NBA free agency 2024: Every signing, trade and rumor from the first week of the NBA offseason

I’ve seen plenty of people questioning why the Kings would do a sign-and-trade for DeMar DeRozan when it doesn't make them contenders. They might ask: "What does this deal actually accomplish?"

These are the things I'd remind people:

• The West is running roughly 13 teams deep next season. I'm assuming Portland and Utah won't be competitive, and I'm giving Victor Wembanyama the benefit of the doubt for the rest of time.
• Oklahoma City, Dallas, Golden State and New Orleans got better. Denver and the Clippers might've gotten worse, but one has Nikola Jokić and the other added depth in the departure of a star.
• The Lakers, Minnesota and Phoenix are all in the same area as last year, and that area was better than Sacramento. Houston and Memphis will be back, too.
• The Kings also got better here! And isn’t that the point of offseason moves?

The Kings were the No. 3 seed in 2022-23 with a 48-34 record and snapped the longest playoff drought in NBA history (16 seasons). They got bounced in the first round after Steph Curry had a 50-point Game 7. This past season, the Kings went 46-36 (almost the exact same record), finished ninth in the West, won a Play-In Tournament game to end the Warriors' season and then lost to New Orleans with a chance for the No. 8 seed. What changed between those two seasons? The West was just crazy good! Two fewer wins wasn’t some indictment of a Kings team that dealt with injuries at the end of last season. The issue was the West just got better, so the Kings decided they needed to get better, too.

They’ll have the improvement of 23-year-old Keegan Murray in his third season, as well as three elite playmakers with DeRozan, De'Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis in the mix. Sacramento should have enough shooting on the roster to balance out playing Sabonis and DeRozan together. And most importantly, again, they got better!

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Three seasons and one playoff appearance do not constitute an era, but there's no arguing that DeMar DeRozan was a wonderful player for the Chicago Bulls.

He made two All-Star teams, averaged 25.5 points on 49.6 percent shooting and played in all but 17 games over three seasons. He was basically Jimmy Butler without the defense and the drama.

DeRozan was a star, a mentor, a leader and in a more competent organization, a consistent winner. He helped the Bulls out of the rebuilding muck and into the bottom tier of respectability.

Mostly, he made Bulls basketball fun again. On some nights, anyway.

Everything is past tense because DeRozan is gone now, joining Alex Caruso as beloved ex-Bulls off to hopefully greener pastures in the Western Conference.

They both deserved better from the Bulls. So do Bulls fans.

Read the rest of my column here.

A league source confirms free-agent forward Haywood Highsmith has signed a two-year, $11 million deal to return to the Miami Heat. The deal is fully guaranteed and does not include any options.

Toronto Raptors president Masai Ujiri was asked about the status of Sasha Vezenkov, who was acquired in a draft-day trade with the Sacramento Kings. Ujiri said many words that can be summed up with "We'll see."

There have been reports from overseas that Vezenkov has agreed to play for Olympiacos, but he is under contract in the NBA (and has a team option for next year). So, we'll see.

My read on this: Vezenkov can't sign another contract to play for another team, obviously. More to the point, his salary ($6.7 million next season and a team option for just under $7 million in 2025-26) could be very useful in trades. Unless Vezenkov wants to give. like, all of his money back, there isn't much incentive for Raps to "buy him out."

Free agent center Daniel Theis will sign a one-year, $3 million deal with the New Orleans Pelicans, league sources tell The Athletic.

Theis played a combined 60 games last season with the Pacers and Clippers, averaging 6.3 points and 4.1 rebounds.

New Philadelphia 76ers star Paul George said a "disrespectful" initial contract offer and the lack of a no-trade clause were among the reasons he left his hometown LA Clippers after five seasons.

George, who signed a four-year, $212 million contract to join the 76ers last week, said the Clippers initially offered him two years and $60 million last fall during in-season negotiations that he eventually tabled in February.

"I'm like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa," George said on his podcast, "Podcast P." "Two years, 60? That's crazy! I'm not signing that."

When negotiations resumed after the season, George wanted a no-trade clause to go with a 3-year, $150 million offer from the Clippers. But he said LA didn't want to include a no-trade clause or a fourth season on the deal, leading to his decision to team up with NBA MVP center Joel Embiid and 2024 Most Improved Player recipient Tyrese Maxey in Philadelphia.

The NBA's new collective bargaining agreement, which introduced the heavily punitive second apron, played a large role in the Clippers offers, the team said in a statement. LA signed Leonard to a three-year, $153 million contract extension in January, and re-signed James Harden — who they acquired in a November trade with the 76ers — to a two-year, $70 million deal at the start of free agency last week.

George said he was interested in a similar deal to Leonard's, but says the Clippers offered less to George before he tabled negotiations in February until the offseason.

