Dorian Finney-Smith has agreed to a four-year, $53 million contract with the Houston Rockets, according to ESPN’s Shams Charania, adding a versatile 3-and-D frontcourt piece to a Rockets roster with designs on contending next season, especially after the acquisition of Kevin Durant.
Finney-Smith, 32, is currently rehabilitating after undergoing left ankle surgery in early June. He is expected to be available by the start of training camp in September.
Undrafted out of Florida in 2016, the 6-foot-7, 220-pound Finney-Smith became one of the most sought-after targets on the free-agent market after declining his $15.4 million player option for next season in pursuit of a longer-term, more lucrative deal. While a multi-year deal will carry the veteran through his mid-30s, teams around the NBA saw the value in Finney-Smith, who has carved out a decade-long career by becoming a valuable player type in the modern game: a stout, switchable defender across the forward spots who can guard up as a small-ball center and who makes enough 3-pointers to pull opposing big men out of the paint and help unlock the benefits of five-out spacing for your offense.
Finney-Smith developed into a starter and integral role player for the Mavericks, growing into a trusted 3-and-D stalwart on the Luka Dončić-led teams that made three straight playoff appearances, capped by a run to the 2022 Western Conference finals. With Dallas scuffling midway through the 2022-23 season, Finney-Smith found himself on the move to Brooklyn, packaged with Spencer Dinwiddie and multiple draft picks in exchange for Kyrie Irving.
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He’d spend parts of three seasons as a good-soldier vet at Barclays Center, providing energy, effort and switchability on Nets teams largely spinning their wheels in search of a roadmap to the future, before a December deal sent him to Los Angeles — where, just a few weeks later, he’d be reunited with old buddy Dončić as part of a revamped Lakers rotation around LeBron James.
Finney-Smith acquitted himself well in forum blue and gold, shooting 39.8% from 3-point range in the second half of the season and offering dependable contributions on both ends, whether he was starting or coming off the bench. By the end of the Lakers’ first-round playoff defeat at the hands of the Timberwolves, it was abundantly obvious Finney-Smith was one of the only players head coach J.J. Redick felt he could trust; he was part of the five-man unit that Redick infamously ran for the entire second half of Game 4, and he started and played 30 minutes in the deciding Game 5.
Whatever your thoughts on Redick’s strategy, it made sense that Finney-Smith was one of the players he felt gave the Lakers their best chance of winning — one of the players that, almost irrespective of matchup and opponent, he couldn’t do without. According to The BBall Index, only seven players who logged at least 1,500 minutes in the NBA last season ranked in the 80th percentile or higher in average matchup difficulty, defensive positional versatility and 3-point shot-making … and Finney-Smith was one of them.
The rest of the list? Dillon Brooks, Royce O’Neale, teammate Rui Hachimura, De’Andre Hunter, Taurean Prince and Trey Murphy III. That’s five guys who’ve been specifically targeted as high-end role players on teams with championship aspirations, and one (Murphy) who’d quickly become the belle of the ball on the trade market if the Pelicans ever made it clear they were interested in taking calls. Players who can defend multiple positions at a high level and shoot with consistency and accuracy can be awfully valuable come April, May and June; with this new deal, Houston is signaling they expect to be playing as spring turns into summer, and they expect Finney-Smith to be part of the reason why.
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