Surprise Landing Spots for Top NBA Trade Targets
Welcome to the time of year that ranks among the toughest for NBA trade aficionados to navigate.
Training camps are opening, transactions have slowed to a faint trickle, everyone has shaved body fat off their frame while gaining muscle, and above all, teams want to see what they have already in place before they begin dismantling or adding to it.
This is an annual trend, so we are here eyes wide open. At the same time, this year is different from most in that the list of hot-button trade targets requires some serious imagineering.
Sure, a couple of names are making headlines. But this offseason did not feature a marquee trade request we're still tracking. On top of that, the implementation of the second apron has lent itself to a dearth of red-carpet activity. Teams seem more focused on talent retention (extensions) and general bookkeeping as they traverse the new climate.
Our pool of top trade targets is more predictive than usual as a result. Not all of these names are readily available right now, but they're impact players that teams will be monitoring as more concrete needs and aggressive buyers start to develop.
Dark-horse destinations will be determined anecdotally. We are looking for suitors that have not—or will not—be commonly tied to each player but have the assets and, as of now, motivation to target them.
Jimmy Butler: Atlanta Hawks
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Jimmy Butler did not sign an extension with the Miami Heat over the offseason and has a 2025-26 player option. Maybe he picks it up. Perhaps he and the team will hash out their future together next summer.
Or maybe, just maybe, Miami's current window has run its course and the front office contemplates taking a bigger-picture approach.
Admirers will not be hard to find if Butler hits the rumor mill. All the usual suspects will be mentioned—namely the Golden State Warriors and Los Angeles Lakers.
But how about the Atlanta Hawks?
Draft-pick compensation gets complicated since San Antonio controls their next three first-rounders. But that merely incentivizes the Hawks to go for it now. They can build a pretty competitive package thanks to the firsts they received for Dejounte Murray as well as the more distant first-rounders they have available.
Miami may insist on getting Zaccharie Risacher or Jalen Johnson. Atlanta should draw a line on them. Butler just turned 35 and is approaching the end of his contract. The Heat's leverage is limited. Scooping up a handful of digestible contracts, players like Onyeka Okongwu (who can be re-flipped since Miami has Bam Adebayo and Kel'el Ware), Dyson Daniels and Kobe Bufkin and multiple firsts is a viable return.
Whether Butler transforms Atlanta into a quasi-contender is a separate matter. The same goes for how his diabolical competitive streak meshes with Trae Young. But the two are no doubt a dynamite on-court fit.
Young has more off-ball chops than he's consistently shown, and Butler is someone to whom ceding partial offensive control makes sense. Between Risacher, Butler himself, Vit Krejčí and potentially Daniels, the Hawks would also have a line to some pretty intriguing defensive combinations around their floor general.
Dorian Finney-Smith: Memphis Grizzlies
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Dorian Finney-Smith will crack the list of pretty much every team in the market for rotation upgrades. The Brooklyn Nets are (presumably) open for business, and his three-and-D skill set fits anywhere.
Recent slippage could cap the number of Finney-Smith admirers. But that just means roughly half of the league will remain in on him. His drop-off has been far from stark, and teams can trust that his standstill three-point clip will climb back up above league average once he's inside an ecosystem with better playmaking.
Though the Memphis Grizzlies are seldom considered prominent trade candidates—the Marcus Smart deal took many by surprise—acquiring a mid-tier role player is right up their alley. They also just so happen to have an enduring need on the wing. Especially after GG Jackson II underwent right foot surgery.
Memphis would ideally bag a combo wing with more ball skills, but the evolutions of Desmond Bane and Jaren Jackson Jr. give it the latitude to focus on higher-profile specialists. Coming up with the money to match DFS's money ($14.9 million) won't be an issue, either. Spacing gets dicey if Luke Kennard's expiring deal has to be included (after Dec. 14), but the Grizzlies have a smattering of sub-mid-level-exception contracts they can aggregate.
Draft-pick compensation forecasts as the real hang-up. Perhaps Finney-Smith's value doesn't rise above, say, second-rounders or Santi Aldama. If it does, this isn't really a move the Grizzlies can make until midseason, once they know for sure they're good enough to consider shipping out a bottom-10 first-round pick.
Brandon Ingram: Golden State Warriors
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Just about everyone has Brandon Ingram penciled in as a goner for the New Orleans Pelicans. They acquired another cheaper, more plug-and-play ball-handler in Dejounte Murray, have to plan around Trey Murphy III's next deal, need to flip somebody to juice up a bare-bones center rotation and, most notably, have not come to terms on an extension with the 27-year-old.
Ingram's contract is likely the biggest sticking point of all. He is eligible for a four-year extension worth up to roughly $208 million. Even if the Pelicans think he's worth it—which they clearly don't—their perpetual unwillingness to pay the tax is prohibitive to keeping both him and Murphy without moving another core player. CJ McCollum comes up as an alternative, but his trade value likely skews toward net-negative territory on his current deal, and his shooting remains important to an offense that needs bankable and willing floor-spacers.
