Six NBA franchises are nearing completion of a single, wide-ranging trade that folds several earlier agreements into one transaction, ESPN reported late Tuesday night. The proposed deal involves the Mavericks, Grizzlies, Pistons, Bucks, Wizards and Clippers and would move nine players and a dozen draft considerations.
Projected movement by team
Mavericks receive:
• Forward Santi Aldama (from Grizzlies)
• Guard Marcus Sasser (from Pistons)
• Draft rights to Tarik Biberovic (from Grizzlies)
Grizzlies receive:
• Center Isaiah Stewart (from Pistons)
• Guard AJ Johnson (from Mavericks)
• Guard D’Angelo Russell (from Wizards)
• Warriors’ 2030 first-round pick, top-20 protected (from Mavericks)
• Rockets’ 2029 second-round pick (from Mavericks)
• Lakers’ 2029 second-round pick (from Wizards)
• Wizards’ 2033 second-round pick (from Wizards)
• 2032 second-round pick swap with Washington
Pistons receive:
• Forward John Collins via sign-and-trade (from Clippers) — three years, $51 million
• Forward Taurean Prince (from Bucks)
• Guard Gary Harris (from Bucks)
• Second-round pick in 2029: Pistons/Knicks/Bucks, second-best of the three (from Grizzlies)
• Mavericks’ 2031 second-round pick (from Grizzlies)
• Pistons’ own 2032 second-round pick back (from Grizzlies)
Bucks receive:
• Guard Caris LeVert (from Pistons)
• Bucks’ 2027 second-round pick (from Pistons)
• Lower of Mavericks/Nets 2029 second-round picks (from Pistons)
• Cash considerations (from Clippers)
Wizards receive:
• Forward Khris Middleton via sign-and-trade (from Mavericks) — three years, $17.6 million
• Mavericks’ 2033 second-round pick
Clippers receive:
• Protected 2028 second-round pick (from Pistons)
Why the pieces are being combined
The six-team structure was put together over the past two weeks. Detroit and Memphis started talks involving Stewart during the June 24 draft. Subsequent agreements on July 1 added a Clippers-Pistons sign-and-trade for Collins and a Grizzlies-Mavericks arrangement for Aldama. Earlier Tuesday, Milwaukee and Detroit reached terms on a LeVert-centered swap, Dallas lined up a sign-and-trade that would send Middleton to Washington, and the Wizards agreed to move Russell to Memphis.
Rolling the transactions into one trade allows several clubs to preserve large trade exceptions and meet salary-matching rules without tapping those exceptions. Dallas, for example, can keep its entire $20.8 million Anthony Davis exception by aggregating Middleton’s outgoing $5.6 million with Johnson’s $3.2 million to absorb Aldama’s $17 million salary. Memphis retains the full $28.9 million exception created in February by using Aldama’s outgoing money to match the incoming contracts of Stewart, Johnson and Russell.
Detroit can use Caris LeVert’s $14.8 million outgoing salary to match Collins’ first-year figure, projected between $16 million and $18 million, while generating new exceptions for Stewart and Sasser. Washington will utilize the remainder of an expiring trade exception to absorb Middleton’s $5.59 million starting salary and create a new exception worth Russell’s $6 million. The Clippers will open a fresh exception roughly equal to Collins’ new salary.
Once finalized, all six participants will be hard-capped at the first tax apron because each will take back more than 100 percent of the outgoing salary as part of the expanded traded-player exception rules.
No team had formally submitted paperwork to the league office as of late Tuesday night, and the exact pick protections could still be tweaked. League approval is expected once the remaining details are settled.
Source: Hoops Rumors
