June 10, 2025 • 34 mins
When the 2025 NBA Finals conclude in a few days, teams across the league will be able to exclusively negotiate with their own pending free agents. With the Rockets, that includes names such as Fred VanVleet, Steven Adams, Jeff Green, Aaron Holiday, and Jae’Sean Tate.
So, with Houston’s payroll on the rise, what internal deals are likely to make basketball and business sense? Tuesday’s podcast explores the parameters, including why new three-year contracts for VanVleet (around $90 to $100 million, in total) and Adams ($40 to $45 million, in total) could be the sweet spot for both the player and team.
So, with Houston’s payroll on the rise, what internal deals are likely to make basketball and business sense? Tuesday’s podcast explores the parameters, including why new three-year contracts for VanVleet (around $90 to $100 million, in total) and Adams ($40 to $45 million, in total) could be the sweet spot for both the player and team.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Cheers, Rockets fans, Welcome to The Logger Line, an exclusive
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Speaker 2 (00:20):
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Speaker 1 (00:23):
Get Ready, Ready, Get Ready. The lagger Line starts now.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
Welcome aboard, Welcome in to another episode of the Logger Line,
as always served to you courtesy of Houston's Carback Brewing.
I'm Benju Bo's your host, editor of USA Today's Rockets
Fire and contributors Sports Talk seven ninety, official flagship radiotation
(00:52):
of your Houston Rockets. It's Tuesday, June tenth, and it's
a busy time for teams across the association, not just
for the two teams playing in the NBA Finals, the
Oklahoma City Thunder and the Indiana Pacers, but the other
twenty eight teams. They're getting ready for the draft, which
is a little over two weeks away, the start of
free agency negotiations across the league, which is now under
(01:12):
three weeks away on June thirtieth. Trades are being discussed.
There's lots going on across the NBA, so it's a
busy time for the Rockets who are going through the
pre draft process as well as examining their options for
free agency and trades. We've talked about some of the
external possibilities in recent pods with regards to trade pursuits
big names like Giannis and Kevin Durant. We've talked about
(01:34):
some of the external free agency options such as Brook
Lopez with the Bucks. We'll talk about the draft in
the coming days. I'm hoping to get more of indication
of whether the Rockets are actually going to stay at
pick ten before we do that, but if things look
like that there may be staying the course, we'll do
some draft talk in the coming days. This episode is
going to be looking at the internal possibilities and what
(01:56):
the numbers are likely to be if the Rockets, as
report to plan on keeping Fred Nfleet and Steven Adams,
and also possibly keeping other players closer to the end
of the bench who are becoming free agents or could
become free agents. Guys such as Jeff Green, Jay Sean Tate,
Jacques Landale, Aaron Holliday. Will get to them, although we
won't spend nearly as much time on them as we
(02:18):
do Fred and Steven because obviously they're not nearly as important.
There's a reason they didn't play as many minutes. And
I want to begin our conversation by looking at Fredvenfleet
because I think there's a little bit of a misunderstanding,
at least with the fans I follow on social media
and message boards, with the leverage points in these negotiations,
and why I don't think they're as tilted in favor
(02:40):
of the Rockets as some would like to believe. I
saw Sam Bessini of The Athletic, their NBA draft writer,
who I really respect. He put out his Rockets off
season previewpot a few days ago and projected a Fredvenfleet
extension to be three years, ninety to one hundred million.
That's if the Rockets don't pick up the team option
on his previous contract, which is worth a little under
(03:01):
forty five million dollars for next year it would be
the final season of that deal. And then Sam projected
Steven Adams to get three years about forty two to
forty five million dollars. I think both of those numbers
are perfectly reasonable. I'll explain why there seems to be
a segment of the fan base that thinks it's a
little rich, especially for Fred. I think some of that
(03:23):
could possibly be fans not recalibrating how they view and
contextualize these numbers. With the rising salaries across the NBA,
you should look at it as a percentage of the
salary cap rather than simply the raw numbers, which can
give you sticker shock. But I also think that there's
a fundamental misunderstanding of the leverage that Fred than Fleet
(03:46):
has and why, even coming off a year in which
his surface level stats were a little underwhelming, at least
in the regular season, there's a reason why he should
be able to command that deal, and I do think
it would be in the Rocket's best interest to do that.
And so I'm going to spend most of this pot
talking about Fred because obviously the stakes are highest there
(04:06):
because we're talking about a lot more money with Steven.
I think forty to forty five million is much more reasonable.
With Fred, he could get as much as one hundred
million dollars. And I get that there's some sticker shock
when we're talking about a nine figure deal, but I
think we need to understand that both sides, not just
Fred and Fleet, but the Rockets as well, are entering
(04:27):
into these negotiations playing chicken. They both have something to lose.
Let's be clear, both Fred and the Rockets have said
since the end of last season that they want the
partnership to continue, and I think they're being truthful when
they say that. So it's not a matter of needing
to convince Fred of wanting to stay in Houston and
the Rockets needing to be convinced that he's the right path. No,
(04:50):
both sides want to stay the course. It's just about
finding a number that works for both sides. And perhaps
I'll acknowledg there's a small chance that maybe there's a
wink wink arrangement and that number has already been agreed
upon based on previous negotiations. But if that's the case,
(05:10):
it is what it is. My inclination is actually that
it's not agreed to, because if it was, my suspicion
is that the deal would already be done. We know
the Rockets push back the deadline for a decision on
Fred's contract. It was supposed to be five days after
the playoffs ended for the Rockets, now it's June twenty ninth.
I think the reason they push back that deadline is
because there is a little bit of negotiation that is
(05:32):
going to happen and probably is happening right now. Well,
I guess technically negotiations can't start until after the NBA
Finals end. That's the exclusive window that teams can negotiate
with their own free agents before the June thirtieth start
of negotiations across the entire league. But come on, we
know a lot of these conversations are already happening and
have happened behind the scenes. Let's be realistic here. But
(05:55):
to go back to the playing chicken component of this.
With Fred, it's been said and there's some truth in it. Look,
he doesn't want to actually enter unrestricted free agency. I
think that's true. There's not a lot of teams with
caps face. He's coming off a year in which, at
least from a shooting perspective, he underachieved. He's thirty one
(06:16):
years old, and there are questions regarding the aging curve
for smaller guards. I don't think he wants to leave
Houston to begin with. There aren't that many teams with
major space beneath the salary cap, and the few teams
that have it, like the Brooklyn Nets, how much would
they really spend on a thirty one year old Fred
(06:36):
van Fleet. I think there's a point in which they
would where the value is so extreme that they'll use
him in the short term and worst case they can
trade him to a contender at the deadline and get
positive value. So it's not that there would be no
options for Fred, but I don't think it's ideal by
any means. He wants to stay in Houston for basketball
reasons and also financially. I think he's comfortable here. He's
(07:00):
talked about it being his home. There's not that many
options on the market this summer if he was to
hit it. So yeah, there's some truth in the argument
of Fred being incentivized to get a deal done with
the Rockets, and so theoretically it limits his leverage. The
problem is the Rockets are very incentivized to do a
(07:21):
deal with Fred as well, and Fred's camp knows this
because once the Rockets gave contract extensions to all for
Chrangon and Jalen Green last ball, they committed to being
an above the cap team for the foreseeable future. That's
just the reality. You can't not spend money on Fred
and then reallocate it to go and sign or trade
(07:44):
for someone somewhere else in the NBA. It doesn't work
that way. You can exceed the salary cap to retain
Fred because he's your own player. You can't just immediately
reallocate that money somewhere else because the Rockets are above
the salary cap. So no, you can't just look at
the three years, one hundred million, whatever the deal is
and say, wow, if we didn't do that, what could
(08:05):
the Rockets have brought in by reallocating that money somewhere else. No,
that's not how it works from a team building perspective.
