2026-27 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

Yeah it’s like when people say Atlanta still has interest in Kuminga. Well they could have just taken up his team option, or renounced it and extended him for less per year but more years. But neither happened.

I do think Kessler is a really good center. Defensively he is top 5 and I like the contract as well. 2 firsts isn’t so bad, it’s just unfortunate they were our last ones. It’s no fun having bare cabinets.

 

Was just yanking your chain.

 

His uncle was a good jump shooter in college, if he developed a 3pt shot, I would view him differently, but like I said, he's not a scrub, I'm just not sure, if this was the best move or value. I liked Gobert for 2FRP and we could have dumped all our salary..Ayton, Vando, Jake and Dalton in the process. Minnesota are out of picks for awhile, and they need bodies. We'd still have everybody we signed, and 30M to spend right now.

We made the move we made though; so you hope the positives outweigh the negatives.

This is a snap shot of him, head to head with more mobile guys. It gives an idea of what to expect. If that's suitable for 32M and 2FRP, in anyone's opinion..so be it.


https://www.landofbasketball.com/games_between/anthony_davis_vs_walker_kessler.htm

https://www.landofbasketball.com/games_between/jalen_duren_vs_walker_kessler.htm

https://www.landofbasketball.com/games_between/joel_embiid_vs_walker_kessler.htm

https://www.landofbasketball.com/games_between/daniel_gafford_vs_walker_kessler.htm

https://www.landofbasketball.com/games_between/isaiah_hartenstein_vs_walker_kessler.htm

https://www.landofbasketball.com/games_between/walker_kessler_vs_domantas_sabonis.htm

 

They would’ve matched he didn’t want to be there. They made him an offer. And we’re very vocal about bringing him back. Come on man don’t call this guy John Koncack.

 

Nah..big John was a scrub.

 

I'm getting old;I don't get some of today's fashion trends. Fire?

 

I wanted to answer the question, what happens next year with our cap space and the ability to use the exceptions if we sign Kuminga or another player?

Salary Cap is projected to be $174m and the First Apron is $220.5m

Our team next year looks like:

Luka (53.4m) / Sexton (9.8m) / Bronny (2.5m)
Reaves (44.5m) / Carr (3.5m) / x
Grimes (14.7m) / Adou (2.5m) / x
x / x
Kessler (31.7) / Mamu (12.4m) / x

This is assuming we get rid of Vando this year and decline the team options on Hardy & Knecht next year. We'd also have a cap hold for Jake of 7.8m. Let's assume we let him go for a moment (or sign him into something like the BAE). The salary for that team above of 9 guys would be 175m.

We'd then be able to add an MLE player for 15.9m, a BAE player for 5.8m and 2x vet min guys at 2.5m to get to 13 guys. That leaves us 18.8m below the First Apron.

Why is that 18.8m important? Well if we give Kuminga (or anyone else) a contract this year, we have to make it fit within that 18.8m next year if we want to use all of our MLE and BAE which is the main way to improve next year.

That means we have to give Kuminga a contract of something like 3 Years - 60m:

Year 1: 21.2m
Year 2: 18.8m
Year 3: 20m

This could change if we do something more complex or drastic this year.

 

So the follow up to that for me is, what is something more drastic we could do this year?

Currently we have the following team:

Luka (49.5) / Sexton (9.4) / Bronny (2.3)
Reaves (41.2) / Carr (3.3) / Hardy (6) / Knecht (4.2)
Grimes (14) / x / Adou (2.1)
x / Jake (6) / Vando (12.4)
Kessler (30.2) / Mamu (13) / Looney (2.5)

That's $196.1m with the first apron being $209m, so we are $12.9m below the First Apron.

There is a rumour that Vando + a swap could go out for Kuminga and maybe some interest in PJ Washington or DJJ.

What else could we do? Well as an example, we haven't signed Reaves, Sexton or Looney yet, so technically we're at $163.9m in salary and the cap is $165m. If we could dump any of the guys we want to get rid of like Bronny, Knecht, Hardy, Jake or Vando etc, we could technically sign a player into the cap space we create by dumping those guys. The benefit is, you can sign someone at a higher level that the vet min.

As an example (and one trade I would love): We dump Knecht with a second to a team with cap space. We then turn around and offer Spencer Jones a 4 year 17.2m contract starting at 4m with a team option in year 4. We get a 3&D wing for peanuts.

We can then still trade Vando + Swap for Kuminga and have his salary starting at 17m to use both the MLE and BAE next year? Or we can still do Vando + Swap + 2 Seconds for PJ at a salary of 19.8m (which I prefer). We'd lose the BAE next year, but we effectively used it this year for Spencer Jones anyway.

Luka (49.5) / Sexton (9.4) / Bronny (2.3)
Reaves (41.2) / Carr (3.3) / Hardy (6)
Grimes (14) / Jones (4) / Adou (2.1)
PJ (19.8) / Jake (6)
Kessler (30.2) / Mamu (13) / Looney (2.5)

That's 203.3m and next year that team costs 200.6m - so we can still use the MLE and can sign 2x veterans (we lose Hardy & Jake though).

