Houston Rockets: Ongoing struggles highlight the effects of missing a Championship Window

The Houston Rockets’ ongoing struggles this season highlight the effects of a team missing its window for success

You can list a countless amount of teams in NBA history who missed their window for success and couldn’t win the NBA Finals. And now the modern-day Houston Rockets are one of those teams.

Last season, the Rockets finished with the best record in the NBA (65-17). Their ability to do so was ignited by the acquisition of perennial All-Star point guard Chris Paul and the defensive-savvy additions of P.J. Tucker and Luc Mbah a Moute. Collectively, this was a team who couldn’t be stopped on the offensive end.

Paul and James Harden clicked from the get-go, quickly forming the best backcourt in the NBA and complementing each other’s skill sets nicely. Clint Capela was a potent force on the defensive end, and the Rockets got contributions from Eric Gordon, Trevor Ariza, and Gerald Green out on the perimeter.

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The biggest question throughout the regular season with head coach Mike D’Antoni and the Rockets was whether they would be able to dethrone the Golden State Warriors in the playoffs; the two teams just so happened to meet up in what became a storyline-brewing Western Conference Finals series.

With home-court advantage on their side, the Rockets split Games 1 and 2 in the Toyota Center and were demolished by the Warriors in Game 3, 126-85. But they bounced back to win the ensuing two games to take a 3-2 lead, putting the Warriors on the brink of elimination. Concurrently, they suffered a devastating blow in Game 5 when Paul injured his hamstring in the fourth quarter – which forced him to miss the rest of the series.

The Rockets would go on to lose Games 6 and 7, resulting in the Warriors reaching the NBA Finals for a fourth consecutive season. Now, if Paul were healthy, would the Rockets have finished the series in Game 6, or won one of the next two games? There’s a legitimate argument in support of that notion, but the Rockets still had a double-digit lead in both games at halftime and proceeded to lose by double-digits.

Despite their playoff collapse, there was optimism from the Rockets going into this season that they would rebound and get back to playing at a high level; currently 11-14, they’ve been unable to build off their 65-win season. Now, are the Rockets’ struggles partially due to the free agent departures of Ariza and Mbah a Moute? Absolutely, they were each perimeter shooting threats, and, more importantly, two of the Rockets best defenders.

One would argue the Rockets are now one of the worst perimeter defending units in the NBA. In fact, it’s a vital reason why they consider Tucker untouchable in trade talks. It also stems from a lack of depth which starts with general manager Daryl Morey committing a combined $478 million to his three best players (Harden, Paul, Capela).

This offseason, the Rockets prioritized keeping Paul and Capela and understandably so. Paul is still one of the best floor generals and players in the NBA, and Capela has established himself as one of the best centers in the NBA. But, in doing so, Morey has made it virtually impossible to truly improve the Rockets. They had to let Ariza and Mbah a Moute walk because they couldn’t afford them and are now struggling to make trades to improve themselves because they have little to offer.

The Rockets took a flier on Carmelo Anthony this offseason. The thinking was he’d serve as their third, or fourth, scoring option, or simply carry the scoring load in the second unit, but it didn’t work out. While he flashed an ability to contribute on a consistent basis, the Rockets felt a world without Anthony was better than one with him, opting to waive him. Well, it appears Anthony wasn’t the problem after all.

The Rockets are now the 14th seed in the Western Conference, which is astonishing to think about. They went from having the best record in the NBA to having the second worst record in their conference. The Rockets once unstoppable offense has become one of the most anemic in the association. Going into Monday night, they were 21st in points per game (108.3), 23rd in field goal percentage (44.7), and 24th in 3-point shooting percentage (33.7).

So, realistically, what’s the best-case scenario for the Rockets this season? Yes, as the 14th seed they’re only six games behind the Warriors for the one seed in the West – which sums up how deep the conference is this season. The Rockets can still turn things around, get back in the playoff mix, and return to being the dynamic offense the NBA once feared, but to what extent, and how many teams are they definitively better than?

The Warriors are still the team to beat and have the best starting five in the NBA; the Oklahoma City Thunder have recovered from a slow start and are now cruising through the beginning stages of the season; the Denver Nuggets are on a roll, have turned the corner as a franchise, and look like a legitimate conference threat; LeBron James and the new-look Los Angeles Lakers are beginning to figure things out.

The Memphis Grizzlies and Portland Trail Blazers are playing competitive basketball and have cores which have been in place for multiple years. Meanwhile, the Rockets core has been together for only a couple of seasons. Heck, the Los Angeles Clippers have been one of the most captivating storylines of the season, as they’re out to a 17-9 start. Can the Rockets truly beat three of those teams in a seven-game series?

If and when the Rockets either miss the playoffs, or, most likely, lose in the first or second-round, what’s next for their franchise? They’re committed to the trio of Harden, Paul, and Capela for, at least, the next three seasons, have little to no money to spend in free agency, and are one of the oldest teams in the NBA.

At this stage of his career, Harden isn’t getting any better. He’s one of, if not the best scorer in the NBA and a continued finalist for the Most Valuable Player of the Year Award, but a below-average defender. Paul is still an elite point guard, but he’s 33 and has a track record of getting hurt in the playoffs. And if the Rockets don’t have depth, they’ll always be one injury away from their offense becoming futile.

If the Rockets knocked off the Warriors in the Western Conference Finals last season, there wouldn’t be any concrete concern about the well-being of their roster; their slow start would be viewed as a hangover. Plus, winning back-to-back titles is a daunting challenge within itself to begin with. Instead, the Rockets’ inability to win one of their last two games last season has them in a predicament where their window for success has closed.

Since the moment the Rockets acquired Harden before the 2012-13 season, they’ve added win-now players, not young players on the rise. They’ve had opportunities to do damage in the postseason with those players – and teams – and have been unable to finish every time. In the 2014-15 season, they reached the Conference Finals with Harden and Dwight Howard, but lost to the Warriors in five games.

Two years later, they couldn’t beat an aging San Antonio Spurs team in the semifinals who played without Kawhi Leonard in what became a closeout Game 6 win that featured the Rockets losing by 39 on their home floor. Last season, Paul suffered an injury at the worst possible time, but the Rockets couldn’t finish off their double-digit halftime leads in the final two games of the series.

Two years from now, the Warriors’ dynasty could be over; Kevin Durant and/or Klay Thompson could head elsewhere in free agency. Heck, Steve Kerr could resign as head coach if the Warriors win the NBA Finals this season. But, for the Rockets, it won’t matter. The bulk of the West is young and improving, and the Rockets are heavily reliant on stars in their prime, or near the back nine with a thin bench.

The Houston Rockets had multiple chances to represent the Western Conference in the NBA Finals this decade, and the effects of being unable to do as such hurt and yearn regret on their end. The Rockets are showcasing what happens when you fail to capitalize on your window for success; the rest of the conference catches up to you.