Houston Rockets Face 'Most Challenging' Offseason in New Era

The Houston Rockets are beginning their offseason on Monday after beating the LA Clippers in the season's final game to achieve a 41-41 record for the year.

The team won 19 more games than the previous year, a sign that things are moving in the right direction. However, they aren't satisfied and more work needs to be done if the team wishes to make the postseason next year. In fact, anything less than a postseason berth would be underachieving for the Rockets.

That's part of the reason why ESPN's Bobby Marks claims that this is going to be the most challenging offseason for general manager Rafael Stone since he took over in 2020.

"The 2024 offseason will be the most challenging for general manager Rafael Stone, because Stone now has the daunting task of taking a competitive roster and transforming it into a play-in and eventual top-six team in the Western Conference," ESPN writes.

Stone had a lot to work with in previous years with high draft picks and cap space, but this year will be slightly different. The Rockets will have a high pick from the Brooklyn Nets, but it's likely to fall in the back half of the lottery in what is one of the historically weakest draft classes in NBA history.

The team also isn't able to sign too many big names like it did last year. The time for splashes was a year ago, and now the team simply has to get better around each other. So, Stone is going to need to find a way to upgrade the roster without making much external change.

That's why it's ultimately going to come down to the players on the roster to improve on their own, because the core is set, and it's ready to make the playoffs a year from now. But they have to put the work in on their own in order to ensure that happens.