1 Tough Question Every NBA Franchise Must Answer Next Season

There are a few outstanding moves still to come around the NBA, but the bulk of the 2024 offseason is already behind us.

That doesn’t mean we have all the answers about the 2024-25 campaign, though. In fact, there are legitimate, tough questions to be answered about each of the league’s teams.

We’ve gathered the biggest one for each team here.

Rumors about a possible Trae Young trade have been swirling for months. While the Dejounte Murray deal that split the Atlanta Hawks’ ill-fitting backcourt may have calmed things for now, those rumors could resurface if Atlanta remains as mediocre as it has been recently.

If Young, who turns 26 in September, has averages around his career norms (25.5 points and 9.5 assists), improves his defensive effort and scores as efficiently as he did in his fourth season, he’ll likely end the 2024-25 campaign as a Hawk.

If not, and Jalen Johnson and incoming rookie Zaccharie Risacher show flashes of cornerstone upside, Atlanta could pivot to a new era bolstered by whatever return Young would command in a trade.

Playmaking wings were crucial in the Boston Celtics’ 2024 title run. Meanwhile, undersized point guards haven’t been the primary piece of many championship runs across NBA history. Do the Hawks want to keep swimming against that tide?

Derrick White just turned 30 at the beginning of July. Kristaps Porziņģis, Jaylen Brown and Jayson Tatum are all under 30. All four of them are under contract through at least 2025-26, as is Jrue Holiday.

In just about any previous NBA era, we’d likely be looking at these Celtics as a potential dynasty. But with the wildly restrictive collective bargaining agreement that’s forced us to learn about first and second aprons, new trade rules and luxury-tax penalties, it’s fair to wonder how long Boston can keep this group together.

With restrictions that included the inability to aggregate outgoing contracts in trades and sign players using certain exceptions, being over the new second apron year after year makes team-building borderline impossible. This year’s Celtics roster will cost nearly $200 million in salary and over $50 million in luxury tax, but it’s fair to wonder how long they can stay above that threshold. The repeater-tax rates go up even higher beginning in 2025-26.

Boston should absolutely be considered the favorite to win the title in 2024-25, but Tatum’s new mega-contract ($315 million over five years) kicks in next summer. Once it does, the Celtics will be faced with some tough choices because of the new CBA.

The Brooklyn Nets shipped Mikal Bridges to the New York Knicks and regained control of their 2025 first-round pick with a pair of trades earlier this offseason. Considering how dreadful the Nets were to close out the 2023-24 campaign, the post-Bridges Nets have to be planning on tanking this coming season.

That begs the question: Who else will they trade?

Can Brooklyn convince another team to take on the last year of Ben Simmons’ contract? Plenty of teams should be interested in a 6’8″ dedicated floor spacer like Cameron Johnson. Dorian Finney-Smith is another veteran contenders whom could chase.

At this point, the Nets should be interested in flipping as many players as possible for future assets that will help expedite their rebuild. That may mean a dismal season featuring lots of losses and Cam Thomas hoisting 25 shots per game, but this is a typical organizational life cycle in the NBA.

Most teams have to be bad before they become good.

The more important question may be whether LaMelo Ball drives winning, but we don’t have enough information to even ask that yet. Over the course of his career, the Charlotte Hornets have barely been better with Ball on the floor, but there isn’t much a sample to analyze beyond that.

Ball puts up awesome raw numbers—23.5 points, 8.3 assists, 5.9 rebounds, 3.7 threes and 1.5 steals per game over the last two seasons—but they typically come in losses. He has averaged only 46 appearances per season across his four-year NBA career, too.

If Ball is going to be the Hornets’ cornerstone, he has to start playing in more games, especially since they may have a new foundational talent on the wing in Brandon Miller. Building around a wing may be safer than doing so with a guard, and the 6’9″ Miller is coming off a rookie campaign in which he averaged 19.8 points and 2.9 threes per game over his last 42 games.

Ideally, Ball will get and stay healthy enough to work well alongside Miller, but he’s no longer Charlotte’s only option going forward.

Based on the reporting about the Zach LaVine situation over the last few weeks, the pendulum has swung too far regarding his trade value.

“There is no market for Zach Lavine,” ESPN’s Bobby Marks said. “[The Chicago Bulls] are trying to give him away and attach a first-round pick. I’ve been told that by multiple, multiple people.”

LaVine is coming off an injury-riddled campaign and still has three years and $138 million left on his contract, including a $49 million player option in 2026-27. Given his injury history, being 29 years old may mean he’s post-prime, or at least close to it.