So from a Houston perspective, it's somewhat used it or
lose it. And Fred's camp knows that coming off a
fifty two to thirty year with the number two seed
in the Western Conference, the Rockets do not want to
take a step back. And Fred for all of his
(08:27):
plumps in the regular season, and I think some of
them were injury related. We know he really struggled with
the ankle injury. In the second half of the season
when it really mattered. In the playoffs, Fred was the
Rocket's best player. He was outstanding I think for starters
when trying to determine the market value for these guys.
Teams are not just going to the front page of
MBA dot com and looking at regular season only efficiency statistics. No,
(08:50):
they're doing a lot deeper dives into this stuff. And
even when Fred was struggling in the regular season, the
impact statistics on off court data statistics suggests that he
was still very valuable for this team. But underneath it all,
I think what matters the most. The Rockets said consistently
that they're going to need him when shit really gets real,
(09:12):
as it tends to do in the playoffs when you
play really good teams, and that's exactly the way it
plays out. So no, I don't think that you can
discard that series against the Warriors and say, oh, it's
a small sample size, just seven games. No, the Rockets
are pretty insistent throughout the year that when it matters
most and when defense is really dialed up, that's when
Fred will be at his most valuable when exactly what
(09:35):
they argued plays out, and you needed Fred to be
competitive in that series. If you didn't have Fred van Fleet,
the struggles of Jalen Green would have probably led to
you losing in four or five games. So Fred was
very important, and when the way it played out was
basically exactly what the Rockets themselves were saying throughout the year,
(09:57):
it's hard to dismiss it as small sample size theater. No,
there's something to it. The idea that Fredvanfleet is a
playoff riser. Obviously, we saw it in his run to
the NBA Championship with the Toronto Raptors in twenty nineteen.
That's a big part of what you're paying him for.
He delivered when it mattered most, and that's part of
the equation that gets left out if you're just pulling
(10:18):
up the NBA dot Com profile page for Fred and
looking at regular season only numbers and just very basic
box score stuff. There's a lot more to it, and
we saw that in the playoffs, and losing Fred for
no compensation would be a blow, an unacceptable blow for
the Rockets because we can talk about some of these
(10:39):
younger backcourt guys like Jalen Green, Reed Shepherd and men
Thompson gradually taking on more responsibility and eventually becoming, you know,
at least one of them capable of being the primary
point guard, the engine, whatever you want to call it
for this team. That's a multi year process. That's not
something that they're going to be ready to handle in
three months when the Rockets were to training camp in
(11:00):
late September for next season. You still need freddin Fleet
and the Rockets saw that in the playoffs when certain
younger guys struggled, but Fred stepped up, and that's how
the Rockets were nearly able to beat the Warriors, even
with a very down series from Jalen Green and at
least offensively from a scoring perstructive, a down series for
(11:21):
all fre Inch Shongoon as well. Fred has a lot
of value and the Rockets do not want to take
a step back. You can worry about I guess, oh,
what's the contract going to look like in a few
years when he's thirty three, thirty four years old. Look,
the Rockets are worried about the here and now, and
there are advantages. I mean, there's a reason why they're
(11:42):
being talked about as a viable destination for guys like
Giannis and KD. It's because of the on court success
they've had, which fredvan Fleet had an enormous role in.
So I'm not saying that there are no questions about
a three year ninety to one hundred million dollar deal
for fredvan Fleet. But I think they pale in comparison
(12:02):
to a scenario where you just let him go for
no compensation and you try to run it back next
season without Fred, because I think the Rockets would likely
take a step back in that scenario and the consequences
of that short term in long term, and you look
at how desirable or not desirable they would be to
(12:23):
players across the league, that would be a much greater concern,
at least to me, than if they exactly how Fred's
going to age and what his trade value exactly is
or isn't two or three years from now, which is
obviously hypothetical to begin with. So the Rockets are not
going to let Fred walk for no compensation. That's just
(12:45):
a non starter. They need him for the foreseeable future.
So if push comes to shove and the Rockets and
Fred just can't come to an agreement, I firmly believe
the Rockets would just pick up the team option one
year a little under forty five million, and say, Effitt,
even if it costs us a bit more luxury tax money,
(13:06):
we start the clock earlier. Maybe you have to go
even cheaper on filling out the end of your bench
relative to losing Fred for nothing. The Rockets would pick
up that option as they should. Losing him for no
compensation would be unacceptable. Both sides have something to lose here.
Fred wouldn't be able this offseason to easily get I mean,
(13:28):
there are sign and trade possibilities, but that would require
working with the Rockets. Fred wouldn't be able to easily
get the money he wants elsewhere, but the Rockets wouldn't
be able to replace his production as an above the
salary cap team. They'd basically be losing him for nothing.
So it's use it or lose it when we're talking
about that money. So how you get to three years
(13:49):
ninety million? Fred's representation Basically they want him to be
made whole. So the status quo is, if he plays
out his existing contract, the Rockets pick up that option,
which is about forty five million dollars for next year,
and then he enters free agency at age thirty two.
What could Fred get on the open market a year
from now? If he just plays out his existing deal?
(14:11):
The Rockets pick up that option, so forty five million
is in the bank, and then he signs a deal
next offseason. I think even the biggest Fred than Fleet
hater in the world would acknowledge that the worst case
would be the non taxpayer MLE, and I think that's
far too bearish. But Fred is a winning player. Even
(14:34):
if he goes out there and as another injury plague
down year, he can get at thirty two years old,
a two year MLE deal, the non taxpayer version, which
now has a starting salary of about fifteen million dollars
in that world, which is as verish as I think
you could come up with, and personally I think it's unrealistic.
It would be three years, seventy five million in total,
(14:57):
because you'd be taking the forty five million for this
coming season and then the two year mL deal which
is about thirty million dollars in total, and so over
the next three years he'd be getting about seventy five
million dollars. The bull scenario. Now, I don't think he'll
be getting the same money that he has on his
current deal, no matter what I think. Being thirty two
(15:18):
versus twenty nine, obviously that's a difference. And we also
know the Rockets overpaid him a little bit because when
the Rockets signed him in June of twenty three. They
were coming off three straight years as the last place
team in the Western Conference. The Raptors were still at
least a play in team at the time, so the
Rockets had to overpay a little bit on this current deal.
(15:38):
It has him making forty plus billion dollars each year
to get him to leave at least a decent situation
for a team at the time that was one of
the worst in the league. And he was also twenty
nine years old, so he had a bit more leverage
now with at least a little bit of a decline,
which is natural as guys get into their thirties, and
the Rockets not being as desperate and being thirty two
(16:01):
instead of twenty nine. I don't think Fred can get
forties unless he has a crazy good year, and I
don't think you'd be willing or should be willing to
bet on that. I think he has a pretty good
year to something closer to his year one statistics in
Houston where he was shooting, you know, upper thirties. From three,
I could see two years seventy million something that's in
(16:25):
the load to mid thirties average annual value. You tack
on that sixty five or seventy million to the forty
five million dollar team option, and you're at somewhere in
the one hundred and ten to one hundred and fifteen
million dollar range for the next three years. Well, you
take the median of those two scenarios, the bear scenario
(16:45):
where he has a bad year, there's not much of
a market and he gets an mL deal that's three
years seventy five million, and the Bowl scenario, he goes out,
plays well and gets what I think is a reasonable
deal at thirty two years old for his level of production,
maybe double the something in the low to mid thirties
average annual value. That'd be three years, one hundred and
ten hundred and fifteen million dollars in total. The median
(17:07):
of that is going to be somewhere in the nineties
three years ninety million to three years one hundred million.
