The Houston Rocket's Roster...
"(E'twaun) Moore and (Sean) Williams -- playing on nonguaranteed contracts -- are expected to be waived by the Rockets" - http://espn.go.com/boston/nba/story/_/id/8184923/boston-celtics-acquire-...
Aldemir won't be signing with the Rockets this year, he's a draft and stash guy. Donatas Motiejunas is 7 feet tall and weighs 222lbs, he'll be spending most of his time at center which should help the forward conundrum a tiny bit. The Rockets will likely add Omer Asik since the Bulls can't afford the poison pill offer sheet he signed.
So if you subtract the three guys who won't be with the Rockets this year its 18 players. Add Asik that makes 19. So a few forward and center guys should be looking for a new opportunity cause they likely won't make the team : my guess Jon Brockman, Diamon Simpson, Greg Smith...but we'll have to wait and see.
If the Rockets are really dying to make the Dwight Howard trade so they can give up assets to rent him, then they should be careful what they give up. If I'm Darryl Morey I'm not dealing Donatas Motiejunas for sure, but I don't know who else they would want from the rookies assuming they'd be taking back Kevin Martin. They drafted two power forwards in Andrew Nicholson and Kyle O'Quinn and Big Baby is still on the roster. They may want Lamb too just because he's talented but trading your number one and number two shooting guard could hurt. I'm not a huge Rockets fan by any sense, but I don't trade potentially talented guys and draft picks to take on bad contracts and rent a player for a year.
JLin is definitely not part of any trade. Besides Orlando wants cheap contracts and picks so they can star over. They will not take back KMartin unless they need it to make salaries work. But since Houston has so much cap room I don't think they will need it.
I think Orlando would want the rookies from this year's draft included in any trade.
I don't think the trade gets done. I'm thinking the Rockets are liking what they already have, if Howard said he would resign that would be different but I think the Rockets are starting to understand what they have a realize there is not a quick fix available right now
The Rockets really should cut some big men if possible or trade them away for future second rounders. They could do without Brockman, Harrelson, Williams, Johnson, Simpson, and Smith. They could have Parsons and Jones at the 3, Patterson, White and Morris at the 4 and Motai and possibly Asik at the 5. If they don't get Asik maybe keep Harrelson. They also have no use for Livingston or Fortson.. These should be fairly easy players to get rid of since they're so cheap, and they could never have enough minutes for all of them.
I agree they should build around what they have rather than trading for a star, but they need to make small trades to give playing time to their young bigs in order to get better in the future.
regardless if they make the D12 trade or not... it's going to be alot of long faces in Houston when it's time to make cuts. Brockman, Fortson, Harrellson, Forbes, Moore, Simpson and Smith might as well hang it up. Livingston and Sean Williams shouldn't feel to safe either.
0 Furkan Aldemir PF 20 6-9 230
0 Jon Brockman F 25 6-7 255 Washington $1,000,000
0 Toney Douglas PG 26 6-2 185 Florida State $2,067,880
0 Gary Forbes F 27 6-7 220 Massachusetts $1,500,000
9 Courtney Fortson PG 24 5-11 185 Arkansas $762,195
0 Josh Harrellson F 23 6-10 275 Kentucky $762,195
0 JaJuan Johnson F 23 6-10 221 Purdue $1,089,240
0 Terrence Jones PF 20 6-9 252 Kentucky $1,485,000
0 Jeremy Lamb SG 20 6-5 185 Connecticut
7 Jeremy Lin PG 23 6-3 200 Harvard $762,195
0 Shaun Livingston PG 26 6-7 175 $3,500,000
12 Kevin Martin SG 29 6-7 185 Western Carolina $12,439,675
0 E'Twaun Moore G 23 6-4 191 Purdue $762,195
2 Marcus Morris F 22 6-9 235 Kansas $1,905,360
20 Donatas Motiejunas F 21 7-0 222 $1,361,400
25 Chandler Parsons F 23 6-9 227 Florida $888,250
54 Patrick Patterson PF 23 6-9 235 Kentucky $2,096,760
26 Diamon Simpson F 24 6-7 230 Saint Mary's $762,195
0 Greg Smith C 21 6-10 250 Fresno State $762,195
0 Royce White PF 21 6-8 270 Iowa State
0 Sean Williams PF 25 6-10 235 Boston College $915,852
So if I'm counting, thats...
4 Point Guards,
1 Combo Guard,
2 Shooting Guards,
EIGHT Combo Forwards,
5 Power Forwards,
One Center,
21 Total players.
The Rockets had better get this Dwight trade done or it's going to be an interesting season in Houston...