Rockets boast most players in recent under 25 rankings

The Houston Rockets' youth movement is well underway.

Sure, this roster has been young for a while now. Finally, they've reached a point where they're both young and productive. The Rockets are 15-6, and several of their young, core players have contributed to their success.

They've been one of the best stories of the 2024-25 NBA season. ESPN has taken notice. They just published their list of the top 25 players in the NBA under 25.

The Rockets had the most players on the list.

Rockets well represented in young player rankings

Houston had four players on this list. The Magic had three, and no other team had more than two.

Tari Eason ranked 24th, Amen Thompson landed 22nd, Jalen Green was 20th and Alperen Sengun topped all Rockets at ninth.

That's impressive. Having four of the best players under 25 in the NBA gives the Rockets an edge on their competition. That said, some will suggest that depth is less important than top-end talent. The highest-ranked Rocket in this list was still only viewed as the ninth-best player in the group.

Is that fair?

Young Rockets have room to improve

There's subjectivity at play here. Nobody can definitively claim their place in this hierarchy.

Still, Amen Thompson feels underrated at 22. Without naming names, he's already among the very best defensive wings in the NBA. It's probable that the Rockets wouldn't trade him for several of the players named ahead of him on this list.

There's no need to name names if we're asking who ahead of Sengun has a higher Box Plus/Minus (BPM). None of them do. Sengun's mark of 7.6 ranks fifth in the NBA - including players of all ages.

In fact, only Orlando's Franz Wagner (6.3) and the Thunder's Jalen Williams (7.2) are even ahead of Eason (5.9). It seems that the numbers like Houston's young core more than ESPN.

Did the Rockets get the short end of a stick here?

Rockets (almost) fairly represented by ESPN

One could make that case.

Although, BPM is not everything. ESPN is accounting for context. Sure, Eason has a higher BPM than Anthony Edwards. If you think a single NBA general manager would choose Eason over Edwards, your last name had better be Eason.

Sengun deserves to be ranked a bit higher here. He's battling a perception that he's a defensive liability. It simply hasn't been true in 2024-25, but perception often takes some time to catch up to reality. Sengun will wake the critics up in due time:

With plenty of help from his young teammates.