For $190 million, the dark horse of the West is rising! Averaging 26 points per game, Harden can't go back

The 30 teams in the NBA are nothing more than two states of survival, one is not to have the future, and strive to compete for the championship in the short term. After the free market opened this summer, the Celtics got Porzingis and Holladay to find a helper for the double probe; The Bucks gave Alphabet Brother a trade to Lillard; Without too many future assets, the Lakers quickly shot to get Hayes, Vincent, Prince and others; The Suns got Beal in exchange for Allen and Nurkic for this purpose: Teams with superstars are often reluctant to spend time developing young people. And the other is not to have the current results, go all out to train young people, the Spurs get Venbanyama, the Blazers get Henderson, including the Thunder crazy hoarding of first-round picks, the future is their battlefield. And there is a team that is moving from the latter to the former, and in just a few months, it is like being reborn in nirvana.

Let's start with the free market this summer. When the media focused on the championship team, the Rockets exposed heavy signings one after another: 3 years for $130 million to win VanVleet, the third year with the player option; 4 years for $86 million to sign Brooks; 2 years for $19.2 million to sign veteran Jeff Green; 4 years for $32 million to sign Randale, in addition to 1 year $2 million base salary to sign Aaron Holladay. Just look at the amount, the Rockets are all premium signings except for the base salary signing Holladay, but as columnist McMahon said, if the Rockets don't pay more, who wants to come here to make green leaves for young people and experience the taste of failure every night? In the draft, the Rockets took Amen Thompson and Whitmore, and the talent six began to take shape: Jaylen Green + Jabari Smith + Ethan + Shenjing + Thompson and Whitmore.

In addition, Garuba, Martin Jr., Washington and others were sent away. In the summer league, Jabari Smith and Ethan's performances were a downgrading blow, and after the new coach Uduka took office, he cared more about two things than his predecessor Silas: the team's defense and how to play team basketball. In the preseason, the Rockets first defeated the Pacers 122-103 in the first two games, if there is a certain chance of chance in this game win, and then the Rockets swept the Pelicans 120-87, which completely proved the true strength level of this Rocket: the offense is smooth as mercury, there is only one dribbling in an offensive round, and the ball is completed by four hands; The defensive end forced the Pelicans to make 18 turnovers in just two quarters, Ingram conceded goals again and again in the face of Ethan's death entanglement, and VanVleet led the charge.

Shen Jing said that we gradually adapted to the requirements of Uduka. Nash what? Uduka requires the Rockets to concede 30 points per game in a single quarter for the new season. Uduka in the preseason, the biggest change to the Rockets is to let Jaylen Green play off the ball, let Jabari Smith lead the attack, Shen Jingce should play an axis similar to Jokic, VanVleet + Brooks two, the offensive end is basically not involved with the ball, but from the defensive end to set an example. In two games, Smith made 5 of 6 three-pointers, as a 22-year leader, under the Silas system, Smith was more like a blue-collar and almost scrapped; However, in the Uduka system, the back singles have Durant's shadow, dry jumpers like Maddie, and the outside shooting rate has also increased significantly from 30% last season.

On this basis, Jaylen Green said from media day that he is willing to play no-ball in the new season, as long as the team can win. 52 points in both games, an average of 26 points per game! Uduka said: "I don't care about the result of our pre-season, but the players are working hard and I'm satisfied. Rockets management must be commended, it seems that this summer signed a lot of players at a premium, but in fact the cost is not high: VanVleet only has the first two years of salary protection, a total of $83.64 million; Jeff Green also brought the player option for the second year, and Randale's 4-year contract was only fully guaranteed for the first year, so the Rockets really spent only $190 million. In this era of hundreds of millions of contracts flying in the sky, Halliburton, Three-ball Ball and Edwards have all received super top salary contracts of up to $260 million for 5 years, and Brown has $304 million for 5 years and $186 million for 3 years.

The Rockets only used less than $200 million to cultivate 6 talented rookies point-to-point, even if 2-3 people eventually hit the top salary, the Rockets made a lot of money. The key is that rookies like Shen Jing, Ethan, and Whitmore were underestimated in the middle of the first round, Shen Jing gradually became Jokic, Ethan all-round boy, Whitmore was not in a hurry at all, only 19 years old slowly leveled, and since the preseason, Whitmore has shown vigorous physical talent, empty catch and smash buttons, and difficult stagnant levers. It's also easy to overlook when VanVleet and Brooks, the two highest-paid players, spared no effort on the defensive end, and the rest of the Rockets were doing just that. In this state, it may not be time for the Rockets to storm the top six in the West, but it is not a big problem to compete for a play-off spot in the top ten and play the Western Conference spoiler.

Harden can't go back at all. Uduka rejected Harden after taking office this summer, Harden is still yearning to join the Clippers, and neither the Clippers nor the 76ers seem to be in a hurry. Imagine a day in the future, when Harden really comes to the point where it's time to return to his roots, will the Rockets still have his place? Some media revealed that Harden said when he wanted to join the Rockets this summer that he hoped to return to the Rockets to win the scoring title, but was ruthlessly rejected by management. The back waves of the Yangtze River push the front waves, because of the talent rookies hoarded in the past three years, the Rockets Future and Harden have completely drawn a line. One thing is certain: as long as young people develop good offensive and defensive habits and produce results quickly, the Rockets are accelerating the process.