Clutch City - Houston Rockets Dynasty

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Rockets Draft Picks Signed
HOUSTON, TX - All 3 draft picks by the Houston Rockets have officially been signed to the following contracts:

Skal Labissiere:
2yr/4.79M + 2 Year Team Option (5.8M)

Damian Jones:
2yr/2.47M + 2 Year Team Option (3.63M)

Jake Layman:
1yr/833K + 1 Year Team Option (1.5M)

Labissiere was a surprise pick as he was expected to go much later. He said the following in his press conference:

"It's an honor to have been drafted by the Houston Rockets at #10. The Rockets have a history of winning and I am very happy to be joining Clutch City. The Rockets have had a history of great big men and I hope to contribute to that history some day."

Big words coming from a 20 year old kid that was just drafted not long ago.

The Rockets overall had a pretty decent draft if Labissiere pans out. Their other two picks were good value picks. Labissiere could be a disaster and could be a very bad first move by Rockets GM Michael Cook. Only time will tell.

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NBA Pre-Free Agency News
With Free Agency fast approaching there is some news already. Kevin Durant has elected to re-sign with the Thunder and will hope to work out a deal soon following their loss in the Western Conference Finals.

Dwight Howard has declined his player option, no surprise here. It would have been a big mistake had he taken it as this will likely be his last contract. It is unknown still if he will look to resign with the Rockets.

LeBron James has taken his player option and will remain in Cleveland for one more year after losing in 7 games in the Eastern Conference Finals.

Al Horford has elected to re-sign with the Hawks this summer after a decent playoff push. It is unknown if the Hawks will attempt to resign him due to him being involved in trade rumors at the trade deadline.

The rest of the big name free agents are still unknown if they are re-signing or not.

Rockets Team Options + Qualifying Offers
The Rockets have taken Clint Capela's team option and has waived the right to use Ty Lawson's option, neither of these a big surprise.

The Rockets have also placed qualifying offers on both Donatas Motiejunas and Terrence Jones. If they do resign one of the two it will likely be a few days into free agency and is suspected to be Motiejunas.

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NBA Free Agency Tracker

Top 10 Free Agents
1. Andre Drummond
2. DeMar Derozan
3: Hassan Whiteside
4: Dwayne Wade
5: Dwight Howard
6: Pau Gasol
7: Dirk Nowitzki
8: Jeremy Lamb
9: Eric Gordon
10: Brandon Jennings

Free Agency Day One
Pistons Re-Sign Andre Drummond 3yr/$66.57M
Wizards Sign Pau Gasol 3yr/$59.21M
Trail Blazers Sign Hassan Whiteside 3yr/50.70M

Free Agency Day Two
Lakers Sign Dirk Nowitzki 2yr/$31.19M

Free Agency Day Three
Magic Sign DeMar Derozan 3yr/$79.89M
Heat Re-Sign Dwayne Wade 4yr/$100.09M
Rockets Sign Brandon Jennings 3yr/$21.32M
Raptors Sign Jeremy Lamb 2yr/$11.10M
Rockets Re-Sign Dwight Howard 4yr/$86.51M
Heat Sign Terrence Jones 4yr/$19.95M

Free Agency Day Four
Mavericks Sign J.R. Smith 2yr/$9.57M
Suns Sign Joakim Noah 2yr/$15.46M
Rockets Re-Sign Donatas Motiejunas 3yr/$14.83M

Free Agency Day Five
*****

Free Agency Day Six
Rockets Sign Ben McLemore 2yr/$5.66M

Free Agency Day Seven
*****

Free Agency Day Eight
Rockets Re-Sign Ty Lawson 16r/$3.74M

Rest of Free Agency
*****

NOTE: I only noted major signings and Rockets signings here.

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Summer League Action
HOUSTON, TX - Summer League has come to an end and the Houston Rockets did not make it far. Though the Summer League did give younger players a chance to sign.

Especially good in Summer League was 3rd year player Clint Capela averaging a double-double. Jake Layman also played extremely well for being a 2nd round draft pick. Damian Jones played farely well averaging double digit points but did not do good on rebounds.

However there was one dark spot on the Summer League for the Rockets. Skal Labissiere. He played awful up until the last game where he managed 20 points on 7 of 9 shooting. Out side of that he shot terribly in every game and did not do much of anything. He also averaged 3 turn overs throughout the Summer League.

Clint Capela, who was definetly the star of the Summer League for the Rockets sat down with us talking about the Summer League experience:

"Summer League is great. It gives us young guys a chance to prepare for the season before we hit camp and especially for the rookies gives them a taste of NBA basketball, they may not even play in the NBA this season but if they do this at least prepared them somewhat. Going from college and even this to the NBA is insane its a huge jump. You go from guarding average athletes to guarding world class athletes."

