In advance of the NBA’s 2024 draft and free agent period, Hoops Rumors has previewed the coming offseason for all 30 teams, looking at their salary cap situations and the roster decisions they’ll have to make this summer.
All 30 of our Offseason Preview articles are linked below, sorted by conference and division.
Atlantic
Central
Southeast
Northwest
Pacific
Southwest
Until a team wins a championship once, there will be skepticism about their ability to do it at all. That’s why the Nuggets were considered the title favorites by many NBA fans for most of the 2023/24 season after we saw them claim the Larry O’Brien trophy in ’22/23. But with the benefit of hindsight, it seems pretty clear that the Celtics were the league’s best team from start to finish this past season.
After adding Kristaps Porzingis and Jrue Holiday to an already formidable core led by Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown, the Celtics opened the campaign by winning their first five games and 26 of their first 32. They held the No. 1 seed in the East for all but six of the 174 days in the regular season, and never relinquished that top spot after November 14. Their net rating of +11.7 was the third-best mark in NBA history and was 6.8 points per 100 possessions better than any other team in the East. Their 64-18 regular season record was the best in the NBA by seven games — and the best in the East by 14 games.
The Celtics suffered a surprising loss at home to a Heat team without Jimmy Butler in Game 2 of the first round of the playoffs, raising some concerns that the postseason struggles which reared their heads in recent seasons might resurface this spring. But Boston quickly shut down those questions by reeling off 14 wins in their next 15 games despite missing Porzingis due a calf strain for most of those contests.
Following one more blip in an otherwise dominant playoff run (a 38-point loss to Dallas in Game 4), the Celtics won Game 5 of the NBA Finals at home in Boston, securing their record-setting 18th championship — it was the team’s first since 2008 and the first for Brown and Tatum, who had previously made it to one NBA Finals and multiple Eastern Conference finals without getting over the hump.
Brown, Tatum, and these Celtics have gotten the monkey on their backs with this championship, but it’ll be replaced with a target for the 2024/25 season — the NBA’s other 29 clubs know that Boston is the team to beat, especially since the Celtics are set up to keep their core intact for at least next season and potentially more years beyond that.
Brown and Holiday are already on long-term deals and Tatum will soon join them. Porzingis also has multiple years left on his contract, leaving Derrick White as the only member of the league’s best starting five who will enter 2024/25 on an expiring deal. It’s safe to assume an extension for White will be among the top offseason priorities in Boston. What else will be on the itinerary for the Celtics this summer? Let’s dive in…
In addition to having their entire starting lineup under contract for 2024/25, the Celtics won’t have to worry about their top three reserves — Al Horford has one more year left on his deal, Payton Pritchard has a team-friendly four-year extension going into effect this summer, and Sam Hauser has a minimum-salary team option for next season.
Pritchard is locked in for a while and the Celtics can go year by year with Horford if he wants to play beyond next season, but the team may need to address Hauser’s contract this summer. Exercising his team option would make him a bargain for one more year, but would put him on track to hit unrestricted free agency in 2025. Declining Hauser’s option would allow the Celtics to control his restricted free agency this summer but would mean paying significantly more than the minimum for him in ’24/25 (especially after accounting for the accompanying tax penalties).
The best-case scenario for Boston would be to pick up Hauser’s inexpensive option and sign him to a longer-term extension that goes into effect in 2025/26 in order to ensure he doesn’t hit the open market a year from now. The 26-year-old has made at least 41.8% of his three-point attempts in all three of his NBA seasons and isn’t a sieve on defense, so he’s a valuable role player, and as long as they remain over the second tax apron, the Celtics won’t be in position to add an equivalent replacement if they lose him.
Beyond those top eight players, the Celtics have 2024 deadline acquisition Jaden Springer and 2023 draftee Jordan Walsh on guaranteed contracts. Boston gave up a second-round pick to acquire Springer, a talented perimeter defender who has yet to show much on offense in his three NBA seasons, and used a high second-rounder (No. 38 overall) to select Walsh, who played just nine NBA games as a rookie. They haven’t shown yet that they can be reliable rotation players, but they’re still just 21 and 20 years old, respectively — the C’s will likely be patient with them.
That leaves five open spots on Boston’s 15-man roster for next season. I expect the Celtics to carry just 14 men into the regular season to maintain flexibility for a possible in-season addition and to save a little money toward the end-of-season tax bill, so let’s say there are four other spots to fill.
One of those openings will likely be taken by a rookie. The Celtics control the No. 30 pick in this year’s draft, which is a good spot to be in from a financial perspective. They’ll either get the least expensive first-rounder of 2024 or will trade down for a second-rounder who will have an even more modest cap hit. In either case, the player will be on a cost-controlled contract for the next three or four years. Boston should have its choice in that range between a more seasoned prospect who could potentially contribute in his rookie season and a higher-upside play who might take some time to develop.
The Celtics’ free agents include Luke Kornet, Xavier Tillman, Svi Mykhailiuk, Oshae Brissett (who is expected to decline his player option), and Neemias Queta (who has a team option). I imagine Boston would welcome back both Kornet and Tillman if they’re willing to sign for the minimum. The team, which will hold both players’ Bird rights, may even be prepared to go higher than that to bring them back.
Porzingis and Horford will handle most of the minutes at center when they’re healthy, but it would be a surprise if either one played 70+ regular season games. Even when they’re healthy, the Celtics will want to manage their minutes, so it will behoove the club to have effective backup fives who won’t bristle at receiving inconsistent minutes. Of the two free agent bigs, I’d view Kornet as more likely to return, since I expect Tillman to draw interest from teams looking to spend their bi-annual exception or split up their mid-level exception.
While Brissett and Mykhailiuk didn’t play much, having reliable depth on the wing to call upon when needed was important. If one or both players seek out situations where they might get a chance to play more, the Celtics will return to the minimum-salary market in search of potential bargains. Cedi Osman is one hypothetical target I like quite a bit, but he’d have to be willing to accept a pay cut and a possible role reduction to chase a title.
The offseason plan I’ve outlined so far doesn’t feature much excitement or many roster changes. Maybe I’m wrong about that, given Brad Stevens‘ history of deal-making. But the second apron places real restrictions on what teams are able to do — neither the Porzingis deal nor the Holiday acquisition from last offseason would be at all possible for the Celtics under the new rules, which restrict second-apron teams from aggregating player salaries and from taking back more salary in trades than they send out. Plus, Stevens and the front office should feel less compelled to take big swings now that they know this team is capable of winning a championship.
As a result, the biggest deals of the Celtics’ offseason could be contract extensions. Tatum is now eligible to sign a five-year super-max extension that will begin in 2025/26 and projects to be worth an eye-popping $314.9MM (assuming a $141MM cap in ’24/25 and a 10% increase the following year). It’s safe to assume Boston will put that deal on the table and that Tatum will sign it, surpassing his teammate Brown for the biggest projected contract in league history.
It may not be quite so simple to lock up White, whose maximum four-year extension would be worth approximately $126MM. That’s a fair offer and he may well accept it, but after playing such a crucial role on this year’s title team and earning his second consecutive All-Defensive nod, the veteran guard would also be justified in believing that a bigger payday could be out there if he waits until the end of his current contract in 2025 to test the market. I expect the Celtics to do all they can to get White to sign this offseason, including perhaps adding a fourth-year player option in their offer.
Guaranteed Salary
Jaylen Brown ($49,350,000)
Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Note: Because he has finished each of the past two seasons on a two-way contract with the Celtics, Davison’s qualifying offer would be worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,093,637). It would include a small partial guarantee.
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Other Cap Holds
Note: The cap holds for these players are on the Celtics’ books from prior seasons because they haven’t been renounced. They can’t be used in a sign-and-trade deal.
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Celtics project to operate over the cap and over the second tax apron. That means they won’t have access to the mid-level exception, the bi-annual exception, or any of their three existing trade exceptions. If they were to dip below the second apron, they would gain access to the taxpayer mid-level exception ($5,183,000).
After winning Kyrie Irving‘s debut on February 8, 2023, the Mavericks had a 30-26 record and held the fourth seed in the Western Conference. Over the next two months, however, Dallas lost 18 of 26 contests to wrap up the 2022/23 season, free-falling down the standings to 11th place and missing out on not just the playoffs but the play-in tournament too.
It was an inauspicious start for the star backcourt duo of Irving and Luka Doncic, who struggled to share the ball effectively in crunch-time situations (10 of those 18 losses down the stretch came by five points or less). Crucially though, on the heels of a turbulent stay in Brooklyn, Irving earned rave reviews for his locker room presence and leadership during his first few months in Dallas, inspiring confidence that with more time to practice and play together, he and Doncic would figure things out on the court.
Buoyed by better chemistry between Doncic and Irving and the addition of rookie center Dereck Lively, whom the Mavericks were able to draft due to their late-season slide in ’22/23 (their first-round pick was top-10 protected), the team once again had a solid first half in ’23/24 and entered trade-deadline day with a 28-23 record. And once again, Dallas had an eventful deadline, acquiring P.J. Washington and Daniel Gafford in separate deals by sending out two of just three future first-round picks that changed hands league-wide on February 8.
Washington and Gafford certainly didn’t bring the kind of star power to the franchise that Irving had a year earlier, but the two role players also didn’t require the adjustment period that Kyrie had in 2023 — they were perfect fits in Dallas from day one. Instead of slumping down the stretch, the Mavs took off, going on a 22-9 run from deadline day through the regular season finale and moving up in the standings from No. 8 to No. 5.
While the Mavericks didn’t enter the playoffs as favorites to come out of the West, they quickly made it clear that their second-half surge was no fluke, dispatching the No. 4 Clippers in round one, knocking off the top-seeded Thunder in round two, and then making quick work of the favored Timberwolves in the Western Conference finals, winning three games in Minnesota en route to a 4-1 series victory.
The Mavericks’ run ended in the NBA Finals against a dominant Celtics team that won 64 regular season games and went 16-3 in the postseason, but Dallas was playing with house money by that point. If you’d told anyone in the organization before the season began that the Mavs would follow up their 38-win dud of a 2022/23 season with an appearance in the NBA Finals a year later, they would’ve taken that outcome in a heartbeat.
