Between a first-round selection from the Phoenix Suns and a first-round swap right with the Brooklyn Nets, the Houston Rockets are set up well for the 2027 NBA draft. Both assets are unprotected, and each is from a team with an uncertain outlook, at best.

But in conversations at the NBA’s 2025 summer league, there are seemingly concerns as to how valuable first-round picks in that draft will be.

Advertisement

From Jonathan Givony, ESPN’s draft guru:

The most forward-thinking of those executives are already ringing alarm bells in their front offices for the 2027 NBA draft, which appears to be an especially weak group of rising high school seniors and international players born in 2007 and 2008.

“This is one of the weakest high school classes I’ve seen in a long time,” one grizzled talent evaluator with extensive experience in the amateur youth space told ESPN.

“There might not be a single All-Star in this group, and after the first few prospects, I’m not sure how many NBA starters I see either from the other five-star recruits. New players always emerge, but by now we usually have a pretty good idea of who the most elite prospects are, and it’s looking like slim pickings, even more so than the weak 2024 NBA draft, which at least had several high-end international prospects we could point to.”

This development could also have major implications on how aggressive NBA teams decide to be in dangling 2027 first-round picks while potentially repressing the appetite for teams considering tanking their way to a high draft pick. It also puts significant pressure on rebuilding teams to ensure they are in position to land in the talent-rich top five of the 2026 draft, which features five All-Star or franchise-caliber prospects: high-schoolers Darryn Peterson, AJ Dybantsa, Cam Boozer, Nate Ament, and Mikel Brown.

There is still time over the next two years for the narrative to change and for superior prospects to emerge, but it’s a storyline worth monitoring. From a Houston perspective, perhaps it incentivizes general manager Rafael Stone to explore trade scenarios involving those assets, since they might not be quite as valuable as many had expected.

Then again, with the Rockets already rostering numerous talented prospects such as Alperen Sengun, Amen Thompson, Jabari Smith Jr., Tari Eason, and Reed Sheppard, it could be that Houston is in a better position than other teams to draft role players.

Advertisement

Even if the 2027 class is ultimately lacking in high-end talent, perhaps the Rockets would be comfortable targeting specialists to fill in around their existing young core. That’s a luxury that most teams drafting high each year don’t have, since they’re usually coming off a bad season (hence, why they’re drafting high).

Whatever the case, the 2027 NBA draft is almost two years away, so this is not an imminent concern for Stone and the Rockets. But it is worth monitoring as the months and years progress.

More: After two games, Rockets shutting down Reed Sheppard at 2025 NBA summer league

This article originally appeared on Rockets Wire: Report: NBA teams view 2027 draft as lacking elite prospects