Houston Rockets
The Houston Rockets are an American professional basketball team based in Houston. The Rockets compete in the National Basketball Association as a member of the Southwest Division of the Western Conference. The team plays its home games at Toyota Center, located in Downtown Houston. Throughout its history, Houston has won two NBA championships and four Western Conference titles. It was established in 1967 as the San Diego Rockets, an expansion team originally based in San Diego. In 1971, the Rockets relocated to Houston.
The Rockets won only 15 games in their debut season as a franchise in 1967. In the 1968 NBA draft, the Rockets were awarded the first overall pick and selected power forward Elvin Hayes, who would lead the team to its first playoff appearance in his rookie season. The Rockets did not finish a season with a winning record for almost a decade until the 1976–77 season, when they traded for All-Star center Moses Malone from the American Basketball Association. Malone led Houston to the Eastern Conference Finals in his first year with the team. During the 1980–81 season, the Rockets finished the regular season with a 40–42 record but still made the playoffs. Led by Malone, the Rockets reached their first NBA Finals in 1981, losing in six games to the Boston Celtics.
In the 1984 NBA draft, once again with the first overall pick, the Rockets drafted center Hakeem Olajuwon, who would become the cornerstone of the most successful period in franchise history. Paired with Ralph Sampson, they formed one of the tallest front courts in the NBA. Nicknamed the "Twin Towers", they led the team to the 1986 NBA Finals where Houston was again defeated by the Boston Celtics. The Rockets continued to reach the playoffs throughout the 1980s, but failed to advance past the first round for several years following 1987. Rudy Tomjanovich took over as head coach midway through the 1991–92 season, ushering in the most successful period in franchise history. Led by Olajuwon, the Rockets dominated the 1993–94 season, setting a then-franchise record 58 wins and went to the 1994 NBA Finals and won the franchise's first championship against the New York Knicks. During the following season, reinforced by another All-Star, Clyde Drexler, the Rockets repeated as champions with a four-game sweep of the Orlando Magic.
The Rockets acquired all-star power forward Charles Barkley in 1996, but were unable to advance past the Western Conference Finals. Each one of the aging trio of Olajuwon, Drexler, and Barkley had left the team by 2001. The Rockets of the early 2000s, led by superstars Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming, followed the trend of consistent regular season respectability followed by playoff underachievement as both players struggled with injuries. After Yao's early retirement in 2011, the Rockets entered a period of rebuilding, completely dismantling and retooling their roster.
The acquisition of franchise player James Harden in 2012 launched the Rockets back into perennial championship contention throughout the rest of the 2010s, with no losing seasons in Harden's nine-season tenure with the team. Harden led the team to two Western Conference Finals appearances. Prior to the 2020–21 season, head coach Mike D'Antoni and general manager Daryl Morey left the organization, prompting Harden to seek a trade. He was traded to the Brooklyn Nets which started a rebuilding period.
Moses Malone, Hakeem Olajuwon, and James Harden have been named the NBA's MVPs while playing for the Rockets, for a total of four MVP awards. The Rockets, when piloted by Morey, were renowned for popularizing the use of advanced statistical analytics in player acquisitions and style of play.
History
1967–1971: San Diego Rockets
The Rockets were founded in 1967 in San Diego by Robert Breitbard, who paid an entry fee of US$1.75 million to join the NBA as an expansion team for the 1967–68 season. The NBA wanted to add more teams in the Western United States and chose San Diego based on the city's strong economic and population growth, along with the local success of an ice hockey team owned by Breitbard, the San Diego Gulls of the Western Hockey League. The San Diego International Sports Center, which opened the previous year and was also owned by Breitbard, would serve as home to the new franchise. A local contest to name the franchise chose the name "Rockets", as it paid homage to San Diego's theme of "a city in motion" and the local arm of General Dynamics developing the Atlas missile and booster rocket program.Breitbard brought in Jack McMahon, then-coach of the Cincinnati Royals, to serve as the Rockets' coach and general manager. The team, which would join the league along with the Seattle SuperSonics, then built its roster with both veteran players at an expansion draft, and college players from the 1967 NBA draft, where San Diego's first ever draft pick was Pat Riley. In their first two games of the season, the Rockets were up against the St. Louis Hawks, and lost both of those games. Their first win in franchise history came the very next game which occurred three days after against the SuperSonics. The Rockets won on the road, 121–114. Johnny Green recorded 30 points and 25 rebounds for the Rockets. The following game, the SuperSonics held a 15-point lead for most of the first half, before the Rockets mounted a comeback to force overtime. The SuperSonics eventually pulled away and won the game, 117–110, though Art Williams recorded the first ever triple-double in franchise history, as he recorded 17 points, 15 rebounds and 13 assists for the Rockets. The expansion Rockets ultimately lost 67 games in their inaugural season, which was an NBA record for losses in a season at the time.
