Houston Rockets Were Never Keeping All of Their Young Players

The Houston Rockets have been making significant changes to their team ahead of the 2024-25 season. Since the end of their season, they have made nine separate moves, including extending Ime Udoka and Jabari Smith, signing Fred VanVleet and Steven Adams, and adding Darius Finney-Smith and Clint Capela.

That is three seasons worth of moves in just the first two months of the 2025 offseason. Several of those moves involved some of the Rockets' core seven players. The Rockets have drafted a lot of young players over the last several seasons, and that is not an exaggeration.

The Rockets have drafted 10 players over the last five seasons, with several coming in the lottery. That's a lot of young players to try to fit into your system at once. When you are a rebuilding team, like the Rockets were in their first three seasons, it is easier because you prioritize player development over wins.

Once the Rockets moved past the rebuilding stage, they sought to bring in more veteran leadership on the court, which they did in the 2023 offseason. The Rockets signed both Fred VanVleet and Dillon Brooks to help turn around the Rockets.

That thought process has continued in the 2025 offseason, which resulted in the Rockets trading away the first post-James Harden draft pick, Jalen Green, and trading away the 20th overall pick in the 2023 draft, Cam Whitmore.

The Rockets have now traded away five of the 10 draft picks, which was always going to be the case. It's tough for any team to keep that many young players, especially if they are trying to win. The Rockets are no different, and with the trade for Kevin Durant, the Rockets had to give up a valuable player in return, which was Jalen Green.

Ime Udoka mentioned after their first-round loss to the Golden State Warriors said the Rockets needed to get smarter, and it seems the Rockets felt experience would help them play smarter next season. The Rockets are still a fairly young team, but have over the last two seasons added multiple veterans to their team in the hope of taking that next step in 2024-25.

Even though the Rockets had to move on from some of their young core, they still have a great mix of up-and-coming players, but also players who have been through the fires of deep playoff runs.