Summary

In today's NBA, which has become as positionless as ever, there aren't many guys classified as "tweeners". However, Wilson is certainly one of them, as he's stuck between being a power forward and being a center. He's probably best served to play center, but At 6'10", he's a little undersized for that position. He's also on the lighter side, which makes it difficult to battle inside against many centers, and he hasn't developed the defensive awareness and timing to make up for his lack of size and be any sort of rim protector. Playing Wilson at power forward puts him on the perimeter on defense more often, and he's not quite quick enough to trust guarding wings.

 

On offense, Wilson is similar to a poor man's John Collins, who is also a bit of a tweener but has been able to succeed as a four primarily because of development in his perimeter game offensively. Wilson has some lob threat potential as a roller and can space out to three, but he doesn't put fear in the hearts of the defense playing either of those rolls. I think Wilson will likely get some interest from teams, but I don't expect it to be for much more than minimum "prove-it" type contracts.

 

Cap Considerations

Wilson will be a restricted free agent with a $18.5 million cap hold and a $6.4 million Qualifying Offer. If the Rockets do not have interest in bringing back Wilson they could refuse to tender him a QO, making him an unrestricted free agent. With Wilson's QO being above his market value, I expect them to not offer him the QO, even if they want to try to bring him back.

 

Other teams will have multiple ways to Wilson as even teams without cap space could possibly use either of the Non-Taxpayer MLE, Taxpayer MLE, or possibly even the Room MLE to sign him to an offer sheet or outright as an unrestricted free agent. He also could likely be signed for the minimum.