Elijah Nelson also commented on the teams performance in Summer League:

"Summer League is good as Clint said, it prepares our guys for camp and if they play in the NBA, it gets them ready for that too. As far as our performance goes, we do not necessarily have a very big roster of young guys a lot of our guys are veterans so of course we wont do as good as say a team like the T-Wolves, or 76ers.

I also think people read too much into Summer League games, for a lot of these guys it can be nerve wracking, they are playing in front of the biggest audience they have ever seen. Now its nothing compared to once they get to the actual NBA but you get the idea. I think we will be okay I think our young guys will do well."

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Rockets Off-Season Recap
HOUSTON, TX - Well the off-season has officially come to an end. It was less eventful than many thought for the Rockets as they failed to make any real free agent signings. They brought back Dwight, which is good, bringing back an aging star to a 20+ million dollar deal.

They brought back Ty Lawson, thats a disaster. They brought back D-MO who is still likely kind of annoyed that they tried to trade him for a late 1st round pick. These two will definetly help the mess of chemistry that the Rockets had last year.

They were able to acquire Brandon Jennings a solid playmaker who will hopefully be better than Lawson last year. They also had a pretty decent draft besides Labissiere.

Damian Jones looks like he has a lot of potential as does Jake Layman. While neither never get to All-Star caliber they could develop into decent starters at some point. Assuming Michael Cook actually keeps his draft picks and develops them instead of trading them away.

We did however save cap space, the Rockets have 9.93M in cap room and could have up to another 15mil in cap space depending if they take player options and dont resign anybody, allowing the Rockets to offer a max contract if they so decided next free agency.

Anyway lets get to the Off-Season grade:

Draft: B+
Free Agency: B-
Trades: N/A
Contracts: B
Overall: B

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Rockets Media Day
HOUSTON, TX - Rockets media day is finally here so lets just jump right in it!

James Harden on last season:

"Well, I mean obviously it didnt go as planned thats a given. We need to play better as a team this year, from day 1. We cant start slow, we need to hit the new season at a fast pace and be after the championship from day one. That is still the same goal as last year, we want to bring Houston a championship."

Harden on Chemistry:

"Last season we didnt all get to camp, and those of us who did wern't 100% prepared for camp so that really hurt us as far as chemistry goes. We got better as the season goes on but we were basically trying to run our camp as we went through the season, trying to build chemistry. This year we had everyone ready to go and the chemistry is already a hundred times better."

Dwight Howard on re-signing:

"I mean I like it here in H-Town, the fans are great the city is great I like it here. Obviously there was a lot of drama last year but it was just a bad year an off year we have to move on from it. I am happy to be here."

Elijah Nelson on getting ready for the new season and expectations:

"Well as James said we had everyone at camp and we had a really really good camp we feel really good about the chemistry and everything. Obviously coming into this position I was told about the problems last season and I feel like those problems are no longer here.

As far as expectations we want to make the playoffs and make a run. Ideally ending in a championship. Its big expectations but this team is built to win and I believe we can win with this team. We also want to get some of the young guys playing time. Guys like Montrezl Harrell and K.J. McDaniels didnt get too much playing time last year, that will be different young guys will get playing time."

Donatas Motiejunas on being traded, then sent back, then re-signed:

"Houston is my home, I have said that since I was traded. I was shocked when I got the news about the trade and delighted when I was sent back to Houston I love it here. I mean its never fun being trade but you just have to move on from it, it happened, now get over it its a business. All that matters to me is I am happy here and ready to play. I am 100% healthy and 100% ready to go."

All and all, everyone in the organization seems happy to get onto this new season and has high expectations. Hopefully its a good year.

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Rockets Fall to Thunder 112-91
HOUSTON, TX - The Houston Rockets have fallen to the OKC Thunder in their season and home opener tonight. Kevin Durant was able to post a triple double in the victory. As far as houston goes, It was really just Harden, Howard and some assists. Everyone besides the two H's shot terribly from the field. Not a good start to the season but the Thunder did make it to the Western Conference Finals last year as the 1 seed, and well the Rockets were the 11 seed.

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Rockets Defeat Kings 94-82
HOUSTON, TX - The Rockets bounced back from their loss against the Thunder in a win against the Kings. It was an all around team effort for the Rockets who had 5 players in double digit points. Skal Labissiere however did get injured and is expected to miss a few days, doubtful for Wizards.