Blockbuster NBA Trades for Teams That Should Reset (2024)

With the NBA draft lottery recently completed and the league's top teams still duking it out in the playoffs, the extreme ends of the competitive spectrum are soaking up all of our attention. But what about the squads hanging around the middle?

The trades we'll propose here are mostly aimed at NBA teams situated in that soft, chewy center. We will, however, also broaden the focus to include good teams that nonetheless need a reshuffling to avoid sliding back toward the middle. We're looking at clubs that need to get more flexible as well as ones that might benefit from starting all the way over.

In most cases, that'll entail trading veterans for youth, ideally without giving up draft picks to do so.

That's a tough needle to thread, and it'll likely involve painful steps backward. Sometimes, though, the only way up is down.

The Trade

Golden State Warriors acquire Kevin Durant from the Phoenix Suns for Andrew Wiggins, Jonathan Kuminga, Moses Moody and a 2025 first-round pick

The Suns will push for an additional 2027 first-round pick, the only other one the Warriors can include, assuming this deal goes down on draft night. Meanwhile, the Dubs will try to swap in someone like Brandin Podziemski for Kuminga, whom the organization has labeled untouchable.

In addition to those negotiating sticking points, Golden State is still taking on about $3 million more in salary than is allowed—and that's assuming it doesn't include Kevon Looney's non-guaranteed $8 million salary for 2024-25.

Put all those hangups aside and consider, though, that the Warriors are one of very few teams more tied to an immediate win-now timeline than the Suns. Stephen Curry has two more years on his deal, and it seems clear the organization is committed to surrounding him with a competitive team. Durant will turn 36 before next season starts and comes with health risks, but he's probably the more valuable short-term contributor than Kuminga, Wiggins or Moody.

Would Phoenix admit its mistake in trading for KD so soon? Probably not. But that doesn't change reality: The Suns are extremely expensive, inflexible and in for a long stretch of ugly seasons if and when their three max players decline or break up. A Durant trade is the only way to soften the landing over the latter half of this decade. It'd replenish the team's stock of young players, picks and depth.

Phoenix gets to go into 2024-25 with two max-level stars (Devin Booker and Bradley Beal) and three new combo forwards in its rotation. The roster suddenly makes much more sense, and Kuminga's upside provides some down-the-road optimism. Meanwhile, the Warriors lean all the way into the "last ride" narrative by bringing KD back to function as a savior rather than the bandwagon-hopping free-agent acquisition he was in 2016.

The Trade

Los Angeles Lakers acquire Trae Young from the Atlanta Hawks for Austin Reaves, Rui Hachimura, Gabe Vincent, a 2029 first-round pick and a 2031 first-round pick

With no clear top-option talent available to select at No. 1 in the 2024 NBA draft, the Atlanta Hawks can't exactly justify moving Trae Young because they've got his replacement all lined up. They can, however, use their fortunate position at No. 1 to sell a broader reconfiguring of the roster.

Possession of a top overall pick provides great cover for a soft reset.

In this hypothetical, the Hawks put the ball in Dejounte Murray's hands full-time, a tactic that yielded solid-to-good results in 2023-24. Atlanta put up a plus-0.8 net rating when Murray played without Young and was an even better plus-4.7 when Bogdan Bogdanović manned the other guard spot.

Reaves would offer a flexible third-guard option in that rotation, while Hachimura and a healthy Vincent would be useful role players on a Hawks roster that will likely be without Saddiq Bey (injury, restricted free agency) and Wesley Matthews (unrestricted).

Young is due to earn $43 million next year and $46 million in 2025-26 with a $49 million player option for 2026-27. That's a hefty price tag for an offense-only guard whose leadership qualities haven't exactly shone through to this point in his career. Or at least that's the argument the Lakers will use to justify not including another first-round pick in their offer.

Atlanta isn't facing a financial imperative to move Young, but GM Landry Fields seems convinced that the Young-Murray backcourt isn't working. He may have even hurt his team's trade leverage by broadcasting that belief.

For the Lakers, this is a pure star play. LeBron James and Anthony Davis need two-way support pieces more than anything else, but Young has had multiple seasons in which he's rated among the league's most effective offensive forces. His potential impact on L.A.'s offense, and his ability to create easy looks for James and Davis, could pay off in a big way.

The Trade

Cleveland Cavaliers acquire Brandon Ingram and Jordan Hawkins from the New Orleans Pelicans for Jarrett Allen and Caris LeVert

NBA Insider Marc Stein reported the New Orleans Pelicans are expected to "aggressively explore" moving Brandon Ingram. Cleveland can save the Pels the effort of searching for a trade partner by offering up a package built around Jarrett Allen.

For the Cavs, dealing Allen would constitute a partial reset. In this hypothetical, Donovan Mitchell would stay on the team at least through the 2025 trade deadline alongside Darius Garland and Evan Mobley. The main difference: Mobley would move to a full-time gig at the 5, improving spacing that Ingram could explore as a secondary scorer.

This version of the Cavs would be fundamentally different from the "two-big, two-small" one we've watched since Mitchell arrived.