Money is also probably the reason Ingram is still on the Pelicans. A $36 million expiring salary isn't necessarily easy to move, and any interested teams must be willing to pony up what it takes to re-sign him.
Given how quiet it's been on the Ingram trade front, you can make the case any team qualifies as a dark horse. I'm settling on the Golden State Warriors. They are very much at the fore when discussing higher-end trade scenarios, but Ingram would represent a noticeable departure from how they prefer to play. The two players they have been most linked to this summer—Paul George and Lauri Markkanen—both champion more scalable styles.
Still, depending on the cost, Ingram is a worthy dice roll. The Warriors need another ball-handler and table-setter who registers as a scoring threat to streamline and optimize life in the half-court for Stephen Curry as well as minutes without him. And though they have plenty of secondary creators, none of the in-house options currently match Ingram's bucket-getting apex.
If New Orleans' asking price has dropped low enough, Golden State can live with giving up Andrew Wiggins, Moses Moody, one of Kevin Looney or Gary Payton II and a 2025 first-rounder. A third team may be needed to get the Pelicans a big if they're not smitten with Looney, but the framework is there. And though the Warriors must reconcile Ingram's next payday while gearing up for Jonathan Kuminga's second contract, the inclusion of Wiggins shaves $28.2 million from the 2025-26 payroll.
Zach LaVine: Los Angeles Clippers
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Perhaps no household name is more gettable right now than Zach LaVine. Of course, that doesn't say much about his value—because he's still with the Chicago Bulls.
Trepidation as the default to acquiring him is fair. Right knee issues limited him to just 25 appearances last year, the "Is he a winning player?" stigma remains alive and well, and he's owed $138 million over the next three years.
People have actually wondered whether the Bulls will need to include assets to get off LaVine. Spoiler alert: They won't. Because if they do, they simply won't move him. There's no scenario in which compensating teams to take on LaVine makes sense for the Bulls.
Could they accept a minimalistic return built around multiple cheaper contracts that doesn't net them a ton of draft equity? Now that's a different story.
Enter the Los Angeles Clippers.
Kawhi Leonard's latest right knee update is a worst-case scenario. The Clippers offense was already shaping up to be a misadventure following the exit of Paul George. Leonard's likely absence to start the season lowers the ceiling even further.
Perhaps this is why the Clippers let George walk at all: because they knew their short and medium and long terms were cooked even with him. But that doesn't square away with their draft-pick obligations. They don't control their next five first-rounders. There is no incentive for them to lean into a rebuild unless they're going to somehow recoup draft selections from, mainly, Oklahoma City.
To that end, if you can use incumbent contracts and zero first-round equity to poach LaVine, then why not do it? Defensive returns with him and James Harden sharing the floor could be tough to stomach, but LaVine injects perimeter off-the-bounce and spot-up shot-making to an offense that doesn't have a ton of players who provide both.
P.J. Tucker and Norman Powell are starting-point salary anchors for any deal. Piecing together the extra $13 million or so while retaining Terance Mann is not impossible now but gets easier once trade restrictions lift on others.
Coby White: Detroit Pistons
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Coby White is the most likely player on the Chicago Bulls to be peddled as the face for whatever the organization is currently doing. He is just 24; entered the Most Improved Player discussion last year amid an uptick in scoring, playmaking and general on-ball variability; and will make under $25 million over the next two seasons.
This is precisely why the Bulls should trade him—and why teams around the league will no doubt be monitoring his availability.
White's value will never be higher than it is now, with multiple years on his deal. And while he fits whatever timeline Chicago is traveling down, the cut-rate contract he's on works against a long-term stay. His salary is too low to hope he extends off it, and the Bulls won't be good enough by 2026 to shell out a megadeal for someone who, despite his talent, doesn't project as the best player on a really good team.
Gobs of suitors will line up if Chicago opens up the bidding. Could the Detroit Pistons be convinced to join that fray?
Pairing White with Cade Cunningham would be a divine fit on the offensive end. It would also probably mean the Pistons are getting out of the Jaden Ivey business. It may be too early to make that call, but the idea is far from egregious.
Building a package could get somewhat challenging. The Bulls will want picks, but Detroit's own remain too valuable to just jettison—and its options are somewhat wonky given that the protections on the first-rounder they owe to New York span through 2027.
Could Chicago be enticed by a package built around Ivey? Or maybe one of the Pistons' young wings? Would Detroit even consider using Ron Holland or Ausar Thompson to land White? Would it be more inclined to dangle soonest-allowable first-rounders? We will leave this part of the process to the front offices in the Motor and Windy cities.
Dan Favale covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter (@danfavale), and subscribe to the Hardwood Knocks podcast, co-hosted by Bleacher Report's Grant Hughes.
Unless otherwise cited, stats courtesy of NBA.com, Basketball Reference, Stathead or Cleaning the Glass. Salary information via Spotrac. Draft-pick obligations via RealGM.
