SDRSan Diego Rockets

Franchise history

The Rockets joined the NBA as a 1967 expansion team alongside the Seattle SuperSonics, with owner Robert Breitbard paying a $1.75 million entry fee. The debut was rough: San Diego lost its first game by a single point and went on to finish 15-67, then an NBA record for losses. The silver lining came in 1968, when the Rockets won a coin flip for the first overall pick and selected University of Houston star Elvin Hayes, who immediately became one of the league's top scorers and rebounders.

Hayes lifted San Diego to its only playoff berth in 1969, a Western Division semifinal sweep at the hands of Atlanta. The 1970 draft added future longtime Rockets Rudy Tomjanovich and Calvin Murphy, but the team never turned its young talent into sustained success, and thin San Diego crowds kept the franchise in the red. Breitbard sold the Rockets in 1971 to a Texas ownership group, which relocated the team to Houston as the NBA's first franchise in Texas.

Sources

• History of the Houston Rockets — Wikipedia
• Elvin Hayes — Wikipedia