The expectations will be higher in Dallas going forward, and after falling short of a championship this spring, the Mavs will have to figure out how to get back to the NBA Finals — and how to put themselves in a better position to win it all once they get there.
Head of basketball operations Nico Harrison has done a good job so far adding complementary pieces around his franchise player (Doncic) and raising the ceiling of this roster, but there are still areas that could use an upgrade. With no cap room this offseason and their collection of future draft picks somewhat depleted, the Mavs may need to get creative to keep getting better.
In his end-of-season press conference, Harrison expressed confidence that the Mavs’ core doesn’t require any major changes, telling reporters, “If you look at our top seven or eight players that really played. I don’t see anything happening with that.”
Doncic, Irving, and Lively certainly aren’t going anywhere, and it’s safe to assume Washington and Gafford will be back after helping turn the team into a legitimate contender after the trade deadline. After that though, I’m not sure I’d write any names in pen for next year’s roster.
Beyond those five players, Josh Green and Maxi Kleber are the best bets to be back. Green, who signed a three-year rookie scale extension prior to the start of the season, battled some health issues but once again had a solid year, knocking down 38.5% of his three-pointers, handing out a career-high 2.3 assists per game, and providing solid, versatile defense on the wing. Kleber also had an injury-plagued season, appearing in just 43 contests, but continued to be a very useful frontcourt role player when available — he’s not as athletic as Lively or Gafford and won’t show up on many highlight reels, but the German big man is a versatile defender who can hit a three-pointer.
We’ve mentioned seven of Dallas’ eight highest-paid players so far. The one in that group who is least likely to return is Tim Hardaway Jr. The veteran wing, who came over from New York in the Kristaps Porzingis trade in January 2019, is one of the longest-tenured Mavericks, but his 26.8 minutes per game in 2023/24 represented his lowest average since he arrived in Dallas and his .353 3PT% was below his career rate. Hardaway battled an ankle injury in the playoffs and wasn’t used much even when he was healthy, logging just 12.7 MPG in 14 postseason appearances.
Between Hardaway’s declining role and his expiring contract (worth approximately $16.2MM), he’s the team’s most obvious trade candidate entering the summer. Any major deal – whether it’s to acquire another impact player or to create extra cap flexibility – seems almost certain to include the 32-year-old.
The Mavs aren’t loaded with tradable draft assets after having given up their 2027 first-round pick for Washington and their 2029 first-rounder for Irving. But they still have the ability to move both their 2025 and 2031 first-round picks if they make them unprotected (neither one is eligible to be pushed back a year due to the Stepien rule and the seven-year rule). They could also sweeten a potential trade offer by including one or both of Olivier-Maxence Prosper and Jaden Hardy, two youngsters who will be 22 in July and who have flashed upside early in their NBA careers.
It’s certainly possible that Dallas will make an effort to acquire another high-caliber starter together using a package that includes Hardaway, one or both of their remaining first-round picks, and one of both of those prospects. But I also wouldn’t be surprised if the Mavs look to make a smaller, cost-cutting move that turns Hardaway into a less expensive rotation piece.
For instance, a deal with the Hornets for wing Cody Martin ($8.1MM) would be legal whether or not Charlotte operates under the cap — perhaps Dallas could entice the Hornets to take on that extra salary by attaching a second-round pick or two to Hardaway. That’s just one example. There could be other teams willing to make a similar move, especially since Hardaway is still capable of providing decent rotation minutes.
The thinking here is that the Mavericks probably won’t be in position to re-sign Derrick Jones unless they trim their payroll a little. They project to operate over the tax line and possibly right around the first tax apron, which means that their only options for re-signing Jones are to offer him a Non-Bird raise (20% above his minimum salary) or to give him the full taxpayer mid-level exception ($5.18MM). Rival suitors, who would likely be eager to poach the Western champions’ starting small forward and top perimeter defender, would easily be able to top either offer.
However, if Dallas can create a little extra breathing room below the first apron, they’d be able to use more than the taxpayer portion of the mid-level exception – potentially as much as the full non-taxpayer mid-level of $12.86MM – to make a more competitive bid for Jones.
Spending more than $5.18MM of the MLE would hard-cap team salary for 2024/25 at the first apron (around $178.7MM), and Dallas already projects to have about $173.7MM counting toward the apron for 12 players, assuming Dante Exum‘s $3.15MM non-guaranteed salary is retained. So swapping out Hardaway for a player making half as much money would put the Mavs in a far better position to re-sign Jones. Veteran Dallas-area reporter Marc Stein has suggested that moving Hardaway is a “key element” of the club’s plan to keep Jones.
While sending out Hardaway in what’s essentially a salary dump would take a key salary-matching piece off the table for the Mavs’ next big trade, the team still has several mid-sized contracts on its books that could be used in such a deal. Kleber, Green, Gafford, and Washington are all earning in the $11-16MM range and are under contract for multiple seasons. Jones could join that group if Dallas is able to free up the non-taxpayer MLE to give him a new contract.
When asked after the Mavs’ season how the team will get better going forward, Harrison spoke about wanting each of his players to improve by “10 to 15 percent.” That suggests to me that he’s willing to be patient and to see how the current group does with a full training camp together rather than going out and immediately taking another big swing this summer. There will be non-Hardaway contracts to use in a bigger trade down the road if the front office eventually determines that’s what’s needed to get Dallas over the hump.
Further down on the offseason to-do list, there are five Mavericks who will be extension-eligible before the season begins, but Hardaway isn’t a candidate for a new deal from Dallas and there should be no rush to extend either Gafford or Kleber, who each have two guaranteed years left on their current contracts.
Hardy is a potential extension candidate, but again, there’s probably not a lot of urgency to get something done right away unless he’s willing to give the Mavs a team-friendly rate — he’ll be extension-eligible all season long, and if he doesn’t get a new deal, the club will have plenty of leverage next summer when he’ll be eligible for restricted free agency.
That leaves Doncic, who is a lock to get a huge new maximum-salary extension from the Mavericks. However, it won’t happen this summer. The superstar guard met the performance criteria for a super-max extension (which will start at 35% of the cap instead of 30%) this spring by making his second consecutive All-NBA team, but he only has six years of NBA service. A player must have seven to sign a super-max extension, so while Doncic is technically eligible to sign an extension this offseason, he won’t be eligible to sign that more lucrative super-max contract until July 2025.
The Mavs would obviously like to get Doncic locked up long-term as soon as possible, but they can at least feel pretty confident that the 25-year-old will be ready and willing to sign on the dotted line in 2025. Following a sub-.500 season in 2022/23, another disappointing result in ’23/24 might have prompted Doncic to question his ability to win in Dallas. This year’s success should assuage any doubts he may have had.
Guaranteed Salary
Luka Doncic ($43,031,940)Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Other Cap Holds
Note: The cap holds for these players are on the Mavericks’ books from prior seasons because they haven’t been renounced. They can’t be used in a sign-and-trade deal.
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Mavericks project to operate over the cap and either at or above the first tax apron. If they move below the first apron, they would gain access to the bi-annual exception ($4,681,000) and the full mid-level exception ($12,859,000) instead of the taxpayer mid-level exception and would regain access to their two trade exceptions (the largest of which is worth $4,953,980 and expires on July 8). If they surpass the second tax apron, they would lose access to the taxpayer MLE.
A year ago at this time, the Timberwolves‘ 2022 trade for Rudy Gobert was widely viewed as an unmitigated disaster and a cautionary tale for teams who were considering the idea of selling the farm for a single player.
That blockbuster deal cost Minnesota three solid rotation pieces (Malik Beasley, Patrick Beverley, and Jarred Vanderbilt), a young center who had a terrific rookie season with his new team in 2022/23 (Walker Kessler), the 2023 draft pick that became Keyonte George, and four more future draft assets, including two unprotected first-round picks, a top-five protected first-rounder, and an unprotected first-round swap.
In their first season with Gobert, the Timberwolves took a step back, winning just 42 games after posting a 46-36 record in 2021/22, and the three-time Defensive Player of the Year struggled to adapt to his new situation. When the 2023 offseason got underway, there were myriad calls from pundits and fans for Minnesota to break up its frontcourt by trading either Gobert or (more likely) Karl-Anthony Towns.
What a difference a year makes.
Instead of dismantling their core, the Wolves chose to stand relatively pat last summer, betting they’d be just fine with better health from Towns, more acclimation time for Gobert, another year of growth for rising star Anthony Edwards, and the stabilizing influence of 2023 deadline addition Mike Conley. They were right.
The Wolves’ 56-26 record was just one game off the top mark in the Western Conference, and Gobert looked far more comfortable in his second year in Minnesota, as he anchored a unit that posted the NBA’s best defensive rating (108.4) and won his fourth Defensive Player of the Year award.
After passing their regular season test with flying colors, the Wolves entered the playoffs looking for their first postseason series victory since 2004. Not only did they get it, but they made it look easy, sweeping Kevin Durant, Devin Booker, and the Suns out of round one. For good measure, Minnesota followed up that dominant first-round showing by knocking off the defending champions in round two, eliminating the division-rival Nuggets in a hard-fought seven-game series.
A dream season to that point ended on a sour note, however. Despite entering the Western Conference finals as the higher seed and a heavy favorite against Dallas, Minnesota had no answer for the firepower of Luka Doncic and Kyrie Irving, dropping three games at home to the Mavericks en route to a 4-1 series loss.
While it was a disappointing finish, the season was a major success overall for the Wolves, as Edwards’ ascension to stardom and their dominant defensive play provided reason to believe that more lengthy postseason runs are possible in the coming years. The challenge now will be keeping the core intact as the cost of the roster gets higher and billionaires battle over control of the franchise.
Edwards, Towns, and All-Defensive wing Jaden McDaniels will all get huge raises this summer, pushing team salary over the second tax apron, while longtime owner Glen Taylor and the new prospective ownership group led by Marc Lore and Alex Rodriguez head to arbitration in an effort to determine who will ultimately be the club’s majority stakeholder.