That's why Sam Vessini threw out that number. I think
it's very reasonable. I think a lot of fans you
Fred negatively simply because of the contract, and that's fine.
My rebuttal to that would be for starters. With Fred,
(17:29):
it's never just about him, it's about the collective no
doubt James Harden individually would have been a better signing
two years ago. The argument is that Fred as a leader,
what he gives you in the locker room, how he
helps your defense, how he benefits younger guys such as
all Bridge Shongoon, with how he runs the offense, not
(17:52):
just for himself but the collective, that Fred provides intangible
benefits beyond just simply his own stats. That's the first
thing I would argue. If you're looking at it strictly
through the numbers, I don't think you're looking at it
the same way the Rockets are in terms of valuing
his contributions. But even if you don't buy that, even
if you think Fred's overpaid, I mean for starters, the
(18:14):
Rockets knew they were doing that. They sort of had
to as one of the worst teams in the league
two years ago. And now you're at a point where,
with Houston being above the cap, regardless based on the
raises given to Shingoon and Jalen Green, you can't just
reallocate that money in free agency. If you let Fred go,
it's use it or lose it. And I feel pretty
(18:36):
confident in saying that even if he's overpaid. You'd rather
have Fred and Fleet, then just let him walk. The
only argument you can make in favor of letting him
walk would be the hypothetical of, well, I'm a little
nervous about what happens in three years when a Men
Thompson gets his MAX deal and if Fred VanVleet making
(18:57):
thirty something million dollars at thirty three, thirty four years old,
is that going to be untradeable? Is that going to
be an albatross? Is that going to cripple you with
team building? That's very speculative. I personally think kill age
pretty well, very high IQ, good shooter. But worst case,
I'm willing to take that risk when the alternative is
(19:19):
taking a step back in the here and now, which
I feel pretty confident the Rockets would do if they
tried to run it back as is, But without Fred Nfleet,
there's way too much to lose when you look at
what would likely happen in the standing SEXU year, the
Rockets taking a step back, and the consequences of what
that means for the development of the young players, what
(19:39):
that means for the desirability of the franchise around the league.
On the trade market with free agents. I would not
want to take that gamble. There's no perfect path, there
really is. And so yeah, there's some risk of is
Fred going to be a positive trade asset on the
third year of the deal, But I would rather risk
(20:01):
that than just letting Fred go and having a worse
team next season. Or you can have seen some say, well,
could you just pick up the option and let him
go a year from now and hope that by twenty
six Reed Shepherd or Jalen Green or a Men Thompson
or some combination or able to fully take the reins.
(20:21):
I guess. But the thing is, if you keep Fred
at the same annual value that he was at last year,
Andrew bring back Steven Adams, which we saw in the
playoffs how valuable he is, and you're giving these big
raises to Shinghoun and Jalen Green, You're talking about being
well into the luxury tax this year, above the first
(20:43):
apron in all likelihood. And so that has consequences not
just to you know, how many yachts Tilman for Tita
can buy. No, it has consequences to team building under
the new collective bargaining agreement. It has consequences to what
rafel Stone can do now, especially into the future with
putting together a roster. So the Rockets want to be
(21:05):
careful with when that clock starts because I'm not going
to get into the weeds here, but the more consecutive
years that teams are above these thresholds, the more strict
some of these consequences can be. I don't think the
Rockets want to start the clock this season to the
(21:27):
extent that it would start if you are picking up
Fred's option and going well above first apron territory. That
would have its own consequences that I don't think are
acceptable or the Rockets don't want to accept them, at
least to me, the smarter play is to lower that
average annual value, use the savings for Steven Adams, We'll
(21:50):
get to him in a minute, and then take the
risk of exactly how Fred's going to age and what's
the value of that deal going to be. If you
do get trade in three years from now, we can
worry about that two three years from now. To me,
that is the safest bet to make relative to the
other scenarios of letting them walk all together or just
(22:13):
picking up the option and having a super bloated payroll
to keep everything together based on how the Rockets finished
last season, to be looking at the three possibilities here,
negotiating a longer term deal moderately lower annual value relative
to the last couple of years, that's the path that
makes sense for the Rockets. That's why writers like Sam
(22:35):
Vassini have been throwing out something in the three from
ninety to three for one hundred range as being realistic.
When you look at the team option, which is the
floor scenario projecting what his market would be a year
from now, the bear market, the bull market. Something in
the nineties is the median. That's where you know, both
(22:55):
sides risk a little bit, but they also get some certainty.
And maybe the Rockets can negotiate fred a little closer
in the ninety saying hey, this gives you a bit
more insurance in case you go out and God forbid
tarn Achilles or something like that. But generally speaking, if
it's closer to a hundred, I wouldn't you know, I
wouldn't feel terrible anything in the ninety two hundred range
(23:17):
to me when you look at the market, when you
look at the team option and the options, the Rockets
have and don't have if Fred wasn't around, I think
that's a reasonable deal and that's ultimately what I think happens,
and I do expect Fred to be back. As stated
any win now scenario, if you want to go down
the road of pursuing Kevin Durant, the Rockets feel like
(23:37):
Fred Benfleet needs to be on the roster in any
of those scenarios because they still need him that much
to win at a high level in the short term. So,
if you want this team to play competitive basketball, if
you believe that playing in high stakes games is good
for the development of young guys like him in Thompson,
like all for echin Goon, which I firmly do, you
probably need Fred Benfleet around. The Rockets want him around.
(23:58):
He's a great leader, he's love throughout the building. I
expect them to be back, and that's why I think
a three year ninety million up to three year one
hundred million, that's the sweet spot for a deal, and
ultimately I think it gets done around that price now.
As far as other guys, Steven Adams, using that Sambasini
(24:21):
podcast as a template, he throughout three years forty two
to forty five million. I think that makes perfect sense.
It's basically the non taxpayer Emily at thirty one years
old and coming off serious knee surgery less than two
years ago. I don't think even if the impact stats
love him, which they do, I don't see a team
with kaproom like the Brooklyn Nets being willing to pay
(24:43):
twenty five at thirty million dollars a year in average
annual value. I also don't think it makes sense for
Steven at this stage of his career to go to
a non competitive team. Most teams around the league have
access to the non taxpayer Emily, not all, but enough
to where at least one or two I think would
be willing to go spend it on Steven. And he
made twelve point six million dollars last year, so getting
(25:04):
a slight raise and access to the MLE which is
probably the full Emlie, that's probably his market to begin with.
It also happens to be in the same ballpark as
what you're likely to save if you give Fred van
Fleet the deal that I was talking about, take him
down from forty four point nine million next year to
something in the low thirties, and so I think something
(25:28):
for two or three years at non tax for mL
money about fifteen million dollars a year makes all the
sense in the world. And it's just going to come
down to whether Stephen wants to stay in Houston. I
personally think he does. I wouldn't roll out the possibility
of him leaving simply because, look, we can talk about
the double big lineups, but he's not going to start
here all frind shram Goon is going to be the guy.
