Tag: Mike D’Antoni

Why the Rockets have a decision to make this week on Ben McLemore

For both basketball and contractual reasons, the Houston Rockets may need to make a decision this week about Ben McLemore’s future.

Last week, the Houston Rockets waived Ryan Anderson just days before his salary was set to pass his partial guarantee of $500,000.

In addition to freeing up a roster spot, the transaction limited the amount of future money and potential luxury tax payments that might have had to be made for a player who did not figure into the team’s longer-term plans. Payments up to the $500,000 guarantee were essentially a sunk cost once Anderson made the opening-day roster, but anything beyond that total needed to make sense on the merits of his on-court play.

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By Sunday, they could have a similar decision to make with regards to 26-year-old swingman Ben McLemore, who is poised to exceed the $500,000 partial guarantee in his contract on Dec. 1, 2019.

It’s certainly not as easy of a decision with McLemore as it was with Anderson. After all, the veteran forward never cracked the team’s rotation and only played in two games this season.

McLemore, on the other hand, has played in all 17 games for the Rockets (11-6) this season, and his minutes per game jumped from 7.3 in October to 24.2 in November. He even started four games at small forward when usual starter Danuel House Jr. was out due to injury. Both head coach Mike D’Antoni and superstar guard James Harden have praised McLemore at various points this season.

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The issue for McLemore, however, is that his primary role — at least in theory — is a fairly replaceable one. In effect, he’s supposed to be the bench shooter for Houston in place of Gerald Green, who is lost for the 2019-20 season with a broken foot.

But despite getting numerous open looks off the attention drawn by Harden and Russell Westbrook, McLemore is shooting just 29.6% from three-point range on the season on 5.8 three-pointers per game. With 98 total attempts, that’s not an insignificant sample size, and it’s hard to justify significant minutes at that level for a team as dependent on three-pointers as D’Antoni’s Rockets. In his last four games, McLemore has had two games of 0-of-5 and 0-of-6 from three-point range.

By contrast, Green connected on 36.0% of his three-pointers over the last two seasons with the Rockets.

Internally, D’Antoni could consider giving some of McLemore’s time to young prospects Chris Clemons or Gary Clark — though neither would be a drop-in replacement for McLemore’s usual wing minutes. At 5-foot-9, Clemons is a half-foot shorter, while the 6-foot-6 Clark has primarily played in the NBA at power forward and even as a stretch center.

The simplest change could be an external signing, where several proven veteran wings are available. Keep in mind, there is precedent for D’Antoni’s Rockets to make such a change on the fly, given the in-season signings of Green two years ago and House and Austin Rivers last season.

After last Friday’s loss in Los Angeles, The Athletic‘s Kelly Iko wrote that the Rockets were not yet considering such a move.

Concerning the injuries to Houston’s snipers, Rockets fans have pointed to the free-agent pool of shooters like J.R. Smith, Jamal Crawford, and Nick Young — names I brought up in conversation — but there’s no sense of desperation to go that route. Internally, they believe the contributions of Ben McLemore and even calling up players like Gary Clark can hold them above water while Eric Gordon and Danuel House return to the fold.

But things can change quickly in the NBA. McLemore went 0-for-6 from long range in Sunday’s loss to the Mavs, which puts the Rockets on their longest losing streak of the year at three games.

Since Gordon isn’t expected back until late December, there could be a sense of urgency to do something sooner. With Harden on a historic scoring binge, teams are double-teaming him more frequently than ever, which makes it imperative that other players on the court with him take advantage of the resulting open shots and four-on-three situations.

Moreover, from a logistics perspective, this week could be an ideal opportunity to consider changes. In addition to Sunday being a key inflection point with McLemore’s contract, the Rockets are in Houston all week and have just one game (Wednesday versus Miami) between Sunday’s loss to Dallas and Saturday’s game versus Atlanta.

That means ample practice time for the Rockets, and an opportunity for D’Antoni to tweak his rotation, should he and the team deem it necessary.

To be clear, the Rockets wouldn’t have to release McLemore to change their rotation. They already have an open roster spot after waiving Anderson, and there’s also the option of replacing his minutes internally with the likes of Clemons or Clark. But if Houston deems McLemore unworthy of rotation minutes, it may not be not worth having him occupy a roster spot and the potential luxury-tax payments on it down the line.

After all, the Rockets already have the NBA’s third-highest payroll for the 2019-20 season, and owner Tilman Fertitta hasn’t yet shown a willingness in his tenure to spend deep into the luxury tax.

The one exception could be if the Rockets felt they needed McLemore as salary filler for a potential in-season trade, since any new signing — unlike McLemore, who was signed in the offseason — could not be aggregated for trade purposes for 60 days.

There’s also the option, of course, that they continue using McLemore in the same role they have for weeks. It’s not as if there isn’t a case for it. Even with the losing streak, Houston’s current stretch of eight wins in 11 games would be good for a 60-win pace over a full season. In that run, McLemore has averaged nearly 25 minutes per game.

Despite his shooting struggles and occasional defensive issues — at 6-foot-3, he’s quite undersized relative to most small forwards — McLemore still grades out favorably by many metrics. For example, though he shot 0-of-6 in Sunday’s loss, his +4 in the plus/minus category during his 21 minutes was the only positive of any player in D’Antoni’s rotation.

For the season as a whole, McLemore’s defensive rating of 103.9 and overall net rating of 10.9 are both the best of any Rockets rotation player. However, those numbers would appear to fly in the face of both the percentages and the eye test. That’s the dilemma for D’Antoni and GM Daryl Morey as they try and assess his true value to the team.

As of Monday, it’s unclear what the final verdict will be. But the Rockets are home in Houston all week, with a stretch of four off days in five days. There’s a clear sense of urgency to turn things around after three straight losses, and they’re well aware that Sunday is a critical inflection point, as it pertains to McLemore’s contract. That makes this subject one to monitor closely as the week progresses.

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