Fan favorite Green retires, joins front office
Gerald Green, a former Rockets guard who became a fan favorite for his love of his hometown of Houston as much as for his talent, announced his retirement Friday before the Rockets’ home opener. The end of his career also will be the start of another.
Green, who was hurt in the 2019-20 preseason, will join the Rockets’ player development staff, working with his longtime mentor, Rockets assistant coach John Lucas.
“I know when all this is over, I’m probably going to go to the bathroom and cry like a baby,” Green said. “I’m so thankful for this opportunity. I sleep, eat, breathe Houston. It’s all over my body. …
“I’m excited about this. I had a lot of crying nights leading up to this. I think it’s the best decision moving forward for me and my family.”
Green had hoped to return from his foot injury suffered in Japan, forcing him to miss all of the 201920 season. The Rockets waived him before last season. At the time, Rockets general manager Rafael Stone said, “Gerald is all heart and he will forever be a part of the Rockets family.”
On Friday, he made that official.
“Gerald and I have talked a lot over the past couple days. And it’s a little bittersweet. Like I told him, though, I had to give up playing when I was 22. So he had a lot better run than I did, than the vast majority of us. He should be incredibly proud of his time as a player in the game. But just because you’re not a player, it doesn’t mean there’s not a spot for you.
“Gerald is a special guy. Gerald’s the type of person who brings a smile to your face when you’re in his presence. There’s no business, no organization in the world that’s not better for having people like that.
We’re just really happy to have him with us.”
Green has brought more than smiles. After Hurricane Harvey, when Green was playing for the Celtics, he rescued victims from their homes by boat. In the months that followed, he made many donations, including buying furniture for families that lost theirs.
He has been known for wearing his love of Houston on his sleeve, with a tattoo of an I-45 road sign and another of the Houston skyline.
“I may be the only coach with tattoos like this,” he said.
Green averaged 10.2 points in 20.9 minutes per game with the Rockets. He hit the most 3-pointers off the bench in the NBA from the time he signed, Dec. 28, 2017, to the end of the 201819 season. In 12 NBA seasons out of Gulf Shores Academy, Green averaged 9.7 points in 19.8 minutes per game.
A 2005 high school AllAmerican, he won the 2007 NBA dunk contest.
He said getting the call to join the Rockets in 2017-18 was one of the highlights of his career.
Green, 35, said he had hoped to resume his career but determined that “the tank is empty.”
“I’ve been going through some things this past year trying to get right,” Green said. “It was a little tough, working out every day. Some things, you close a chapter and open a new one. I couldn’t be more excited.”
With the Rockets, he will be able to bring a perspective few other can, having been a teenage rookie when he was taken 18th in the 2005 NBA draft. The Rockets have five 19-yearold rookies on the roster, though the NBA no longer drafts players directly from high school, as Green was.
“You just got to be there for them,” Green said. “It’s going to be a tough journey. There’s not a lot of guys who came out of high school being so young. I think my job is provide guidance, tell them the things I wasn’t told when I was a young kid. My job is to make sure their growing pains are not pains; they’re just lessons.”
Green had plenty of both, but they brought him back to where he started and always wanted to be.
“It’s a dream come true,” Green said. “I’m going to tackle this like I did everything else.”