Before Fred VanVleet tore his ACL in September, the big storyline was straightforward: The Houston Rockets are going for it . In the offseason, they traded for Kevin Durant , addressing their biggest weakness (halfcourt scoring) in the simplest, splashiest way possible. With the addition of Dorian Finney-Smith and some improvement from burgeoning stars Amen Thompson and Alperen Sengun , they had a shot to compete for a championship.

Is that still the case without VanVleet? Maybe not. The Rockets were significantly worse on both ends when he was off the court last season, and this year's roster has much more depth in the frontcourt than the backcourt. There is still tons of talent here, though, with a fair amount of versatility and overwhelming size and length. "Sometimes it'

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