2025-26 Team Developments: Trades / Free Agents / News / Rumors / Ideas

I feel like we can’t keep people out of the paint, but if you have DA and Antek in the paint, that’s pretty solid. But then we probably struggle against teams that has good shooting bigs from deep

 

Honestly, a guy like Klay can be had for basically a 2nd rounder and make a huge impact on the Lakers. The Lakers don't have snipers... It's unlikely they're going to find a decent 3/D option in this market.

 

Jonathan Kaminga????

clearly out of the rotation in San Francisco.

Give the 2032 1st round pick unprotected

Knect Vincent or Hachimura.

I don’t know seems like what we need an athlete. Maybe a change of scenery will help.

 

I’ll tell you personally Klay would like to come back here.

I think Dallas it’s just miserable. Are we getting 3-D Klay nope.

but you’ll get a good production change of scenery. He still has some stuff left and can be crafty. Is this the greyhound that will be hounding the perimeter? Nope but in the playoffs when we need good perimeter shooting he can help.

You cant go how do we beat OKC??? You go in that mindset you’ll lose. 4-0. You just have to be playing great basketball at the right time and hope you catch them on a cold streak.

I will tell you playoff basketball is different. We saw Indiana take them to game 7 and a torn Achilles Haliburton away from beating them.

players like Luka are huge in game 7 you can lean on them.

our others have to support him and Reaves looks like he took that next step.

Ima keep it 100 this guy has proven he can deliver clutch performances in the finals.

and if you’re playing Denver OKC San Antonio Houston you gotta get this guy. Teams saying no on him. And Minnesota this guy beats Minnesota and marginalizes Ant Man.

and his name is Gianiss. If you got a shot get him. What I will tell you is Rob will due diligence. And Rob will get aggressive.

This is mark Walter’s team.

I do think Yes the Lakers will make an offer for Gianiss.

and Does Gianiss and Luka go on a run with LeBron in the playoffs??? It’s a shot.

s***s gonna get interesting.

Spurs are out and not pursuing him.

 

i think guys like thompson (huerter, kennard, kispert, etc.) are available across the league for a reason--you just can't play non-defenders anymore. also, they're generally one-trick ponies on offense, too, which makes things even tougher.

i was interested in kuminga during his contract dispute, but i'm less so now, and i don't think gs would work with us anyway.

trey murphy is the right guy to pursue on NO, but i'm not sure he answers our problems. we need a guy we can start next to ayton/lebron/luka/reaves. and if we're giving up major assets, this player needs to be young and able to assume a starting role on a winning team for the next few years. murphy checks boxes there, as post-lebron, you slot luka in as the 4 defensively (which is what dallas did when they were at their best). but in terms of present fit, i don't love it.

i keep coming up with the same list of names when i dig around stats and rosters.

my big play would be for bridges (if ny trades for giannis), but that's a pipe dream for a few reasons.

my persistent wish is for ellis.

my weird interest has become getting dalen terry on the cheap. still wonder if a vando/gabe package for williams/terry would work. vando's salary is one year shorter and 6 million per less. gabe slots in there as a backup when they inevitably trade white at the deadline and is expiring.

i wonder if we could get kcp to decline his player option in a deal with memphis for kleber/gabe? or maybe balance the deal a bit more by sending knecht and getting jackson or vince williams back?

 

I think Haynes meant the Lakers are calling for Herb Jones; Murphy would require more assets.

Think Rob is trying to swipe Herb for low & and he really isn't helping his value with his play on the court. We'll see.

Rui has to be bench or be traded at some point; that just has to happen. He was awful yesterday and just doesn't fit. Vincent was okay yesterday, but he's been awful for the most part, and I'd be happy to move him, too. Knecht isn't getting time on a team that can definitely use his shooting, so that should tell us where JJ sits with him right now, and he'll probably be shopped, too.

The west is starting to shake out a bit with the contenders and pretenders. We'll see where we match up with Houston on Christmas.

Today is the deadline and a lot of the league becomes trade elgible, right? Trade deadline Feb 5th. We'll see.

 

yeah, the tweet got it twisted--haynes said lakers herb jones, golden state trey murphy. i get that. kuminga+ for murphy makes sense to me.

maybe knecht/first/kleber for jones? i'd like to see what the other bids are, though. as we've discussed, jones isn't trending the right way. i would spend a first to see if a change in scenery brought back previous jones, though. he can't move until 1/15.

it's basically where most of us thought it would be:

okc

hou/denver

lal/sas/minny

i had gs and maybe dallas and the clips in tier 3 with us, but the latter two crashed out and gs has had the (predictable) injury issues.

