Hoops Rumors’ Arthur Hill held a live chat today exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. Topics included the Bulls' options in the draft, players to watch in the buyout market, impact free agents for this summer, Kevin Durant's next team and more! Use the link below to read the transcript.
While the majority of February's biggest transactions have been trades, it has also been an eventful month for contract extensions.
The Bulls took point guard Lonzo Ball off the trade market when they reached an agreement on a two-year, $20MM extension, which was finalized on Friday. The Warriors completed a two-year, maximum-salary extension with Jimmy Butler as part of the trade that sent him from Miami to Golden State. And the Raptors locked up Brandon Ingram to a new three-year, $120MM deal shortly after acquiring him from New Orleans.
Among the players who entered the month eligible for veteran extensions, Ball, Butler, and Ingram were three of the top candidates to sign new contracts. But even with that trio off the board, there are more than two dozen players eligible for veteran extensions up until June 30.
Not all of those players should be considered legitimate candidates for new deals. For instance, I wouldn't hold my breath on P.J. Tucker signing an extension with the Raptors or the Nets getting a new deal done with Bojan Bogdanovic. Still, there are a number of extension candidates worth keeping an eye on in the coming days, weeks, and months.
Let's take a closer look at those players to watch...
Dorian Finney-Smith (Lakers)
As we detailed late last night, it was a wild week leading up to the NBA trade deadline, with 25 teams completing 21 trades involving 63 players.
As the dust settles and we look forward to several impact players debuting with their new teams in the coming days, we want to dig a little deeper on this week's deals, taking a closer look at certain trends, below-the-radar details, and cap-related minutiae that caught our attention.
Let's dive in...
The Lakers and Mavericks officially finalized one of the most shocking trades in NBA history on Sunday, making a deal so unexpected that we had to make sure ESPN's Shams Charania hadn't been hacked before we published our initial story late on Saturday night.
Luka Doncic, a reigning MVP finalist who has made the All-NBA First Team five years in a row, has been sent to the Lakers along with Maxi Kleber and Markieff Morris, with 10-time All-Star Anthony Davis headed to the Mavericks alongside Max Christie and a 2029 first-round pick.
Utah also got involved in the deal, taking on Jalen Hood-Schifino from the Lakers and getting a future second-round pick from both Dallas and L.A.
Much has already been written - and will continue to be written - about why each team (especially Dallas) felt motivated to make this move. Today, while we're still reeling from the news, we want to dig into the nitty-gritty of the trade, exploring how it works from a cap perspective, examining how it impacts Doncic's future earnings, and considering what the Lakers and Mavs do next to follow this up.
Let's dive in...
Hoops Rumors’ Arthur Hill held a live chat today exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. Topics included how many Wizards should be traded before the deadline, whether the Bulls are ready for a major overhaul, Tyler Herro's All-Star chances, Jimmy Butler's ultimate destination and more! Use the link below to read the transcript.
The Pistons are the only NBA team that currently has any cap room. While that has been true for the better part of six months, it will be more important than ever during the next 12 days, since that cap space will give Detroit significant flexibility to make deadline deals that could help the team in the present and/or future.
Entering the fall, it seemed likely that the Pistons, coming off a franchise-worst 14-68 season, would remain deep in rebuilding mode in 2024/25, but that hasn't been the case through the first half of the season. A resurgent Detroit team has gotten off to a 23-21 start and currently holds the No. 6 seed in the Eastern Conference. If the season ended today, the Pistons would control a guaranteed playoff spot.
If the Pistons were clearly lottery-bound again, it would make sense to use their cap room to take on teams' unwanted contracts with assets (draft picks, cash, and/or prospects) attached. But given their spot in the standings, there has been speculation that the front office will instead look to acquire a player (or players) who could help the team right away.
Since Jaden Ivey, the Pistons' starting shooting guard and primary backup point guard, went down on New Year's Day with a broken fibula, that speculation has centered around the idea of Detroit adding another ball-handler and play-maker. But many of the options linked to the team don't make a lot of sense to me.