Another option of something drastic but highly unlikely is, if we dump Vando with a swap to Atlanta. Then attach a 2nd each to Knecht, Hardy and Jake to dump them. We'd have 29.7m in cap space. We could offer that to Watson and probably pick him up for that. We'd then have:

Luka (49.5) / Sexton (9.4) / Bronny (2.3)
Reaves (41.2) / Carr (3.3) / Vet Min (2.5)
Grimes (14) / Vet Min (2.5) / Adou (2.1)
Watson (29.7) / Vet Min (2.5)
Kessler (30.2) / Mamu (13) / Looney (2.5)

We could fill the minimums with Thybulle, Zaire Williams and some guard. But that's extremely tough to do. It's probably Kuminga or Kuminga + something else.

 

i'm getting old as well, but this looks like it could have been taken in 1990.

 

Yeah. I think if he wanted to be there they would have worked something out. He and his team wanted to go elsewhere.

Also, we shouldn't operate under the assumption that all the teams in the league actually want to win. Many are perfectly fine doing the bare minimum and promising their fanbases a future based on their draft war chests. It's part of the reason I think we have to always hold our own front office's feet to the fire.

 

Just want to take a minute and thank you for doing all these scenarios for the team

They are always full of ideas and I enjoy looking at all options to improve the team

 

my opinion is that utah knew that jjj/markkanen/kessler front line wasn't going to work. jjj is a center who wants to be a pf (like AD), and markkanen is a pf who often plays sf. further, they have to pay keyonte george in the short-term and probably one of bailey/peterson (latter is my guess) longer-term. having a 130 million dollar front court maybe wasn't the best way. so they got some assets (which could be very nice, depending on how long luka holds up and if we're decimated after).

we're in win-now mode, so we burnt the picks because the opportunity arose to fill a huge roster hole that's been a significant challenge for a while now. we had all our money in the back court and were trotting out vet mins and reclamations at center.

 

btw, am i the only one who thinks vando + pick swap for kuminga is a pretty big win? like, i'd think just dumping vando would take that swap.

 

Trevor Lane put out a video last night where he tried to portray the overwhelming consensus approval of the “Vando + swap for Kuminga” as missing some deeper context…

And the “deeper context” basically just assumed the worst case scenario where Kuminga was demanding the most player friendly deal possible in the sign-and-trade ($20M + AAV, 3 years guaranteed). He talked about how that would make it difficult for us to use the MLE next year, and if Kuminga underwhelmed it would quickly become a negative value contract

So thank you to svtzr for crunching the numbers and showing how you could get Kuminga and other follow up moves while preserving your MLE next summer

I also don’t get Lane’s assumption that the sign-and-trade would necessarily mean Kuminga would demand the highest possible salary. If we’re currently offering $10M via cap space route, if we pivoted to sign-and-trade route just because we COULD go up to $20M doesn’t mean we’d have to. Even going up to $16M is probably a sweeter deal than anybody else is offering.

Also feel like at some point Lane was arguing against the signing route because a 1+1 means Kuminga could leverage us for a pay raise and then leave elsewhere. Well if you’re going to highlight the risk of that, it doesn’t make sense to emphasize the risk of a 3 year deal via sign and trade. I think Kuminga’s age, physical profile, the body of work he’s already put together would most likely result in even an underwhelming Lakers season still having him as a neutral value contract that wouldn’t be too difficult to flip if we did want to change directions

I am curious though if the Lakers simply don’t believe in Kuminga as THE guy to slot in as our long term wing. That they’d rather look for a stopgap option, maybe because they have their eye on someone else who should be available for MLE money next season who they have more confidence in being the long term wing.

 

Considering the word has been for a year that it'll take a first just to dump Vando and if we're not only dumping him but getting a young starter in return that's robbery even if it's just we're just renting Kuminga for a year.

I'd prefer Washington, but i just don't see that path as long as he's a Mav. Maybe if we were willing to give up the swap and all 3 2nds, but i don't think they take Vando off our hands in that scenario even. Mavericks have to win the trade against us if they trade with us again.


I have to wonder what's the hold up on Kuminga though. We want him, he wants to play here, Hawks are down. The only viable scenario here is the haggling over $ and type of contract (guaranteed years, PO vs TO). Whatever it is, need to hash it out ASAP before Hawks have a change of heart or someone else swoops in now that the offer is public. Cause most teams can pony up a bad contract + a swap. He and his agent control there because he's a FA but I don't want him to have more options in front of him.

 

Why do I NOT hate this new report of the growing idea of LeBron going to Philly?

 

LeBron in Philly is an interesting thought but man, I have a hard time believing he would put Cleveland through another Decision process just to not select them again. Who knows though.

 

It's one of those things where I sit there and go "Either go to Philly to get them a ring for the first time in a long time, as well as everyone on the team getting some credit to that OR help Harden and Mitchell get a ring and more glory in Cleveland."

Both are good thoughts.

 

Yeah why has the valuation of a swap seemingly changed overnight? I'm seeing all over X and whatever that we shouldn't trade "our last first round pick" for Kuminga. A swap is not a first round pick? They've never been treated like one? I get that the lottery rules are different now, so even if we're pretty good in 2032 or whatever it could still end up being a good pick.