- James Harden, whose arrival at the Walt Disney World campus was delayed, is expected to practice with the Rockets for the first time on Thursday, tweets Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports. The club is still waiting on Russell Westbrook and Luc Mbah a Moute.
- French club ASVEL Basket announced today in a press release that it has finalized a two-year deal with swingman William Howard. It’s an unusual update, since Howard technically remains on a two-way contract with the Rockets — at least for now. Presumably, Howard is on track to join ASVEL Basket when his current deal expires.
Rockets center Tyson Chandler is on an expiring contract and will turn 38 years old this fall, but he’s not sure whether he’ll call it a career after this season, tweets Tim MacMahon of ESPN.
As MacMahon notes, Chandler originally thought he would retire last summer, but decided he still had the desire to continue playing and signed with Houston after the club recruited him for weeks. After another year in the NBA, he hasn’t yet made a decision on what his future holds.
“I’ll do myself some justice, not get ahead of myself and wait for that moment to come,” Chandler said.
The second overall pick in the 2001 NBA draft, Chandler has appeared in a total of 1,160 career regular season games, including 26 for Houston this season. The veteran big man has also played in 75 postseason contests, winning a championship with the Mavericks in 2011 and earning an All-Star nod with the Knicks in 2013.
While Chandler doesn’t play a major role on the small-ball Rockets, he’s essentially the only option the team can turn to if it wants to match up with an opponent by using a traditional center, especially with Isaiah Hartenstein no longer on the roster. Forwards like P.J. Tucker, Jeff Green, and DeMarre Carroll typically serve as Houston’s de facto centers.
Rockets All-Star James Harden arrived at the NBA’s Orlando restart campus on Tuesday evening, five days after most of the rest of his club touched down, per a video tweet from the team’s official Twitter account.
The 2018 NBA MVP did not travel with the rest of the Rockets for undisclosed reasons. Harden is averaging 34.4 PPG, 7.4 APG and 6.4 RPG in 61 games this season, his eighth All-Star campaign in Houston.
Tonight’s arrival is in line with the targeted mid-week estimate that Rockets head coach Mike D’Antoni said the team had been aiming for as recently as Sunday, according to Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle. Before Harden can join his teammates at practice, he will have to quarantine within his hotel room. Next, Harden will have to test negative for COVID-19 over three straight days and undergo a physical conditioning test, per Rachel Nichols of ESPN (Twitter link) and Marc Stein of the New York Times (Twitter link).
Despite the arrival of Harden, the Rockets will continue to be without a few players for now. Harden’s fellow All-Star guard Russell Westbrook announced yesterday that he did not travel with the team because he tested positive for COVID-19. Westbrook hopes to join the Rockets once he recovers.
Forward Luc Mbah a Moute also did not travel with the Rockets last Thursday for undisclosed reasons. Additionally, after accidentally breaking the campus’s quarantine restrictions, Mbah a Moute’s fellow forward Bruno Caboclo has been forced to re-isolate for seven more days.
As we detailed on Friday when we discussed the playoff picture in the Eastern Conference, there will be an opportunity for teams to move up – or down – in the standings when play resumes on July 30.
With eight “seeding games” on tap, teams are unlikely to make up five- or six-game deficits on the clubs ahead of them in the standings, but there’s a strong likelihood of a shake-up in instances where teams are only separated by a game or two.
That’s even more true in the Western Conference than it is in the East, albeit not necessarily at the very top of the standings, where the 49-14 Lakers hold a fairly comfortable lead on the 44-20 Clippers. The Lakers’ magic number to clinch the conference is just three, so they’re a safe bet to hang onto the No. 1 seed.
After that though, there’s some congestion in the standings. The Clippers’ lead on the Nuggets (43-22) is just 1.5 games. Denver holds an identical lead over the Jazz (41-23). Utah, meanwhile, is just a couple losses away from slipping down to the No. 6 seed, as the Thunder (40-24) and Rockets (40-24) are right on their heels. The 40-27 Mavericks round out this group of six teams, a game-and-a-half behind OKC and Houston and just 5.5 games behind the second-seeded Clippers.
