With the Houston Rockets’ Ty Lawson experiment likely drawing to an ignominious end, there are trade whispers in the air from teams needing a point guard.
It comes as no surprise to anybody who follows the Houston Rockets, but the Ty Lawson experiment hasn’t gone well. The Rockets are 7-11, the offense is underwhelming and the defense is horrendous. According to the outstanding NBA Wowy, the Rockets net rating (which is points scored versus points surrendered per 100 possessions) is 7.7 points better with Lawson off the court.
Needless to say, this early season endeavor has been a tremendous failure and doesn’t look to get any better.
Fortunately, front office savvy may have enabled the Rockets a way to get out of this without too much damage.
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The Rockets acquired Lawson for essentially spare parts in the first place. Nobody that the Rockets traded to the Denver Nuggets for Lawson in the first place is currently on an NBA roster, and the only lasting sacrifices from the deal may be a lottery-protected 2016 first round draft pick and a 2017 second-round pick.
One of the main perks with Lawson is that his 2016-17 salary, valued at $13.21 million, is fully non-guaranteed.
One more tidbit: Sources say Lawson has agreed as condition of trade to make the final year of his contract -- 2016-17 -- non-guaranteed.
— Zach Lowe (@ZachLowe_NBA) July 20, 2015
That means that the Rockets (or whoever has his rights) can cut ties with Lawson at the end of the season and owe none of that salary. This could make Lawson an enticing buy-low and high-upside acquisition for teams in need of a ball-dominant point guard.
There have been rumors that the Rockets may be willing to shop Lawson, which makes sense. At this point getting anything in return for Lawson at all, and not having to eat the entirety of the $12.4 million of his contract for this season, has to have some serious allure for the Rockets and general manager Daryl Morey.
According to Steve Kyler of BasketballInsiders.com, the Rockets may have been keeping an eye open for deals for the point guard.
As Kyler writes:
"The Rockets have been sniffing around the league for deals and there is a belief among other teams that Lawson could be had in trade, and had cheaply. Lawson is owed $12.4 million this season with the final $13.21 million of his deal being fully non-guaranteed.As the Rockets search for ways to change, there is a belief that Lawson could be the first Rocket player moved. But given how poorly Lawson has played in Houston and his troublesome off-the-court history, it’s hard to imagine that Lawson alone is going to yield much in return. But as teams start to get desperate, Lawson does have a career assist average of more than 6.5 assists per game and averaged 9.6 per game last season for the Nuggets. Lawson’s salary could return an asset or two and given the rut the Rockets find themselves in, they seem to be a bit more motivated to deal than normal."
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In a normal season, Lawson’s effectively expiring contract would be considered an asset in and of itself, with teams looking to take on salary that would come off the books the following offseason, but the NBA’s salary cap is set to explode next year and the year after. That diminishes the value of his contract to some degree, because everybody is going to have cap space.
It’s easy to forget with this terrible start to the season that Lawson came to Houston off a career high in assists a year ago, at the aforementioned 9.6 per game. His play this year has been poor, but he’s also been asked to play a role he’s thoroughly unfamiliar with. He’s a ball-dominant guard by trade, and playing alongside James Harden simply doesn’t allow for that.
A better fit might be exactly the cure for what ails him. There are teams in need of a player of Lawson’s breed, and he could probably had for fairly cheap.
The Utah Jazz don’t really have a point guard, and while he isn’t known for the kind of defense that they play, an NBA-quality guy (regardless of the disaster with the Rockets, he’s almost certainly still an NBA-level player) at the point might be a jumpstart that they need.
While there don’t seem to be indications that the Milwaukee Bucks are weary of Michael Carter-Williams, he hasn’t been good this season. MCW is averaging 10 points, 3.5 rebounds and 4.9 assists per game, and shooting 42.9 percent from the floor. Lawson could provide the Bucks with a needed offensive boost.
With all of that said, it’s hard to tell just how serious these rumors are at this point, in spite of the fact that there might be some reasonable fits out there.
Kyler himself distanced himself from the rumors on Wednesday, tweeting the following:
Despite a sense from others that Ty Lawson could be had from the Rockets - sources close to situation say Rockets not looking at deals.
— Steve Kyler (@stevekylerNBA) December 2, 2015
While these discussions may simply be back-room discussions at the moment, knowing Daryl Morey, if the right move comes along the Rockets will be quick to jump at it.
As demonstrated by firing former head coach Kevin McHale 11 games into this season after a 4-7 start, Morey isn’t afraid of a big move, and the Rockets have a precedent of making big mid-season moves.
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Last December, the Rockets acquired Corey Brewer from the Minnesota Timberwolves, and signed Josh Smith after he was waived by the Detroit Pistons. The Rockets are no strangers to taking big chances, and with the terrible start to this season, we might get to see Morey’s entire bag of tricks to get them back on track.