But LaVine also averaged 25.1 points, 4.5 assists and 2.7 threes per game while shooting 38.8 percent from deep over the five seasons prior to the 2023-24 campaign. If a contender brings him in, he could be facing opponents’ second- or third-best perimeter defenders.

If the Bulls are OK with salary-dumping him, some team has to take that chance, especially if a pick is attached.

The Cleveland Cavaliers have four bona fide core pieces in Darius Garland, Donovan Mitchell, Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen. That’s a great start toward building a title contender. But last season, just about any combination of them was better than all four playing together.

Garland and Mitchell often seemed too small when playing together. Knowing which of those two is responsible for the offense can be tricky, too.

As for the frontcourt, there probably isn’t enough shooting between Mobley and Allen.

Since taking one piece out of that puzzle has made the whole look better together, it’s fair to wonder which ones might be traded, especially after Mitchell signed a three-year extension with the Cavaliers this offseason.

The Cavs shouldn’t be in a rush to make a move. If Mobley extends his shooting range, the fit between him and Allen would make a lot more sense. There’s time between now and February to see if that happens, or if new head coach Kenny Atkinson can simply figure out if/how all four work in concert.

The Dallas Mavericks just went to the NBA Finals thanks to a banged-up Luka Dončić and a supporting cast that got hot at just the right moments before going cold against Boston.

The players who were third, fourth and fifth in regular-season and playoff minutes for that team (Derrick Jones Jr., Tim Hardaway Jr. and Josh Green) are now gone. They’ve been replaced by Klay Thompson, Naji Marshall and Quentin Grimes.

That three-for-three switch seems like an upgrade, but the degree to which it actually is largely depends on Thompson.

Much was made of the post-injuries version of Thompson and how he’d adjust to a bench role last season. The 34-year-old is no longer the athlete or defender he was in the mid-2010s, but he also isn’t “washed” to the degree that popular consensus may believe.

Thompson averaged 17.9 points and 3.5 threes per game last season while shooting 38.7 percent from deep. Playing alongside Dončić and Kyrie Irving could help him maintain that level of production.

Klay is one of the best off-ball movers we’ve ever seen, but he might get more standstill catch-and-shoot opportunities in Dallas. That could nudge his three-point percentage back up to 40 and might preserve his legs a bit for defense.

The Denver Nuggets lost fifth starter Kentavious Caldwell-Pope to the Orlando Magic this offseason, but their front office doesn’t seem all that concerned.

Some of that could be public posturing for the media and fans. It doesn’t make sense to act like the loss of KCP is a doomsday scenario for the team’s title hopes, but there’s also some merit to Booth’s position.

The NBA’s new collective bargaining agreement makes team-building nightmarish for expensive rosters. The Nuggets are already right around the first apron, and future extensions for Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon could make them uber-expensive beginning in 2025-26.

With that in mind, banking on internal development for young wings and forwards like Christian Braun, Peyton Watson and Julian Strawther makes sense. However, there could be some growing pains in the early portion of the 2024-25 campaign.

If any of them picks up the slack left by KCP’s departure—Braun seems like the leader in the clubhouse there—the Nuggets should be right back in the title hunt.

The Detroit Pistons traded Chauncey Billups during the 2008-09 season. In the 15 full seasons since, they’ve only won 35.9 percent of their games.

That isn’t just the worst winning percentage in the league over that span. It’s 3.7 percentage points shy of the Sacramento Kings, who are 29th. The distance between them and the Kings is around the same as the distance between 29th and 23rd.

Getting out of that kind of organizational funk is going to require a superstar. However, the Pistons don’t have a guaranteed one on the roster.

The best bet is Cade Cunningham, the No. 1 overall pick in the 2021 draft. However, the 22-year-old just posted the first above-average box plus/minus of his career (barely), has never been anywhere near an average true shooting percentage and has a concerning career turnover rate.

But Cunningham is also several years shy of his prime, has great size for a lead playmaker (6’6″ with a 7’0″ wingspan) and profiled as a good shooter coming out of college.

It’s way too early to say that Cunningham won’t be a star. If he works through the weaknesses in his game, everything else about the Pistons would make more sense.

Even if they aren’t able to swing a deal for a No. 2 scorer like Lauri Markkanen, the Golden State Warriors recovered well from the losses of Chris Paul and Thompson this offseason.

