There are two ways to see this.
The Rockets have suddenly become the NBA’s worst team. A big-city franchise that spent years devoted to the annual pursuit of international superstars now excels at losing big names. Run it back was run into the ground and the Rockets will spend years paying the price for never being able to beat the Golden State Warriors when it mattered.
Or there’s the other way.
The potential in the uncertainty. The promise that top-to-bottom organizational upheaval can represent. The realization that change, when done the right way, can be a very good thing.
Jim Crane spent years as Houston’s biggest sports villain, as the Astros stacked up 100-loss seasons and became unwatchable. Then winning returned in 2015 and Houston’s Major League Baseball team has made the playoffs five out of six seasons since.
The Rockets won a franchise-record 65 games the season after Tilman Fertitta bought the franchise for $2.2 billion in September 2017 and came a Chris Paul injury away from making (and likely winning) the NBA Finals. But the aging and salary-cap limited Rockets declined the next two seasons and now they can barely win a game. Entering Saturday night’s contest at Denver, the Rockets (15-45) were a surreal 4-35 since Feb. 5 and their draft-lottery odds were the only statistic worth remembering.
“You’ve got to understand, Daryl (Morey) did everything he could to win a championship in those four or five years and it just kind of takes the air out of a franchise because you gave up everything,” Fertitta said Saturday. “Everybody knew that the run was over. … It happened to Boston, it happened to (Los Angeles), it happened to Dallas, it happened to Miami. This is what happens.”
This season wasn’t supposed to become this broken, though, and finishing with the worst record in the NBA won’t guarantee that the Rockets end up with the league’s No. 1 overall pick for the July 29 draft.
The devotion and faith of Rockets fans have been tested. So has the patience of Fertitta, who normally has more in common with a bull than a china shop in his billionaire business world.
“It’s really, really hard because I am competitive and I hate to lose,” Fertitta said. “But my people, including Tad (Brown) and (Rafael Stone) and even my son Patrick, just (say) the biggest mistake you can make right now is use all these picks to be a .500 club, because you’re never able to be a championship caliber club. But I hate losing so much I’m totally staying out of it, because I’m scared that I can make the wrong decisions. I want to win today. I just have to (stay out of it) because they’re right and they just gave me examples and examples.”
This week, Brown, the Rockets’ longtime CEO, joined Mike D’Antoni, Russell Westbrook, James Harden and Morey as recent ex-Rockets. All five have departed the organization since last September. Throw in the midseason departures of P.J. Tucker, Victor Oladipo and DeMarcus Cousins, and a long-delayed rebuild (or restructure) is finally underway inside Toyota Center.
An uneven and disappointing 2020-21 campaign characterized by constant change — D’Antoni, Morey and Brown leaving; Westbrook and Harden demanding trades; a 20-game losing streak; numbing injuries and games when the Rockets barely reached the NBA’s eight-player minimum — only feels like the beginning of all the changes to follow.
The Rockets have pieces to build around with Christian Wood, Kevin Porter Jr., Jae’Sean Tate and Kenyon Martin Jr. Stone and his front-office staff were also smart to move on from Tucker and Oladipo, who were out of place on a team with a .250 winning percentage. (The franchise-worst 2013 Astros, who went 51-111, still won 31.5 percent of their games.)
“You’ve got to remember on Kevin Porter, he’s 20 years old,” Fertitta said. “None of your superstars are great at 20. Go back and look at James Harden at 20.”
But does Porter have the right support system around him — veteran teammates, coaches, etc. — to keep him focused on improving nightly on the hardwood? There are several reasons the Rockets acquired him for the NBA equivalent of nothing and now he is being kept off the court because of another off-the-court misstep. Late April blowouts don’t matter for the 2020-21 Rockets, but the competition is essential for Porter’s hardwood evolution.
How long will it take for the remade Rockets to find another legitimate superstar who can carry and inspire the team to the top of the Western Conference?
Is there a way to package some of the future draft picks and acquire a rising name that can complement Porter? The Rockets didn’t draft Harden in 2009. They traded for him three years later in a franchise-altering blockbuster.
How will Stone handle the futures of pricey veterans Eric Gordon and John Wall? The latter has spent this season posting career-lows in field-goal percentage, assists and rebounds and has made the Rockets-era Harden look like the most efficient player in NBA history.
Wall is set to make $44.3 million next season and holds a player option for $47.3 million in 2022-23. He should be traded this offseason or eventually bought out, if the Rockets are going to do this tear down right.
The Rockets will never replace “Run it Back” with “We’re Rebuilding!” But Fertitta was honest and direct when discussing what his much-changed team faces in the years to come.
“Are we going to be a championship team next year? No, we are not, OK? And I don’t even know that we’ll challenge for the playoffs next year,” Fertitta said. “This is what they’re telling me. We can’t be stupid … and sometimes you’ve got to bide your time.”
Phoenix was horrible for years and there were questions across the league whether the Suns would ever get it right again. Devin Booker is now an All-Star example of how to expertly use a No. 13 overall draft pick. Combining coach Monty Williams with Paul, an ex-Rocket, has worked wonders for the rebuilt Suns, who entered Saturday with the second-best record in The Association and have suddenly become a legit Finals contender.
Utah made it work with the draft, trades and free agency after struggling for years to find a way back to the top of the West.
Philadelphia, Brooklyn and both of Los Angeles’ NBA teams were really bad not that long ago.
The Rockets will win big again. When and how are the pressing questions.
It’s time to intentionally go backward for the first time in a long time. And the change of direction must be done the right way.
“You have to be patient and you have to make good decisions,” Fertitta said. “You just have to make good decisions.”
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