Rockets Have Shot to the Top

On Dec. 12, 1987, the Houston Rockets swapped center Ralph Sampson and guard Steve Harris for Golden State counterparts Joe Barry Carroll and Sleepy Floyd, causing one Houston sportswriter to label it “the worst trade of the century.”

Longtime Rockets watchers also questioned subsequent moves that sent crowd favorites Rodney McCray and Jim Peterson packing for Sacramento and allowed guard Robert Reid to be plucked by the expansion Charlotte Hornets.

When the housecleaning ended this season, only center Akeem Olajuwon and reserve guard Allen Leavell remained from the 1985-86 team that upset the Los Angeles Lakers and carried the Boston Celtics to six games in the National Basketball Association final.

Such tumultuous changes generally leave teams in transition, searching for an identity and a touch of respectability. But the resurgent Rockets somehow have overcome the usual pitfalls.

Indeed, the Rockets rate as the biggest surprise of the new season, leading the Midwest Division with an 18-9 record, including a six-game winning streak.

The primary architects in the Houston resurrection have been General Manager Ray Patterson and new head coach Don Chaney. Former coach Bill Fitch had managed to alienate most of the Rockets and their fans, who had envisioned the start of a dynasty only three years ago.

A number of personnel moves were borne out of necessity, as Houston lost three guards--John Lucas, Mitchell Wiggins and Lewis Lloyd--from the 1986 finalists because of drug abuse.

“You take the three top guards off any club, with no player compensation and no draft picks, and it’s very difficult to overcome,” Patterson said of the drug epidemic of 1986.

Last season’s unpopular Sampson trade was mostly a result of his inability to meet the high expectations of Fitch, who had been forced to re-think his theory that playing with “Twin Towers” Olajuwon and Sampson represented a new wave.

Chaney was a popular choice to replace Fitch despite his 53-132 record in two-plus seasons as coach of the inept Los Angeles Clippers. The defensive-minded guard still was remembered fondly for being part of the 1967-68 University of Houston team with Elvin Hayes that upset top-ranked UCLA and Lew Alcindor before 52,693 fans at the Astrodome Jan. 20, 1968.

“I didn’t try to make waves right away,” Chaney said yesterday. “I was inheriting a team that won 46 games last year. At first, I thought I’d only have to make some cosmetic changes. But once I got into training camp, I knew we needed certain things.”

One thing Chaney was sure he needed was a power forward to help relieve some of the burden on Olajuwon, now recognized as the league’s dominant center.

“I know that Peterson and McCray were crowd favorites in Houston, but for us, (Sacramento’s) Otis Thorpe represented the ideal power forward.”

Once the Rockets learned Thorpe was available, they were more than willing to trade Carroll to New Jersey.

Thorpe now is teaming with Olajuwon to give the Rockets as formidable a one-two punch as they possessed in Akeem and Sampson. Together, Olajuwon and Thorpe are averaging more than 40 points and 25 rebounds a game.

“The power forwards of the past were big and clumsy,” said Chaney, “but Thorpe is strong and agile. He’s just learning to put the ball on the floor, but he’s given us a lot more speed in the frontcourt.”

It wasn’t only poor team chemistry that hurt the Rockets last season, Chaney noted. He also had to end the disharmony between floor leader Floyd and team captain Olajuwon, who criticized Floyd for not playing like a point guard and looking for his shot first rather than setting up his teammates.

“One of the first things I had to convey to Sleepy is that I want him mainly to run the show,” said Chaney. “He’ll get his quota of shots in the flow of the game, but I preferred having someone else shooting the ball from the backcourt. That’s why we signed Mike Woodson, and he’s done the job for us (15.3 points a game). Once we regain our harmony, the rest will fall in place.”

The Rockets now boast one of the deepest benches in the league, with Frank Johnson and rookie Derrick Chievous as backcourt reserves, Tim McCormick as Olajuwon’s backup and streak-shooting Purvis Short as the key frontcourt substitute.

“We’ve still got some pieces to the puzzle left,” Chaney said. “We’ve gelled quicker than expected, but I’ve been concentrating on the defensive end. That’s where we’ve made our most dramatic improvement. When we’ve had to fight it out in the trenches, we’ve put it all together.”

Yes, the Rockets are acting like title contenders again, and, not surprisingly, no one in Houston has mentioned the Sampson trade in quite a while.