Buddy Hield, Kyle Anderson and De’Anthony Melton are significant additions to the Warriors supporting cast. If Draymond Green can avoid more suspensions, Golden State is a real contender to get back into the playoffs.

But as of now, the Warriors don’t have a clear No. 2 scorer (unless Hield gets back to averaging 20-plus points per game), and several Western Conference powers keep getting better. The days of Golden State being at or near the top of the league might be over.

We shouldn’t be stunned by that, either.

Stephen Curry is still an All-NBA player, but he’s 36 years old. Draymond is 34. While the Warriors have assembled an intriguing young core around them, there’s no guarantee that Jonathan Kuminga, Brandin Podziemski or Trayce Jackson-Davis will develop into the kind of stars who are capable of carrying the aging Warriors to a fifth title in the Curry era.

The Houston Rockets made major strides last season before they ran out of steam late in the year. With the addition of No. 3 overall pick Reed Sheppard in this year’s draft and AJ Griffin from a trade, they now have eight first-round picks who are still on their rookie contracts.

Alperen Şengün, Jalen Green, Jabari Smith Jr., Amen Thompson, Griffin, Tari Eason and Cam Whitmore have all shown varying degrees of upside. Şengün had an outside shot at his first All-Star appearance in 2024, and Sheppard might already be the best shooter on the team.

But the collective bargaining agreement and the NBA’s salary cap will make it impossible for Houston to keep all eight of them long-term. The Rockets need to spend the 2024-25 campaign figuring out which of them make the most sense as long-term core pieces.

Şengün seems like a no-brainer, especially considering what having a playmaking 5 has done for the Nuggets, but it’s an open question after that. No one should be stunned if Green, Smith, Thompson, Whitmore and Sheppard all develop into stars one day. But again, the Rockets likely can’t keep all of them.

The educated guesswork that goes into deciding which ones are likeliest to hit their respective ceilings could define this franchise for the next decade.

The Indiana Pacers are coming off an ahead-of-schedule conference finals appearance, but injuries all over the Eastern Conference helped contribute to that.

If the Celtics, New York Knicks, Philadelphia 76ers and Milwaukee Bucks are healthy and Indiana brings back most of the same roster from last season, another trip to the third round might not be likely. That is, unless two or three of their young players take significant developmental steps between now and the 2025 postseason.

The contributions of Tyrese Haliburton and Pascal Siakam aren’t particularly surprising at this point of their respective careers. But Bennedict Mathurin, Aaron Nesmith or Andrew Nembhard becoming fringe stars could change the Pacers’ fortunes.

Can Nesmith go from being a three-and-D specialist to a three-and-D-plus difference-maker? Can Mathurin become a more efficient scorer? Can Nembhard sustain the kind of production he had at the end of the 2024 playoffs, when he averaged 20.8 points and 7.4 assists over his final five games?

If the answer to two or three of those questions is yes, Indiana may surpass expectations again.

The Los Angeles Clippers losing Paul George was one of this offseason’s bigger stories. The size and length of the deals they did make should’ve been, too.

James Harden’s contract only covers the next two seasons (at most). The same goes for Nicolas Batum. And while Derrick Jones Jr.’s contract will run through 2026-27, its average annual value is only $10 million.

The 2026-27 campaign represents the Clippers’ cap-space backstop, since that will be Kawhi Leonard’s last season under contract as well. If L.A. takes a significant step back without George this year, it might have to think more seriously about the post-Kawhi era.

Despite his lengthy injury history, Leonard may still hold value on the trade market. The Clippers will have some flexibility with every other player’s contract expiring over the next few years, too.

A full-fledged rebuild may be in order, but we need to see how the first few months of the Clippers’ 2024-25 season go either way.

The Los Angeles Lakers still have LeBron James and Anthony Davis. That alone should be enough to help them make the playoffs, or at least the play-in tournament.

Some purpose beyond that might require more than the front office has done to this point of the offseason.

As the West’s bona fide title chasers are loading up this summer, L.A. has only added 23-year-old rookie Dalton Knecht and LeBron James’ son, Bronny, who averaged 4.8 points as a freshman at USC and went into cardiac arrest last offseason. The Lakers re-signed LeBron and Max Christie, but they’ve otherwise stood pat in free agency.

The story of a father and son playing together for one of the NBA’s most storied franchises is genuinely cool. Mostly running it back with 2023-24’s roster should keep the Lakers competitive, at the very least. New head coach JJ Redick could be a positive shakeup, too.

But for much of L.A.’s history, “title or bust” has been a realistic approach. Barring something dramatic between now and February’s trade deadline, that isn’t reasonable right now.

