00:01Did the Rockets point guard situation just get worse over the weekend?
00:06We'll get to that here on The Drive.
00:08I'm Luke Morgan, alongside Clint Sterner, T-Mill on the 1s and 2s.
00:12You can join the conversation anytime on the text line 713-572-4610
00:18or also on the YouTube and Twitch chats as well.
00:24You know, we know last year that was a big problem for the Rockets,
00:26lack of point guard, and a lot of Rockets fans are waiting to see
00:31what's going to be done this offseason with most people kind of just resting their hat
00:35on the idea that, well, Fred VanVleet, he'll be back.
00:38He'll be healthy this year.
00:40Maybe that's not the case.
00:41Luke, Luke, I know you're on a roll right there.
00:44I don't mean to interrupt you.
00:45But, I mean, this is, I mean, I can't tell you how many times we have been,
00:52I mean, just, I mean, because we're pretty critical of the Rockets, right?
00:55I mean, who wasn't?
00:56I mean, who in this area, who that covers the Rockets in Houston
01:00weren't critical of the team and the stretch and the young core
01:05that didn't develop along the way?
01:07And every, it seemed like every single response was,
01:11guys, they don't have Fred VanVleet.
01:13Guys, they don't have a point guard.
01:14Guys, Fred VanVleet's going to come back.
01:17This is just an, has to be an absolute, I mean, knockout punch
01:21to that part of the Rockets fan base that just believes
01:24that Fred VanVleet would have changed everything.
01:26Yeah.
01:27Yeah, that's all.
01:27Everything will be fixed once VanVleet comes back.
01:29Well, now we don't even know if he'll, with and when,
01:32what he'll be like when he comes back.
01:34In case you're unfamiliar with what exactly we're talking about,
01:36let's hear from the man himself.
01:38Here was Fred VanVleet on his podcast that he does with Jay Sarge, I believe.
01:42And this was VanVleet talking about that knee injury
01:44that he suffered a year ago.
01:47Dr. Lowe did it.
01:49So I was f***ed up with what probably never was disclosed
01:53was I did ACL and both meniscus.
01:55So my whole knee exploded.
01:56All right.
01:57Pow!
01:57But you're going to come back better than watch.
01:59For sure.
01:59I've been working.
02:00I've been grinding.
02:01Dr. Lowe cold.
02:03So even worse than, as he said, exploded, right?
02:05Even worse than initially reported or that we were let on
02:08to believe all year.
02:09He did opt in today to that player option, $25 million.
02:13So he is back in as a Rocket this year.
02:16Now, just for the housekeeping, it does waive his no-trade clause.
02:19So technically, he can now be traded to any team and have no say in it.
02:22If the Rockets want to try to move him,
02:24I don't know how much you could get for a 31-year-old guard
02:26coming off an exploded knee now that he put this piece of audio out there.
02:30But that remains to be seen.
02:32But, yeah, Clint, as we were already kind of getting into,
02:36for those people that were saying, like,
02:37hey, we're going to get Steven Adams back, who's injury-prone.
02:40We're going to get Fred VanVleet back, who, you know,
02:42is coming off this knee injury that's even worse than we originally thought.
02:45To think that that's going to fix everything,
02:48suddenly now a wrench has been thrown into that whole plan.
02:50And I don't know how comfortable you should feel about VanVleet
02:52being the fix-all for this offense.
02:54Well, look, I mean, as you could imagine,
02:56I was never comfortable with the thought that Fred VanVleet changes everything.
03:00Now, there's no doubt about it that, look,
03:03Fred VanVleet proved me wrong last year when he did come back last year
03:07and was, I mean, a legit problem in the playoffs.
03:11I mean, and I mean that in a good way for the Rockets.
03:13I mean, he carried them, right, when they needed him the most.
03:16And he showed that he was a former champion
03:18and that he could do some of those things.
03:20And, look, I am a floor general guy.
03:22I just – I don't believe that you can win at an extremely high –
03:29even when you have great, great pieces,
03:32it's hard to win the big run if you don't have a guy like a Jalen Brunson
03:38who not only is your leader, he's your floor general.
03:41Now, it helps that he can go put up 40 in a championship finals winning game.
03:46But, like, if you don't have that floor general, it's hard.
03:50You better be really, really good in the other places.
03:52So, I'm a believer in the floor general.
03:54I've been proven wrong, and I've come around to the Fred Van Vliet line of thinking
03:59that he is actually a critical piece to this thing.
04:04But I never could, Luke, in his absence, get to a point where I'll watch the Rockets
04:08and go, yeah, you put Fred Van Vliet on his team right here,
04:11and it changes the whole game, right?
04:13One, you put Fred Van Vliet on the floor, you've got to pull somebody off of it, right?
04:17And that is a big, big change.
04:21You put Fred Van Vliet on the floor, that's not going to make Amin Thompson
04:24all of a sudden shoot the ball better, right?
04:26You take the ball out of his hands and give him fewer times to get downhill
04:31and get to the rim, how does Amin Thompson respond to that piece of it, right?
04:38So, I don't know that Fred Van Vliet was necessarily going to, he was going to make things better,
04:42but I don't know that he was going to fix all of the Rockets' problems any way you slice it.
04:46Now, you sit here and you go, boy, he self-admittedly just blew his knee up.
04:52You wonder if he is coming back, and if he does, what does he look like when he does come
04:57back at that age?
04:58Yeah, certainly.
04:59And if he is not 100% or isn't back at the beginning of the season or misses a large
05:04amount of the season,
05:05then, yeah, we're having these same issues and conversation this past year if this team needs a point guard.
05:11And there are reports and rumors that they are, the Rockets are the favorite to go get Marcus Smart,
05:16so that would help as like a replacement if needed for Fred Van Vliet.