(25:48):
He's an All Star for a reason, and so if
some other team offers him a more clear pathway to
minutes and the opportunity to start and not just be
used situationally as a double big, but to actually be
the primary guy at center, because we know, in a
perfect role, the double big is just another club in
the bag. I don't think the Rockets will or should
use it quite to the extent they did in the
(26:09):
playoffs this year, as talked about in recent pods. I
think that was more out of desperation. If some other
team offered him a bigger role, or he just wants
to be another market for one reason or another, then
say thank you, and I guess you pivot to back
up plans, most so to Bluebrook Lopez according to the
reporting that we've seen to date. But if that's the case,
it wouldn't be about money because the types of suitors
(26:31):
that make sense for Steven, it's not like they'd have
more money than that mL. And I also don't think
if you're the Rocket shoot they expect him to take
a pay cut, especially coming off that great playoff run.
I think a slight increase in pay, something in the
range of fourteen to fifteen million dollars a year makes
all the sense in the world. Hopefully Steven wants it,
(26:51):
and if he doesn't, you wish him well and you
go on down the list. Personally, I expect him to
stay and it works out well because in terms of
the total payroll considerations, again, you'll be in the same
ballpark of what you're saving with Freven Fleet, assuming you
extend him, and so the payroll will be going up
a little bit between the Shingoon and Jalen extensions the
(27:13):
big pay increases they get, but you can offset that
a little bit by the combined value of Fred and
Steven being a little less than it was this past season.
So I think financially there's not a lot to say
with Steven. His market is pretty evident, and it's not
like the Rockets are going to be outbid. They have
bird rights. It's just a matter of where he wants
(27:33):
to be. I think that's Houston, but time will tell.
We'll see later this month, and then the other internal
free agents. As we wrap up this mini pod, it's
going to come down to roster composition. I think, you know,
the Rockets like having Jeff Green, Jacques Landale, Jay, Sean Tate,
Aaron Holliday, guys or that accomplished at like the let's
(27:53):
say nine through thirteen spots on their bench. It provides
a really good insurance policy to email you and if
guys get hurt, which is inevitable over eighty two games,
it's really useful. But this is a team that's going
to be more expensive, and that's if they just stay
the course. They could get even more expensive if they
make a deal for someone like Kevin Durant. So with
(28:15):
the team getting more expensive and the fact that going
into the luxury tax beyond the first day form and
so on and so forth carries actual team building penalties.
It's not just whether Tilman Bertita is willing to spend
and you have two younger guys in Reach Shepherd and
Kim Wentmore, and maybe if you keep the number ten
pick a third that you want to give more minutes to. Anyway,
(28:36):
it doesn't make sense to keep those veterans at all costs,
even if they're good on the practice s court, even
if they're good in the locker room, because salaries are
going up for the team as a whole, and because
the CBA has team building penalties for teams that are
too expensive. They're a good insurance policy, but they're not
so essential that you would keep them no matter what,
(28:58):
especially with the other young guys the rock want to
give more minutes to as is, so I think the
Rockets will explore bringing those guys back. Green and Tate
will be unrestricted free agents Landale and Aaron Hollo. They
have team options at basically eight million and five million, respectively.
It could be a scenario where the Rockets ask all
of these guys to take minimum deals, and if they're
(29:20):
not willing to do so, or if they get better
offers elsewhere, they wish them well. I hope that's not
the case, but it very well could be, especially if
the Rockets are fortunate enough to keep both Fred and
Stephen and or make a splash trade of significance, bring
in say a Kevin Durant someone like that. Then yeah,
as the team gets more expensive, which it would be
(29:43):
simply staying the course based on assuming you're able to
keep Fred and Stephen and then the raises to Shingoon
and Jalen and then external free agency or trade editions.
At some point, something's going to have to give, and
the Rockets are going to be much more willing to
give at the spots deep on their bench ten eleven, well,
guys that aren't going to be playing in the playoffs,
(30:05):
assuming all goes well in you don't have any major
injuries next season. In a perfect world, you'd keep all
those guys there. But those are acceptable losses. And so
that's why I think I won't say for sure that
they would have to take minimums. Some of it's going
to depend on do the Rockets make a big trade
or free agency signing. Are they fortunate enough to bring
(30:25):
back both Fred and Steven. There's some scenarios where maybe
they have a little more wiggle room and can go
above the minimum, especially for Aaron Holliday whose team option
is like four point nine million. Maybe that's doable, but
I think they're going to have to draw some hard
lines in the sand. And so if they're not willing
to let Fred or Steven go, which for the reasons
(30:46):
I outlined earlier in the spot, I don't think they are,
then it's further down the bench. That's where the harsh
decisions are going to have to be made, so that
the Rockets aren't deep into the luxury tax and starting
the clock early, because we know this team's going to
get more expense in the coming years as guys like
Jabari Smith and Terry Eason are due for contract extensions,
and men Thompson and Cam went Moore the year after that,
(31:07):
and so on and so forth. As the young core develops,
they're going to get more expensive. Our decisions are going
to have to be made. That's the collective bargaining agreement.
Jeff Green and Jay shrin Tape were both making about
eight million or slightly under that. In Tate's case last
year holiday was it five million or maybe four and
a half. Jack Landill was at eight million. I hope
they take pay cuts, but if they aren't, if other
(31:27):
teams are willing to pay him more, you know it sucks,
but you may just have to wish them well and
try and replace them cost efficiently. That's the new reality
of the NBA as I see it, and I'll wind
down the pod here. Fred and Stephen are the priorities.
I think it's fairly clear what the markets will be
with Fred. I think it's very likely a deal gets
done with Steven. I think it's reasonably likely, although I
(31:49):
wouldn't say it quite with the confidence that I do Fred,
simply because a Stephen will be an unrestricted free agent
and b Unlike Fred, there's not a clear starting role
here in Houston, so there's at least a possibility that
he might have wandering eyes and look for a situation
that's a little bit better that allows him to fully
(32:09):
unleash his skill set and play to the biggest role possible.
With Fred, the Rockets obviously have the team option that
can prevent him from becoming an unrestricted free agent, and
he's running the show here, he's the floor general, he's
sticking around. I think that's likely to happen. I think, well,
I think that's basically a lot to happen. I think
Steven is likely to happen but not a lot, and
(32:30):
then the guys through the end of the bench to
be determined. I think the Rockets will welcome them back,
but most will likely need to take pay cuts, and
the extent of the pay cuts will likely depend on
exactly what happens with Fred and Steven, as well as
any other free agents and trades the Rockets theoretically bring in.
Do they keep to number ten pick because that has
a little bit of a salary that the companies that
on the rookie scale deal and so on and so forth.
(32:50):
Stay tuned. Anyway, That'll do it for today and until
our next show, which I think will be more draft based.
Unless there's some breaking news need to react to, but
that's something there's not, then try and do some draft
talk in the coming days. This was sort of my
look at the internal options. A lot of our recent
pods have been looking externally. This is internally what the
numbers are likely to be for guys like Fred and
(33:12):
Steven and other pending free agents from the Rockets, especially
because once the NBA Finals conclude, which could be as
soon as this weekend, the Rockets will be able to
negotiate with those guys. Officially now unofficially. I'm sure there's
been some at least parameters tossed out, but of officially
once the NBA Finals end, which could be as soon
as well, I guess because it has to go five games,
(33:32):
so I guess that the soonest would be next Monday.
But point is it could be within the next week
that the window officially opens and deals could actually be reached.
Stay tuned anyway until our next show. This is where
we'll break and if you go out more content between
now and then, the best place to get it is
on social media. I am on Blue Sky at Bean Doubo's.