The 2022-23 Memphis Grizzlies went 51-31 and finished second in the West behind 23-year-old Ja Morant. This past season, thanks to a suspension and shoulder injury, Morant played only nine games.

Morant wasn’t the only one whose 2023-24 campaign never got off the ground. Starting center Steven Adams missed the entire season and was eventually traded to the Houston Rockets. Marcus Smart played only 20 games in his debut campaign with the Grizzlies because of a finger injury.

Amidst that relentless wave of injuries, the Grizzlies went 27-55 last season. It’s hard to imagine that campaign as a harbinger of things to come, though.

With Morant, Adams and Smart sidelined, players like Jaren Jackson Jr., Desmond Bane, GG Jackson and Vince Williams Jr. had the opportunity to expand in more demanding roles.

Now, Morant’s supporting cast should be as stout as it’s ever been. Even though the West remains a gauntlet, the Grizzlies should be right back in the playoff mix if they stay healthy.

The 2024-25 season could be Jimmy Butler’s last in a Miami Heat uniform.

Butler turns 35 in September, has a player option for the 2025-26 campaign and isn’t planning to sign an extension this offseason, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium. If the Heat follow up their first-round exit from last year with another disappointing finish, it may not make a ton of sense for either Butler or Miami to keep this partnership alive.

The former may not have a ton of runway left to secure his first title, and the 2025 offseason may offer better opportunities for him to get it. The latter could pivot toward a rebuild around a younger core with Bam Adebayo and Tyler Herro.

That puts a fair amount of pressure on the Heat to exceed expectations one more time if they want to do so with Butler.

The Milwaukee Bucks can probably justify running back the same core when they look at the right lineup data. They were plus-16.3 points per 100 possessions last season when Damian Lillard, Khris Middleton, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Brook Lopez were all on the floor.

But they also had a losing record after Doc Rivers took over as head coach midseason, were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs for the second straight year (amidst another Giannis injury) and just lost starting shooting guard Malik Beasley in free agency.

It’s reasonable to expect better health and more continuity between Lillard, Antetokounmpo and Rivers to lead to better results, but it’s also fair to worry about a fourth straight underwhelming postseason performance.

Lillard turns 34 in mid-July, while Lopez is 36. Since the Bucks’ title run in 2020-21, Giannis’ postseason scoring efficiency has lagged way beyond his regular-season marks. And while Milwaukee has mostly stood still this offseason, the Celtics have gotten the confidence boost that comes from winning a title, and the New York Knicks and Philadelphia 76ers both loaded up to challenge them.

Anthony Edwards has made each of the last two All-Star games, but relatively inefficient scoring and a ho-hum assist-to-turnover ratio have kept him out of the top-10-to-15 range of players, at least in terms of regular-season production.

In the playoffs, he has elevated his game and production dramatically. For his career, Edwards has averaged 27.8 points and hit 39.1 percent of his threes in those high-pressure games. His true shooting percentage, assist percentage and box plus/minus are all significantly higher in the postseason.

On that stage, he rises in spite of the extra pressure.

If Edwards can play at that level throughout the 2024-25 season, Minnesota will be tough to keep up with in a loaded Western Conference.

The Wolves were already in the hunt for first place in the West for much of 2023-24, and they were plus-9.5 points per 100 possessions with the starting five of Mike Conley, Edwards, Jaden McDaniels, Karl-Anthony Towns and Rudy Gobert on the floor.

In late June, the Sacramento Kings were reportedly among the teams after Brandon Ingram in a trade with the New Orleans Pelicans. However, landing DeMar DeRozan in a sign-and-trade on Saturday probably took them out of that chase.

An Ingram trade still feels like a domino that will eventually fall, though. We’ve heard rumblings all offseason about the Pelicans’ willingness to trade him, and their point differential per 100 possessions was worse when he shared the floor with Zion Williamson than it was when either played without the other.

That and having a ready-made Ingram replacement in Trey Murphy III has put all kinds of writing on the wall. But until the Pelicans actually move Ingram, they might be mostly the same as last year’s team despite the addition of Dejounte Murray.

The New York Knicks added yet another Villanova Wildcat this offseason in Mikal Bridges, which is both a cool story and an obvious basketball fit. His length and volume three-point shooting will be welcome on a New York squad that’s already one of the league’s grittiest and deepest teams.

But the Knicks are now on the title contenders’ tier, and topping that group almost always requires a bona fide superstar.

