The Waive and Stretch: Trade Deadline Fallout and Takeaways

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Takeaways From the Trade Deadline

We are through yet another trade deadline, and what a deadline it was. We saw Luka Doncic, Anthony Davis, De’Aaron Fox, Zach LaVine, Brandon Ingram and Jimmy Butler all get sent to new teams. For what was shaping up to be a relatively quiet deadline instead turned out plenty of fireworks. A lot of these big trades have been discussed to death, so I wanted to focus on some of the things that really stood out to me during deadline season.

Trade Deadlines Are For Ducking The Tax
As the founder of a website called Ducking The Tax, Its not lost on me just how many transactions occur at/around the trade deadline that are strictly financially related. This year, we saw four teams duck the luxury tax completely, while almost every other tax team reduced their tax bill as well. In total, we saw teams shed about $150 million in luxury tax payments from the start of the season to the trade deadline. This resulted in the luxury tax distribution to non-tax teams go from 16 teams each getting $18 million to 20 teams each getting $11.4 million. The table below breaks out just how much each tax team reduced their bill by.

There’s been a lot of discussion around how restrictive the new CBA is, but we saw plenty of stars on big contracts get moved amid a very active deadline. In fact, teams being able to use the MLE as a trade exception actually helped grease the wheels on trades. I still think the actual boogeyman in the new CBA is the more punitive luxury tax rules below, and we saw teams give up assets to get into more manageable luxury tax bills for this year and next.

Trade Deadlines Are For Desperation And Future Planning
Yes, we saw a lot of big time players get moved. But these were all made by teams that were either desperate to remain relevant in the playoff hunt this year (Butler to the Warriors, LaVine to the Kings), or with future planning in mind (Fox to the Spurs, Ingram to the Raptors), the Luka/AD trade notwithstanding, because I am still processing how that happened. The biggest move made by a Top Four team in either conference was the Cavaliers adding De’Andre Hunter. A solid pickup, but nothing that would shift title odds significantly. And I get why most of those teams did nothing. mid-season trades are harder to get done than offseason deals, and you are often operating from a place of desperation when working against a deadline.

Trade Deadlines Are For Some Tight Accounting
It is always fun to follow along with all the reported deals as they come in piecemeal and figuring out how it comes to be compliant with the CBA. For example, as all of the details came in on the Jimmy Butler to the Warriors trade, it was pretty evident that the Warriors were going to be very tight up against the first apron after they are done filling out their roster. After the Butler deal, Golden State was $1.8 million under the first apron with only 11 on the roster. After converting Quinten Post, they now currently sit $1.3 million under the first apron with 12 players. If they had to fill out the roster to 14 players immediately, they would not have been able to do the Butler deal. But because they get two weeks to stay under that 14 player limit, they can carry 12 players up until February 17th, when they can then sign two rest of season deals. If they did that, they would end up a little under $30k below the first apron.

The Grizzlies Prioritized The Future Over The Present
The Memphis Grizzlies had, to me, the most intriguing trade deadline in the League. They are the second seed in the west and yet all of their deadline moves were future-focused at the expense of this year. They were primed to make a big win-now deal, they had all of their own firsts and salaries to aggregate. Instead, they sent out Jake LaRavia, Marcus Smart, and their own 2025 1st for the expiring contracts of Marvin Bagley and Johnny Davis. The team certainly got worse from a talent standpoint, and they dealt their own first this year to do so.

But what they did gain out of this deadline was future cap flexibility. They now project to have around $7 million in cap space for this summer, and could get to $13 million if they moved John Konchar. This isn’t much, and generally I would say they would just operate as an over-the-cap team. However, it would seem that this cap space may be earmarked for an emergency renegotiation and extension for Jaren Jackson Jr in case he does not make All-NBA. Right now, JJJ will be eligible for a 4 year, $146.8 million extension this summer if he does not make All-NBA. There is no way he would accept that, especially given the fact that teams are hoarding cap space for the summer of 2026, which is the year he hits the market (will write more on that later). Now, if he does make All-NBA this year, he could sign an extension starting at at least 30% of the cap. That would be $228 million over that same 4 year period. It would seem that the Grizzlies are now in a place where they could still technically offer JJJ that $228 million, 4 year extension even if he doesn’t qualify for it via All-NBA. They would have to move John Konchar, but they would then use their ~$13 million in cap space to renegotiate his 2025/2026 amount to ~$36 million, and max extend off of that. That gets him to almost the exact same $228 million amount he would’ve gotten over that same time frame from the Designated Veteran Player Extension.

Here Come The 10 Days and Two Way Conversions
There were open roster spots aplenty once the dust settled on the trade deadline. This is where 10 day contracts and conversions start revving up. Teams can use 10 days to tread water until the buyout landscape really shakes out and teams know who they can sign to rest-of-season deals. We’ve already seen five 10 day deals officially signed since the deadline, with at least two more reported but not signed. You can check out my 10 day tracker here.

We’ve also seen multiple players get converted from two-ways to standard contracts in Justin Edwards in Philadelphia, Jamison Battle in Toronto, Quinten Post in Golden State, Moussa Diabate in Charlotte, and Ajay Mitchell in Oklahoma City. Teams like the Hornets and Raptors still had room with their MLE to sign those guys to 3 year deals, whereas the Sixers and Warriors were limited to two year deals. But both got a team option in the second year, where they can then turn that down and negotiate a new long-term deal using Non-Bird Rights.

I was fascinated by the deal that Ajay Mitchell got from the Thunder. They signed him to a two year, $6 million deal with a team option in year two. He is actually going to end up making more this year than AJ Johnson, the 23rd overall pick in the draft. Because it was more than his minimum, they had to use a portion of their Room MLE to do it. They could have signed him to a three year deal because they used their Room MLE, but they did not. That is a little weird to me. They could’ve really used a minimum contract contributor in 2026/2027, when extensions for both Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams kick in. Maybe they turn down his team option for next year and sign him to a longer term deal. Or maybe they didn’t want to fully commit to a roster spot for next year until they see how the draft shakes out. They already have 15 players under roster for 2025/2026, and are likely to end up with three first round picks this year.

Estimate Player Value Updates

Current Year Top Ten

Life of Contract(s) Top Ten