After trading away top wing defender Dillon Brooks to the Phoenix Suns for Kevin Durant, the Houston Rockets landed an elite replacement in the opening hours of NBA free agency.
NBA free agency is officially underway, and while most of the top players have opted into their contracts or signed new deals to stay with their old teams, the league is bound to be shaken up.
In their effort to build a championship-worthy roster around Kevin Durant, the Houston Rockets inked standout defender Dorian Finney-Smith to a four-year, $53 million deal, stealing him away from the Los Angeles Lakers.
The Rockets gave up Dillon Brooks in the trade that landed them Durant, and Finney-Smith is more than capable of picking up where Brooks left off.
After adding Durant in exchange for Brooks, Jalen Green, and the tenth overall pick in the 2025 draft, the Rockets were expected to remain the second seed in the Western Conference behind the Oklahoma City Thunder, although the chances of them getting upset in the first round decreased drastically.
While losing a volume scorer in Green and an All-Defensive wing in Brooks certainly hurt, they added an All-NBA scorer who is capable of putting up 30 points with high efficiency on any given night.
By adding Finney-Smith into the fold, the Rockets are expected to remain a top-five defensive team, and can boast a lineup of Fred VanVleet, Amen Thompson, Finney-Smith, Durant, and Alperen Sengun. Add in Jabari Smith Jr., Reed Sheppard, Cam Whitmore, and Steven Adams coming in off the bench, and the Rockets could be on top of the Western Conference.
| Player | PPG | RPG | 3PT% | SPG | BPG |
| Dillon Brooks | 14.0 | 3.7 | 39.7% | 0.8 | 0.2 |
| Dorian Finney-Smith | 8.7 | 3.9 | 41.1% | 0.9 | 0.3 |
While Brooks is a slightly better defender and much more physical player (pest?) despite the stats, the new addition brings more offense and floor spacing, which is ideal for the Rockets as they try to march towards their first title of the 21st century.
Not all is good in Hollywood. The Lakers, who owe LeBron James roughly $52 million after he opted in, wanted to bolster their defense around James, Austin Reaves, and Luka Doncic. Had James restructured his deal to be more team-friendly, the Lakers could have made Finney-Smith a better offer and managed to compete for a high-end center like Clint Capela, Deandre Ayton, or Clint Capela.
The Lakers still have the cap space to add a center, although keeping Finney-Smith, a longtime teammate and friend of Doncic’s, would have been good for both on and off the court success and chemistry.
When Doncic was initially traded to the Lakers, it was his reunion with Finney-Smith, not the chance to play with James, that garnered excitement.
If the Lakers have to pick and choose between Luka and LeBron this season, it’s clear that they value youth and the future, although losing Finney-Smith when it could have been easily prevented is not a sign of good things to come.