This is a roster capable of contending for a title and worth paying a hefty luxury tax bill. But operating over the second apron will restrict the front office’s ability to make additional moves, and not knowing who will be on the hook for those tax bills raises concerns about the sustainability of such a high payroll.
Let’s start with the cap situation. Towns, Gobert, and Edwards are now all on maximum-salary contracts that will be worth between $42-50MM in 2024/25, so that trio alone will take up nearly the entire $141MM cap. Throw in McDaniels at $23MM, Naz Reid at $14MM, Conley at $10MM, and this roster gets expensive in a real hurry.
The second apron is projected to be $189.5MM; Minnesota’s nine players on guaranteed contracts are owed a combined $191MM, and that doesn’t account for the cap hit for the team’s first-round pick ($2.55MM) or new contracts for free agents like Kyle Anderson, Monte Morris, and Jordan McLaughlin. If no cost-cutting moves are made, team salary will likely end up north of $200MM, with a luxury tax penalty of at least $75MM, and those are relatively conservative estimates.
There are some teams who wouldn’t bat an eye at those figures, especially for a roster capable of vying for a title. The Clippers reportedly paid $142MM+ in taxes this season for a team that didn’t make the second round of the playoffs; the Warriors were on the hook for $177MM in tax penalties for a club that didn’t even make the playoffs.
But the Wolves under Taylor have never been eager to surpass the luxury tax line, having not paid a tax bill larger than $1MM in two decades. And it’s unclear if Lore and Rodriguez would be big spenders either, given that they’ve repeatedly had to raise capital during the process of buying into the franchise and had reportedly projected a payroll decrease for 2024/25 (though that’s said to be a common practice that doesn’t preclude subsequent revisions).
Towns would be the player to watch if the Wolves decide they need to clean up their cap situation. He’s one of the best frontcourt shooters in NBA history, but he has become a second option on offense due to Edwards’ emergence, and he isn’t a valuable asset on defense — playing him next to Gobert is a challenge in certain matchups, since neither big man is at his best when he’s chasing forwards or wings out on the perimeter.
Towns’ $49.35MM cap hit in 2024/25 will also be the highest for any Minnesota player, and the team has a bench player capable of replacing him in the starting five if necessary — Reid isn’t KAT, but the NBA’s reigning Sixth Man of the Year is coming off his best season and is making a fraction of Towns’ salary.
Still, all the reasons that make Towns the most likely odd man out among the team’s highest-paid players would work against the Wolves if they placed him on the trade block. His four-year, maximum-salary contract will be onerous and impractical for many clubs to carry under the new Collective Bargaining Agreement, and any trade partner would need to be in position to surround him with the right personnel. Plus, the Wolves won’t just be looking to dump Towns’ salary — they’d want to get back quality rotation players who come in at a much lower price point. It’ll be a challenge.
My bet is the Wolves won’t do anything too drastic this summer. We saw a year ago that Tim Connelly and his front office are willing to be patient to give a talented roster time to jell, and for most of the season, the current group worked just fine together. As for ownership, that standoff seems unlikely to be resolved within the next few weeks, and as long as Taylor maintains majority control, I doubt he’ll want to take the PR flack that would ensue if he slashed salary after the team’s best season in 20 years.
If no big moves are in the cards, it could be a pretty quiet summer in Minnesota, with the priority being to build depth beyond a top seven of Edwards, Towns, Gobert, McDaniels, Conley, Reid, and Nickeil Alexander-Walker. As a second-apron team, the Wolves won’t have any form of mid-level or bi-annual exception available and won’t be able to aggregate salaries in trades, limiting their options.
Wendell Moore, Leonard Miller, and Josh Minott have contracts for next season (Minott’s salary is non-guaranteed), and I’d expect Miller and Minott to be back, since their cap hits will come in below the two-year veteran’s minimum. But Moore is slightly pricier and has barely played in his first two seasons, so he’s a trade candidate unless the Wolves remain bullish on his upside.
If two of those three youngsters return, that would leave at least five open roster spots for Minnesota to fill. I imagine the team would welcome back Anderson, Morris, and/or McLaughlin if they’re willing to accept minimum-salary deals, but Anderson and Morris, at least, should have stronger offers — McLaughlin might too. The Wolves have the Bird rights necessary to make any of those players competitive offers, but it would cost exponentially more than just the player’s salary, given how far into the tax the club will be.
Minnesota also controls the 27th and 37th picks in this year’s draft, putting the team in position to add a couple more low-cost prospects to the roster. But if Anderson and Morris depart, the front office will likely head to the free agent market on the lookout for at least a couple veterans capable of playing rotation minutes, especially in the backcourt and on the wing. Kyle Lowry, Cameron Payne, Alec Burks, Lonnie Walker, and Justin Holiday are some of the free agents who might be available for the minimum and who could be fits on the Wolves’ roster.
Gobert is the only notable extension candidate to monitor this offseason, as he’ll be eligible to reach free agency as early as next summer if he declines a 2025/26 player option. He’ll remain extension-eligible even after the regular season begins though, so the Wolves shouldn’t feel urgency to get anything done by opening night.
Guaranteed Salary
Karl-Anthony Towns ($49,350,000)
Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Other Cap Holds
Note: The cap holds for these players are on the Timberwolves’ books from prior seasons because they haven’t been renounced. They can’t be used in a sign-and-trade deal.
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Timberwolves project to operate over the cap and over the second tax apron. That means they won’t have access to the mid-level exception, the bi-annual exception, or their trade exception worth $4MM. If they move below the second apron, they would gain access to the taxpayer mid-level exception ($5,183,000). If they operate below both aprons, they could access the non-taxpayer mid-level exception ($12,859,000), the bi-annual exception ($4,681,0001), and their trade exception.
While their regular season success was overlooked to some extent due to more significant jumps in the standings in 2023/24 by Oklahoma City, Minnesota, and Orlando, you could make a case that no NBA team exceeded preseason expectations from start to finish by a greater margin than the Pacers.
After winning 25 games in 2021/22 and 35 in ’22/23, Indiana was projected to take another modest step forward in ’23/24 — oddsmakers had their over/under set at 38.5 wins. However, propelled by a high-flying offense led by star point guard Tyrese Haliburton, the Pacers didn’t spend a single day below .500 all season, finishing the year with a 47-35 record and a top-six playoff spot in the East. They knocked off the No. 3 Bucks and No. 2 Knicks in the postseason before falling to the eventual champion Celtics in the Eastern Conference finals.
Indiana likely wouldn’t have been one of the last four teams standing if not for some injury luck in the playoffs. Giannis Antetokounmpo, Damian Lillard, Julius Randle, OG Anunoby, Mitchell Robinson, and Bojan Bogdanovic were some of the opposing players who missed most or all of their playoff series vs. Indiana.
Still, the Pacers beat the teams in front of them in the first two rounds, then played the Celtics about as competitively as a team on the losing end of a sweep can, dropping one game in overtime and two more (without Haliburton) by a single basket. They likely won’t enter the 2024/25 season as a favorite to return to the Eastern finals, but this is a good team that doesn’t appear to have reached its ceiling yet.
To continue getting better, the Pacers may have to rely mostly on internal improvement and tweaks around the margins. Haliburton’s All-NBA season means his maximum-salary rookie scale extension will begin at 30% of the 2024/25 cap (instead of 25%) and the club has already committed to a similar max deal for free agent forward Pascal Siakam. Those two contracts will occupy a substantial chunk of Indiana’s cap room for the next few years, and the club gave up a handful of first-round picks in order to acquire Siakam from Toronto in the first place.
That doesn’t mean the Pacers have no paths to making upgrades though — two of the three first-rounders they gave up for Siakam were 2024 picks, so they still have future draft assets available to offer up in trade talks. And even with max deals for Haliburton and Siakam set to hit the books, the team isn’t quite up against the luxury tax line yet. There’s room to maneuver here, even as the ongoing development of young players like Haliburton, Bennedict Mathurin, Jarace Walker, and Ben Sheppard offers hope of growth from within.
As noted above, the Pacers have already taken care of the No. 1 item on their summer to-do list. They became the first team to take advantage of the NBA’s new rules allowing clubs to negotiate with their own free agents beginning one day after the end of the NBA Finals, quickly coming to terms on a reported four-year, maximum-salary deal with Siakam.
There are a couple caveats to keep in mind here. First, that deal can’t be officially signed until July 6, so it’s technically possible for it to fall apart before then, but that’s extremely unlikely. Siakam has seemed to genuinely enjoy his time with his new team, and the Pacers acquired him knowing they would probably have to go up to the max to retain him beyond 2023/24. He did nothing during his half-season in Indiana to dissuade them from making that offer, leading the team in scoring and rebounding in both the regular season and the playoffs.
Second, while Siakam’s new deal has been reported as a four-year max, we won’t know all the specific details of that deal until it’s official. Are all four seasons fully guaranteed? Are the base salaries technically slightly below the max, with incentives available to max it out? Is there an option on year four?
The answers to these questions will go a long way toward determining just how much risk the contract carries in the back half (Siakam will be 34 when it expires), but regardless, it’s a deal the Pacers had to make. Indiana isn’t a free agent destination, so when the team finds itself in a position to lock up a two-time All-NBA forward for the foreseeable future, it has to take advantage of that opportunity.
With Siakam taken care of, the Pacers have just about all of their rotation players under contract for 2024/25, but there are a couple exceptions. Reserve forward Obi Toppin is eligible for restricted free agency this summer, while backup big man Jalen Smith holds a $5.4MM player option that he may decline. Of the players who finished the season on the roster, Toppin and Smith ranked seventh and ninth, respectively, in minutes per game.
Accounting for Siakam’s new contract and T.J. McConnell‘s full salary (it’s partially guaranteed for now), the Pacers are already on the hook for about $149.4MM for 10 players, which doesn’t include new contracts for either Toppin or Smith. I imagine ownership would prefer to stay below the projected luxury tax line of $171.3MM if possible — that means it could be a tight fit to retain both Toppin and Smith and then fill out the rest of the roster.
