No. 3 Pick Reed Sheppard Could Step Into Rockets Rotation 'From Day One'

Host of the "Locked On Rockets" podcast Jackson Gatlin joins Next Up to review the first round of the NBA Draft where the Houston Rockets drafted Reed Sheppard, a guard from the University of Kentucky, with the No. 3 overall pick. "He can get it done anywhere" on the floor and has the ability to "step into the Rockets' rotation...from day one," Gatlin said. The Rockets have extended the young core on their roster after drafting Amen Thompson fourth last year, Jabari Smith Jr. third in 2022 and Jalen Green second in 2021. Head coach Ime Udoka is "going to give the minutes to the best players" regardless of how they entered the league. The second round of the NBA Draft starts Thursday, and the Rockets have the No. 44 pick. Gatlin also breaks down the pick-swap trade between the Rockets and the Brooklyn Nets. The Rockets, who currently have a lot of young talent, traded for future picks and "get to push those assets a little further out."

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Round one has come and gone.Last night, we now know that Reach
Shepherd out of Kentucky, the shootingguard slash point Gune is coming here to
H town, and I believe Jacksonas we welcome you in Jackson Gatlin Locked
on Rockets Pod, Locked on NBApod as well, courtesy of the Locked
on family. Gord is a partof that. From an sec standpoint,

(00:22):
Jackson good more. Only I don'tunderstand how anybody could take issue. I
believe Reed Shepherd should be welcome withopen arms. What say you? Yeah?
I mean, I think the biggestknock that you look at when people
try to say that they're upset withthe pick about Reed Shepherd is Yeah,
he's maybe a little bit undersized,maybe not the most athletic, but those

(00:46):
are really the only two knocks thatyou can call when you look at his
game, right. I mean,he's a lights out shooter, show well
beyond fifty percent from the three pointline, and he can shoot from all
over the floor. He's more orless a three level score. He can
get it on anywhere. He's agreat playmaker, he's a solid defender.
I really don't understand why people areupset about this pick. I think the

(01:07):
biggest issue is there were some thatreally felt like the Rockets needed, you
know, I guess a true rimprotector or a big man. There were
some people that felt like Dominan Klingtonshould have been the pick, and when
he was on the board with ReedShepherd, there were some people that were
clamoring for him to be his selection. But Reed shepperd addresses the biggest need
for this Rocket team deal like theAchilles heel for this team, which was

(01:30):
their clear lack of shooting from thispast season. So being able to pick
up a prospect that is the bestshooting prospect in the draft is an absolute
slam dunk home run. Jack Soon. I know you had a chance to
ask for Felstone last night about youknow, there was reports that they were
interested in, you know, perhapsin Donovan Klingon. How shocked were you
when he said no. It wasbasically our board was Reed Shepherd and everybody

(01:53):
else, and if he hadn't beenthere, that was it. Like I've
never heard rafel be that outspoken aboutone player before and basically tell us so
if he wasn't there, we weregoing to either trade back or trade out
of the draft all together. Yeah, I mean a very candid answer from
ravel Stone. I don't know howtrue that answer really would have been if
if re Jepherd hadn't been there.What I do take from it, though,

(02:15):
Gordy, is I think I thinkStone and the Rockets front office kind
of learned their lesson after getting burnedspectacularly burned a couple of years ago in
the Palo Bancaro draft where they ultimatelywound up with Jabaris m Junior. Look,
they were not shy about their interestin Palo Bancaro a couple of years

(02:35):
ago, right They basically all signspointed towards the Rockets being incredibly excited about
getting ban Caro at three. Andthen suddenly things started shifting right at the
last minute, and the Orlando Magicswooped it, you know, just swung
in and took ban Cao number oneoverall, and the Rockets were left with
jabarism Junior, which I still thinkwas, you know, a great pickup.

(02:57):
But obviously the Rockets were really excitedabout bringing ban Caro to Houston,
trying to pair him up with JalenGreen, and that didn't work out.
So I think they kind of learnedtheir lesson from then and this time around.
I mean, you saw we hadAdrian wol Sharowski, we had Kelly
Eco, we had you know,other reporters, you know, all being
kind of given this idea, thisinformation that donv and Klingen was the leading

(03:21):
contender of the front runner for theRockets. Now, that may have been
strategic in trying to drive up thevalue of that third overall pick to potentially
trade it if a really, reallygood offer came through. But it seems
like they basically just did a giganticsmoke screenplay to not drive up the you
know, the value or the UI guess, the desire of other teams

(03:44):
to pursue Reed Shepherd. And itworked out. They got their guy,
Jack and Gallen locked on Rocket Spot, joining Fleet and Gordon here on next
up talking Reed Shepherd, Don ofKentucky, the newly acquired third overall pick,
joining a cast of other young guysthe other some other pushback and I
think there's a ton of positives aboutReid, and we've highlighted some and I

(04:04):
want to do that throughout the courseof the show. Some people have asked,
and I got into a pretty heateddebate to wrap up the Draft show
last night with one Adam J.Wexler as well as ros Viria of Sports
Talk seven ninety minutes, Production andminutes. What do you think would classify

(04:25):
as a productive rookie season for ReedShepherd given the folks that are coming back
like Tari that are healthy, Alpiwill be healthy, and where the state
of the roster will be as theforecast looks right now. Yeah, Well,
first off, I think, youknow, regardless of who they had
taken, whether it was Read,whether it was somebody else. With that

