Houston Rockets vs. Philadelphia 76ers game preview

Obviously, the Houston Rockets are in the news for not-so-fun reasons.

Generally speaking, a tanking team wants to keep quiet and lose its games in peace. They unload desirable players at the trade deadline and get excited for the lottery and draft. That’s how it works.

So it’s a bad sign that Adrian Wojnarowski and Shams Charania were tweeting about a 10-27 team on Saturday night. Christian Wood and Kevin Porter Jr. have made the situation about themselves. John Lucas is well-respected around the league, and not being able to take constructive criticism from Lucas is a bad sign about your attitude.

Houston has probably been shopping Wood, waiting for a contender to break and give them a haul for the young forward. Now they lose leverage as teams know that the player and team are at odds. That’s not great, but Rafael Stone and the front office will have to wait until a deal materializes that helps the team. If that means waiting until the offseason, then so be it.

For now, Houston will need to keep losing, which should be easy tonight if the team punishes Wood and Porter Jr.

Tip-off is at 6pm CT on AT&T SportsNet Southwest