On the surface, Toppin looks like the logical keeper if the Pacers have to decide between the two. The former lottery pick thrived in the team’s up-tempo offense, settling into a role off the bench as an efficient scorer and rebounder (and even a shooter — his .403 3PT% was a career high). He was a key part of the postseason rotation, while Smith was barely used in the playoffs.
But the equation won’t necessarily be that simple. While Toppin’s qualifying offer is worth about $7.7MM, there may be a team willing to give him a deal that starts in the neighborhood of the full mid-level ($12.9MM) or even a little higher than that — matching such an offer could force the Pacers to go over the tax line. Plus, if Smith ultimately gets a sense that he’s better off picking up his player option than testing the open market, he can lock in his $5.4MM cap hit without the club having any real agency in the decision, which would make it trickier to re-sign Toppin and stay out of the tax.
Of course, it’s worth stressing that there are no rules preventing the Pacers from signing both players to new contracts. Maybe ownership will be comfortable paying a small tax bill for a roster coming off an Eastern Conference finals appearance. If Toppin’s price comes in lower than expected, perhaps they could even squeeze both players and two or three more in below the tax line. A trade that reduces salary elsewhere on the roster would also be an option.
One additional factor that should help the Pacers navigate the tax line and the aprons? The team holds three 2024 second-round picks, at Nos. 36, 49, and 50. I wouldn’t necessarily expect Indiana to use all three picks on players who will immediately sign standard contracts, but adding one or two of them to the 15-man roster would make sense financially — a minimum-salary free agent would count for about $2.09MM for cap and tax purposes, whereas a second-round pick will likely count for just $1.16MM.
Gaining that bit of extra financial wiggle room with a couple roster spots could end up coming in handy, and Indiana’s scouting department showed with its Sheppard pick at No. 26 in last year’s draft that it can find players further down the draft board who are capable of contributing right away (during the playoffs, Sheppard averaged 19.7 MPG and started two games).
The Pacers will also have contract extension decisions to make in 2024/25 for a pair of players who look more valuable than ever coming off the team’s extended playoff run.
Myles Turner was considered a trade candidate for years and appeared to be on the outs in Indiana back in 2022 when the club signed Deandre Ayton to a maximum-salary offer sheet, while McConnell began the 2023/24 season out of the rotation. But both players were huge parts of the Pacers’ success in ’23/24, with Turner averaging 17.0 points per game on .517/.453/.760 shooting in 17 playoff starts, while McConnell averaged 11.8 PPG and 5.1 APG off the bench in those 17 games.
Turner won’t become extension-eligible until midway through the season, but McConnell could be signed to a new deal beginning in July.
It will be interesting to see what the price point is for Turner, who has never been viewed as a star but is that rare form of center who can both capably protect the rim and hit three-pointers. He’ll earn $19.9MM in the final year of his current contract in 2024/25 and it’s safe to assume he’ll be seeking a raise on his next deal. I expect his camp to keep a close eye on what Nic Claxton gets in free agency — if Claxton signs for upwards of $25MM per year, Turner’s reps could make a case for an even larger payday for their client by arguing that he makes a similar impact to Claxton on defense and is more versatile offensively.
McConnell, 32, is four years older than Turner, plays a lesser role, and will make $9.3MM in ’24/25. His next deal won’t be as lucrative as his teammate’s, but there’s no reason to count on him taking a pay cut. The pesky 6’1″ guard is coming off perhaps the best two-year stretch of his career, having averaged 9.4 PPG, 5.4 APG, and 2.9 RPG on .550/.427/.823 shooting since the start of the 2022/23 season. He’s a Rick Carlisle favorite and has shown how useful he can be on a winning team.
If the Pacers aren’t comfortable with how the initial extension negotiations go with McConnell, they can afford to be patient. He’ll be extension-eligible for the entire 2024/25 league year, up until June 30, so there’s plenty of time to get something done. The window for Turner is a little smaller, since he won’t become extension-eligible until January 30.
It’s worth noting that Indiana traded Buddy Hield in a contract year a few months ago when it became clear that he and the club weren’t going to agree to terms on an extension. I don’t think the Pacers will want to move Turner or McConnell, but it’s a possibility worth monitoring if one or both players don’t have a deal in place before February’s trade deadline.
Guaranteed Salary
Tyrese Haliburton ($42,300,000)
Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Other Cap Holds
Note: The cap hold for York is on the Pacers’ books from a prior season because he hasn’t been renounced. He can’t be used in a sign-and-trade deal.
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Pacers project to operate under the cap and under the first tax apron. If they approach or exceed the first apron, they would lose access to the full mid-level exception and bi-annual exception and would gain access to the taxpayer mid-level exception ($5,183,000).
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, trade exceptions don’t expire before the regular season begins.
The Knicks‘ 47-35 record in 2022/23 was their best mark since the days of Carmelo Anthony and Mike Woodson, and their first-round triumph over Cleveland last year was the team’s first playoff series win in a decade. So the fact that they were even better in 2023/24 was no small feat.
This year’s Knicks improved their record to 50-32, and while they didn’t advance any further in the playoffs this spring than they did in 2023, they put up a stronger fight in the second round, taking a 3-2 lead over Indiana before a series of injuries caught up to them.
Jalen Brunson, who began heading down a path toward stardom in his first year as a Knick, completed that journey this past season, finishing fifth in MVP voting and claiming a spot on the All-NBA second team. He set new career highs in points (28.7) and assists (6.7) per game while providing crucial availability (77 starts) for a Knicks team that battled the injury bug all season long.
Brunson’s emergence as a legitimate star raises the team’s ceiling on the court going forward and changes the outlook for the front office. It seems safe to assume that head of basketball operations Leon Rose won’t be looking to acquire a ball-dominant guard (like, say, Donovan Mitchell) anytime soon.
Brunson has become the star point guard New York had been missing for so long, reducing any urgency the club might have felt to package assets in a trade for an impact player. Most of those assets are still on hand and could be used on the trade market if the right opportunity arises, but the Knicks can afford to be patient in waiting for that right deal, shifting their focus to wings, forwards, and big men rather than lead guards.
While the Knicks’ injury woes may have prevented the club from making a deeper playoff run, they created opportunities for players who otherwise wouldn’t have played such substantial roles. Isaiah Hartenstein, Donte DiVincenzo, Miles McBride, and Precious Achiuwa were among those who thrived upon taking on additional responsibilities. That should pay off in the long run, assuming New York is able to keep its roster intact (Hartenstein and Achiuwa are free agents, as is midseason acquisition OG Anunoby).
Running it back with a similar group would give the team one of the NBA’s deepest rosters once Julius Randle, Mitchell Robinson, Anunoby, and Bojan Bogdanovic are back to full health. And, having seen the way those reserves performed in increased roles, the Knicks are in position return to the trade market confident they’ll still have plenty of depth even if they give up multiple solid rotation pieces in a deal for a single player, like they did when they gave up Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett for Anunoby in December.
Knicks fans have had a rough go of it for the last couple decades, but the team’s future looks brighter now than it has at virtually any other point in the 21st century.
Re-signing Anunoby is an important first step for the Knicks this summer. The former Raptor is one of the NBA’s best three-and-D players – he has a .383 3PT% over the past five seasons and an All-Defensive nod under his belt – and his impact in his first 23 games as a Knick was undeniable. The team’s net rating during his 802 regular season minutes was an incredible +21.7. New York’s offensive rating (122.6) and defensive rating (100.9) during those minutes both would’ve ranked first in the NBA.
Anunoby’s injury history is a concern. He has been unavailable for at least 29 games in three of the past four seasons (he missed 15 in the fourth) and was on the shelf for most of the second-round series vs. Indiana last month. Plus, if a cap-room contender like the Sixers or Thunder gets involved in the bidding, his price as a free agent could rise higher than what the Knicks would prefer to pay. But New York didn’t acquire him to be a rental, and he’s been such a perfect fit that it’s hard to see the club letting him get away unless a rival suitor comes in with a long-term, maximum-salary offer.
Another team could offer Anunoby up to a projected $182MM over four years; the Knicks would likely be more comfortable with something in the four-year, $140-150MM range. We’ll have to wait to see if that’ll be enough to get it done or if they’ll face a decision on whether to match (or top) a higher bid.
The decision on Hartenstein should be a bit more straightforward. Since the Knicks hold the big man’s Early Bird rights, they’re limited to offering him a 75% raise on his previous salary. That works out to a starting salary around $16.2MM and a maximum four-year total of approximately $72.5MM. New York will have to determine whether it’s comfortable offering that full amount, which would be a significant investment in a player who is coming off a two-year, $16MM deal and who was averaging just 17.0 minutes per game before Robinson went down with his ankle injury.
It’s possible – but not certain – that another team would be willing to go even higher than $72.5MM over four years for Hartenstein, a reliable defender, strong rebounder, and good passer. An oversized short-term deal that guarantees him a substantial amount of money in the next couple years could also be an option for a team trying to steal him from the Knicks. However, the 26-year-old is said to be seeking long-term security and has spoken highly of his experience in New York, so if the Knicks make him a competitive offer, my guess is he’ll accept it, like Malik Monk did with the Kings’ Early Bird offer.
Re-signing both Anunoby and Hartenstein would be a big win for the Knicks, but it would also be expensive. Let’s pencil in a $35MM starting salary for Anunoby and assume Hartenstein gets his maximum first-year Early Bird salary. That’ll increase the Knicks’ total guaranteed salaries for 2024/25 to about $158MM for nine players, assuming Jericho Sims‘ inexpensive team option is picked up (which should be a lock)
If we assume the team guarantees Bogdanovic’s full $19MM salary (it’s currently partially guaranteed for $2MM), we’re up to nearly $175MM for 10 players. The Knicks don’t have to hang onto Bogdanovic, though recent reporting has suggested they probably will. He wasn’t great after the midseason trade that sent him from Detroit to New York, but Bogdanovic has been a reliable scorer and shooter for years and his expiring contract could serve as a useful salary-matching piece in a trade.