The show is on Twitter, slash x at the logger line,
(33:53):
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(34:15):
please read USA Today's Rockets Wire, Rocketshire dot USA today
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Just hit up Rocketswire dot USA, Today dot Com read
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those plays complete, I will adjourn it here. As always,
(34:36):
I appreciate you folks so much for listening, and please
come back soon for more new episodes.
Cheers, Rockets fans, Welcome to The Logger Line, an exclusive
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Welcome aboard, Welcome in to another episode of the Logger Line,
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(00:52):
of your Houston Rockets. It's Tuesday, June tenth, and it's
a busy time for teams across the association, not just
for the two teams playing in the NBA Finals, the
Oklahoma City Thunder and the Indiana Pacers, but the other
twenty eight teams. They're getting ready for the draft, which
is a little over two weeks away, the start of
free agency negotiations across the league, which is now under
(01:12):
three weeks away on June thirtieth. Trades are being discussed.
There's lots going on across the NBA, so it's a
busy time for the Rockets who are going through the
pre draft process as well as examining their options for
free agency and trades. We've talked about some of the
external possibilities in recent pods with regards to trade pursuits
big names like Giannis and Kevin Durant. We've talked about
(01:34):
some of the external free agency options such as Brook
Lopez with the Bucks. We'll talk about the draft in
the coming days. I'm hoping to get more of indication
of whether the Rockets are actually going to stay at
pick ten before we do that, but if things look
like that there may be staying the course, we'll do
some draft talk in the coming days. This episode is
going to be looking at the internal possibilities and what
(01:56):
the numbers are likely to be if the Rockets, as
report to plan on keeping Fred Nfleet and Steven Adams,
and also possibly keeping other players closer to the end
of the bench who are becoming free agents or could
become free agents. Guys such as Jeff Green, Jay Sean Tate,
Jacques Landale, Aaron Holliday. Will get to them, although we
won't spend nearly as much time on them as we
(02:18):
do Fred and Steven because obviously they're not nearly as important.
There's a reason they didn't play as many minutes. And
I want to begin our conversation by looking at Fredvenfleet
because I think there's a little bit of a misunderstanding,
at least with the fans I follow on social media
and message boards, with the leverage points in these negotiations,
and why I don't think they're as tilted in favor
(02:40):
of the Rockets as some would like to believe. I
saw Sam Bessini of The Athletic, their NBA draft writer,
who I really respect. He put out his Rockets off
season previewpot a few days ago and projected a Fredvenfleet
extension to be three years, ninety to one hundred million.
That's if the Rockets don't pick up the team option
on his previous contract, which is worth a little under
(03:01):
forty five million dollars for next year it would be
the final season of that deal. And then Sam projected
Steven Adams to get three years about forty two to
forty five million dollars. I think both of those numbers
are perfectly reasonable. I'll explain why there seems to be
a segment of the fan base that thinks it's a
little rich, especially for Fred. I think some of that
(03:23):
could possibly be fans not recalibrating how they view and
contextualize these numbers. With the rising salaries across the NBA,
you should look at it as a percentage of the
salary cap rather than simply the raw numbers, which can
give you sticker shock. But I also think that there's
a fundamental misunderstanding of the leverage that Fred than Fleet
(03:46):
has and why, even coming off a year in which
his surface level stats were a little underwhelming, at least
in the regular season, there's a reason why he should
be able to command that deal, and I do think
it would be in the Rocket's best interest to do that.
And so I'm going to spend most of this pot
talking about Fred because obviously the stakes are highest there
(04:06):
because we're talking about a lot more money with Steven.
I think forty to forty five million is much more reasonable.
With Fred, he could get as much as one hundred
million dollars. And I get that there's some sticker shock
when we're talking about a nine figure deal, but I
think we need to understand that both sides, not just
Fred and Fleet, but the Rockets as well, are entering
(04:27):
into these negotiations playing chicken. They both have something to lose.
Let's be clear, both Fred and the Rockets have said
since the end of last season that they want the
partnership to continue, and I think they're being truthful when
they say that. So it's not a matter of needing
to convince Fred of wanting to stay in Houston and
the Rockets needing to be convinced that he's the right path. No,
(04:50):
both sides want to stay the course. It's just about
finding a number that works for both sides. And perhaps
I'll acknowledg there's a small chance that maybe there's a
wink wink arrangement and that number has already been agreed
upon based on previous negotiations. But if that's the case,
(05:10):
it is what it is. My inclination is actually that
it's not agreed to, because if it was, my suspicion
is that the deal would already be done. We know
the Rockets push back the deadline for a decision on
Fred's contract. It was supposed to be five days after
the playoffs ended for the Rockets, now it's June twenty ninth.
I think the reason they push back that deadline is
because there is a little bit of negotiation that is
(05:32):
going to happen and probably is happening right now. Well,
I guess technically negotiations can't start until after the NBA
Finals end. That's the exclusive window that teams can negotiate
with their own free agents before the June thirtieth start
of negotiations across the entire league. But come on, we
know a lot of these conversations are already happening and
have happened behind the scenes. Let's be realistic here. But
(05:55):
to go back to the playing chicken component of this.
With Fred, it's been said and there's some truth in it. Look,
he doesn't want to actually enter unrestricted free agency. I
think that's true. There's not a lot of teams with
caps face. He's coming off a year in which, at
least from a shooting perspective, he underachieved. He's thirty one
(06:16):
years old, and there are questions regarding the aging curve
for smaller guards. I don't think he wants to leave
Houston to begin with. There aren't that many teams with
major space beneath the salary cap, and the few teams
that have it, like the Brooklyn Nets, how much would
they really spend on a thirty one year old Fred
(06:36):
van Fleet. I think there's a point in which they
would where the value is so extreme that they'll use
him in the short term and worst case they can
trade him to a contender at the deadline and get
positive value. So it's not that there would be no
options for Fred, but I don't think it's ideal by
any means. He wants to stay in Houston for basketball
reasons and also financially. I think he's comfortable here. He's
(07:00):
talked about it being his home. There's not that many
options on the market this summer if he was to
hit it. So yeah, there's some truth in the argument
of Fred being incentivized to get a deal done with
the Rockets, and so theoretically it limits his leverage. The
problem is the Rockets are very incentivized to do a
(07:21):
deal with Fred as well, and Fred's camp knows this
because once the Rockets gave contract extensions to all for
Chrangon and Jalen Green last ball, they committed to being
an above the cap team for the foreseeable future. That's
just the reality. You can't not spend money on Fred
and then reallocate it to go and sign or trade
(07:44):
for someone somewhere else in the NBA. It doesn't work
that way. You can exceed the salary cap to retain
Fred because he's your own player. You can't just immediately
reallocate that money somewhere else because the Rockets are above
the salary cap. So no, you can't just look at
the three years, one hundred million, whatever the deal is
and say, wow, if we didn't do that, what could
(08:05):
the Rockets have brought in by reallocating that money somewhere else. No,
that's not how it works from a team building perspective.
So from a Houston perspective, it's somewhat used it or
lose it. And Fred's camp knows that coming off a
fifty two to thirty year with the number two seed
in the Western Conference, the Rockets do not want to
take a step back. And Fred for all of his
(08:27):
plumps in the regular season, and I think some of
them were injury related. We know he really struggled with
the ankle injury. In the second half of the season
when it really mattered. In the playoffs, Fred was the
Rocket's best player. He was outstanding I think for starters
when trying to determine the market value for these guys.
