Houston Rockets: Which Players Will Get Traded?

Trevor Ariza

In a season full of failed expectations from almost everybody on the Rockets’ roster, Trevor Ariza has actually been decent. Ariza has performed fairly close to his career numbers, eating up minutes and averaging almost 35 minutes per game.

He’s scoring 12.3 points per game and adding 4.6 rebounds, 1.9 assists and another 1.9 steals per game, and his shooting splits of .411/.377/.725 are fairly in line with what the Rockets would expect from him.

Ariza has a net rating of -2.3 points per 100 possessions, but virtually everybody who has played any minutes at all for the Rockets this season has a negative net rating, so in his case we can take it with a grain of salt.

The main team interested in Ariza seems to be the Cleveland Cavaliers at this point. As evidenced by the fact that they fired their head coach with a three-game lead over second place in the Eastern Conference and during a stretch of eight wins in 10 games, the Cavs are driven to win now and utilize the waning years of LeBron James‘ transcendence.

That said, it looks a bit like any trade the Cavs would make for Ariza would be a move almost just for the sake of making a move.

You can never have too many 3-and-D wings, particularly when you intend to battle the Warriors in the NBA Finals, but unless the Cavaliers plan on sending back Iman Shumpert (who hasn’t been good this season) it’s hard to see exactly their reasoning or the method they would use to acquire him.

Next: Will Anybody Actually Get Moved?