Houston Rockets: A potential roadmap for the future

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NBA Houston Rockets Clint Capela (Photo by Bob Levey/Getty Images) /

Personnel upgrade?

Now in terms of personnel, Houston is pretty set in terms of salary but they would have enough room to sign maybe one guy (for around 7-9 million).

A guy like Wesley Matthews or Trevor Ariza would be a valuable pickup, especially given the Rockets’ need for more two-way depth on the wing. This depth on the wing (or lack thereof) had been an issue all year after Ariza and Mbah a Moute departed the summer before and judging by Houston’s 11-14 start to the season, it took them a while to really adjust to those changes.

And then as far as trades are concerned, they have two real assets that they could move away in a deal and that is Eric Gordon and Clint Capela.

Eric Gordon is more valuable to this team than Capela is at the moment, which he proved in the playoffs so I would only deal him if I’m getting a surefire upgrade in return. However, age could also be a factor with Gordon as he’s getting up there into his 30s and with his injury history, it’s hard to know how much longer his body will hold up so maybe now is the best time to trade him since his value is pretty high after an impressive playoff run (especially his showing against the Dubs in round two).

With Clint Capela, I think the Warriors series proved that he may not actually be as essential or valuable to this Houston Rockets team than we may have thought earlier in the year. He did have a career season, averaging around 16.5 points and 12.5 rebounds and was the perfect lob partner for both Paul and Harden but the playoffs this year showed that he may be a little overvalued and may not actually fit with this team’s winning style. They might be better trading him for a “decent to pretty damn good” perimeter player and then finding a couple of serviceable centers to fill the void he would inevitably leave in the middle.

So, although on paper it seems like the Houston Rockets are pretty stuck with what they’ve got, they do have just enough flexibility to make one minor signing and then they have the assets to pull off one or two trades so if they make the right moves, there’s no way they shouldn’t be right back at the top of the West come next year!