Rockets will finally grant Dorian Finney-Smith his longtime wish

As the Houston Rockets signed Dorian Finney Smith this offseason to a four-year, $52 million deal, they knew that the skill-set he could provide them with would be hugely important to their chances at contention this season.

Yet, for Finney-Smith, his arrival to Houston will also represent something equally as important: his first chance in his career to play for a bona-fide championship contender.

Now, depending on the role that Finney-Smith ultimately plays within the rotation, this could easily be a serendipitous union for both parties.

Dorian Finney-Smith will finally get to play for a seriously contending team

Finney-Smith, 32, brings an element of perimeter shooting, and an archetypal 3-and-D skill-set that Houston will desperately need this season. Although they have added Kevin Durant, who shot 43% from 3-point range last season, they also lost Dillon Brooks, who had become one of their more important perimeter shooters over the past couple seasons.

Last season, through 63 games between the Brooklyn Nets and Los Angeles Lakers, Finney-Smith averaged 8.7 points, 3.9 rebounds and 1.4 assists while shooting 41.1% from beyond the arc.

Therefore, Finney-Smith, at times from the bench and at times from the starting lineup, will likely be relied upon to help space the floor and replace some of the defense lost by the departure of Brooks.

Yet, with a new role comes renewed responsibility. Although he was a starting forward on many of those late 2010s Dallas Mavericks rosters, Finney-Smith has never truly gotten the chance to contend for a title. For most of his tenure in Dallas, which extended pre-Luka Doncic, the team was rather awful.

When they did finally compete, making the Western Conference Finals in 2022, they were handled easily by the Golden State Warriors, and, by the time the Mavericks made the Finals in 2024, Finney-Smith had already been dealt to the Brooklyn Nets in the Kyrie Irving deal.

The Nets' situation past the blow-up of the Irving, Durant and James Harden experiment needs very little explanation. Suffice it to say that, during Finney-Smith's tenure there, they were not contenders.

Even in his stint with the Los Angeles Lakers this past season, in which he was acquired to help the revamped, Doncic-led roster compete for a playoff spot, the team was disposed of rather easily in the first round by the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Therefore, while it remains to be seen whether the Rockets will ultimately become a team that can compete with the Oklahoma City Thunder for a Western Conference championship, this is quite possibly the best roster that Finney-Smith has ever played on, and the Rockets will be able to grant him his longtime wish by giving a bona-fide shot at a championship.