A number of those six clubs bunched up in the middle of the Western Conference playoff picture will face one another when play resumes. For instance, the Thunder – who have the potential to move up or down a couple spots in the standings – will open the restart against the Jazz and Nuggets and eventually finish their season against the Clippers. The Clips will face the Mavericks and Nuggets in addition to OKC. Dallas opens its eight seeding games by playing the Rockets.
Given the strength of competition in the West, seeding could be paramount in the postseason. The Nuggets, for example, could conceivably face the Jazz, Thunder, Rockets, or Mavs in the first round and would likely prefer some opponents to others in that group. The Jazz, currently at No. 4, could be motivated to avoid the No. 6 Rockets in the first round, since they’ve been eliminated by Houston in each of the previous two postseasons.
At the bottom of the playoff picture, the No. 8 Grizzlies (32-33) have essentially no chance to move up, since they’re seven games back of Dallas. But they’ll be looking to increase their lead over the Trail Blazers, Pelicans, Kings, Spurs, and Suns — if they can finish with more than a four-game lead on all those clubs, they’ll avoid a play-in tournament. If the Nos. 8 and 9 seeds finish within four games of one another, a play-in tournament will be necessary to determine that final playoff spot.
A newly-healthy Blazers squad will be a major threat to the Grizzlies, as will a Pelicans team that faces one of the league’s weakest schedules over the course of the eight seeding games.
What do you think? Do you think we’ll see much movement in the Western Conference’s top eight? Will the Grizzlies be knocked out by one of the challengers behind them in the standings? What do you expect the West’s top eight seeds to look like by the time the playoffs begin?
Head to the comment section below to weigh in with your predictions!
Rockets guard Russell Westbrook announced today (via Twitter) that he tested positive for the coronavirus prior to departing for the NBA’s campus in Florida.
“I’m currently feeling well, quarantined, and looking forward to rejoining my teammates when I am cleared,” Westbrook wrote in his statement.
Westbrook had been one of three Rockets players who had yet to report to the Walt Disney World campus, along with former MVP James Harden and recently-signed forward Luc Mbah a Moute. It’s unclear whether Harden’s and Mbah a Moute’s absences are coronavirus-related or whether their arrivals have been delayed for other reasons. Head coach Mike D’Antoni said on Sunday that he expected the missing players to report within a few days.
Teams are permitted to replace players who contract COVID-19 with a substitute player. However, replaced players are ineligible to return for the rest of the season. With Westbrook said to be feeling well, there’s no reason for the Rockets not to wait for him to recover — his statement and D’Antoni’s comments suggest the team will do just that.
Assuming Westbrook is cleared to head to Orlando and report to the Rockets within the next week or two, he should still have plenty of time to ramp up before the playoffs begin on August 18.
Acquired last July in a blockbuster trade with the Thunder, Westbrook has had a strong first season in Houston, averaging 27.5 PPG, 8.0 RPG, and 7.0 APG in 53 games (35.9 MPG). He has been particularly effective as a slasher and play-maker since the Rockets introduced their “micro-ball” lineup and will be counted on to play a key role if the club is to make a deep postseason run.
Rockets forward Bruno Caboclo inadvertently broke quarantine at the NBA’s Walt Disney World campus and will be required to re-quarantine for another eight days before he resumes team activities, according to Tim MacMahon, Zach Lowe, Malika Andrews, and Tim Bontemps of ESPN (Twitter link). Jonathan Feigen of The Houston Chronicle clarifies (via Twitter) that Caboclo is now two days into a new 10-day quarantine period.
Any sort of coronavirus outbreak within the Disney campus could throw a wrench into the NBA’s restart plan, so the league is requiring players, coaches, and staffers to strictly follow the protocols put in place. Caboclo is the first player known to have run afoul of those protocols, having left his room during the initial quarantine period, tweets MacMahon. He was unaware he wasn’t allowed to do so, despite having been informed of those restrictions.
Caboclo, 24, was traded from Memphis to Houston at the trade deadline in February, but didn’t see much action after joining the Rockets. He appeared in just five games before the season was suspended in March, averaging 2.0 PPG and 1.8 RPG in 5.6 minutes per contest.
