Trade & Free Agency 2026/2027

[DanSchwartzgan]

From the OP, Trade #3 had me go down a rabbit hole. I know it's been mentioned a lot here, most recently by Dan, but I went through all the players '26-'27 salaries from $10M to $20,830,154 (TPE-AD) and jotted down some somewhat realistic TPE type trades with those players and the teams current draft picks this year:

Kuzma $20,345,152. MIL has #10.

Caruso $19,550,160 $20,998,320 $22,446,480. OKC has #12 & 17.

Poeltl $19,500,000 $27,300,000 $29,484,000 $27,300,000. TOR has #19.

Strus $16,660,836. CLE has #29.

D. Robinson $15,992,957 $15,151,222. DET has #21.

LeVert $14,809,200. DET has #21.

Schroder $14,809,200  $15,514,400. CLE has #29.

Josh Green $14,679,012. CHA has #14 & 18.

G. Williams $14,265,750. CHA has #14 & 18.

Z. Risacher $13,826,040 $17,434,637. ATL has #23.

Moody $12,500,000 $13,425,925. GSW has #11.


Some of these are expiring and I don't know the financial situation of every team off the top of my head, so hard to know the motivation for any of these kinds of deals. Plus, any salary that fits in the NTMLE can be done with teams that have that exception. At first glance, the ones that stand out are:

Caruso for #17
Poeltl for #19, plus a future pick?
One of the CLE guys for #29
One of the DET guys for #21
One of the CHA guys for #18

There used to be an unwritten rule of thumb that a later first was worth about $20mm in savings FWIW.  That's not $20mm per year, it is $20mm.  So, the multi-year guys probably don't work except maybe Risacher as an upside "swing".  

Pure dump's for picks are pretty rare.  It goes better if you can convince the fans there is an asset to be had as part of all the financial engineering.  It can happen at the draft (Holmes and #24 for the TPE we got for trading down with OKC).  That space was used by the Kings to extend Sabonis...so instant payoff.  Or, it can be used to get under an apron or free up a larger exception or create extra cap room.  Sometimes that's at the draft and sometimes in July using a future pick.

I think the next test of your theory is looking at the potential partners and figuring out the practical use of moving off of the player in a tangible way.