BPI has dropped us a bit, which has tracked our downturn of late. but still has us at 5th/6th in the west, which seems about right to me. assuming nothing disastrous happens, we'll end up having to play one of houston/minny/SA in round 1, just matter of who has HCA.

yeah, most guys are eligible to move now, but historically, trade season doesn't pick up until a couple weeks ahead of the deadline.

 

Mentioned Dalen Terry? Any interest in Jevon Carter? Reminds me of a Jordan Goodwin clone in a bit. Buy-low candidate, IMO. He's a little small, though. Might be more of the Vincent type. Kriss Dunn?

Or we looking for a bigger SG/SF? just throwing names out there because I'm curious. Zaire Williams, Brooklyn? Bigger, Longer, can't shoot. IDK. Throwing s*** on the wall

 

would be a clear fallback option, but yes. he's basically playing how we hope gabe would play.

gabe for carter+terry actually works salary-wise, and we have the space under the apron to absorb the money and the extra player, i think.

i do think we're looking at keeping that space open for either a buyout or to potentially upgrade smith, though...

also, both guys are expiring, so the bulls don't gain much here in terms of flexibility. i'd throw 'em a 2nd.

 

This new CBA sucks.

 

definitely restricts movement, probably went a little too far in some ways, but the financial penalties weren't doing anything by themselves.

i was just thinking earlier today how utterly ridiculous some of the old rules were, too--like the boomerang deals when guys would get traded, cut, and return to their team, lol.

 

Definitely designed to keep parity and stars in with their respective teams who were drafted by them; nobody can "dodgers" their way through this salary cap without eating an exorbitant amount of cash.

either way, it makes it where you have to nail the margins on trades and scout like you never have before to find talent, ideally cheap talent if they come up through the G-League, 2way, etc.

 

Ironically, the CBA was meant to kill dynasties and legislate parity, but it may end up entrenching OKC as a dynasty by making it too difficult for anyone to catch up to them.

 

we'll see. looking like they'll repeat this year, but:



it's important to understand that the second apron is 223 million, and the thunder have not been especially willing tax payers historically.

they're going to have to cut kenrich williams for the roster spots for their two first rounders this summer. this is nothing, but it's just an example of what's coming. and one of those picks being a top-10 pick (the clips) only helps if they nail it, as the salaries for those picks are also high.

cason wallace might already be the league's best POA defender. his salary is going to balloon in two years to something in the 30+ range. they're over the 2027-28 luxury tax line without hartenstein, dort, or wallace on the books.

does this mean they can't be clever and that they can't hit on some more picks and just keep rolling? no. totally possible that they can just lose those guys and replace them with draft picks. but taking that as a given is being pretty optimistic. thomas sorber may step in and replace hartenstein--or he can go the way of most mid-first round picks and be a backup or out of the league. as it stands, one of their recent lotto picks (ousmane dieng) is slated to just walk in the summer after 4 years of basically non-development in their vaunted system.

tl;dr--i think the CBA is coming for okc.

 

btw, keon ellis and devin carter both dnp-cds in another sac loss.

 

Trey Murphy is wayyyy better then Kuminga.

I don’t think we have a shot at him.

I think we have a realistic shot at Herbert Jones. So we’ll lock in on him. We’re not looking at the glamorous scoring. Just guys with Length on the perimeter who can play the Wings and hit the outside shot. Herbert Jones can do that. I’ve seen Herbert Jones do that and play like that consistently. He can be that guy. I know it.

perfect player for us. I was looking at him when we had AD. His length is needed. He’ll pick it up and play better.

I mentioned Zaire Williams before. Nice young player.

I mean looking at Williams Herb can he be better than Cam Reddish? I think so. Cam could play some defense. He just couldn’t score. But in terms of player. You’re looking at a guy like that. Young legs that you can play on the perimeter.

in the D league are there guys like that??? Not many. You gotta keep developing Thiero and just hope he comes along. The repetition is huge.

There are guys you can roll the dice on Kyle Kuzma KCP who were great defenders on our championship runs.

and then see what you want to do on Andrew Wiggins.

I honestly think Rob is trying to nail a guy like Herbert Jones that type. Thybille they are fine with offense coming from Luka Reaves LeBron and Ayton.

they want this guy to nail perimeter defense. Those other guys are legit 3-D guys.

what does a Knect for Clarkson trade look like?

 

Great stealth tank job - no we're trying to win look we have future HOF WestBrick starting and taking up a bunch of minutes along with former chicago all-stars lavine and derozan (brick is better then caruso and pre-injury lonzo trust us he's Brick)

 

Herb might be our best bet. One other thing to consider: we have to force JJ's hand or Rob does; we know we need a starting lineup change, and I think if you were to trade for another starting piece, It would force JJ to make that change, and I hope it means sitting Rui and inserting that "starter" whomever that may be, IMO>