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HOUSTON – A person with direct knowledge of the deal said Monday that the Denver Nuggets have agreed to send point guard Ty Lawson to the Houston Rockets.
The Nuggets will get a lottery-protected first-round pick in 2016 along with Nick Johnson, Kostas Papanikolaou, Pablo Prigioni and Joey Dorsey in the deal that also sends a future second-round pick to Houston. The person spoke on condition of anonymity because the teams have not announced the trade.
Lawson would give the Rockets needed depth at point guard with Patrick Beverley, though is currently dealing with off-the-court issues. He entered a 30-day residential treatment program for alcohol last week after his second DUI arrest.
Lawson was a first-round pick by the Timberwolves in 2009 before being traded to the Nuggets that day. He’s averaged 14.2 points and 6.6 assists in his six-year career with Denver. The 27-year-old started a career-high 75 games last season and averaged 15.2 points and a career-best 9.6 assists.
None of the four players the Rockets gave up were key members of last year’s squad that reached the Western Conference finals before being eliminated by Golden State. Papanikolaou averaged 4.2 points in 43 games in the regular season as a rookie last year, but scored just 0.4 in the postseason and Johnson, a fellow rookie averaged only 1.3 points in the playoffs.
The 38-year-old Prigioni backed up Jason Terry late in the season after Beverley suffered a season-ending injury, but his contribution was minimal and he averaged only 3.1 points in the playoffs. Dorsey appeared in 69 games in the regular season and helped fill in when Dwight Howard was out by starting 17 games. But he fell out of favor with the team late in the season and played just 13 minutes in the playoffs as the Rockets gave rookie Clint Capela his spot in the rotation.
The deal was first reported by Yahoo Sports.
