In a challenge trade unlike any in NBA history, the Houston Rockets and Oklahoma City Thunder agreed Thursday to swap future Hall of Fame point guards with massive contracts. Days after the Thunder sent Paul George to the LA Clippers following his trade request, they accommodated Westbrook's desire to be reunited with former backcourt mate James Harden in Houston.
The Rockets shed Paul's contract, which had the potential to become an albatross as he moved into his mid-30s, but sacrificed fit by replacing him with a weak shooter at point guard. Will Westbrook and Harden fit as well together as they did when Harden was a sixth man for the Thunder? Did Oklahoma City get enough value to make up the difference in the two contracts? Let's take a look at yet another shocking NBA deal.
Houston Rockets get: Russell Westbrook
Oklahoma City Thunder get: Chris Paul, protected first-round picks in 2024 and 2026, protected rights to swap picks in 2021 and 2025
Get more trade grades for every deal here.
Houston Rockets: C
When I wrote about a possible Westbrook trade on Saturday, I said I didn't think the Rockets and Thunder would be able to agree on the compensation necessarily to make up the difference between Paul and Westbrook going forward. Rockets general manager Daryl Morey proved me wrong, offering a pair of lightly protected first-round picks (with top-four protection in 2024 and 2026) and pick swaps in 2021 (provided Houston's pick isn't in the top four) and 2025 (if the Rockets' pick is outside the top 20).
I suspect Morey's motivation is twofold. First, accumulating star talent is a hobbyhorse for Morey, and at this stage of their respective careers there's no question that Westbrook is a better talent than Paul. Over the past three seasons, Westbrook has produced nearly 20 more wins above replacement by my WARP metric than Paul thanks to a combination of superior durability (over that span, Westbrook has played nearly 50% more minutes) and playing a larger role in the Thunder's offense.
Second, Westbrook's contract has a far better chance of retaining positive trade value than Paul's. Had Houston simply wanted to trade Paul into a team's cap space to create additional salary-cap flexibility, it might have taken this many draft picks or more to accomplish. Meanwhile, Westbrook could probably be traded for positive value -- particularly once more teams have the ability to deal for him on Dec. 15, when most players signed this summer can be included. (Certain players who re-sign with their own teams cannot be traded until Jan. 15.)
Based on that logic, if Morey simply wanted to remove Paul's salary from the team's cap sheet altogether, laundering his salary through a Westbrook trade would probably be a better way to accomplish that goal.
Still, the Rockets most likely got Westbrook to start him at point guard with Harden for now, and I'm less confident of the deal's merits in that regard. As compared to Paul, Westbrook figures to lose far more of his value in an off-ball role alongside Harden. Surprisingly, Westbrook has taken catch-and-shoot 3-pointers more frequently over the past three seasons than Paul, according to Second Spectrum tracking data on NBA Advanced Stats. But Paul has hit such attempts at a 45% rate compared to 33% for Westbrook.
Houston coach Mike D'Antoni will be challenged to create the kind of spacing required for Harden to be hyperefficient on isolation plays or out of the pick-and-roll with defenders cheating off Westbrook from the weak side. And Harden's inactivity without the ball is a concern if the Rockets decide to take the ball out of his hands to let Westbrook operate. Harden is a totally different player than when he played with Westbrook in the 2012 NBA Finals, back when Harden ran the second-team offense but spent more time spotting up alongside Westbrook and Kevin Durant.
Beside maximizing Westbrook's weaknesses, a pairing with Harden seems to minimize some of his strengths. Westbrook's durability isn't as valuable on a team that could already keep a future Hall of Fame point guard on the court for all 48 minutes when Paul was healthy, although his presence could make Harden more comfortable resting for longer stretches. Additionally, Westbrook's ability to grab uncontested rebounds and push the ball in transition duplicates something Houston already gets from Harden.
In a vacuum, there's no question Westbrook is a better player in 2019-20 than Paul. In the specific context of the Rockets' offense, I'm no longer as certain that's the case. Given Houston's desire to maximize Harden's peak years, downgrading while giving up so much trade value would be a huge issue.
And while Westbrook, at 30, is four years younger than Paul, Westbrook's own future is cloudy given his history of knee injuries and how reliant he is on athleticism to succeed. It's possible that by this time next summer, we regard Westbrook's contract as similarly troublesome.
Oklahoma City Thunder: B
As compared to the leverage-aided trade sending George to the Clippers, this isn't as clear a win for the Thunder. Yes, it returns far better draft-pick compensation than Oklahoma City could have possibly gotten in a more conventional Westbrook trade, but that comes at the price of limiting the Thunder's cap flexibility until Paul's contract ends in the summer of 2022.
Let's take a closer look at the picks Oklahoma City got. As in the George deal, the Thunder wisely pushed them out as far as possible to maximize the chances of age-related decline producing better choices.
By 2024, the first year Houston will send its first-round pick to Oklahoma City, Westbrook will be 35 and Harden 34. By 2026, the second of the two outright picks, they'll be 37 and 36. Though the Rockets might be able to reload by then, there's a lot of upside potential to Houston's picks, and it's a little surprising Morey didn't push harder to move the picks closer to Harden's prime, when they look less valuable.
There's little chance that the Rockets will have a better draft pick than the Thunder in 2021, the first of two possible swaps, so the potential ability to swap out Miami's unprotected first-round pick instead of Houston's would be crucial. In that case, it's more realistic that Oklahoma City could benefit from the swap. The more intriguing year is 2025, in between the two outright picks when Harden is unlikely to still be producing at an MVP level. By that time, a new Thunder core could be competitive in the Western Conference and the team will have swap rights with both the Clippers and Rockets, giving them two additional shots at a lottery pick.
The alternative cost of dealing for Paul is the possibility of a Westbrook trade that returned largely expiring salary -- say, Goran Dragic, Meyers Leonard and Justise Winslow from the Miami Heat. In that framework, Oklahoma City would have been able to use the expiring salaries of Dragic and Leonard to deal for bad, long-term contracts from other teams in exchange for draft compensation. So the Thunder could probably have accumulated multiple first-round picks from a Westbrook trade either way, though I suspect they would have been more heavily protected than the ones from Houston.
As compared to the bad, long-term contracts typically shed in trades, Paul's pedigree is entirely different. Keeping him would have both pros and cons for the Thunder. In the short term, Paul's return to where he played his first two seasons when New Orleans temporarily moved its basketball operations to Oklahoma City after Hurricane Katrina gives the team a recognizable star to keep fans coming out.
In the long term, Paul's aging could be awkward for the Thunder, obligating them to remain competitive and minimizing the role of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, their point guard of the future acquired in the George trade. So it's no surprise that ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski reported that Houston explored a three-team deal sending Paul elsewhere, and that a second trade involving Paul remains a possibility. How much it costs Oklahoma City to move Paul -- if he's moved at all -- would go a long way toward determining whether this trade was a good one.