Bringing back those three players would push the Knicks’ team salary above the luxury tax line without accounting for either of their first-round picks. Or restricted free agent Achiuwa. Or unrestricted free agent Alec Burks. Or players to fill out the rest of the 15-man roster. It’s possible the club’s total salary could ultimately surpass the second tax apron in that scenario.
I don’t expect that to happen though, since being a second-apron team would prohibit the Knicks from aggregating player salaries in a trade, which would seriously hinder their ability to be opportunistic if and when a star becomes available. I expect the front office to make a concerted effort to at least remain below the second apron, and perhaps below the first apron too — operating over either apron would prohibit the Knicks from taking back more salary than they send out in a trade.
Avoiding one or both aprons would mean making a sacrifice somewhere else on the roster if both Anunoby and Hartenstein re-sign (if one of them walks, it likely won’t be an issue). Maybe that means waiving Bogdanovic. Maybe it means moving Robinson — a deal with the Thunder could make sense, given their rebounding woes, their available cap room, and their collection of draft assets. Achiuwa might also be a cap casualty unless the Knicks can get him back at a pretty favorable price, and I’d expect New York to trade at least one of its first-round picks (at No. 24 and 25), opening up that roster spot for a minimum-salary player.
While the Knicks should once again put themselves in position to trade a star, it’s unclear if the right fit will be out there this offseason. There has been plenty of speculation over the years about Karl-Anthony Towns, a CAA client who previously played for head coach Tom Thibodeau, and Towns’ ability to space the floor makes him an intriguing target. But he’ll be on one of the NBA’s most expensive long-term contracts beginning in 2024/25 and he’s not the sort of two-way contributor Thibodeau prefers.
I’d consider Paul George and Jimmy Butler two potential trade candidates who would be more logical fits for New York. George is a CAA client and Butler previously played for Thibodeau in both Chicago and Minnesota. More importantly, both players are capable of sharing the offensive load with Brunson and defending at a high level on the other end of the court.
It remains to be seen whether either player will be attainable though. George would probably have to pick up his player option for 2024/25 and push for a trade to New York — if he extends with the Clippers or declines his option to become a free agent, he’ll almost certainly be off the table for the capped-out Knicks. As for Butler, while there has been speculation that his contract demands might result in a standoff between him and the Heat, it’s still hard to imagine a scenario in which Miami agrees to trade him to one of its primary Eastern Conference rivals.
Some combination of Randle, Bogdanovic, and Robinson, along with draft assets, would likely need to be included in a trade for a maximum-salary player like George or Butler. In addition to their two 2024 first-round picks, the Knicks control all their own future first-rounders, as well as protected 2025 picks from Detroit, Washington, and Milwaukee.
Finally, we should touch on a pair of contract extension negotiations worth watching this offseason. Both Thibodeau and Brunson are entering contract years (Brunson holds a 2025/26 player option) and figure to be offered new deals soon, if they haven’t been already.
It sounds like it’s a matter of when, not if, Thibodeau is extended, though it remains to be seen how much he’ll paid and how many years he’ll get. A multiyear deal in the neighborhood of $10-11MM per year seems about right, given the rising salaries for head coaches around the NBA.
As for Brunson, he’ll be eligible to sign a four-year extension worth approximately $157MM. Waiting another year would make him eligible for a deal worth up to a projected $270MM over five years. There has been some speculation that he’ll be willing to do a deal sooner rather than later, which would be a great outcome for the Knicks, but even if it doesn’t get done this offseason, they shouldn’t be worried — yes, he could become a free agent in 2025, but there’s no indication he’d consider leaving New York at that time. Waiting the extra year would just be about maximizing his earnings.
Randle will also be extension-eligible this summer, but I’d be surprised if he gets a new deal done, given that he’ll spend most of the offseason recovering from shoulder surgery and isn’t necessarily a lock to be part of the Knicks’ long-term plans like Brunson is.
Guaranteed Salary
Julius Randle ($28,939,680)
Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Note: Because he has finished each of the past two seasons on a two-way contract with the Knicks, Washington’s qualifying offer would be worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,168,944). Brown is no longer eligible to sign a two-way contract and would also have a qualifying offer worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,244,249). Those offers would each include a small partial guarantee.
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Knicks project to operate over the cap and under the first tax apron. If they approach or exceed the first apron, they would lose access to the full mid-level exception, the bi-annual exception, and their trade exceptions and would gain access to the taxpayer mid-level exception ($5,183,000). If they exceed the second apron, they would lose access to all of their exceptions.
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, trade exceptions don’t expire before the regular season begins.
After going 22-50 in 2020/21 and 24-58 in ’21/22, the Thunder took a major step forward in their rebuild in ’22/23, finishing 40-42, good for the No. 10 seed in the West. Oklahoma City won its first play-in game that season over New Orleans, but the team was eliminated from postseason contention by Minnesota, which advanced as last season’s No. 8 seed.
A year-over-year increase of 16 wins is pretty rare in the NBA. Yet in 2023/24, the Thunder actually surpassed that total, winning an additional 17 games and finishing 57-25 (they had the same record as Denver but claimed the West’s top seed due to a head-to-head tiebreaker). Oklahoma City finished the regular season third in offensive rating and fourth in defense, for an overall net rating of +7.3, which only trailed the Celtics (+11.7).
In their first playoff run with their young core, the Thunder quickly dispatched the Pelicans in a first-round sweep before falling to the Mavericks in a six-game second-round series. While the outcome was obviously disappointing, it was a competitive series — the two teams scored the exact same number of points. Dallas went on to make the NBA Finals, losing to Boston in five games.
Oklahoma City’s ascent from a rising young team to a legitimate contender was very rapid, spearheaded by the emergence of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander as a MVP candidate — he finished third in the 2024 balloting. Second-year wing Jalen Williams and center Chet Holmgren, who just finished his rookie campaign but has technically been under contract for two years, round out the Thunder’s formidable (and very young) big three.
With Gilgeous-Alexander as the team’s primary ball-handler and Williams a frequent secondary creator, Josh Giddey became expendable. The Mavs dared Giddey to shoot in their second-round series and he struggled defensively as well, later admitting his confidence took a hit. Reigning Coach of the Year Mark Daigneault ultimately moved the former sixth overall pick to the bench, but even before the playoffs, Giddey’s fit going forward was a major question mark.
The Thunder are trading Giddey to the Bulls in a one-for-one swap for defensive stalwart Alex Caruso, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski. OKC had its sights set on the 30-year-old for a while and the team reportedly views him as a long-term fit. Caruso is on an expiring contract but will be extension-eligible during the season, whereas Giddey will be restricted next year if he doesn’t sign a rookie scale extension with Chicago this offseason.
It’s worth noting that Caruso has ties to the Thunder, having played for Daigneault while the two were with the Blue — OKC’s NBA G League affiliate — several years ago. Caruso also publicly praised Daigneault back in November.
The move made a lot of sense, as Caruso doesn’t need the ball to be effective and is in a different league as a defender compared to Giddey. He’s also a much better shooter, having made 40.8% of his 4.7 three-point attempts in 2023/24, versus 33.7% (a career-high) on 3.0 attempts for Giddey.
President of basketball operations Sam Presti has been hoarding draft picks for years, so Oklahoma City has plenty of non-player assets to dangle in additional trade talks. The Thunder also project to have $33MM+ in cap room this summer, putting the team in a unique position as a contender who can be a major player in free agency.
The Thunder have Gilgeous-Alexander, three-and-D wing Luguentz Dort, and last year’s 10th pick, Cason Wallace, under team control for at least the next three seasons. The same is true of Kenrich Williams, though his future with OKC seems a little uncertain after his role was reduced this past season. Still, Williams’ contract is relatively team-friendly and he would likely appeal to rival teams if he were made available.
The 2026 offseason is an important one to keep in mind for OKC, as that’s when Holmgren and Jalen Williams will have completed the fourth and final seasons of their rookie scale contracts and will be up for new deals. Based on how they played this past season and factoring in projected growth, it wouldn’t at all be surprising if they both received maximum-salary contracts in the future, whether that comes via extensions in the 2025 offseason or as restricted free agents in 2026.
That means the Thunder have a two-year window to take advantage of their financial flexibility, since it may be the last period in which they’ll have a significant amount of room available for quite some time. The Thunder don’t have to commit long-term money this summer if they don’t want to though — they could preserve flexibility for 2025 by “overpaying” a player or two on short-term deals, similar to what happened with Indiana and Bruce Brown last offseason.
The Pacers gave Brown a two-year, $45MM contract which only features one fully guaranteed season (the second is a team option). They later used him as salary-matching ballast in the trade to acquire Pascal Siakam from the Raptors (Toronto is expected to exercise its $23MM option on Brown and will reportedly look to trade him).
That type of contract structure could be appealing to the Thunder if they want to hedge their bets. The players they sign could be used as salary-matching pieces if the right opportunities present themselves while also (hopefully) being positive contributors for OKC.
Isaiah Hartenstein has been mentioned as a possible free agent target, and he only has Early Bird rights, which means the Knicks are limited to offering him a four-year, $72.5MM deal. One rumor suggested the Thunder might be willing to offer Hartenstein a short-term deal — perhaps two years — with a high salary. Would that appeal to Hartenstein?
Fred Katz of The Athletic recently reported the 26-year-old big man is looking for “long-term security, not high-risk, high-reward instability,” so a deal with just one or two guaranteed years may be a tough sell. If they wanted to, the Thunder could easily offer Hartenstein a three-year deal that matches or exceeds New York’s total, allowing him to hit free agency a year earlier while joining a great team.
Hartenstein would bring a different dynamic to the Thunder as a more “traditional” big man. While I place a high value on the 26-year-old’s game, I don’t necessarily love his fit with Oklahoma City. The main reason for that is the Thunder run a “five-out” offense predicated on everyone being able to handle the ball, pass and shoot. That spacing creates driving lanes for Gilgeous-Alexander and Jalen Williams, and is part of what makes Holmgren so effective as a center. Hartenstein makes good on-ball decisions and is a plus passer for a big man, but he’s essentially a non-shooter.
