The winners and losers of the NBA change deadline

Now that the dust has settled in perhaps the busiest exchanges in the season in the history of the NBAIt is time to take stock of who won and who could regret having made their movements on the deadline, or not having done anything.

The shocking agreement on Saturday night sent to the superstar escort Luka Doncic A Los Angeles Lakers For a package headed by the holder All-NBA Anthony Davis He marked the tone of what was to come. De’aaron Fox (San Antonio Spurs), Zach Lavine (Sacramento Kings), Jimmy Butler (Golden State Warriors), Brandon Ingram (Toronto Raptors) and Andrew Wiggins (Miami Heat) They are all former All-Stars who still play near that level and changed equipment.

It should be noted that the best teams in the league were relatively quiet. Only the Cleveland Cavaliers, leaders of the Eastern Conference, who acquired De’andre Hunter of the Atlanta Hawks, made a significant exchange from near the top of the classification. Unless Doncic and his newcomer Mark Williams can be coupled with LeBron James faster than expected or Davis is up to the expectations of the expectations of Dallas Mavericks of matching it with Kyrie Irvingthe race for the title probably did not change much during the past week.

However, there is much to analyze while we consider the winners and losers of the NBA exchanges deadline, beginning, of course, with the exchange of Doncic.

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Winner: Lakers with a new look

Do not give too many turns to this.

If the Lakers had renounced Davis, their two negotiable first round selections (2029 and 2031), an exchange in 2030, Max Christie and Dalton Knecht by Doncic, no one would have surprised. That is how valuable Doncic after finishing third in the vote to the MVP last season at age 25.

Instead, the Lakers managed to use those young players and selections to get Doncic but also Williams as a replacement in the center. I am not completely sure of how good this team of the Lakers will be (now fifth at the West Conference and only two games of the third) this season. They are betting strong that Doncic (which will return soon from a distension in the calf suffered on Christmas day) since Williams remains healthy. Beyond the duration of LeBron James contract, the Lakers are undoubtedly better positioned for their next era with Doncic and Williams, 23, as central pieces.

Winner: The NBA product on the court

Do you remember the first two months of the season, when most of the dialogue was about how many triples the NBA teams were taking and the concern for television audience rates? The conversation, on the other hand, has focused on the exchanges of great success that we have seen during the past week, in particular the shocking Exchange Doncic-Davis.

Within the reasonable, players who change teams increase interest because they serve to shake the NBA snowball. When I grew up, I remember that my interest in the League woke up in an article by Sports Illustrated that highlighted the transactions in the summer of 1992. Although that low season he saw Charles Barkley transferred to the Phoenix Suns, where the MVP would win and would take the Suns to the finals, most of the great exchanges of that summer would not move the needle now. The Lakers will be an obligatory appointment once Doncic returns from a calf injury. The same goes for the Mavericks and Davis, the Spurs with Fox and the Warriors with Butler. The middle of the season are a way to raise the importance of the regular season matches, particularly during a part of the calendar that, otherwise, might seem an exhausting task.

Losers: The skeptics of the exchanges mid -season

Since last summer, we have heard about how difficult it would be to exchanges under the new collective bargaining agreement. Depending on how some multi -team agreements are finally structured, we will have seen about 20 exchanges in the last week with more than 60 players, approximately one seventh of the League.

The strict bumper imposed on the equipment that adds more salary than they can send in an exchange certainly made it more difficult to execute exchanges between two teams. But a less discussed element of the new CBA was to allow equipment to use their exceptions to add salary in exchanges and the hiring of free agents. That opened the group of equipment available to intervene and facilitate larger agreements, such as the participation of Utah Jazz in the Doncic-Davis exchange.

The arc of the salary cap is long, but as we have seen this week, it leans towards more transactions, no less.

Winners: Simmons, Brown and other candidates for purchases

Purchases after the deadline tend to be overvalued in terms of their importance for the playoffs’ free agents.

Both the Heat and the Philadelphia 76ers maneuver to reach an agreement that forced them For non -taxpayers. Bruce Brown, sent from the Raptors to the New Orleans Pelicans, would easily be the most attractive player of that group if the Pelicans buy it.

Shams Charania de AM850 reported Thursday that Ben Simmons and the Brooklyn Nets are working to achieve a buyout. But at this point in his career, Simmons, who was the number one election in 2016 and won the rookie award of the year in 2017-18, is averaging a minimum of his 8.9 points for 36 minutes and has tried only 26 shots Free in 33 games in a Brooklyn team that could use the shot.

Although Milwaukee Bucks cannot sign a player who was winning more than $ 12.8 million, their movements series this week allowed them to offer other candidates for purchase up to $ 3.2 million using their exception of the average level of taxpayers. The Oklahoma City Thunder (average room level) and the Houston Rockets (middle level without taxes) are two contestants that also have the ability to offer more than the minimum.

Loser: Equipment below the tax

The teams that do not pay the NBA luxury tax divide 50% of the taxes paid by the teams that spend the most in the League. At the beginning of the season, Bobby Marks of AM850 projected that distribution in around $ 18 million or $ 19 million. Because four teams (the Cavaliers, Clippers, Pelicans and 76ers) avoided the tax and other equipment took measures to reduce their tax bills, that has decreased significantly.

For now, teams that do not pay taxes should receive around $ 11.6 million, although that figure will increase slightly as the equipment completes their templates after opening places. That will end in the same range as 2023-24, when the distribution to the equipment that does not pay taxes was $ 12 million and well below the 2022-23 record of more than $ 15 million.

Winner: The best team in the east

Given their talented templates, the Thunder and the Boston Celtics had no need to add players on the deadline. But Oklahoma City had the flexibility of surrounding its young nucleus with even more talent and decided to stay as it was. The Thunder acquired the veteran pivot Daniel Theis to obtain a selection of the New Orleans Draft, but they fired him on Thursday, releasing a place in the template for the acquisition market.

In that context, the cavaliers must feel good to get a quality role-playing player in De’Andre Hunter to potentially complete their titular quintet together with three all-stars of 2025 (Darius Garland, Donovan Mitchell and Evan Mobley) and the former pivot All-Star Jarrett Allen.

As I pointed out last week, the eventual champions rarely add key players through a exchange during the season. However, we have seen signings on the deadline that have resulted in many finals, including the Mavericks after negotiating by Daniel Gafford and Pj Washington a year ago. It is possible that Hunter can be that type of player who sets the difference is spring in Cleveland.

LOSDOR: Cameron Johnson’s playoff prospects

Johnson is precisely the type of quality role player who could have helped a contender. Instead, the playoffs will be seeing from home after Brooklyn chose not to transfer it before the deadline.

Presumably, Johnson will be an exchange candidate again this summer with two remaining years in his contract and the Nets in the early stages of a reconstruction. It is one of several players whose names arose this week that could be transferred during the low season, a list headed by the PHOENIX SUNS star, Kevin Durant. Durant has at least something to play the rest of the way, with the Suns fighting for a play-in position in the west. Johnson probably will not have much action for the rest of the way since Brooklyn prioritizes the probabilities of the lottery.