Rockets Reportedly Had Trade Interest In Kelly Olynyk, Andre Drummond, Jericho Sims, Xavier Tillman

According to Kelly Iko of The Athletic, the Houston Rockets had trade interest in Kelly Olynyk, Andre Drummond, Jericho Sims and Xavier Tillman. 

However, the Rockets didn’t acquire any of their targets. Instead, they traded Victor Oladipo and draft picks to the Memphis Grizzlies for Steven Adams, who won’t play this season due to a right knee injury. 

“Names like Kelly Olynyk, Chicago’s Andre Drummond, New York’s Jericho Sims and Xavier Tillman Sr. were mentioned as potential solutions — among others — but resistance was met with each concept that was floated, either from the opposing team or internally as a group,” Iko wrote. 

The Utah Jazz traded Olynyk to the Toronto Raptors and the Grizzlies sent Tillman to the Boston Celtics. Meanwhile, Drummond remained with the Chicago Bulls and Sims stayed with the New York Knicks. 

“There were obviously things we were interested in doing, but by no means were we feeling like we had to do something,” Rockets general manager Rafael Stone said. “We were exploring options that we thought made sense for us, both in the present and the future — and at the end of the day it just makes the most sense to stand pat.”

The Rockets are 24-29 on the season. They are in 12th place in the Western Conference standings. If the season ended today, Houston would not even be in the play-in tournament. 

However, the franchise is optimistic about the second half of the season. 

“Goal two is to take being competitive to winning more games,” Stone said. “We’ve won more too. But the point being, we’ve left a bunch of wins on the table this year through all kinds of mistakes and you get better through experience. But we do expect and demand that as our guys get more experience, they learn and they don’t make the same mistakes twice.”