Of course, that’s just a cursory glance at his potential fit. Hartenstein is also an excellent screener and an unselfish ball mover — a fairly atypical combination for a big man. When they’re at their best, the Thunder are frequently moving, setting screens and back-cutting toward the basket on the weak side. That would seemingly pair well with Hartenstein.
Hartenstein had an excellent all-around season by traditional measures and by advanced statistics. For instance, when he was on the court during the regular season, the Knicks had the equivalent of the NBA’s third-best offense and second-best defense (they were slightly negative when he didn’t play). He ranked seventh in the league in defensive FG% at the rim, ahead of Victor Wembanyama, Brook Lopez and Anthony Davis. He would also improve the Thunder’s rebounding at both ends of the court.
The Thunder’s biggest weakness during the 2023/24 season was on the boards, ranking just 27th in the league in rebounds per game and 28th in rebounding percentage. That weakness was exploited by Dallas in the postseason, particularly on the offensive glass, where the Thunder struggled to limit second-chance opportunities.
The main issue with potentially signing Hartenstein is that I think Holmgren is clearly a center, not a power forward. How many minutes would Hartenstein realistically play? I suppose OKC could attempt to pair them at times, since they can both pass and Holmgren can space the floor, but the fit might be awkward.
Holmgren is a fearsome paint protector in his own right, ranking just ahead of Hartenstein in DFG% at the rim. He’s also a more dynamic offensive player due to his three-level scoring.
I’m just not sold on paying Hartenstein a high salary to be a backup, and that’s what he’d be on the Thunder. I’m also not sure his trade value would be positive if he were making $20MM+ annually and didn’t have a starting role.
I do like the idea of the Thunder going after a big man like Wendell Carter, who has shot 36.4% from three-point range on 3.5 attempts per game over the past two seasons. He would provide more bulk off the bench while preserving the team’s ability to space the floor. The Magic center, who is still just 25, makes $22.8MM over the next two seasons.
Before they traded for Caruso, the Thunder were also linked to his Bulls teammate, Patrick Williams. When healthy and playing his best, Williams fits the mold of a three-and-D player with athletic tools and some on-ball upside. However, he’s a restricted free agent — Chicago can theoretically match any offer sheet he receives — and he has also missed significant time due to injuries in two of the past three seasons.
At the very least, the Thunder have to hit the salary floor. They will have to use their cap room in some fashion. If it’s not Hartenstein or Williams, it will need to be someone else.
If preserving flexibility is the top priority, I don’t hate the idea of the Thunder signing someone like Tobias Harris to a short-term deal. Klay Thompson is another name to keep an eye on for a front-loaded contract, though I don’t love his fit at this point in his career due to his defensive limitations.
A high-IQ veteran like Nicolas Batum would make sense as forward with some size and versatility. Ditto for Kyle Anderson, though he’s a very methodical and inconsistent shooter.
A floor-spacing big man like Jalen Smith could be attainable for some of the room exception. Goga Bitadze or Andre Drummond would likely be cheaper options at backup center, but neither is a threat to shoot from behind the arc.
As for the No. 12 pick, the Thunder have typically taken a “best player available” approach. With their draft arsenal, they could move up, down, or out of the draft; none of those scenarios would be surprising.
Technically, the Thunder could create enough cap room to sign certain players to a maximum-salary contract if they trade Kenrich Williams and Ousmane Dieng or the No. 12 pick. OG Anunoby, for example, would work in that scenario — I think he’d be a great fit, but it would be a high-risk, high-reward move given his lengthy injury history.
While Oklahoma City doesn’t have any major free agents this summer, the team does have three role players with non-guaranteed team options in Lindy Waters, Isaiah Joe and Aaron Wiggins. There’s no reason to believe Joe and Wiggins won’t be back, either on their inexpensive team options or on new contracts that give them a raise. But Waters’ position is more tenuous after he bounced between two-way and standard deals for the past two years. Backup big man Jaylin Williams also has a non-guaranteed contract for 2024/25 — I expect him to return as well.
The Thunder could be a major player for any star that becomes available in the future. They have the draft assets to top just about any team’s offers. While it’s true they have a two-season window to take advantage of their cap flexibility, they also need to pick their supporting cast wisely, and there’s nothing wrong with waiting until the trade deadline — or even until next season — if further opportunities to improve the rotation don’t materialize this summer.
Guaranteed Salary
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander ($35,859,950)Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Note: Because he has finished each of the past two seasons on a two-way contract with the Thunder, Sarr’s qualifying offer would be worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,168,944). It would include a small partial guarantee.
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Thunder project to operate under the cap.
Luke Adams contributed to this post.
In 2022/23, the Cavaliers made the playoffs without LeBron James on their roster for the first time since 1998 and earned the No. 4 seed before being quickly dispatched in the first round by the No. 5 Knicks. They entered the ’23/24 season with a fairly simple goal: win their first playoff series without LeBron since 1993.
Cleveland ultimately achieved that goal, but the path to get there was a bumpy and somewhat unsatisfying one. Rather than taking a step forward during the regular season, they won three fewer games (48) than they did a year ago (51), then narrowly escaped a seven-game first-round series against a lower-seeded Magic team whose core players were participating in their first postseason. The Cavs were never close to getting past the Celtics in the second round, falling to the eventual champions in five games.
Now, there are a few caveats that make the Cavs’ season sound better than it appeared on the surface. They had to deal with a series of injuries affecting their most important players in both the regular season – Donovan Mitchell, Darius Garland, and Evan Mobley each missed 25+ games – and the postseason, where starting center Jarrett Allen missed eight of 12 contests due to a rib injury and a calf issue sidelined Mitchell for final two games vs. Boston. And even if the Cavs had been fully healthy, no one was beating the Celtics in these playoffs — Cleveland’s one win against them was as many as any of Boston’s four playoff opponents earned.
Still, Cavs management was dissatisfied enough with the team’s season on the whole to make a head coaching change this spring, dismissing J.B. Bickerstaff after he spent four-plus seasons in that role. The club has yet to officially hire a replacement, but appears to be leaning toward James Borrego, the former Hornets head coach who has spent the last two seasons as a top assistant in New Orleans.
Will the head coaching change be the only major move the Cavaliers make this offseason, or will the front office also determine that significant roster changes are needed to take the next step toward title contention? Will Mitchell, who can become a free agent in 2025, sign an extension with the franchise or decline to commit beyond next season? The answers to those two questions will help the Cavs chart a path this summer and will determine just how similar next year’s roster looks to this year’s.
We don’t yet have definitive answers to the two questions posed above, but recent chatter has suggested we’re trending in a certain direction. A series of reports have indicated there’s growing optimism in Cleveland about the team’s odds of extending Mitchell this offseason. That would be a big win for the Cavs, who gave up a huge collection of assets — including Lauri Markkanen and multiple unprotected first-round picks — to acquire Mitchell from Utah two years ago.
There has been speculation that Mitchell will opt for a shorter-term extension that lines him up to get his next deal in 2027, when he has 10 years of service under his belt, rather than seeking the longest term possible at this time. I have to think that would be just fine with the Cavaliers, who would be happy to get some clarity of any kind and would be able to put off any major decisions about Mitchell’s future for at least a couple more years. If that scenario comes to pass, the star guard would likely sign a three-year extension worth a projected $151MM that begins in 2025/26 and includes a third-year player option for ’27/28.
If Mitchell gets extended, Garland’s future will become the newest subject of speculation in Cleveland. The former All-Star is under contract for four more guaranteed seasons and the Cavs have shown no inclination to break up their star-studded backcourt, but at least one report has stated that a new deal for Mitchell could prompt Garland’s representatives at Klutch Sports to talk to the club about finding a new home for their client. Garland, who made the All-Star team in 2022, has seen his scoring, assists, and usage rate decline in the two seasons since Mitchell’s arrival.
Even if Garland or his reps ask for a trade, the Cavaliers would be under no obligation to grant that request, given that he has no path to free agency until 2028. But it’s fair to wonder if it might actually be in the club’s best interest to consider a deal that sends out Garland for a wing who would better balance the roster.
The best stretch of Cleveland’s 2023/24 season came after Garland suffered a broken jaw in December. The team, which had a 13-12 record to that point, went 15-4 with Garland sidelined. Additionally, while Mitchell had a +7.3 net rating during his 1,943 regular season minutes, that number dipped to +4.4 during the 750 minutes in which he shared the court with Garland.
On their own, those numbers aren’t nearly compelling enough to justify trading a 24-year-old who has an All-Star nod on his résumé, especially since they don’t tell the full story — for instance, a few of the wins in that 15-4 stretch came without Mitchell available, and the team’s hot streak extended well into Garland’s return. While they’re both ball-dominant, Mitchell and Garland are also reliable three-point shooters, so the fit isn’t bad. That’s why I expect the club to keep its guard duo intact through the 2024 offseason, unless things go south in some way (e.g. Mitchell doesn’t sign an extension, or Garland pushes aggressively for a trade).
That’s not the only positional overlap the Cavs will have to evaluate this summer though. Mobley is up for a rookie scale extension and is considered likely to get a maximum-salary offer. Up to this point, the team has been happy to play him at power forward alongside Allen at center, but the strengths (rim protection, interior scoring) and weaknesses (a lack of floor spacing) of those two big men are pretty similar, resulting in speculation that Mobley will eventually make the move to the five.
As with the guards, there are reasons why it makes some sense to retain both bigs. Having both of them available gives the Cavs the ability to have an elite rim protector on the floor for all 48 minutes, and playing them alongside one another helps make up for defensive breakdowns on the perimeter. The duo also didn’t really get the chance to show what it could do together on the postseason stage, since Allen was injured in Game 4 of the first round and didn’t play again after that.
But again, the Cavs had a better net rating with just one of Allen or Mobley on the court than they did when the two big men played together. And if the club decides Mobley is the center of the future, Allen would have substantial value on the trade market this summer, given his relatively team-friendly contract, which has just two years and $40MM left on it.