Jalen Brunson, who finished fifth in MVP voting in 2023-24, was at that level last season. At 27 years old, he’s right in the middle of his prime. It’s fair to expect another monster campaign next season.

League history says those kinds of campaigns are rare for players his size, though. There are only seven other players in NBA history who averaged at least as many points per game as Brunson did in 2023-24 (28.7) at his height (6’2″) or shorter. Allen Iverson (who did it four times), Damian Lillard (three), Stephen Curry (three) and World B. Free (twice) are the only ones with more than one such season.

If Brunson can replicate his magical 2023-24 campaign, he’ll both join that list and have his team in the hunt for a deep playoff run. If he comes back to earth, it’ll be tough to knock teams like the Celtics or reloaded 76ers.

The Oklahoma City Thunder should’ve had to wait longer to be as good as they are. Teams this reliant on young talent typically aren’t championship contenders.

Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who finished second in MVP voting last year, turns 26 this offseason. He’s the oldest member of an emerging Big Three that also includes Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren.

Now that the Thunder added Alex Caruso and Isaiah Hartenstein this offseason, it’s fair to expect them to be even better. That’s a scary thought for a team that won 57 games last year.

Becoming a real title threat could depend on at least one of Williams or Holmgren becoming a real star. Both have the potential to get there, but there’s no guarantee either of them will be as far ahead of schedule as the 2023-24 Thunder were.

Led by Franz Wagner and Paolo Banchero, the Orlando Magic have one of the most exciting young cores in the NBA. This offseason, they added one of the most coveted free agents on the market in three-and-D veteran Kentavious Caldwell-Pope.

Caldwell-Pope’s outside shooting should help space the floor for an offense that finished in the bottom third of the league in 2023-24, but there are still real concerns about the attack.

The Magic don’t have a table-setting point guard, Banchero was one of the NBA’s least efficient scorers in 2023-24, and Wagner shot a dismal 28.1 percent from three-point range.

Banchero and Wagner are both young enough to develop into the kind of playmaking forwards who can make a traditional point guard unnecessary, though. There’s plenty of time for their shots to develop, too.

If rookie Tristan da Silva can add a little scoring punch, that’d help. But it may be unreasonable to expect all of that to resolve in 2024-25, at least not all the way.

The Magic should still be on an upward trajectory, but they likely need more time to become legitimate title contenders.

This has been the fundamental question about the Philadelphia 76ers for a decade. And the answer has almost always been no.

The Sixers drafted Joel Embiid in 2014, yet he’s still never been past the second round of the playoffs. He’s the only MVP in league history who’s never made it to a conference finals. Injuries have played a factor in multiple early exits.

The Sixers had one of the best and splashiest offseasons of any team in the league—they added Paul George, Andre Drummond, Eric Gordon and Caleb Martin, plus re-signed Tyrese Maxey—but it won’t mean much if Embiid is hobbled in the spring again.

The full-strength version of the Sixers would be a real championship threat. There’s just no way to expect that at this point.

In their first season together, the trio of Kevin Durant, Devin Booker and Bradley Beal got swept in the first round of the 2024 playoffs.

All three are back for 2024-25, and between their payroll and luxury-tax bill, the Phoenix Suns are on track to cost nearly $400 million this season alone. That’s a heck of a price to pay for a team that might not be a real championship contender.

Barring a trade of either Durant or Booker, the Suns don’t have many easy ways out, either. Phoenix might have to try to this again, even with the amount of offensive overlap between the stars and the lack of defense they provide.

In the NBA, raw talent is often enough to stack up some wins. That’ll probably be the case with these Suns. But they’ll have to show a lot more cohesion over the first few months of the season to be taken seriously against teams like the Timberwolves, Thunder and Nuggets.

The Portland Trail Blazers’ rebuild feels a bit rudderless. It took longer than expected for them to move Malcolm Brogdon. Jerami Grant and his contract make almost no sense on this team. Deandre Ayton had a strong close to the 2023-24 campaign, but he probably isn’t a franchise cornerstone, either.

Transforming back into a winning team will likely require at least one star. Scoot Henderson may be the Blazers’ best bet.

The No. 3 overall pick in 2023 was a highly touted prospect and one of the biggest names on the now defunct G League Ignite, but he had a nightmarishly difficult rookie campaign.

Among the 955 three-point-era rookies who played at least 1,000 minutes, Henderson ranks 939th in box plus/minus. His two-point percentage and three-point percentage were both way below the league average for 2023-24. And he had the second-highest turnover percentage in the NBA.