Teams are not just going to the front page of
MBA dot com and looking at regular season only efficiency statistics. No,
(08:50):
they're doing a lot deeper dives into this stuff. And
even when Fred was struggling in the regular season, the
impact statistics on off court data statistics suggests that he
was still very valuable for this team. But underneath it all,
I think what matters the most. The Rockets said consistently
that they're going to need him when shit really gets real,
(09:12):
as it tends to do in the playoffs when you
play really good teams, and that's exactly the way it
plays out. So no, I don't think that you can
discard that series against the Warriors and say, oh, it's
a small sample size, just seven games. No, the Rockets
are pretty insistent throughout the year that when it matters
most and when defense is really dialed up, that's when
Fred will be at his most valuable when exactly what
(09:35):
they argued plays out, and you needed Fred to be
competitive in that series. If you didn't have Fred van Fleet,
the struggles of Jalen Green would have probably led to
you losing in four or five games. So Fred was
very important, and when the way it played out was
basically exactly what the Rockets themselves were saying throughout the year,
(09:57):
it's hard to dismiss it as small sample size theater. No,
there's something to it. The idea that Fredvanfleet is a
playoff riser. Obviously, we saw it in his run to
the NBA Championship with the Toronto Raptors in twenty nineteen.
That's a big part of what you're paying him for.
He delivered when it mattered most, and that's part of
the equation that gets left out if you're just pulling
(10:18):
up the NBA dot Com profile page for Fred and
looking at regular season only numbers and just very basic
box score stuff. There's a lot more to it, and
we saw that in the playoffs, and losing Fred for
no compensation would be a blow, an unacceptable blow for
the Rockets because we can talk about some of these
(10:39):
younger backcourt guys like Jalen Green, Reed Shepherd and men
Thompson gradually taking on more responsibility and eventually becoming, you know,
at least one of them capable of being the primary
point guard, the engine, whatever you want to call it
for this team. That's a multi year process. That's not
something that they're going to be ready to handle in
three months when the Rockets were to training camp in
(11:00):
late September for next season. You still need freddin Fleet
and the Rockets saw that in the playoffs when certain
younger guys struggled, but Fred stepped up, and that's how
the Rockets were nearly able to beat the Warriors, even
with a very down series from Jalen Green and at
least offensively from a scoring perstructive, a down series for
(11:21):
all fre Inch Shongoon as well. Fred has a lot
of value and the Rockets do not want to take
a step back. You can worry about I guess, oh,
what's the contract going to look like in a few
years when he's thirty three, thirty four years old. Look,
the Rockets are worried about the here and now, and
there are advantages. I mean, there's a reason why they're
(11:42):
being talked about as a viable destination for guys like
Giannis and KD. It's because of the on court success
they've had, which fredvan Fleet had an enormous role in.
So I'm not saying that there are no questions about
a three year ninety to one hundred million dollar deal
for fredvan Fleet. But I think they pale in comparison
(12:02):
to a scenario where you just let him go for
no compensation and you try to run it back next
season without Fred, because I think the Rockets would likely
take a step back in that scenario and the consequences
of that short term in long term, and you look
at how desirable or not desirable they would be to
(12:23):
players across the league, that would be a much greater concern,
at least to me, than if they exactly how Fred's
going to age and what his trade value exactly is
or isn't two or three years from now, which is
obviously hypothetical to begin with. So the Rockets are not
going to let Fred walk for no compensation. That's just
(12:45):
a non starter. They need him for the foreseeable future.
So if push comes to shove and the Rockets and
Fred just can't come to an agreement, I firmly believe
the Rockets would just pick up the team option one
year a little under forty five million, and say, Effitt,
even if it costs us a bit more luxury tax money,
(13:06):
we start the clock earlier. Maybe you have to go
even cheaper on filling out the end of your bench
relative to losing Fred for nothing. The Rockets would pick
up that option as they should. Losing him for no
compensation would be unacceptable. Both sides have something to lose here.
Fred wouldn't be able this offseason to easily get I mean,
(13:28):
there are sign and trade possibilities, but that would require
working with the Rockets. Fred wouldn't be able to easily
get the money he wants elsewhere, but the Rockets wouldn't
be able to replace his production as an above the
salary cap team. They'd basically be losing him for nothing.
So it's use it or lose it when we're talking
about that money. So how you get to three years
(13:49):
ninety million? Fred's representation Basically they want him to be
made whole. So the status quo is, if he plays
out his existing contract, the Rockets pick up that option,
which is about forty five million dollars for next year,
and then he enters free agency at age thirty two.
What could Fred get on the open market a year
from now? If he just plays out his existing deal?
(14:11):
The Rockets pick up that option, so forty five million
is in the bank, and then he signs a deal
next offseason. I think even the biggest Fred than Fleet
hater in the world would acknowledge that the worst case
would be the non taxpayer MLE, and I think that's
far too bearish. But Fred is a winning player. Even
(14:34):
if he goes out there and as another injury plague
down year, he can get at thirty two years old,
a two year MLE deal, the non taxpayer version, which
now has a starting salary of about fifteen million dollars
in that world, which is as verish as I think
you could come up with, and personally I think it's unrealistic.
It would be three years, seventy five million in total,
(14:57):
because you'd be taking the forty five million for this
coming season and then the two year mL deal which
is about thirty million dollars in total, and so over
the next three years he'd be getting about seventy five
million dollars. The bull scenario. Now, I don't think he'll
be getting the same money that he has on his
current deal, no matter what I think. Being thirty two
(15:18):
versus twenty nine, obviously that's a difference. And we also
know the Rockets overpaid him a little bit because when
the Rockets signed him in June of twenty three. They
were coming off three straight years as the last place
team in the Western Conference. The Raptors were still at
least a play in team at the time, so the
Rockets had to overpay a little bit on this current deal.
(15:38):
It has him making forty plus billion dollars each year
to get him to leave at least a decent situation
for a team at the time that was one of
the worst in the league. And he was also twenty
nine years old, so he had a bit more leverage
now with at least a little bit of a decline,
which is natural as guys get into their thirties, and
the Rockets not being as desperate and being thirty two
(16:01):
instead of twenty nine. I don't think Fred can get
forties unless he has a crazy good year, and I
don't think you'd be willing or should be willing to
bet on that. I think he has a pretty good
year to something closer to his year one statistics in
Houston where he was shooting, you know, upper thirties. From three,
I could see two years seventy million something that's in
(16:25):
the load to mid thirties average annual value. You tack
on that sixty five or seventy million to the forty
five million dollar team option, and you're at somewhere in
the one hundred and ten to one hundred and fifteen
million dollar range for the next three years. Well, you
take the median of those two scenarios, the bear scenario
(16:45):
where he has a bad year, there's not much of
a market and he gets an mL deal that's three
years seventy five million, and the Bowl scenario, he goes out,
plays well and gets what I think is a reasonable
deal at thirty two years old for his level of production,
maybe double the something in the low to mid thirties
average annual value. That'd be three years, one hundred and
ten hundred and fifteen million dollars in total. The median
(17:07):
of that is going to be somewhere in the nineties
three years ninety million to three years one hundred million.
That's why Sam Vessini threw out that number. I think
it's very reasonable. I think a lot of fans you
Fred negatively simply because of the contract, and that's fine.