While I like the idea of moving Allen a little more than I like the idea of moving Garland, finding a perfect match isn’t easy. From an on-court perspective, a deal with the Pelicans (who have had interest in Allen for years) involving Brandon Ingram makes a ton of sense, but if the Cavs are already on the hook for maximum-salary contracts for Mitchell, Garland, and Mobley, acquiring Ingram in order to extend him and add a fourth max deal to their books probably isn’t financially feasible. If Cleveland is going to move Allen for a wing or forward, the team would probably want that player earning a salary more in the range of Allen’s $20MM.
Washington could be a fit. Kyle Kuzma‘s three-year, $64.4MM contract is far more manageable that what Ingram will earn over the next few seasons. However, Kuzma’s subpar three-point efficiency (33.6% in 2023/24; 33.7% for his career) would be an issue for the Cavs, and the rebuilding Wizards, who are in position to draft their center of their future (Alexandre Sarr or Donovan Clingan) at No. 2 in next week’s draft, may not have much interest in Allen.
With those roadblocks in mind, it’s perhaps not surprising that Koby Altman told reporters in May that he doesn’t expect “sweeping changes” this offseason, or that recent reports have suggested the front office’s private stance has aligned with its public one.
If Mitchell signs an extension, all four of Cleveland’s core pieces will be under contract for multiple seasons and would each still have significant trade value at the 2025 trade deadline, in the 2025 offseason, or even at the 2026 deadline. The Cavs can afford to be patient for the time being, perhaps waiting to see if the new head coach helps that core unlock its full potential. There’s no reason to rush into a trade involving Garland or Allen this summer unless the deal is an obvious fit from both a basketball and financial perspective.
So if the Cavs stand pat with their big four, what might their offseason look like? Well, their position to the tax line will have to be a consideration as they weigh possible decisions, including what to do with restricted free agent Isaac Okoro. If we assume the team locks in Craig Porter‘s partially guaranteed salary and keeps its first-round pick (20th overall), payroll would be at about $159MM for 11 players. That would leave plenty of room below a projected $171MM+ luxury tax line to fill out the roster with minimum-salary players, but a new deal for Okoro – whose qualifying offer is $11.8MM and who will likely exceed that figure on a new contract – would almost certainly push the Cavs into a tax territory.
If the Cavs want to retain Okoro and aren’t prepared to be a taxpayer, perhaps a deal involving Caris LeVert ($16.6MM) or Georges Niang ($8.5MM) could be in the cards. Frankly, both players could become trade candidates even if tax savings aren’t a consideration.
LeVert doesn’t make sense in the club’s starting five and is on an expiring contract. While he has some value as a sixth man, the club could stagger Mitchell and Garland to ensure one of them is running the second unit, reducing the need for another ball-dominant player like LeVert in that group. As for Niang, he was one of Cleveland’s most-used reserves during the season and shot the ball well (.376 3PT%), but saw his minutes slashed in the playoffs due to his defensive limitations. Both guys have value to Cleveland, but I expect the team to at least explore upgrading their spots.
Ty Jerome is another candidate to be traded after he missed nearly his entire first year in Cleveland due to an ankle injury, though his cap hit is just $2.56MM. If he’s healthy, the Cavs may prefer to keep Jerome and see if he can deliver on the promise he showed in 2022/23 that prompted the club to give him a guaranteed two-year deal in the first place.
If this year’s No. 20 pick isn’t used as a sweetener in a trade, the Cavs can afford to take the best player available at that spot, since they won’t necessarily be expecting that player to vie for a spot in the rotation right away. I could also see the club trading down in order to replenish its cupboard of future draft assets a little and to reduce the cap hit for that pick. For what it’s worth, the latest mock drafts from both ESPN and Bleacher Report have the club rolling the dice at No. 20 on one of the youngest players in the draft, Pittsburgh guard Carlton Carrington.
Guaranteed Salary
Darius Garland ($36,725,670)Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Note: Because he has finished each of the past two seasons on a two-way contract with the Cavaliers, Mobley’s qualifying offer would be worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,093,637). It would include a small partial guarantee.
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Other Cap Holds
Note: The cap holds for these players are on the Cavaliers’ books from prior seasons because they haven’t been renounced. They can’t be used in a sign-and-trade deal.
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Cavaliers project to operate over the cap and under the first tax apron.
After winning the first championship in franchise history a year ago, the Nuggets kept their starting five intact but lost a pair of reserves who played key roles during that title run. While Bruce Brown and Jeff Green were the first two players off the bench for Denver in last year’s postseason, the Nuggets weren’t in position to compete with Indiana’s offer for Brown – which included a $22MM starting salary – or the Rockets’ bid for Green (an $8MM starting salary, plus incentives).
The Nuggets’ plan to address those holes in their rotation centered on youth. In addition to drafting three experienced prospects who had a combined 13 college seasons under their belts (Julian Strawther, Jalen Pickett, and Hunter Tyson), Denver figured second-year players Christian Braun and Peyton Watson would be ready to take on larger roles, as would fourth-year big man Zeke Nnaji.
The Nuggets’ plan wasn’t entirely misguided — Braun, in particular, had a strong sophomore season, earning head coach Michael Malone‘s trust and a spot in Denver’s playoff rotation. But Watson was up and down, Nnaji’s playing time dropped to just 9.9 minutes per game, and the three rookies weren’t as NBA-ready as the front office had hoped.
By the time the Nuggets were eliminated from the playoffs, there were only really six players (the starters, plus Braun) that Malone felt like he could count on, with even veteran reserves like Justin Holiday and Reggie Jackson seeing very limited minutes in the postseason.
The Nuggets don’t need to overhaul their roster. The starting five of Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray, Michael Porter, Aaron Gordon, and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope remained extremely effective in 2023/24, registering the second-best net rating of any lineup that played at least 250 minutes together (+13.6). But Malone simply had to rely on that five-man group too heavily — it logged 958 total minutes together across 48 games, while the league’s second most-used lineup (the Thunder’s starters) played 799 minutes in 63 outings.
The challenge for Denver’s front office this offseason is twofold. First, can the Nuggets keep that starting five intact for another year? Caldwell-Pope holds a $15.4MM player option that he’s expected to decline, and there will certainly be rival suitors looking to steal the three-and-D stalwart away from the 2023 champions.
Second, whether Caldwell-Pope re-signs or whether Denver has to elevate Braun to its starting five, can the Nuggets do a better job of constructing a reliable second unit? The salary cap situation won’t make it easy — with Caldwell-Pope back, team salary could rise above the restrictive second tax apron, and even without him on the books, the club projects to be a taxpayer.
General manager Calvin Booth earned kudos a year ago for the moves he made to help turn the Nuggets into a championship team, but most of the core was built when Tim Connelly was running the front office. This offseason will represent Booth’s biggest challenge yet, as he looks to put together a roster capable of returning to the NBA Finals.
The Nuggets hold Caldwell-Pope’s full Bird rights, so assuming he turns down his ’24/25 player option, as expected, there’s nothing stopping them from offering as much as it takes to re-sign him. It simply comes down to what sort of commitment management and ownership are comfortable with.
Caldwell-Pope isn’t a particularly dynamic offensive player, but he has made 41.5% of his three-point attempts since arriving in Denver and is one of the keys to the defense — he and Gordon take on the most challenging assignments on that end of the floor. That makes him an extremely valuable role player, and at age 31, a team can feel relatively confident about investing in him for the next three or four seasons and not having his performance fall off significantly in the later years of that contract.
An annual salary of $20MM+ certainly seems within reach for Caldwell-Pope, so unless he’s willing to accept any sort of discount to remain in Denver, the team may have to offer something in the neighborhood of Gordon’s current deal ($87MM over four years) to retain him. That would likely mean operating over the second apron unless the Nuggets can shed salary elsewhere on the roster.
If Denver does look to cut costs, Nnaji would be an obvious candidate to be moved. He’s entering the first season of a front-loaded four-year, $32MM contract that he signed last fall. At the time, it seemed like a reasonable investment, with Nnaji seemingly poised to take on a larger role in Green’s absence, perhaps even serving as Jokic’s primary backup at center. But 2023/24 was the 23-year-old’s worst NBA season, as he averaged just 3.2 PPG and 2.2 RPG on .463/.261/.677 shooting. Needless to say, if he were eligible for restricted free agency this summer, a four-year, $32MM deal would be a long shot.
Nnaji’s salary isn’t massive, and he’s still young enough to be a bounce-back candidate, but his value has slipped so precipitously in the last year that it would take draft assets to move off his four-year contract. The Nuggets may prefer to preserve those assets for a move that actually upgrades the roster instead of just saving some money.
If we assume Caldwell-Pope re-signs and Nnaji returns, the Nuggets’ roster-building options aren’t extensive. Jokic, Murray, and Gordon aren’t going anywhere, and the team’s top decision-makers signaled at the end of the season that Porter wouldn’t be moved either. No one else is earning more than $5.25MM – or $3.1MM, if Jackson declines his $5.25MM player option – and if Denver is operating over the second apron, the team won’t be able to aggregate salaries in a trade.
A lack of trade activity would leave two paths for filling out the bench: hoping for improvement from young players and scouring the free agent market for minimum-salary bargains. As we discussed above, that was the strategy that didn’t work particularly well last year, though there’s reason to hope it could be more successful this time around. Players often make major strides between their first and second or second and third seasons, so guys like Watson, Strawther, and Pickett could follow Braun’s path and become more consistent performers in 2024/25.
It’d be risky to count on that though, so the Nuggets ought to be a little more aggressive seeking out a rotation player or two who would be willing to sign for the minimum. Denver can offer a good situation for veterans looking to contend for a championship and potentially play regular minutes. Torrey Craig, Kyle Lowry, Lonnie Walker, Delon Wright, Robert Covington, Dario Saric, Mason Plumlee, and Daniel Theis are some potential low-cost targets I like.
The Nuggets will also have to make a decision on Vlatko Cancar, who missed the entire 2023/24 season due to an ACL tear and has a $2.35MM team option for ’24/25. Cancar steadily took on a larger role over his first four years in Denver (2019-23) and his injury was a factor in why the team’s bench didn’t live up to expectations last season. Having Cancar available wouldn’t have entirely turned things around, but he showed some real promise in the championship season, averaging 5.0 PPG and 2.1 RPG with a 37.4% three-point percentage in 60 games (14.8 MPG). If the club feels good about where his health is at following his ACL recovery, he should be back.
