Houston Rockets: The Return Of Josh Smith

The weirdest team in the NBA, the Houston Rockets, just got a bit weirder by returning Josh Smith to the fold on Friday morning.

According to reports from the esteemed Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports, the Houston Rockets have reacquired Josh Smith from the Los Angeles Clippers for cash and the rights to foreign player Maarty Leunen. The Clippers will cover Smith’s salary for the rest of the season.

Josh Smith played the final 55 games of the regular season and the playoffs for the Rockets last season after being waived via the stretch provision by the Detroit Pistons just 28 games into 2014-15, and was instrumental in a stunning comeback in the third and fourth quarters of Game 6 against the Clippers in the Western Conference semifinals.

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The Clippers signed Smith for the vet minimum in the offseason, but he didn’t spend much time on the floor in Los Angeles this season, playing just 14 minutes per game in 32 appearances.

Smith put up mediocre numbers in Los Angeles, averaging 5.7 points and 3.9 rebounds per game with shooting splits of .383/.310/.595.

The Rockets are known to have poor locker room chemistry, and the addition of Josh Smith is not likely to help with that issue. Particularly on a roster already dealing with effort issues and an inexperienced interim coach at the helm in the form of J.B. Bickerstaff (oh yeah, these guys got their head coach fired 11 games into this season, by the way), this seems like a powder keg ready to blow.

Considering that the Clippers and Rockets may very well meet in the playoffs, it’s telling that the Clippers were willing to make this deal. Clearly getting rid of Smith by any means necessary was the priority, which has been a recent trend for teams that find themselves with him.

This is the second time in 13 months he’s been essentially given away, with the Rockets opting to not re-sign him in the offseason being the third time a team he played for expressed no desire to have him.

It’s going to be interesting to see how Smith is used in Houston. It’s possible that he might be slotted into Clint Capela‘s spot in the starting lineup, and it’s certain that he’ll see more time on the floor than he did in Los Angeles.

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Dwight Howard and Josh Smith have some history together, having played for the same AAU team when they were kids, so their relationship may actually aid chemistry. That said, the rest of the team is absolutely dysfunctional and adding Josh Smith to an equation like that seems like a desperate move that is destined to fail.