Rockets head coach Mike D’Antoni is unlikely to utilize a super-deep rotation in Orlando, but with David Nwaba unable to play due to his Achilles recovery and Luc Mbah a Moute rejoining the team after a long layoff, Caboclo had a chance to move up on the depth chart. Now that he won’t be able to resume practicing until next week, it seems less likely that he’ll play regular minutes during the seeding games.
The Rockets are still waiting for stars James Harden and Russell Westbrook, as well as Mbah a Moute, to report to the Disney campus in Florida. According to Feigen, D’Antoni said on Sunday that those players are working out at “their own home base” and that they should arrive “in a few days.” He declined to offer specifics on why the arrivals of Harden, Westbrook, and Mbah a Moute have been delayed.
“These are things that people are dealing with,” D’Antoni said. “We’re not going to get into why not. They’re on their way.”
- Rockets stars Russell Westbrook and James Harden are expected to arrive in Orlando soon, Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle writes. Houston had its first team practice on Saturday without the star duo, with head coach Mike D’Antoni hinting that the two All-Star guards will likely join the club in the next few days.
69-year-old Rockets head coach Mike D’Antoni, who says he has cleared his medical screenings with Houston, has flown with the team to Orlando, per ESPN’s Tim MacMahon (Twitter link). Though D’Antoni was granted no “formal NBA thumbs up,” as Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle tweets, the league also did not restrict D’Antoni’s campus attendance following the medical clearance.
D’Antoni is the league’s second-oldest head coach, after 71-year-old Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich. The 40-24 Rockets are currently the No. 6 seed in the West, 1.5 games clear of the seventh-seeded Mavericks.
There’s more out of Houston:
- D’Antoni and Rockets general manager Daryl Morey are relishing the opportunity for the team to practice together ahead of the league’s scheduled July 30 restart, per Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle. “Because we had a major change in the components of the team, we do think a second training camp benefits us,” Morey said. “Because when you’re integrating a starter onto a very good team, getting more time to drill… will allow us to integrate (Robert) Covington in, and I do think that slightly favors us.”
- Rockets All-Stars James Harden and Russell Westbrook did not travel with the rest of the team to Orlando today, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium (Twitter link). They are expected to arrive later this week. Newly-signed substitute player Luc Mbah a Moute and player development coach John Lucas also did not travel with the rest of the Rockets, according to Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle (Twitter link).
- 35-year-old Rockets forward/center and defensive stalwart P.J. Tucker has indicated that he would like an extension on his current four-year contract, which expires after the 2020/21 season, per Fox 26 Houston’s Mark Berman (Twitter link). “I want to retire as a Houston Rocket,” Tucker said. “The fans, the city have embraced me since day one. So fingers crossed, I hope we can strike a deal and get it done.”
- Rockets GM Daryl Morey said this week that he isn’t too concerned about the 2020/21 salary cap uncertainty, having concluded that any fluctuation is “probably not going to impact us too much,” tweets Tim MacMahon of ESPN. As ESPN’s Bobby Marks tweets – and as I pointed out when I previewed Houston’s ’20/21 cap – a shifting tax line could affect the Rockets, since they already have more than $123MM committed to six guaranteed contracts.
JULY 7: Mbah a Moute has officially signed his contract with the Rockets, according to Charania (via Twitter). GM Daryl Morey published a tweet confirming the move.
As a result of the team signing Mbah a Moute as a substitute player, Sefolosha is ineligible to return this season.
JULY 1: Former Rockets forward Luc Mbah a Moute will rejoin the team for the NBA’s restart, tweets Shams Charania of The Athletic. He will serve as a substitute player for Thabo Sefolosha, who opted out of Orlando earlier today.
Mbah a Moute hasn’t played in the league this season, but worked out for the Rockets in early March, shortly before the hiatus. He and the team had mutual interest in a reunion for a while, according to Kelly Iko of The Athletic (Twitter link).
A defensive specialist, Mbah a Moute was a rotation player for Houston during the 2017/18 season before being injured late in the year. He signed with the Clippers before the start of last season, but injuries limited him to just four games.