My rebuttal to that would be for starters. With Fred,
(17:29):
it's never just about him, it's about the collective no
doubt James Harden individually would have been a better signing
two years ago. The argument is that Fred as a leader,
what he gives you in the locker room, how he
helps your defense, how he benefits younger guys such as
all Bridge Shongoon, with how he runs the offense, not
(17:52):
just for himself but the collective, that Fred provides intangible
benefits beyond just simply his own stats. That's the first
thing I would argue. If you're looking at it strictly
through the numbers, I don't think you're looking at it
the same way the Rockets are in terms of valuing
his contributions. But even if you don't buy that, even
if you think Fred's overpaid, I mean for starters, the
(18:14):
Rockets knew they were doing that. They sort of had
to as one of the worst teams in the league
two years ago. And now you're at a point where,
with Houston being above the cap, regardless based on the
raises given to Shingoon and Jalen Green, you can't just
reallocate that money in free agency. If you let Fred go,
it's use it or lose it. And I feel pretty
(18:36):
confident in saying that even if he's overpaid. You'd rather
have Fred and Fleet, then just let him walk. The
only argument you can make in favor of letting him
walk would be the hypothetical of, well, I'm a little
nervous about what happens in three years when a Men
Thompson gets his MAX deal and if Fred VanVleet making
(18:57):
thirty something million dollars at thirty three, thirty four years old,
is that going to be untradeable? Is that going to
be an albatross? Is that going to cripple you with
team building? That's very speculative. I personally think kill age
pretty well, very high IQ, good shooter. But worst case,
I'm willing to take that risk when the alternative is
(19:19):
taking a step back in the here and now, which
I feel pretty confident the Rockets would do if they
tried to run it back as is, But without Fred Nfleet,
there's way too much to lose when you look at
what would likely happen in the standing SEXU year, the
Rockets taking a step back, and the consequences of what
that means for the development of the young players, what
(19:39):
that means for the desirability of the franchise around the league.
On the trade market with free agents. I would not
want to take that gamble. There's no perfect path, there
really is. And so yeah, there's some risk of is
Fred going to be a positive trade asset on the
third year of the deal, But I would rather risk
(20:01):
that than just letting Fred go and having a worse
team next season. Or you can have seen some say, well,
could you just pick up the option and let him
go a year from now and hope that by twenty
six Reed Shepherd or Jalen Green or a Men Thompson
or some combination or able to fully take the reins.
(20:21):
I guess. But the thing is, if you keep Fred
at the same annual value that he was at last year,
Andrew bring back Steven Adams, which we saw in the
playoffs how valuable he is, and you're giving these big
raises to Shinghoun and Jalen Green, You're talking about being
well into the luxury tax this year, above the first
(20:43):
apron in all likelihood. And so that has consequences not
just to you know, how many yachts Tilman for Tita
can buy. No, it has consequences to team building under
the new collective bargaining agreement. It has consequences to what
rafel Stone can do now, especially into the future with
putting together a roster. So the Rockets want to be
(21:05):
careful with when that clock starts because I'm not going
to get into the weeds here, but the more consecutive
years that teams are above these thresholds, the more strict
some of these consequences can be. I don't think the
Rockets want to start the clock this season to the
(21:27):
extent that it would start if you are picking up
Fred's option and going well above first apron territory. That
would have its own consequences that I don't think are
acceptable or the Rockets don't want to accept them, at
least to me, the smarter play is to lower that
average annual value, use the savings for Steven Adams, We'll
(21:50):
get to him in a minute, and then take the
risk of exactly how Fred's going to age and what's
the value of that deal going to be. If you
do get trade in three years from now, we can
worry about that two three years from now. To me,
that is the safest bet to make relative to the
other scenarios of letting them walk all together or just
(22:13):
picking up the option and having a super bloated payroll
to keep everything together based on how the Rockets finished
last season, to be looking at the three possibilities here,
negotiating a longer term deal moderately lower annual value relative
to the last couple of years, that's the path that
makes sense for the Rockets. That's why writers like Sam
(22:35):
Vassini have been throwing out something in the three from
ninety to three for one hundred range as being realistic.
When you look at the team option, which is the
floor scenario projecting what his market would be a year
from now, the bear market, the bull market. Something in
the nineties is the median. That's where you know, both
(22:55):
sides risk a little bit, but they also get some certainty.
And maybe the Rockets can negotiate fred a little closer
in the ninety saying hey, this gives you a bit
more insurance in case you go out and God forbid
tarn Achilles or something like that. But generally speaking, if
it's closer to a hundred, I wouldn't you know, I
wouldn't feel terrible anything in the ninety two hundred range
(23:17):
to me when you look at the market, when you
look at the team option and the options, the Rockets
have and don't have if Fred wasn't around, I think
that's a reasonable deal and that's ultimately what I think happens,
and I do expect Fred to be back. As stated
any win now scenario, if you want to go down
the road of pursuing Kevin Durant, the Rockets feel like
(23:37):
Fred Benfleet needs to be on the roster in any
of those scenarios because they still need him that much
to win at a high level in the short term. So,
if you want this team to play competitive basketball, if
you believe that playing in high stakes games is good
for the development of young guys like him in Thompson,
like all for echin Goon, which I firmly do, you
probably need Fred Benfleet around. The Rockets want him around.
(23:58):
He's a great leader, he's love throughout the building. I
expect them to be back, and that's why I think
a three year ninety million up to three year one
hundred million, that's the sweet spot for a deal, and
ultimately I think it gets done around that price now.
As far as other guys, Steven Adams, using that Sambasini
(24:21):
podcast as a template, he throughout three years forty two
to forty five million. I think that makes perfect sense.
It's basically the non taxpayer Emily at thirty one years
old and coming off serious knee surgery less than two
years ago. I don't think even if the impact stats
love him, which they do, I don't see a team
with kaproom like the Brooklyn Nets being willing to pay
(24:43):
twenty five at thirty million dollars a year in average
annual value. I also don't think it makes sense for
Steven at this stage of his career to go to
a non competitive team. Most teams around the league have
access to the non taxpayer Emily, not all, but enough
to where at least one or two I think would
be willing to go spend it on Steven. And he
made twelve point six million dollars last year, so getting
(25:04):
a slight raise and access to the MLE which is
probably the full Emlie, that's probably his market to begin with.
It also happens to be in the same ballpark as
what you're likely to save if you give Fred van
Fleet the deal that I was talking about, take him
down from forty four point nine million next year to
something in the low thirties, and so I think something
(25:28):
for two or three years at non tax for mL
money about fifteen million dollars a year makes all the
sense in the world. And it's just going to come
down to whether Stephen wants to stay in Houston. I
personally think he does. I wouldn't roll out the possibility
of him leaving simply because, look, we can talk about
the double big lineups, but he's not going to start
here all frind shram Goon is going to be the guy.
(25:48):
He's an All Star for a reason, and so if
some other team offers him a more clear pathway to
minutes and the opportunity to start and not just be
used situationally as a double big, but to actually be
the primary guy at center, because we know, in a
perfect role, the double big is just another club in
the bag. I don't think the Rockets will or should
use it quite to the extent they did in the
(26:09):
playoffs this year, as talked about in recent pods. I
think that was more out of desperation. If some other
team offered him a bigger role, or he just wants
to be another market for one reason or another, then
say thank you, and I guess you pivot to back
up plans, most so to Bluebrook Lopez according to the
reporting that we've seen to date. But if that's the case,
it wouldn't be about money because the types of suitors
(26:31):
that make sense for Steven, it's not like they'd have
more money than that mL. And I also don't think
if you're the Rocket shoot they expect him to take
a pay cut, especially coming off that great playoff run.