05:21He's somewhat similar in some ways to Van Vliet, but it's still not...
05:26I need some help getting there, by the way.
05:28To Marcus Smart?
05:29I mean, I'm not, look, I'm a casual NBA fan.
05:33I heard this conversation on In the Loop, and I think I lean more towards J-Lo's response.
05:38Like, he, I mean, he adds to your shooting problems.
05:42I know he got hot in the playoffs, and I was, even the casual fan that I am, was like,
05:50damn, that's impressive.
05:51But I don't watch Marcus Smart and go, yeah, that's your answer to your guard, your point guard problems.
05:58I agree.
05:59Can he help you on the defensive end of the floor?
06:01Can, can, now, I'll say this, you know, I do think he fits Udoka.
06:06I do think he is a guy that is a little bit more of a, a raw, physical, get-in
06:12-your-face type of guy.
06:14I do think that the, the veteran dog, if you will, I think, helps these young guys play, you know,
06:21play the game a little different.
06:22Kind of like we saw Dylan Brooks do it.
06:24Right.
06:24Previously.
06:25So, I, I don't know that, that I necessarily am against, I know I'm not.
06:31I'd love to have Marcus Smart on our team.
06:33I'd love to have him as a rocket.
06:34I, I can't in any way, shape, or form wrap my head around how, how in any, any way, shape,
06:42or form that could be in the place of a Fred Van Vliet or in the place of a, a
06:49point.
06:49That, that's not a, that's not a championship caliber move, is it?
06:53No, I don't think so.
06:53That's not, that's not even a, a, a, you're a playoff team a couple of years, get you to the
06:58next step type of move, is it?
06:59No, I don't think so.
07:00He, he's, he would be another one of those role players.
07:02Honestly, the only way I think it could be a big move for the Rockets, quote unquote big, is if
07:06he is coming in as some sort of Van Vliet replacement.
07:10But otherwise, if you're going to try to play him alongside Fred Van Vliet or some of the other guards
07:14they have, he's, he's not a shooter.
07:17He doesn't help your shooting or spacing, which were the two biggest problems.
07:20He'll help with the ball handling, sure.
07:21But the biggest issues for this offense, as we've been talking about really beyond the year, has been having that
07:27outside shooting and then having proper spacing for Durant and even Shen Goon in the middle of the floor.
07:32And he wouldn't help either of those two things.
07:34Well, they've got, they've got to get somebody that can, that can, it's the ripple effect, right?
07:39If you, if you get somebody that can bring the ball down the floor, then you have the chance to,
07:43for some spacing.
07:44Then you have the chance to, to build the, the lineup or the offense, whatever, whatever it's going to be
07:48under Udoka.
07:49You can expect some of those things.
07:51Like you, you can't expect, you, you can't, you literally cannot have Shingun and I'm in Thompson bringing the ball
07:57up the floor half the time and expect to have good spacing.
08:00Neither one of those guys are a threat from outside.
08:03Hell, they're not even a threat from mid-range, just to be honest.
08:05I mean, that, that, that is like that, that just doesn't, that just doesn't process.
08:10That doesn't, that doesn't compute.
08:11You know what I mean?
08:12That don't, that don't add up.
08:13So they got it.
08:14They got to have a better solution than that.
08:15I just, for me, where the Rockets are right now being, you know, obviously having Kevin Durant at the end
08:21of his career and being a playoff caliber team already.
08:23I just, if you're not going to make a move, that's really going to move the needle.
08:26Hey man, just start.
08:30And we might dive more into that a little bit later on.
08:33Cause I don't know if there is that move to be made this off season to move the needle.
08:36And they do have those draft picks a year from now.
08:39That might be what you look forward to.
08:41If you're the Rockets.
08:41I do want to get to this though, before we have to hit the break here at the top of
08:44the hour is, uh, I get Fred Van Vliet and his angle where if you think back to this past
08:50year, he was talking about trying to return by the end of the season and the playoffs.
08:56And then I believe there's another clip from that podcast that, that, that we don't have, but that I heard
09:00where he was saying like, oh yeah, no, there was no chance.
09:02I was going to come back and play last year.
09:04You know, the injury was too bad.
09:06I wasn't close.
09:07I get Van Vliet's angle of trying to do that.
09:09So like, you know, the Rockets wouldn't try to move him or whatnot.
09:12I don't know.
09:13I could see his side, but the Rockets, if you recall, the Rockets were also kind of selling this angle.
09:17And did not do anything at the deadline to bring in another point guard at times selling us on this
09:24idea of like, oh, well, we're hoping Fred Van Vliet's going to be back for the playoffs.
09:28And then the first time Ime Adoka said publicly that, oh, actually, you know what?
09:32Fred Van Vliet's probably not going to return this year was at the start of March, just weeks after the
09:36deadline passed.
09:37I almost feel like we were all conned in this last year because the Rockets didn't want to make a
09:42move for a point guard and instead sold this idea of like, hey, Fred Van Vliet might return this year.
09:47We're going to hold out hope for him when now fast forward to this past weekend and Fred saying like,
09:52oh, no, my knee exploded.
09:53Like, there was no way I could play last year.
09:55I feel like us as Rockets fans, we got conned into this idea just so the Rockets wouldn't have to
10:00make a move last year.
10:01Yeah, quiet down, y'all, right?
10:02That's the deal.
10:03Just what can we do to keep them quiet?
10:05Well, our point guard's out and offensively we have, we don't have a polo on any level of an advantage,
10:11but everybody calm down.
10:13We got Fred Van Vliet may come back and may, that's why we didn't make the move.
10:17And that's why we're doing what we're doing offensively is because you plug Fred Van Vliet back in and all
10:22of a sudden this thing has a chance.
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