Pricey veteran stars like Bradley Beal or Zach LaVine, for instance, would be more logical fits if they were on expiring contracts, but I can't imagine the Pistons want to take on their oversized deals for two seasons beyond this one, especially since they'd likely have to send out multiple rotation players to make the money work. Their $14MM in cap room can't accommodate a maximum-salary player without that outgoing salary.
Ivey hasn't even been ruled out for the rest of this season and certainly should be back on the court by the fall -- having a player like Beal or LaVine on next year's roster alongside Ivey and Cade Cunningham doesn't strike me as the best move for the duo's development together, which was trending in such a good direction prior to Ivey's injury.
A smaller deal to upgrade the backcourt might make sense. Bulls guard Coby White stands out to me as a better fit than those max-salary stars, given his cap hit ($12MM), his shorter-term deal (he's an unrestricted free agent in 2026), and the fact that he's gotten accustomed to playing both backcourt positions in Chicago.
But the Bulls would presumably seek at least a first-round pick for White, and the Pistons already owe their 2025 first-rounder to Minnesota. It's not like Detroit is one player away from legitimate contention, so it's still too early in the rebuilding process to be parting with another first-rounder unless it's in a deal that nets the team a star.
In my view, the logical path for the Pistons at this season's deadline is a more conservative approach that sees them continue to stockpile assets while also maintaining cap flexibility beyond this season and acquiring a player or two who could help fill the hole created by Ivey's injury for the rest of 2024/25.
Here's my suggestion for how the Pistons should use their cap room at the deadline:
Hoops Rumors’ Arthur Hill held a live chat today exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. Topics included the All-Star prospects for four Cavaliers, the Bulls' motivation for trying to move Nikola Vucevic and Patrick Williams, Zion Williamson's trade value, Ausar Thompson's future in Detroit and more!
We're only about halfway through the 2024/25 season, but the top contenders for this year's All-NBA teams have already begun to emerge, with a handful of perennial candidates having already been removed from consideration due to injuries that will cause them to fall short of the 65-game minimum.
The race for one of the final spots on an All-NBA Third Team isn't one many fans will be watching closely, but it's extremely meaningful for certain players who have the ability to increase the value of their next contract by tens of millions of dollars by earning All-NBA honors this season.
With that in mind, we're taking a closer look today at which star players have already been eliminated from qualifying for 2025 end-of-season awards and which All-NBA candidates have big-time money on the line depending on whether or not they make the cut.
Let's dive in...
The players affected by the 65-game rule
This is the second season in which a player must appear in at least 65 games to qualify for end-of-season award consideration. The rule had an impact in its first season on players like Donovan Mitchell, who averaged 26.6 points and 6.1 assists per game for the 48-win Cavaliers, but only appeared in 55 contests. In past seasons, Mitchell would've received All-NBA votes and possibly earned a spot. In 2024, he wasn't on the ballot.
Several star players will find themselves in a similar boat this season. If we look at the 49 players who have made an All-Star or All-NBA team in the past three years, we can already rule out eight of them for this year's All-NBA squads due to the 65-game rule. The following players from that group have missed too many games to qualify for end-of-season awards:
Hoops Rumors’ Arthur Hill held a live chat today exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. Topics included whether the Bulls need a complete rebuild, the Knicks' options to find wing help, the potential cost for the Kings to land Cameron Johnson, Bradley Beal's future and more!
It hasn't exactly been a quiet start to 2025 on the NBA rumor mill, as Jimmy Butler's trade request has led to plenty of speculation about where the Heat star could land and how a potential deal could impact the rest of the market. But it may still be a couple more weeks before the in-season trade market truly heats up ahead of the February 6 deadline.
In the meantime, we're taking a closer look at a handful of cap-related topics that have been on our minds, including a scenario in which the Bucks aren't subject to second-apron restrictions, an under-the-radar team to watch as a deadline seller, and why cap room projections for the Nets are a little all over the place.
Let's dive in...