General Manager Rafael Stone Explains Rockets' Buyout Conundrum

The trade deadline came and went without the Houston Rockets making a deal. We'd heard all year about the Rockets being one of the more likely teams to be buyers on the trade market.

Houston has needed a point guard since the team's minicamp in the Bahamas, when starting floor general Fred VanVleet suffered a season-altering knee injury. They haven't filled that void, although they've tried to piecemeal his duties with Amen Thompson and Reed Sheppard.

They also developed a recent need for a big man, when Steven Adams went down with a severe ankle injury that required season-ending surgery. Any chance of getting external replacements would have to come by way of the buyout market.

If the Rockets are interested.

General Manager Rafael Stone explained Houston's conundrum on the buyout front.

"The team has been pretty successful. And our current rotation of guys all have been big contributors to our record to date.

We don't play defensively the way most other teams play. I don't know that we look at our team and we're like, 'Oh, there's somebody who is being waived by another team that's gonna come in and immediately impact us.

'But, it's my job to do all the work. We will. We'll take a hard look at the buyout market."

We'll take a hard look at the buyout market."

Stone continued.

"I don't even know what it is, yet. Alot of it is like kinda like how I don't know what teams will trade, I don't know what players are going to be bought out.

We'll be aggressive in looking at it. But generally people only wanna come if there's a role for them.

And that's a pretty high bar with us. But we'll see."

Stone stated that Houston is interested, but noted there are also players that they'd like that may not hit the market.

"I would say we're interested in it. We'll monitor it. There are definitely players that 100 percent we would bring in if they were to get bought out.

They're probably not super likely to be bought out. But you never know.

So we'll check it out."

It would seem to be easy for the Rockets to create a role for a high-quality guard or big man. It's also worth wondering which players Stone is referring to that Houston would reasonably be expecting to get bought out that aren't "super likely" to hit the market.