(04:46):
third overall pick, I think thatthe goal for the Rockets organization is going
to be to slow play the developmentwhoever of whoever they take. Right It's
not like they're they're drafting Read toimmediately be thrown into the deepen and get,
you know, fifteen twenty twenty fiveminutes a night. It's very different
than it has been in previous yearsfor guys like Jalen or Jabbari who were

(05:09):
immediately able to go in and getthirty plus minutes a night of developmental runway.
That being said, I do thinkReid has a skill set where he's
going to be able to probably dayone step into the Rockets rotation and be
a difference maker, even if it'sjust you know, ten twelve minutes a
night backing up Fred Van's lead.I do think that this kind of points

(05:30):
to a few different signs. Onethey needed a tertiary ball hands, or
they needed somebody outside of Fred VanVliet and Jalen Green to be able to
handle the basketball and take on someplaymaking responsibilities and duties. I doubt that
they bring back Aaron Holliday now thatthey have Reed Shepherd in the lineup.
And the biggest part of this isEmo Odoka treats things as a meritocracy,

(05:53):
right like he's going to give theminutes the best players. He doesn't care
where you were drafts. He doesn'tcare whether you were signed as a free
agent, whether you were a topdraft selection, whether you're a fringe NBA
you know, journeyman. If you'rethe best guy that he thinks gives you
the best chance to win a game, you're going to get those minutes.
We saw a Man Thompson break intothe rotation. We saw Cam Whitmore break

(06:14):
into the rotation last season, soI fully expect reach Ever to be given
a fair chance to break into theRockets rotation, and they've got a really
strong ten men rotation now with himadded to the mix. It is interesting,
Jackson. You know those rumors werebanding about yesterday about all the different
you know, trade scenarios they couldmake, you know, people saying,
oh, they're going big game hunting, they want to go get a big

(06:36):
piece. And I do think thereis a little battle between do we go
get you know, that big starthat's going to elevate us versus, Hey,
what's wrong with keeping on this pathof building the young core, building
around them and you know them continueto grow with one another. You know
where do you fall in argument?Do you stick this thing out with just
the young pieces and continue to addkind of role players around them, or

(06:59):
are they missing that big star?Go get that big Devin book or Duran
or whatever. I think when youlook at kind of the timeline of things,
it doesn't really make a ton ofsense to go all in on a
star right now. Now if youcould get your hands on a guy like
Devin Booker who does sort of matchthe timeline right He's a little bit on
the younger end of you know,those potentially available stars. Donovan Mitchell would

(07:23):
be another one of those names thatyou could kind of make an argument for.
Then I'd be somewhat interested in seeingwhat at least the deal would look
like, and it would make senseto at least kick the tires if one
of those names becomes available. Butotherwise, I think you look at the
trade that they just made with theBrooklyn Nets right sending the Net picks back,
getting their hands on the Funds picks, increasing their quantity of available assets

(07:46):
down the line, and I thinka lot of that speaks to it.
And even Rafel mentioned this last nightwhen he spoke to us after the first
round, But one of the youknow, motivating factors for doing that trade
was to push those picks further.Right. They've got an incredibly young team
right now. They don't want tobe forced to continue drafting and acquiring even
more young talent with those Brooklyn Netspicks that were you know, up next,

(08:11):
and so now they get to pushthose assets a little bit further out,
they get to diversify their assets portfolioa little bit, and I think
that that points to all signs,points to the fact that they want to
kind of run things back this nextseason and see what they have. Right
it'll be year four for Jalen Greenand Alpa and Shangoon. We know that
both of those guys are up forrookie scale extensions. I genuinely don't think

(08:35):
we're going to see the extensions happenbefore the season. I think they're going
to go into the year and theRockets are just going to be happy with
both of those guys being restricted creagents and revisiting that conversation at the end
of this next season. Uh,because they really don't know what they have
yet. They don't know if theyhave that Tier one superstar yet already under

(08:56):
their roof. And if they don't, then yeah, you know they're going
to have to have some hardcomeas.Are going to have to make the package
one or two of the young guysas well as some of that future draft
capital from the Suns or their ownpicks to make a push for a star
down the line. But it doesn'tmake sense to do that right now.
You look at how much of abloodbath the Western Conference is. And even

(09:16):
if you did make a trade andpicked up a guy like Kevin Durant or
like a Devin Booker, right now, does that make the Rockets contenders immediately.
It probably doesn't because there's a lotof competition in the Western Conference.
Man, Jackson, we'll get youhoney on this one. Rockets do have
a draft choice tonight, pick fortyfour. Who are you thinking? What

(09:37):
position? Give us something real quick, about thirty seconds or less. We
think tonight we'll bring for the Rocketsif anything, Yeah, I think I
mean Rafel basically said they're just goingto go best player available with that second
round pick. Look, if he'sthere, I would love for them to
get Jamal shed straight right right thehometown product home. I don't know if
he's going to be there when theRockets are on the board tonight, but

(09:58):
or this afternoon, I should say, but that would be my choice if
he's on the clock, all right, That is Jackson Gatland locked on Rockets
Pod, locked on NBA pod aswell. Dropping by next up hang out
with me and Gordon for a littlebit, won't you Follow Jackson Gatland on
social at J T. Gatland gA T L I N for more intail

(10:18):
on what's going on with the HoustonRockets and the rest of the league.
Jackson, I'll be monitoring, brother. Thank you for your time this morning,
always a pleasure. Guys, Thanksfor having all right there it is