Report: Rockets Still Shopping Nets' Picks After Attempted Trade

Brooklyn declined to get their picks back from the Houston and they will continue to shop around the picks they received from the Nets in 2021.

Other than the Mikal Bridges to Houston for Jalen Green rumors that fell through before the trade deadline, something else was being negotiated between Brooklyn and the Rockets.

According to Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle, the Rockets wanted to exchange the Nets' first-round picks (2024, 2026, swaps in 2025 and 2027) from the blockbuster James Harden trade in 2021 for the Phoenix Suns' future unprotected selections (2025, 2027, 2029) at the deadline.

Feigen said: "the Rockets have moved to a stage of rebuilding that they are more interested in increasing their stockpile of future picks than in adding another young prospect to the current roster. This has been an ongoing effort for several months that is expected to be revisited in the six weeks leading up to the June 26 draft, a person with knowledge of the Rockets’ thinking said. This was the subject of the Rockets’ call to the Nets in January when general manager Rafael Stone sought to offer the Nets’ picks back to Brooklyn general manager Sean Marks in exchange for the draft picks from the Phoenix Suns that the Nets hold."

In essence, the Nets may have bet against themselves in a separate trade of just picks instead of taking a chance on the Suns getting ran out the west.

That would be quite the wager given that Brooklyn went 32–50 this season and don't have a Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal like the Suns. Even so, it seems that Nets GM Sean Marks wasn't prepared to commit to this earlier in the year. Maybe betting against the Suns in a wild Western Conference was worth it. We still have to wait to find out.

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