave were representations of reality), and Holiday. That will not suffice:
The Western Conference Finals gave you proof.
