Rockets: Should Ty Lawson Be Declared To Start?

Wow! The Houston Rockets have just completed the equivalent of sinking an eyes wide shut three-pointer!

They knew they had a chance to get him, they understood the repercussions but they did so any way because they had faith that they’d be able to pull off the unthinkable.

I’m referring to newest acquisition as “him,” but I didn’t even mention him by name.

Tsk, tsk, tsk…shame on me.

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Yes folks, Ty Lawson will be coming to the Bayou City with much fanfare from most Rockets fans.

Having him in Rocket Red addresses two deficiencies that this team faced this past season.

They were:

1) Lack of a play maker in a vibrant offense

2) Lack of an additional scoring threat outside of James Harden in the back court

Now that he’s here, he’ll fit in nicely with Kevin McHale‘s offense which mostly consists of heavy use of the pick-and-roll and lots of free-lance.

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I can just imagine him being the spark plug to our offense and our turnovers as a whole will start to decrease because he continues to be one of the most accurate point guards in the league today.

In fact, Lawson’s offensive rating is off the charts — he was ranked 10th last season — at 114.9.

He also racked up 720 assists last season which was good for third in the league.

Lawson also plays pretty decent defense which will only help this team and allow it to reach levels that haven’t been reached before.

But as you know, Patrick Beverley was just signed to a four-year, $25 million deal just a few weeks ago and with him making that much money, an interesting question has to be posed.

Would it be prudent to move Bev back to the bench?

For all intents and purposes, absolutely!

You know why?

The Rockets are in a unique situation — they don’t have the luxury of having a single kick-tail type point guard but have two pretty darn good ones!

McHale can continue to use these guys and play to their strengths/weaknesses depending on the match-ups.

They should run both as a tandem, subbing in for each other as the nuances of the game flow dictate.

I can see it now — Ty dishing it, lobbing it, handling the ball to the next echelon helping the team rack up W’s along the way.

We know that Lawson has had a checkered past dealing with the parameters of when to use his preferred controlled substances.

But here’s what I think.

He’ll put that doobie down and he’ll focus on the task at hand — after all, he went from a team that’s destined for the lottery once again and now he’s part of a Top 5 contender for the NBA championship next season.

Now many of you will argue that they’re not a Top 5 team but with all things considered, the Rockets opened up some eyes last season with their magical trip to the Western Conference Finals.

With all the moves they’ve so far, they’ve got nowhere to go.

They’ve re-signed Corey Brewer, K.J. McDaniels — and also Jason Terry once a deal is reached — along with the possible addition of an extremely underrated workhorse off the bench in Chuck Hayes.

Let me tell you, Lawson will be the catalyst and Morey won’t regret one bit that he made this move.