In 1968, after the Rockets won a coin toss against the Baltimore Bullets to determine who would have the first overall pick in the 1968 NBA draft, they selected Elvin Hayes from the University of Houston. Hayes improved the Rockets' record to 37 wins and 45 losses, enough for the franchise's first ever playoff appearance in 1969, but the Rockets lost in the semi-finals of the Western Division to the Atlanta Hawks, four games to two. The Rockets limped to a 27–55 finish in the 1969–70 season, before missing the playoffs by just one game in the 1970–71 season.
Off the court, Breitbard was facing serious financial losses due to a controversial ongoing tax-assessment issue that had plagued his San Diego Sports Arena since it was built. He was also still on the hook for paying off the NBA expansion fee for the Rockets, in addition to construction-related bonds on the arena, which he had built with private funding. To make matters worse, the American professional sports economy had begun to plummet in the late 1960s, and professional basketball was being hit particularly hard with nearly all franchises in the NBA and ABA operating at a financial loss at this time.
On January 26, 1970, during an emotional press conference on the floor of the Sports Arena, Breitbard addressed the San Diego fans regarding his dire finances and the state of his Rockets basketball and Gulls hockey teams. "...We have been served an eviction notice..." Breitbard announced. "I've tried to work quietly, to iron this out. But, at the moment it appears impossible. I don't want to sell. I'm not interested in selling outside of San Diego. It seems to me the Rockets and Gulls are part of this town. This arena, the Gulls, the Rockets, are a part of me, and our fans have been wonderful to us." Over the next nearly year and a half, numerous fans circulated petitions and lobbied local officials to help keep the Rockets and Gulls afloat and in San Diego. Several proposals surrounded providing financial aid or payment relief to Breitbard, or having the City and/or County of San Diego take ownership of the arena were discussed, but Breitbard was running out of time. At least 14 private offers for the Rockets were made to Breitbard, though all would have resulted in the team being relocated out of San Diego, which Breitbard was adamantly opposed to. The tax-assessment situation surrounding the Sports Arena ultimately made the prospect of another local owner purchasing the team infeasible.
On January 12, 1971, the Rockets hosted the 1971 NBA All-Star Game at the San Diego Sports Arena, a close contest in which the West beat the East 108–107 in front of a packed house of 14,378 fans.
On June 23, 1971, the San Diego Rockets were abruptly sold by Breitbard to a Houston–based investment group. The NBA hurriedly approved the sale, believing the franchise was on the verge of folding. News of the sale broke before the coaches, players, and team employees and executives could even be notified. Local officials in San Diego were also caught by surprise.
In their fourth and final season in existence, the San Diego Rockets missed the playoffs by just one game in the standings.
1971–1976: Move to Houston and improvement with Murphy and Rudy-T
Texas Sports Investments bought the franchise for $5.6 million and moved the team to Houston before the start of the 1971–72 season. The franchise became the first NBA team in Texas, and the nickname "Rockets" took on even greater relevance after the move, given Houston's long connection to the space industry. Houston previously was awarded an NBA expansion franchise along with Buffalo, Cleveland and Portland on February 6, 1970, but the new entry folded six weeks later on March 20 when its investment group led by Alan Rothenberg failed to make the $750,000 down payment on the $3.7 million entrance fee required before the league's college player draft.Before the start of the season, Hannum left for the Denver Rockets of the American Basketball Association – later renamed Denver Nuggets, who joined the NBA in 1976 – and Tex Winter was hired in his place. In the first six games of the 1971–72 season in Winter's first head coaching season, the Rockets all lost those games with an average of around 15 points per game. Their first win of the season came on October 26, 1971, with a 104–103 win over the home team, Detroit Pistons. Their second win of the season came five days later, a 102–87 win over the Buffalo Braves. After that game, the Rockets lost their next 8 games, against the Knicks, Trail Blazers, Bullets, Warriors, Celtics, Bucks and Bulls. Their next win was on November 17 on the road against the 76ers. However, Winter's clashes with Hayes, due to a system that contrasted with the offensive style to which Hayes was accustomed, made Hayes ask for a trade, leaving for the Baltimore Bullets at the end of the 1971–72 season.
It was also around this time that the Rockets would unveil their classic yellow and red logo and accompanying uniforms used until the end of the 1994–95 season. Winter left soon after, being fired in January 1973 following a ten-game losing streak, and was replaced by Johnny Egan. Egan led the Rockets back to the playoffs in 1975, where the franchise also won their first round against the New York Knicks, subsequently losing to the veteran Boston Celtics in 5 games. At that time the Rockets gained popularity in Houston, selling out several home games during the regular season as the Rockets battled for a playoff spot and then selling out all of their home playoff games.