NBA Trade Deadline 2026 Makes History with Record Number of Moves amid Rumor Frenzy

If you thought more players than usual were on the move in the days leading up to the NBA trade deadline, there's a reason for that.

The NBA announced on Friday that the seven-day period leading up to Thursday's deadline set a new record for both total trades (28) and number of players who were moved in trades (73).

Even though this was a relatively quiet deadline in terms of marquee players who moved, the fact that teams pulled off a record-number of deals is impressive considering how little activity there had been for most of the season.

The only in-season trade from October through January was the deal between the Atlanta Hawks and Washington Wizards involving Trae Young on Jan. 9.

It took until Feb. 1 for the next deal to go down. That was a three-team trade between the Cleveland Cavaliers, Sacramento Kings and Chicago Bulls involving Keon Ellis and De'Andre Hunter.

The dam finally broke two days later when the Memphis Grizzlies and Utah Jazz agreed to a deal involving Jaren Jackson Jr. Some of the other notable deals that happened prior to the deadline involved James Harden going from the Los Angeles Clippers to Cleveland, Anthony Davis being dealt by the Dallas Mavericks to the Wizards and the Indiana Pacers acquiring Ivica Zubac from the Clippers.

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One key takeaway from the NBA's note is that each of the last three deadlines account are among the four of the most-active deadline periods in history.

The NBA and NBPA agreed to the current collective bargaining agreement in April 2023 and it was ratified three months later to start with the 2023-24 season. One of the key details of the CBA are the apron rules that were designed to punish the highest-spending teams by limiting their ability to make roster moves.

We saw several teams make moves that can help their roster for the remainder of this season, but also saved a lot of money for some ownership groups. Cavs general manager Koby Altman publicly bragged about saving $100 million in tax and apron penalties with the moves they made.

"We really felt like we got a lot better in this deadline. I'll say this, it's very rare to improve your team and save $100 million at the same time," Altman told reporters on Thursday.

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The Timberwolves put out a full press release to announce their acquisition of cash considerations after trading Mike Conley Jr. to the Chicago Bulls and a protected first-round pick swap to the Detroit Pistons.

Minnesota did make a separate move with the Bulls to acquire Ayo Dosunmu, but that didn't have any real impact on the financial outlook because he is making less than Conley's $10.8 million salary that was moved in the previous deal with Chicago.

As things stand after the deadline, the Cavs, New York Knicks and Golden State Warriors are the only teams over the first apron. Cleveland is the only club over the second apron, but the team will likely make moves to get under that threshold over the summer.