Mitchell and Garland's lack of size presents defensive challenges. Swapping out Allen for Ingram could exacerbate those by removing a rim-protector and rebounder from the floor. But it also appears clear that the Cavs were held back most—during the regular season and playoffs—by their inability to score. Ingram could relieve a great deal of the spacing crunch that produced Cleveland's No. 18 offensive rating, even if he's not known as a high-volume three-point shooter.

With Trey Murphy III and Herb Jones emerging as better fits next to Zion Williamson in New Orleans, the Pelicans can justify swapping out Ingram for a big man who'll defend the paint and control the boards.

Jonas Valanciunas, last year's starter, is a free agent and seems unlikely to return. Though Allen won't space the floor, his mobility and interior presence make him the better shot-altering last-line defender. It should go without saying he'd also be a far superior lob threat compared to the ground-bound Valanciunas.

If this doesn't work out for the Cavs and they decide Mitchell is also soon to be a goner, they'll still have Garland and Mobley as young core pieces. Ingram's deal expires after this coming season, so Cleveland can either try to extend him or gauge his value in free agency after a trial run.

Both squads address needs and reshape their identities without blowing the whole thing up. If there's such a thing as a low-risk blockbuster, this is it.

The Trade

Chicago Bulls acquire Ben Simmons, a 2027 first-round pick (via PHI; top-8 protected) and a 2027 first-round pick (via PHX; lottery protected) from the Brooklyn Nets for Zach LaVine

Let's acknowledge up front that the Bulls have yet again committed to the pursuit of mediocrity. Michael Scotto of HoopsHype reported teams around the league believe Chicago will beat the market to retain free agent DeMar DeRozan, which makes a teardown hard to imagine.

This, however, is about teams that should reset. The Bulls fall neatly into that category.

Chicago can't begin this purely theoretical era with DeRozan's new contract on the books, but it'll also find it hard to start fresh with LaVine's remaining three years (player option for 2026-27) and $138 million hanging overhead.

The Nets gave control of their first-round picks to the Houston Rockets through 2027 in the James Harden trade, which means bottoming out won't pay off for them like it would for other teams.

That makes Brooklyn a reasonable landing spot for LaVine who, if healthy after a season almost totally lost to an ankle injury, could provide high-level scoring to a team that needs it. At the very least, he'll be more helpful than Simmons, who's played 57 games across the last three seasons and currently owns perhaps the worst dollar-to-production ratio in the league.

Chicago can onboard his expiring $40.3 million contract with a couple of protected picks attached and bask in its newfound optionality. This assumes the Bulls will also deal away Nikola Vučević, Alex Caruso and anything else that isn't bolted down or named Coby White.

Brooklyn could even flip LaVine next year or the one after to recoup the picks it spent to dump Simmons, and everyone leaves the exchange satisfied.

The Trade

Miami Heat acquire a 2024 first-round pick, a 2026 first-round pick (least favorable of OKC, HOU and LAC) and a 2028 first-round pick (via LAC) from the Philadelphia 76ers for Jimmy Butler

Franchise figurehead and team president Pat Riley didn't exactly seem committed to an extension for Jimmy Butler, and a trade sending the five-time All-NBA star away from the Miami Heat would constitute a major reshaping of the franchise.

So...let's go for it.

The Sixers make for a fascinating trade partner, as they can simply take Butler into cap space and send out picks. That assumes the Heat value financial flexibility and assets they can flip more than an actual live body who could help the new Bam Adebayo-led core compete.

Miami might view Butler as the trade chip it could use to secure a high-end replacement from someone else, but it seems at least as feasible for it to collect picks from the Sixers and turn those into the same thing.

Considering one of the concerns Riley listed about the 34-year-old Butler was durability, and in light of Butler's potential to hit free agency via player option in 2025, the Sixers might be able to land him using only their relatively limited draft equity.

The market-busting package of four first-rounders (plus a swap) the Brooklyn Nets got for Kevin Durant, also in his mid-30s, owed at least partly to the remaining four years on KD's deal. Butler doesn't come with that level of locked-down certainty, so a pair of future firsts really isn't that much of a low-ball offer.

The Heat could still project to have over $100 million on the books in 2025-26 between Adebayo, Tyler Herro, Terry Rozier and Duncan Robinson, so this hypothetical Butler deal doesn't clear the decks to any great extent. But it would fundamentally change Miami's identity, add flexibility and give it a shot to reorient itself around Adebayo and a second star acquired in a separate trade.

In the same presser referenced above, Riley also said: "Our organization is not about rebuilding. I'll never use the word. We'll retool as if we're rebuilding to try to make it better. We've always done that."

This trade would put the Heat on path to improve without tearing the whole operation down, and it'd allow them to move off Butler before his value diminishes as he nears free agency. Better to move on from a player a year too soon than a year too late. Meanwhile, the Sixers add a huge name to re(pair) with Joel Embiid in a title chase.

Grant Hughes covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter (@gt_hughes), and subscribe to the Hardwood Knocks podcast, where he appears with Bleacher Report's Dan Favale.