After landing Robert Covington from Minnesota and sending Clint Capela to Atlanta, the Rockets were reportedly on the hunt for some help at center. The inclusion of Jordan Bell in that four-team stunner was notable if only because he was an obvious option to fill in at the five spot, giving the team an undersized but athletic option in moderately traditional lineups.

That idea was snuffed out quickly, with Houston flipping Bell to the Grizzlies for Bruno Caboclo. There’s a top-32 protected pick swap for 2023 in there as well, but Caboclo is by far the most interesting part of the deal.

Caboclo, famously overdrafted as one of Masai Ujiri’s few missteps in his NBA tenure, was with the Rockets on an Exhibit 10 deal back in 2018 but never made the big club, getting cut before the regular season began. He finally looked like a legitimate NBA player down the stretch with a depleted Grizzlies team last year, using his length to play multiple positions and flashing the 3-and-D production that his physical profile always suggested was bubbling beneath the surface.

Last year he was able to average 9.9 points, 5.8 rebounds, 1.9 assists, 0.4 steals, 0.9 blocks and 1.7 3-pointers in 25.9 minutes a night from the start of March onwards. Things certainly opened up for all the Grizzlies after the trade deadline, but Caboclo ran with the opportunity and looked like a capable part of an NBA rotation.

While Caboclo is sidelined for a few weeks with a knee injury, he gives Mike D’Antoni a toolsy player to plug into a lineup that’s already permanently small. Caboclo’s length will be an asset, but the biggest hurdle to climb will be earning D’Antoni’s trust. Despite his progress, there’s a reason that Bruno has yet to earn minutes on a team that’s actually good. This season he’s appeared in just 22 games, averaging 8.7 minutes in those contests. The Rockets are one of the league’s most open teams when it comes to experimentation, but there’s a limit to how much they can stomach.

One thing that is worth noting is that Caboclo has played approximately 36% of his minutes this season at center, per Basketball Reference’s play-by-play data. If Caboclo can get healthy, and if he can fit in, then that would be a very interesting lineup foundation. That’s a lot of ifs, but it could be another wrench for D’Antoni to throw at opponents. Houston could trot out five guys who can shoot (we’ll give Caboclo the benefit of the doubt on his current 16% conversion rate from deep) and have a long, rangy player in the middle. Those lineups would likely have three plus-rebounders for their positions on the floor to help account for Caboclo’s lack of strength.

While there’s some fun things in theory for Houston to try, Caboclo might not be in the rotation at all. The Rockets may have made this trade because Caboclo’s skillset simply fits better than Bell’s, and teams generally avoid entropy if at all possible when it comes to emergency depth. It’s a low-risk swap for the Rockets, who are officially all-in on one of the more unique roster constructions we’ve seen in a long, long time.