Mark WiedmerThe nutty stuff - and the genius stuff - of the NBA offseason was supposed to begin at 12:01 a.m. Saturday.
That's when franchises and players can reach agreement on new contracts. Five days later, those contracts can be signed and termed official.
But two bombshell stories have significantly sped up the what-just-happened-here process. We'll start with the second one first, both because the Los Angeles Clippers trading Chris Paul to the Houston Rockets is actually the bigger, better story and because the first news of the day - the New York Knicks parting company with team president Phil Jackson - was on the wire before most of you cursed your alarm clocks Wednesday morning.
But Paul to Houston is one of those franchise statements that basically says, "We may not be good enough to knock out Golden State in the Western Conference, but if not, we're going to go down swinging." Or at least shooting a gazillion 3-pointers.
And while the Rockets basically gave up half their roster to land Paul - including the underrated Patrick Beverly, the occasionally microwave-hot Lou Williams and the physically imposing Montrezl Harrell - placing Paul and Harden in the same backcourt theoretically gives them no worse than the third-most potent pair of guards in the league, and that's only if the Warriors' Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson both are knocking down a ridiculous number of treys on the same night and Washington's John Wall and Bradley Beal are similarly hot, because they also can do the best job defending.
Otherwise, Houston's backcourt is now potentially better than both, especially on the offensive end, if only because both Paul and Harden are outstanding passers, while only Curry would be considered an elite assist man when Thompson is added to the equation and Wall's perimeter game can turn so cold.
The trade also is a sign the Clippers - however fleeting their moments of faux relevance - are done, including their coach, Doc Rivers. Rumors have begun to circulate that one of the reasons Paul was willing to end his time in L.A. was that Rivers had begun to favor his son Austin, the former Duke player, over Paul when it came to discussing strategy and such.
Nepotism is always risky business, and when the coach seems to be listening to his somewhat talented son over his ridiculously talented All-Star point guard, good news is almost never just around the corner.
That doesn't mean the Rockets are necessarily a safe bet to reach the Western Conference finals against the Warriors, who this month won their second NBA title in three years. Houston collapsed against an aging Spurs team in the playoffs, and the hot-shooting Williams was one reason it got that far. As was once the case with Golden State in the long-ago, Wild West, shoot-first-play-defense-last days of Don Nelson, Houston coach Mike D'Antoni may run no worse than the second-most enjoyable offense in the league behind the current Warriors, but until Houston is willing, capable or both of defending better than it did most nights this past season, the Rockets will win no championships.
Of course, neither will they be the Western Conference version of the Knicks, a franchise that far more closely resembles the Bermuda Triangle these days than the triangle offense its now former president used to win 11 NBA titles as the coach of the Chicago Bulls (six titles) and LA Lakers (five).
And while it's true Jackson never put together a Knicks team with even a smidgeon of the talent he coached in Chicago (Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and Dennis Rodman, etc.) or L.A. (Kobe Bryant, Shaquille O'Neal, Robert Horry, Derek Fisher), his insistence on using the triangle regardless of his personnel overwhelmingly doomed any chance he had to add to the two NBA crowns he won as a Knicks player riding the coattails of Willis Reed, Walt Frazier, Bill Bradley, Dave DeBusschere, Earl "The Pearl" Monroe and crew.
No disrespect to the NBA's all-time Lord of the Rings, but the man once known as the Zen Master evidently forgot the concept of positive reenforcement, not only distancing himself from New York's best player, Carmelo Anthony, but also playing negative mind games with its potential mega-star of the future, Kristaps Porzingis.
And those disconnects, plus his salary, plus his unwillingness to accept that even his beloved triangle offense needed the right personnel to succeed, combined to show one of the most arrogant coaches in NBA history the door.
Or as one NBA official reportedly told ESPN's Ian O'Connor on Wednesday regarding Jackson's treatment of Melo: "Doesn't he understand that Carmelo still has a really big voice amongst the players in this league? So what do you think those guys are going to say when Phil tries to recruit them to New York?"
With Chris Paul and James Harden now both Rockets, those players just might say they're going to Houston.
Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.