But he started to look like an NBA player down the stretch of last season. All the typical caveats about March and April production apply—lots of opponents are banged up are intentionally taking their feet off the gas—but Henderson’s feel as a playmaker improved, and he was doing better at breaking the first line of defense.

Over his last 13 appearances, he averaged 19.2 points, 8.1 assists, 2.4 threes and 1.4 steals per game while shooting 39.7 percent from deep.

It isn’t fair to expect Henderson to produce a line like that for the entire 2024-25 campaign. But if he’s closer to that and continues to show occasional flashes of upside, it’ll be a lot easier to buy stock in Portland’s rebuild.

The Sacramento Kings turning Harrison Barnes and Chris Duarte into DeMar DeRozan should help them get back to the playoffs, but their ultimate ceiling may depend as much on Keegan Murray as anything.

There isn’t a ton of reliable shooting between DeRozan, De’Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis, so Murray’s range will be critical in spacing the floor for them.

The 6’8″ forward made 41.1 percent of his three-point attempts as a rookie, but his percentage dipped below the league average last season. If he gets back to around 40 percent and forces opposing bigs out to the perimeter, driving lanes will be wider for Fox, DeRozan and Sabonis.

But if defenses feel comfortable giving Murray extra time to spot up, the Kings’ offense could start to feel awfully cramped.

Victor Wembanyama’s rookie campaign was absurd.

He averaged 21.4 points, 10.6 rebounds, 3.9 assists, 3.6 blocks, 1.8 threes and 1.2 steals per game. He’s the only player in NBA history to match or exceed all of those marks for a full season.

If you drop the three-point qualifier altogether and lower everything else to 20, 10, three, three and one, you only add Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Hakeem Olajuwon, David Robinson, Patrick Ewing and Bob Lanier. All five are in the Hall of Fame.

Here’s the scary part: That might be the worst version of Wembanyama that we’ll see for the next 10-15 years.

Catch-all metrics pegged him as a top-15 performer this past season, so any improvement will have him knocking on the door of the NBA’s top 10.

After Fred VanVleet left the Toronto Raptors in free agency in 2023, this past season’s trades of Pascal Siakam and OG Anunoby officially ended the last Raptors era and turned the reins of the franchise over to point forward Scottie Barnes.

For the foreseeable future, this rebuild should be about finding the ideal players to fit alongside the 6’7″, soon-to-be 23-year-old playmaker.

Shooting should be the top priority. Barnes is more of a slasher, so he needs deadeyes around him to prevent defenses from crashing on his drives.

Immanuel Quickley may fit the bill, but it’s tougher to trust RJ Barrett’s outside shot. Over the next season or so, Toronto should (and likely will) be evaluating who’s most reliable from the outside and who fits best with Barnes in general.

The biggest domino left to potentially fall this offseason is likely in Utah, where the Jazz have to choose between trading or keeping Lauri Markkanen.

There are reasonable arguments on both sides.

Markkanen is only 27 years old and a fringe All-NBA player who’s reportedly fine with staying on the rebuilding Jazz. Further tearing this roster down and presumably adding more draft assets doesn’t guarantee a future No. 1 overall pick or anyone who’ll become as good as Markkanen.

However, Markkanen also isn’t the kind of offensive engine that’s generally been required to win championships throughout NBA history. Dealing him might nudge Utah’s chances of landing such a player in the draft a bit higher. The 2025 draft, which features Cooper Flagg and Ace Bailey, is loaded.

Utah has reasons to go either way, and its decision could go a long way toward defining the 2024-25 campaign. If he winds up on the Warriors (who reportedly have a “substantial” offer on the table for him), Stephen Curry might get one last run at a title. Winding up with the Spurs (another team that’s reportedly interested) could have Wemby in the playoffs as early as this year.

If Markkanen stays in Utah, the Jazz will have a star in his prime who’s fine with the market. There’s real value in that, too.

The Washington Wizards are in a similar situation to the Trail Blazers. They have a weird mix of veterans and young(ish) players without a single surefire star on the roster.

Henderson may be the safe bet in Portland, and Alexandre Sarr may be it for the Wizards.

This summer’s No. 2 overall pick bounced around various leagues prior to the draft and had a limited role in the NBL in 2023-24. However, he’s 7’0″ with a 7’4″ wingspan, moves well for his size and even has some upside as a perimeter player.

The idealized version of Sarr is a star. If he becomes that, he would put the Wizards on an actual, defined trajectory for the first time in years.