October's NBA transactions are dominated by training camp cuts, as the pair of players hitting waivers today demonstrate. Still, teams make the occasional trade this time of year, and sometimes those swaps are significant. Last year's James Harden trade is a case in point, and while few recent preseason deals have drawn as much attention, the ripple effects that many of them made have drastically changed the fortunes of teams around the league. Other trades from recent Octobers haven't had long-lasting impacts, but they still involved key members of their respective teams. Here's a look at several notable trades that have taken place between October 1st and opening night around the NBA since 2005, when the most recent former collective bargaining agreement took effect.
- October 27th, 2012: Thunder trade Harden, Cole Aldrich, Daequan Cook and Lazar Hayward to the Rockets for Jeremy Lamb, Kevin Martin, a 2013 first-round draft pick (Steven Adams), a future first-round draft pick and a future second-round draft pick — A salary dispute over an extension for Harden precipitated this trade, so perhaps we'll see one of this year's rookie-scale extension candidates change teams before the season begins.
- October 23rd, 2010: Trail Blazers trade Jerryd Bayless to the Hornets for a 2011 first-round draft pick (Tobias Harris) — Bayless has always been a valuable bench piece, but Harris is showing signs of being more than that for the Magic, one of several teams to hold his rights in one form or another since the Bayless deal.
- October 24th, 2007: Timberwolves trade Ricky Davis and Mark Blount to the Heat for Michael Doleac, Wayne Simien, Antoine Walker and a 2009 first-round draft pick (Ty Lawson) — Davis' best days were behind him, but the gem of this trade was the future draft selection. Minnesota later traded Lawson's rights to Denver, where he's turned into perhaps the best player on the Nuggets.
- October 26th, 2005: Hornets trade Jamaal Magloire to the Bucks for Desmond Mason and a 2006 first-round draft pick (Cedric Simmons) — They're largely forgotten about now, but Magloire and Mason played significant roles, both appearing primarily as starters for their respective teams in the season prior to the trade as well as the one after it. Magloire was just a year and a half removed from playing in the 2004 All-Star Game.
- October 4th, 2005: Bulls trade Eddy Curry, Antonio Davis and a 2007 first-round draft pick (Wilson Chandler) to the Knicks for Jermaine Jackson, Mike Sweetney, Tim Thomas, a 2006 first-round draft pick (LaMarcus Aldridge), a 2007 first-round draft pick (Joakim Noah), a 2007 second-round draft pick (Kyrylo Fesenko) and a 2009 second-round draft pick (Jon Brockman) — This was the most significant preseason swap until the Harden trade, and perhaps this one had an even greater effect. Curry, just like Harden, wound up with a lucrative deal as a result of the swap, receiving the six-year, $60MM contract from the Knicks that shortly thereafter turned him into perhaps the most overpaid player in the league. The Bulls got back their center of the future in the draft pick they used on Noah, and they could have used this deal to form an imposing frontcourt if they didn't wind up trading Aldridge to the Blazers on draft night.
- October 4th, 2005: Raptors trade Rafer Alston to the Rockets for Mike James — The Rockets and Raptors swapped point guards, and both took over as starters for their new teams.
RealGM.com and Basketball-Reference.com were used in the creation of this post.
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