The state of play with KPJ
A dark time
Note:
The allegations in this Kevin Porter Jr. case are horrific. If proven to be true, Porter should be punished to the full extent of the law and never suit up for an NBA team ever again. As things stand, this could go down as one of the worst incidents of domestic violence involving an athlete of the past decade. No where in this article will you ever see anything that suggests otherwise.
I honestly don’t know how to go about this so I’m just going to answer some questions I’ve seen circulating on social media related to this tragedy.
Let’s start with some reflection:
Were the Rockets wrong for taking a chance on Kevin Porter Jr.?
I’ve seen this discussed on the fringes of social media and it bothers me on many levels. For one, as troubled as Porter Jr. was, he was never convicted of anything that would be disqualifying of a second chance. On a human level, I believe it’s far too cynical to give up on a 21-year-old kid, no matter how troubled his background is. Just because Porter Jr. pissed away his second chance, doesn’t mean other young adults don’t deserve theirs.
So no, the Rockets weren’t wrong for giving Porter Jr. his second chance in the NBA. On a basketball level, it was always a no-brainer to trade nothing for something and give that something very little guaranteed NBA dollars. At every step along the way, there was very little downside for Houston in this gamble. On a human level, it’s never wrong to give people who come from rough upbringings second opportunities.
Again, this isn’t meant to justify Porter’s actions. It’s a defense of Houston’s thinking at the time which was something along the lines of “It’s worth giving the 21-year-old a change of scenery and a proven, respected mentor in assistant coach John Lucas and seeing if that helps change his behavior for the better”. It didn’t, but that doesn’t mean the approach wouldn’t have worked with someone else who was more receptive to the help.
Were the Rockets too lenient with Kevin Porter Jr.?
In my opinion, this is a far more fair question to ask of the Rockets.
Let’s start with what was already known:
After a very brief stint with the Rio Grande Valley Vipers, Porter Jr. was given a starting spot with the Rockets and kept it even after veteran point guard John Wall was healthy enough to return to action the following season. Reasonable people can probably agree that it was probably a mistake.
A few months after that, Porter Jr. was suspended for only one game for leaving the arena after getting into a verbal altercation in the locker room with then assistant coach Lucas. Reasonable people can probably agree that this may have been a good time for the Rockets to cut bait or at least give Porter a larger suspension.
A few months later, this happened:
Then, there’s what we’re just finding out. Jackson Gatlin, host of the Locked on Rockets podcast, said this on his latest episode:
The Rockets had multiple opportunities to pull the plug along the way or at least give Porter Jr. less leeway and they chose not to do it. Because of this, Porter Jr. felt enabled to keep pushing the line with the team. It feels irresponsible to speculate whether or not he felt untouchable enough to commit this horrific crime, but it is a fair indictment to say the organization let far too many things go during his tenure.
Now what?
What comes next?
The Rockets have to get rid of him, plain and simple. The NBA has a zero-tolerance policy for domestic violence and they should enforce it by voiding Porter Jr.’s contract after this investigation. If they don’t do that, the Rockets should exercise their team powers by waiving him or dumping him to another team that will waive him.
Is it wrong to trade KPJ instead of waiving him outright?
I got to be honest: I don’t understand this conversation at all. If we’re all in agreement that KPJ should not play another NBA game again, why does it matter how the Rockets accomplish that objective? There’s nothing “honorable” about waiving a guy outright versus having another team waive him. In both scenarios, Porter Jr. loses his NBA job and more than 90% of his salary.
Even if you feel the need to virtue signal on Twitter, you’re doing a shitty job because there’s not all that virtuous to waive an NBA player who committed a crime. If the Rockets feel the need to reserve Porter Jr.’s salary spot for future trades, they have the right to do so. You can disagree with it from an asset perspective, but you certainly can’t claim that there’s anything morally ambiguous about it.
It’s not “cold and calculating”. The cold and calculating thing would be something akin to what the Charlotte Hornets did by retaining Miles Bridges. That’s not what’s happening here. The Rockets plan to get rid of Porter Jr. when all is said and done.
This whole conversation is just bizarre and reeks of insincerity.
For example, how would folks have reacted if a trade-and-waive of Kevin Porter Jr. was reported before the news of the alleged-assault broke?
After the dots were connected, the Rockets probably would’ve been lauded for doing the right thing by having a zero tolerance policy against domestic violence.
And we don’t even have to go that far.
What if the Rockets interest in executing this sort of trade was never leaked to The Athletic first? What if we just got news that the trade happened and that Porter was on his way to being waived by Team X?
In both scenarios, the Rockets probably don’t receive the kind of backlash they’re receiving now because the reaction would’ve been something along the lines of “Good riddance”. It’s only because people have gotten time to digest this that they’ve figured out a way to be “outraged” about it.
This is clearly not a conversation being had in good faith. It’s silly and performative.
What about the basketball side of this?
There have been slip-ups and missteps throughout this rebuild, but the Rockets have arrived at a place where they can afford a prospect like Kevin Porter Jr. failing.
Here’s the reality of the situation:
They gave up nothing for Porter and when they did it, the only other young prospect on the roster was K.J. Martin and his upside was fairly limited as a 2nd round pick. Today, the Rockets have six other high-end prospects that all have the upside to become fringe All-Star talents in the NBA. It’s unlikely they all reach that ceiling, but that ceiling exists for all them.
Houston doesn’t need Kevin Porter Jr. They haven’t really needed him since Jalen Green and Alperen Sengun were drafted. He was a nice player to have and a very helpful salary spot that they could’ve used in trades, but by January, the Rockets can aggregate up to $46.7 million in contracts (Dillon Brooks, Jae’Sean Tate, Jock Lansdale, and Jeff Green) without touching their pool of young players or first round picks.
Using Dillon Brooks in a theoretical trade instead of Porter Jr. isn’t ideal due to the difference in guaranteed salary owed, but it gets the job done and keeps Houston at the table for some of the best players in basketball when they become available via trade. That package of players still offers plenty of financial flexibility for the receiving team and ultimately, no team is going to turn Houston down because of Brooks’ presence in the deal.
Such deals are made and broken by the amount (and ceiling) of first round talent swapping hands.
Porter’s absence objectively makes the 2022-23 Rockets worse, but so what? There are bigger things than basketball and there are a slew of young players on the team that will be chomping at the bit for increased playing time. The most obvious beneficiaries would be Amen Thompson, Tari Eason, Cam Whitmore, and Jae’Sean Tate.
Fans of the team shouldn’t lose sleep over this and frankly, neither should the Rockets. It’s best to cut bait and not look back.