I think a slight increase in pay, something in the
range of fourteen to fifteen million dollars a year makes
all the sense in the world. Hopefully Steven wants it,
(26:51):
and if he doesn't, you wish him well and you
go on down the list. Personally, I expect him to
stay and it works out well because in terms of
the total payroll considerations, again, you'll be in the same
ballpark of what you're saving with Freven Fleet, assuming you
extend him, and so the payroll will be going up
a little bit between the Shingoon and Jalen extensions the
(27:13):
big pay increases they get, but you can offset that
a little bit by the combined value of Fred and
Steven being a little less than it was this past season.
So I think financially there's not a lot to say
with Steven. His market is pretty evident, and it's not
like the Rockets are going to be outbid. They have
bird rights. It's just a matter of where he wants
(27:33):
to be. I think that's Houston, but time will tell.
We'll see later this month, and then the other internal
free agents. As we wrap up this mini pod, it's
going to come down to roster composition. I think, you know,
the Rockets like having Jeff Green, Jacques Landale, Jay, Sean Tate,
Aaron Holliday, guys or that accomplished at like the let's
(27:53):
say nine through thirteen spots on their bench. It provides
a really good insurance policy to email you and if
guys get hurt, which is inevitable over eighty two games,
it's really useful. But this is a team that's going
to be more expensive, and that's if they just stay
the course. They could get even more expensive if they
make a deal for someone like Kevin Durant. So with
(28:15):
the team getting more expensive and the fact that going
into the luxury tax beyond the first day form and
so on and so forth carries actual team building penalties.
It's not just whether Tilman Bertita is willing to spend
and you have two younger guys in Reach Shepherd and
Kim Wentmore, and maybe if you keep the number ten
pick a third that you want to give more minutes to. Anyway,
(28:36):
it doesn't make sense to keep those veterans at all costs,
even if they're good on the practice s court, even
if they're good in the locker room, because salaries are
going up for the team as a whole, and because
the CBA has team building penalties for teams that are
too expensive. They're a good insurance policy, but they're not
so essential that you would keep them no matter what,
(28:58):
especially with the other young guys the rock want to
give more minutes to as is, so I think the
Rockets will explore bringing those guys back. Green and Tate
will be unrestricted free agents Landale and Aaron Hollo. They
have team options at basically eight million and five million, respectively.
It could be a scenario where the Rockets ask all
of these guys to take minimum deals, and if they're
(29:20):
not willing to do so, or if they get better
offers elsewhere, they wish them well. I hope that's not
the case, but it very well could be, especially if
the Rockets are fortunate enough to keep both Fred and
Stephen and or make a splash trade of significance, bring
in say a Kevin Durant someone like that. Then yeah,
as the team gets more expensive, which it would be
(29:43):
simply staying the course based on assuming you're able to
keep Fred and Stephen and then the raises to Shingoon
and Jalen and then external free agency or trade editions.
At some point, something's going to have to give, and
the Rockets are going to be much more willing to
give at the spots deep on their bench ten eleven, well,
guys that aren't going to be playing in the playoffs,
(30:05):
assuming all goes well in you don't have any major
injuries next season. In a perfect world, you'd keep all
those guys there. But those are acceptable losses. And so
that's why I think I won't say for sure that
they would have to take minimums. Some of it's going
to depend on do the Rockets make a big trade
or free agency signing. Are they fortunate enough to bring
(30:25):
back both Fred and Steven. There's some scenarios where maybe
they have a little more wiggle room and can go
above the minimum, especially for Aaron Holliday whose team option
is like four point nine million. Maybe that's doable, but
I think they're going to have to draw some hard
lines in the sand. And so if they're not willing
to let Fred or Steven go, which for the reasons
(30:46):
I outlined earlier in the spot, I don't think they are,
then it's further down the bench. That's where the harsh
decisions are going to have to be made, so that
the Rockets aren't deep into the luxury tax and starting
the clock early, because we know this team's going to
get more expense in the coming years as guys like
Jabari Smith and Terry Eason are due for contract extensions,
and men Thompson and Cam went Moore the year after that,
(31:07):
and so on and so forth. As the young core develops,
they're going to get more expensive. Our decisions are going
to have to be made. That's the collective bargaining agreement.
Jeff Green and Jay shrin Tape were both making about
eight million or slightly under that. In Tate's case last
year holiday was it five million or maybe four and
a half. Jack Landill was at eight million. I hope
they take pay cuts, but if they aren't, if other
(31:27):
teams are willing to pay him more, you know it sucks,
but you may just have to wish them well and
try and replace them cost efficiently. That's the new reality
of the NBA as I see it, and I'll wind
down the pod here. Fred and Stephen are the priorities.
I think it's fairly clear what the markets will be
with Fred. I think it's very likely a deal gets
done with Steven. I think it's reasonably likely, although I
(31:49):
wouldn't say it quite with the confidence that I do Fred,
simply because a Stephen will be an unrestricted free agent
and b Unlike Fred, there's not a clear starting role
here in Houston, so there's at least a possibility that
he might have wandering eyes and look for a situation
that's a little bit better that allows him to fully
(32:09):
unleash his skill set and play to the biggest role possible.
With Fred, the Rockets obviously have the team option that
can prevent him from becoming an unrestricted free agent, and
he's running the show here, he's the floor general, he's
sticking around. I think that's likely to happen. I think, well,
I think that's basically a lot to happen. I think
Steven is likely to happen but not a lot, and
(32:30):
then the guys through the end of the bench to
be determined. I think the Rockets will welcome them back,
but most will likely need to take pay cuts, and
the extent of the pay cuts will likely depend on
exactly what happens with Fred and Steven, as well as
any other free agents and trades the Rockets theoretically bring in.
Do they keep to number ten pick because that has
a little bit of a salary that the companies that
on the rookie scale deal and so on and so forth.
(32:50):
Stay tuned. Anyway, That'll do it for today and until
our next show, which I think will be more draft based.
Unless there's some breaking news need to react to, but
that's something there's not, then try and do some draft
talk in the coming days. This was sort of my
look at the internal options. A lot of our recent
pods have been looking externally. This is internally what the
numbers are likely to be for guys like Fred and
(33:12):
Steven and other pending free agents from the Rockets, especially
because once the NBA Finals conclude, which could be as
soon as this weekend, the Rockets will be able to
negotiate with those guys. Officially now unofficially. I'm sure there's
been some at least parameters tossed out, but of officially
once the NBA Finals end, which could be as soon
as well, I guess because it has to go five games,
(33:32):
so I guess that the soonest would be next Monday.
But point is it could be within the next week
that the window officially opens and deals could actually be reached.
Stay tuned anyway until our next show. This is where
we'll break and if you go out more content between
now and then, the best place to get it is
on social media. I am on Blue Sky at Bean Doubo's.
The show is on Twitter, slash x at the logger line,
(33:53):
and you can also if you have not already, please
subscribe leave a positive review at your podcast homework choice, Apple, Google, Spotify.
Positive rating subscriptions that's what we can keep looking good
to sponsors and friends of the program. Carbuck Proge Sports
Talk seven ninety USA Today's Rockets Wire and keep this
podcast running is one of the most active ones covering
Houston Rockets basketball. Also for daily coverage of the Rockets,
(34:15):
please read USA Today's Rockets Wire, Rocketshire dot USA today
dot com. I'm the editor and so I've got post
multiple ones every day talking about the upcoming off season,
the draft process, what's the latest going on with your rockets.
Just hit up Rocketswire dot USA, Today dot Com read
my coverage. I would certainly appreciate that. All right, with
those plays complete, I will adjourn it here. As always,
(34:36):
I appreciate you folks so much for listening, and please
come back soon for more new episodes.
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