Finally, Denver holds the 28th and 56th overall picks in this year’s draft. The front office is unlikely to find an immediate contributor at No. 56, but the other selection could prove useful. There have been rumblings that the Nuggets have made Dayton’s DaRon Holmes II a draft promise — if he’s the target and the team believes he’ll be available early in the second round, exploring a trade back would make sense, since the luxury tax impact of an early second-rounder could be quite a bit less than that of a late first-rounder.
Of the Nuggets’ extension candidates, Murray and Gordon are the ones worth keeping the closest eye on, as both players could become free agents in 2025. Murray has just one year left on his current contract, while Gordon has a player option for 2025/26.
Murray could make himself eligible for a super-max contract (starting at up to 35% of the 2025/26 cap instead of 30%) if he makes an All-NBA team next season. That idea may be tempting, given that Booth suggested last October the Nuggets would open to offering Murray a super-max deal. But it’s a risky move for a player who has battled injuries in recent years, including an ACL tear that cost him the entire 2021/22 season. Murray could still sign for up to $208MM over four years on a standard maximum-salary deal this summer, which would be a pretty nice payday if Denver is willing to offer it.
As for Gordon, he’ll become eligible in September for an extension that could be worth up to about $143MM over four years. That’d be a huge commitment for a player who is a fourth option on offense, but the former lottery pick has been such a perfect fit alongside Jokic in Denver on both sides of the ball that he might be worth it, especially with the salary cap expected to rise by 10% annually over the life of the deal.
Guaranteed Salary
Nikola Jokic ($51,415,938)Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Note: Because he has finished each of the past two seasons on a two-way contract with the Nuggets, Gillespie’s qualifying offer would be worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,093,637). It would include a small partial guarantee.
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Other Cap Holds
Note: The cap holds for these players are on the Nuggets’ books from prior seasons because they haven’t been renounced. They can’t be used in a sign-and-trade deal.
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Nuggets project to operate over the cap and over the first apron. If they move above the second apron, they would lose access to the taxpayer mid-level exception.
After spending a full decade alternately mired in mediocrity (in the good years) or dwelling in the NBA’s cellar (in the bad), the Magic had a breakthrough in 2023/24.
Orlando’s 47-35 record was the team’s best mark since Dwight Howard was on the roster (2010/11), and while the club didn’t win a playoff series, its three first-round wins vs. Cleveland topped its combined postseason win total (two) across the previous 11 years. It was the second straight year in which the Magic made major strides — after winning just 22 games in 2021/22, they boosted that total to 34 in ’22/23 and 47 this past season.
The good news for the Magic is that their young core is largely responsible for that surge up the standings. Orlando’s top three scorers in 2023/24 were Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner, and Jalen Suggs, all of whom will still be on their team-friendly rookie scale contracts in ’24/25. The franchise is in position to keep those players under team control for years to come.
The bad news? Well, “bad” may be an overstatement, but Wagner and Suggs are due for rookie scale extensions this offseason, with Banchero becoming eligible for a rookie scale extension of his own in 2025. That means the young core will be getting a lot more expensive over the next couple years, and the front office still needs more talent to become a legitimate contender in the Eastern Conference.
The Magic have managed their books well – no one made more than $17.4MM last season and there’s no guaranteed money on the cap beyond 2026 – so they’re in position to comfortably extend those cornerstone players. But the rising cost of the roster going forward means the 2024 offseason will be a critical opportunity for the Magic to continue making meaningful upgrades while they still have cap room available to do so.
Let’s start with the Magic’s cap outlook. They only have about $66MM on their books for the seven players on guaranteed contracts for 2024/25, but we can probably add Jonathan Isaac‘s $17.4MM non-guaranteed salary to that total.
Although Isaac – who appeared in just 11 games across the three previous seasons for health reasons – didn’t play big minutes in 2023/24, he suited up for 58 games and provided a reminder in his limited role (15.8 MPG) of why he was considered a future Defensive Player of the Year contender early in his NBA career. I can’t see him being waived, given the impact he’s capable of making on defense even as a part-timer.
Adding Isaac’s salary and a $3.6MM cap hold for Orlando’s first-round pick (No. 18) brings us to just over $87MM. Throw in three minimum-salary cap holds to get to 12 roster spots and the Magic end up with about $50MM in potential cap room.
Now, it’s important to clarify that Orlando would have to make certain sacrifices to fully take advantage of that $50MM. Joe Ingles ($11MM) and Moritz Wagner ($8MM) have team options; Caleb Houstan has a non-guaranteed salary ($2MM); and the Magic may want to try to re-sign free agents like Markelle Fultz, Gary Harris, and Goga Bitadze, all of whom would have cap holds to account for (ranging from $25.5MM for Fultz to just $2.1MM for Bitadze).
While turning down those options and renouncing all those free agents would get the Magic to $50MM in room, I’m skeptical they’ll go that route, given how inclined they’ve been in recent years to retain their own players.
But let’s say the team guarantees Houston’s salary, brings back one (not both) of Fultz or Harris for a deal in the range of the full mid-level ($12-13MM), declines the Ingles and Wagner options in the hopes of bringing them back for the veteran’s minimum and $8MM, respectively, and reaches a new agreement with Bitadze. That could still leave Orlando with upwards of $36-37MM in cap room to use, since Houston’s salary and Bitadze’s cap hold are so modest and Wagner and Ingles could be re-signed after the room is used up.
This is a roundabout way of saying that even if the Magic opt for continuity, they should still be in position to open up enough cap room to splurge on at least one starter-caliber player, and perhaps multiple rotation pieces.
Orlando has been mentioned as a possible Paul George landing spot, but that feels like a long shot. I expect George’s decision to ultimately come down to the Clippers and Sixers. The Magic have also been linked to Klay Thompson, Malik Monk, and D’Angelo Russell, all of whom look to me like much more plausible targets.
As talented offensively as both Banchero and Wagner are, neither of them has been a consistent threat from beyond the three-point line (Wagner was solid in his first two seasons but plummeted to 28.1% in ’23/24), which means the Magic would ideally surround them with two or three shooters. Suggs (39.7%) and Wendell Carter (37.4%) set new career highs in three-point percentage this past season, but Orlando’s roster isn’t exactly loaded with marksmen. Adding shooting will be the top priority this summer for a team that ranked dead last among 30 NBA teams in three-pointers made per game (11.0) in 2023/24.
Thompson, Monk, and Russell aren’t perfect players. Thompson has lost a step since his prime years due to his age (34) and a pair of major leg injuries; Monk’s three-point percentage has dropped over the past couple seasons and was all the way down to 35.0% in 2023/24; and Russell is a subpar defender whose weaknesses have been exposed in the last two postseasons.
Still, there are reasons to like all three fits. Thompson is one of the best shooters in NBA history and would bring championship experience to a relatively young team. Monk would add a new level of play-making to the Magic’s backcourt and would make them less reliant on Banchero and Wagner offensively. Russell is a talented scorer, a solid distributor, and – most importantly – an elite shooter (.415 3PT% on 7.2 attempts per game in ’23/24). Any of those three players would provide some offensive punch for an unbalanced Magic team that ranked third in defensive rating and 22nd in offensive rating.
Of the three, Thompson looks to me like the most intriguing fit, assuming he’s truly willing to leave Golden State. The Magic could potentially offer him an extremely lucrative short-term deal using their cap room, overpaying him for the next two seasons and then having his contract come off the books when he’s 36 and when Banchero’s next contract is about to take effect.
If Orlando strikes out on guys like Thompson and Monk, a few other free agents I view as possible fits include Tobias Harris, Gary Trent, and Buddy Hield. Again, given how good their defense already is, the Magic don’t necessarily need to be targeting two-way impact players like OG Anunoby or Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. They can afford to add a below-average defender if the trade-off on offense is strong enough.
If free agency doesn’t yield the type of upgrade the Magic are looking for, turning to the trade market would be a viable option. Orlando controls all of its future first-round picks, as well as the Nuggets’ 2025 first-rounder (top-five protected), so the club could put together a strong offer that includes multiple valuable draft assets without mortgaging its future at all.
While determining how the Magic will use their cap room is a more fun subject for speculation, it’s worth stressing that trying to workout extensions for Wagner and Suggs will also be a crucial part of the team’s offseason. Those negotiations could be tricky — both Wagner and Suggs are valuable assets, but neither is the sort of player who is a slam dunk for a maximum-salary offer, so they won’t necessarily get done early in July like Tyrese Haliburton, Anthony Edwards, and LaMelo Ball did a year ago.
Of the two players, Wagner is closer to max-worthy, and it wouldn’t shock me if Orlando ultimately puts that offer on the table for him. Something that comes in a little below the max (say, $175MM over five years) isn’t out of the realm of possibility either. Suggs likely won’t be in line for that sort of payday, but he substantially improved his value by making an All-Defensive team and raising his shooting percentages in year three. I could see the former No. 4 overall pick getting into the nine figures (ie. $100MM+) on a long-term extension.
Guaranteed Salary
Cole Anthony ($12,900,000)Non-Guaranteed Salary
Dead/Retained Salary
Player Options
Team Options
Restricted Free Agents
Two-Way Free Agents
Note: Because he has finished each of the past two seasons on a two-way contract with the Magic, Harris’ qualifying offer would be worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,093,637). Schofield is no longer eligible to sign a two-way contract and would also have a qualifying offer worth his minimum salary (projected to be $2,244,249). Those offers would each include a small partial guarantee.
Draft Picks
Extension-Eligible Players
Note: Unless otherwise indicated, these players are eligible for extensions beginning in July.
Unrestricted Free Agents
Other Cap Holds
Note: The cap holds for these players are on the Magic’s books from prior seasons because they haven’t been renounced. They can’t be used in a sign-and-trade deal.
Cap Exceptions Available
Note: The Magic project to operate under the cap.