Houston Rockets: Will the small-ball experiment continue next year?

The Houston Rockets went all-in on small-ball this season, shipping out or demoting everybody over the height of 6’7″. Will this return next season?

The Houston Rockets took an all-out approach to a tactic that had previously only been used sparingly. While small-ball isn’t new, the way the Rockets implemented it was nothing shy of revolutionary. As of the trade deadline when they shipped out traditional center Clint Capela and brought back Robert Covington in exchange, small-ball became their Plans A, B and C.

Historically, teams have used small-ball lineups for short stints. It would enable them to put lineups on the floor that could provide instant offense, often with four or five dangerous shooters and an undersized center who could either shoot or playmake.

Ideally, teams would only utilize this configuration for short stints because of the extra wear and tear from playing against bigger and stronger opponents. However, the Rockets don’t have a gear to switch to that doesn’t involve a small lineup, and results have been mixed as a consequence.

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In the 13 games since the trade, the Rockets have gone 7-6. Their offensive rating of 112.3 sits outside the top 10, checking in at 12th in the league. Their net rating is an unimpressive +0.8, and their chief rivals, the Los Angeles Lakers and LA Clippers, are sure to outrebound, outstrength and outsize them in any playoff matchup.

The Rockets have the worst rebounding percentage in that stretch, and when either P.J. Tucker or Russell Westbrook are off the floor they’re an absolute disaster defensively and on the glass.

All the while, Isaiah Hartenstein toiled for the Rio Grande Vipers, the Rockets’ G-League affiliate, putting up sensational numbers. He averaged 24.9 points and 14.7 rebounds in 32.6 minutes per game, appearing in 14 contests.

Perhaps the Rockets need this small configuration in order to truly unleash Russell Westbrook, and he has indeed been unleashed. The Rockets have a +3.1 net rating when he’s on the floor, and they’re 6-4 in his games. But it hasn’t made enough of a difference in spite of his torrid stretch leading up to the NBA’s coronavirus-induced hiatus.

Next season Westbrook will be another year older at the age of 32, and a few percentage points will come off the top end of what he can provide. The Houston Rockets aren’t a young team, and the physical battering opponents can put on them if they play all small all the time will have a massive cumulative impact as even just in the 13 games leading up to the break it was clear this style exhausted them.

It’s clear at this point that the Rockets have a very brief window in which to conduct this experiment. Next season could be a whole different world for a lot of different reasons. Mike D’Antoni is a lame-duck coach (in spite of owner Tilman Fertitta’s insistence that he doesn’t even know what that means), and it’s highly unlikely that a replacement coach would consider this to be a viable course of action.

As Hartenstein continues to dominate the G-League, pressure in the organization should build to get him back up to the big leagues rather than squandering his performance in obscurity for the sake of clinging to an idealistic approach.

Once this NBA season concludes, this experiment should conclude as well. It was interesting and while perhaps not worth the investment the Rockets made, at least somebody gave it a shot. Now we know that the fatigue and wear and tear is simply too much, and the Rockets can move on to the next big idea.