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Report: Rockets nearly traded for Marcus Smart, Brandon Clarke in June 2019

ben dubose
·3 min read
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In 2019, then-general manager Daryl Morey said the Rockets had reached a trade agreement to acquire a first-round draft pick in the “early 20s,” but it was contingent on Houston drafting a certain player. The deal was scuttled when that player was drafted one pick earlier.

At the time, Morey did not specify the team involved or the intended target. But today, nearly three years later, we finally have confirmation courtesy of Jake Fischer of Bleacher Report. Fischer writes:

In 2019, when Jazz CEO of basketball operations Danny Ainge was still the president of basketball operations for the Boston Celtics, they held serious draft night trade discussions with the Houston Rockets about acquiring Clint Capela for Marcus Smart and the No. 22 pick, sources told B/R.

The agreed-in-principle deal ultimately fell short, but the Rockets were targeting Brandon Clarke before the Memphis Grizzlies swept in to steal the Gonzaga product at No. 21.

The deal makes financial sense, since Boston would have needed to send out a salaried veteran along with Clarke in order for the incoming salary of Capela to work under the collective bargaining agreement.

Capela then stayed with the Rockets as Houston’s starting center until a February 2020 trade sent him to Atlanta, with Robert Covington joining Houston and ushering in a brief “small ball” era. In the 2020 offseason, in what was ultimately the early stages of Houston’s current rebuild, Covington was traded to Portland for two future first-round picks.

In hindsight, it’s a fascinating hypothetical. Clarke has played well in a part-time role in Memphis over three NBA seasons, averaging 10.9 points (59.1% FG) and 5.6 rebounds in 21.9 minutes. At 6-foot-8, 215 pounds, Clarke was and is the type of athletic, undersized-but-versatile rim runner that perhaps would have made for a better frontcourt matchup than Capela versus Golden State and longtime nemesis Draymond Green.

Then again, in this hypothetical, the Rockets wouldn’t have had Covington, who shot a blistering 50.0% on 3-pointers during the 2020 Western Conference playoffs while averaging 2.5 steals per game.

Perhaps the more intriguing name in this trade is Marcus Smart, who is currently starting for the Celtics in the 2022 NBA Finals.

If the Rockets had added Smart, long respected as a locker-room leader, could that have perhaps salvaged the relationship between James Harden and Chris Paul before the ill-fated trade of Paul (and four years of future draft considerations) for Russell Westbrook a month later?

Even if not, what does adding Smart and his tenacious defense do for the 2019-20 backcourt mix? That might have made the Harden/Westbrook group a better matchup versus the Los Angeles Lakers and particulaly veteran point guard Rajon Rondo, who torched Houston in the 2020 second-round series that ultimately ended the Harden era.

There’s also this obvious question, from the other side: Would Boston be in the NBA Finals today, if Smart weren’t on the roster?

We’ll never know, of course, but it’s fun to wonder about. Add this to a long line of “what if?” hypotheticals throughout Rockets history.

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Story originally appeared on Rockets Wire