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Gerald Green
The future mayor of Houston is back!
Days before the start of training camp, Gerald Green signed a one-year, non-guaranteed deal to return to the Rockets.
Green spent all of last season rehabbing a broken foot he suffered in last year’s training camp and did not suit up for the Rockets last season.
Green was traded right before the trade deadline to the Denver Nuggets in a deal that brought Robert Covington to the Rockets, but was waived shortly after by the Nuggets.
Green, who turns 35 next month, is one of just four players left in the league from the 2005 NBA Draft (Chris Paul, Ersan Ilyasova and Lou Williams are the other three.) but will likely not have a role as large as the other three will this season.
Green is competing for minutes in a crowded group of wings, most of whom are far younger than he is and have played professional basketball within the last year.
Another strike against Green is his non-guaranteed deal, which puts his spot on the roster in jeopardy.
He is likely competing for one of the final roster spots with point guards Jerian Grant and Chris Clemons, both of whom do not have fully guaranteed deals. The fact that both Grant and Clemons play point guard should help Green’s cause, but with James Harden’s mysterious absence, keeping an extra point guard might be in the team’s best interest.
However, it also might be in the team’s best interest to keep Green, one of Harden’s former teammates during some of his best years in Houston.
The reason Green was brought back is because he is a fantastic teammate and he’s there to be a positive veteran force of energy in a locker room that is younger now than in recent years.
Sure, he can shoot threes like a microwave for instant points, but his real value comes off the court.