Rockets aren’t making progress in Jimmy Butler deal

On this more interesting than normal Halloween, the Houston Rockets are trying to progress trade talks for another All-Star to no avail. Can they make a deal happen soon?

There is quite a bit going on today, besides regular Halloween festivities. Today is the first day that the Houston Rockets can package Brandon Knight and/or Marquese Chriss in a multi-player deal, presumably in a one for Minnesota for Jimmy Butler.

The Wolves have been adamant, though, requesting a ton in return for their All-Star guard/forward. They certainly have the right to do so, but they should want to trade him sooner rather than later to avoid more team chemistry difficulties and the potential to get nothing for him, letting him walk this summer as a free agent.

With the ability to trade Knight and Chriss, it appears that the Rockets are all in on finding a way to bring Butler to Houston. The renewed trade talks don’t seem to be making much progress, though.

Originally, it was rumored that the Rockets were offering four first-round picks in addition to players that can fill the salary required, like Knight. However, it seems like the Wolves need Eric Gordon in the deal to even consider it. We’ll see if the Rockets are willing to do that, but it should not be EG and the four first rounders. If Gordon must be included, the draft pick number must go down.

Butler news today

There’s been a decent amount of stuff happening today surrounding Jimmy Butler. He is sitting out tonight’s game with “general soreness,” a.k.a. the trade flu, in my opinion. Adrian Wojnarowski reported that he would be back to play against the Warriors on Friday, should he still be in Minny.

Sources: The Timberwolves suggested that Jimmy Butler rest vs. Utah tonight and there’s an expectation that he will join the team on flight to Bay Area to play Golden State on Friday. Teams talking to Minnesota about trades say that the asking price remains steep.

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) October 31, 2018

Woj posted an article to ESPN, stating that the trade talks are currently pretty stagnant. The Wolves are being pretty picky on how they want to go about this trade process.

Sam Amick of the Athletic also had some things to say regarding the Butler/Houston news, responding to some things from Shams Charania and Jon Krawczynski. He shared that the Rockets have made little progress so far today in completing a deal.

One small addendum to Jon & Shams' report: I'm told Houston has made no progress with Minnesota on a Jimmy Butler deal… https://t.co/9ZzLkLtUlD

— Sam Amick (@sam_amick) October 31, 2018

Like I said earlier, the Timberwolves need to trade Jimmy Butler at some point if they want to get something in return before he hits free agency this summer. The Rockets can offer a pretty solid package with plenty of draft picks, what are they waiting for? There have been speculations that Minny doesn’t want to create a superteam, but what does that matter to them? They aren’t going to compete in the near future, so they might as well take the best package presented to them.

We’ll keep you updated with any news regarding the Jimmy Butler and Houston trade talks!