Painful Dorian Finney-Smith truth the Rockets must face this season

As the Houston Rockets navigated this offseason, their various signings were clearly intended to bring in depth to surround their young core and superstar scorer Kevin Durant, shoring up their frontcourt and providing an insurance policy against any possible injuries.

Yet, offseason signing Dorian Finney-Smith, who is set to embrace a full 3-and-D role with the Rockets either as a bench player or a starter, has not always had the most consistent perimeter shot, and Houston must accept the painful truth that this inconsistency could limit his viability within the rotation.

While Finney-Smith, 32, in many ways represents an ideal addition for the Rockets, they must hope that his strongest skill remains consistent in order for him to have the impact they believe he can this season.

Dorian Finney-Smith has not always been the most consistent perimeter shooter

As the Rockets approached the season, their lineup, apart from the fifth starter, was pretty well sorted. Fred VanVleet and Amen Thompson would make up the backcourt, while another player would slot in alongside Kevin Durant in the frontcourt in order to complete the team's front five.

Yet, with the potentially season-ending injury to VanVleet, almost everything has been thrown up into the air. Thompson will now have to move back to point guard, and, apart from Jabari Smith Jr. starting at power forward and Alperen Sengun starting at center, the way the rest of the rotation will shake out remains to be seen.

Therefore, Finney-Smith, whose role was pretty clearly defined prior to the VanVleet injury, must now be ready to be thrown into the fire when he returns from rehabbing his offseason ankle surgery.

What the team needs most from him when he returns is viable perimeter shooting. Apart from Durant, the team now has almost no one to provide spacing on offense, and Finney-Smith, as someone who shot 41.1% from beyond the arc last season between the Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Lakers, is seemingly the perfect candidate.

However, the consistency you could expect from him now has not always been there. While, in his last three seasons with the Dallas Mavericks, Finney-Smith shot 38.9% from 3-point range, cementing his value and ultimately leading to his trade to the Nets, he shot just 36.4% from the line over the past three seasons of his career.

While injuries have certainly played a part in this dip in production, it does raise serious concerns for his viability within the Rockets' rotation. Although Finney-Smith is an excellent defender as well, they desperately need him to be able to shoot either from the starting lineup or the bench in order to help grease the wheels of their offense. In fact, that is likely the primary reason they signed him to a multi-year contract this offseason.

If he shoots closer to 39-40% range we saw last season, this move would be a smashing success. However, if he dips down closer to the 36% range, Houston will be left in a tough spot as they attempt to navigate yet another season with a lack of reliable perimeter shooters.

It is difficult to accept that their margin for error is this small, but the Rockets must also accept the risk they have taken and hope that this painful reality in Finney-Smith's game does not reveal itself this season.