NBA Trade Rumors: 3 deadline deals to help the Houston Rockets clean house
By Ian Levy
The issue with trading Eric Gordon isn’t just that he’s been bad this year (he has — shooting 32.8 percent from beyond the arc), it’s also his weighty contract. Gordon has three more years and nearly $40 million remaining on his contract, although the last year is non-guaranteed which helps a little bit. In a vacuum, plenty of teams could use him and he’d look much better on a team where he didn’t need to handle so much offensive responsibility, but his salary definitely narrows the market.
The Mavericks might be one of the few teams willing to take the short-term hit in exchange for getting Luka Doncic some more shooting help on the perimeter. James Johnson’s contract is an expiring so the primary value for Houston here is cap relief but they also get a decent second-round pick and Tyler Bey who’s averaged 15.1 points and 9.2 rebounds per game as a rookie in the G League.