"We came here together, we want to finish this s— together. I’ll take what Kawhi got, I was cool with that and we were still taking less. Kawhi took less, so if Kawhi takes less, I'm not going," he said.

"It's not about me being paid more than him. 'I'm going to take what he got.' They didn't want to do that … Let me get to the end of this year and we'll discuss this again."

Read more here.

New Orleans made a big trade before the start of free agency by acquiring Dejounte Murray from the Atlanta Hawks. The Hawks were one of the main teams linked with the Pelicans in Brandon Ingram trade rumors since the end of the season for two reasons. First, Ingram made sense as a potential Murray replacement next to Trae Young. Secondly, the Hawks seemed motivated to break up the Murray/Young backcourt and featured several centers who could alleviate the Pels' needs up front with Jonas Valančiūnas leaving in free agency.

As it turned out, Atlanta didn’t have much interest in giving Ingram his next contract or moving either of its top two centers (Clint Capela and Onyeka Okongwu), according to league sources.

So the Pelicans nabbed a new starting point guard — a priority going into the offseason — without giving up any substantial present talent in return. But including Larry Nance Jr. and Cody Zeller in that deal made the need for a center (or two) to complement Zion Williamson even more prominent and the questions about Ingram's future even tougher to answer.

Read my roundup of the Pelicans' current Ingram dilemma here.

On July 12, exactly two years after Jalen Brunson first signed in New York, the Knicks can offer their All-Star point guard a long-term extension. Because of rules in the collective bargaining agreement, the deal would not be as lucrative as one he could receive if he were to wait until 2025 free agency to re-sign. Thus, the original assumption was that Brunson, the franchise's cornerstone, would wait until next summer to re-up with the only organization for which he wants to play.

Of course, you know what they say about assumptions …

There is a world where, instead of gunning for a max contract, Brunson signs the extension for cheaper than his market value.

Since the Knicks' season ended with a Game 7, second-round loss to the Indiana Pacers, Brunson has mulled over whether he should wait until free agency for the bigger contract or take the money now. The Knicks can't make their official offer until Friday, but he knows it's coming. And to this point, according to a league source, signing the extension is still under consideration.

If Brunson were to take it, cementing a deal that would promise him nine figures less than one he could receive as a free agent a year from now, it would do wonders for the Knicks — and not because it places extra dollars in James Dolan’s pockets.

Read more here.

Sacramento Kings No. 13 pick Devin Carter is expected to undergo left shoulder surgery next week, league sources tell The Athletic. Carter's status at the start of next season is in question, but he is fully expected to make a full recovery with no long-term issues.

The Kings acquired DeMar DeRozan and reached a deal with point guard Jordan McLaughlin to shore up the backcourt in recent days. Sacramento dealt with a similar shoulder procedure for Kevin Huerter near the end of last season, and timelines can vary based on rehab and recovery.

Paul George announced on his podcast that his new number with the Philadelphia 76ers will be No. 8. George began his NBA career with the Indiana Pacers wearing 24 as a Kobe Bryant tribute before changing it to No. 13 a decade ago, a nod to the Motion Picture Association film rating system. George kept 13 after joining the Oklahoma City Thunder in 2017 and the LA Clippers in 2019.

But with 13 (Wilt Chamberlain) and 24 (Bobby Jones) both retired by the 76ers, George is going back to a Kobe Bryant tribute by wearing Bryant's original number in the area where Bryant grew up.

The Spurs had to include a second-round pick in a separate trade with Charlotte just to pull this off, dumping Devonte' Graham’s partial guarantee so they could fit Harrison Barnes into their cap sheet. San Antonio received a potentially valuable swap in 2031, but it's six years away and might end up not worth anything. For the Spurs, this is basically a bet on Victor Wembanyama being both awesome and healthy, and the Kings being the Kangz.

The Spurs also smartly parked this swap in 2031 — they already have two swaps in 2030, an unfortunate circumstance of Minnesota having nothing else to trade them on draft night, and additional swaps have diminishing value because you can only swap your own draft pick once.

San Antonio may also be able to double-dip on this trade later if it can get a good year out of Barnes, who tailed off in 2023-24 but is 32 and shoots 37.9 percent career from 3. (This is notable since the Spurs actually started attempting 3s last year; they just couldn't make any.) Twelve months from now, one season of Barnes at $19 million (if he waives his trade kicker) might look like a different value proposition.

Still, taking on a pick swap to take on undesired money is one way to play the cap room game … but the Spurs also could have signed a player into that room. Even if it was a veteran, the Spurs could potentially have reaped much more than a pick swap by signing a player and trading him later.

Of course, that route is filled with unknowns, and the Barnes trade is a known. Other teams in their position have had trouble using cap space effectively this summer (witness the Detroit Pistons and Utah Jazz); the Spurs, if nothing else, gave themselves home-run upside with the unprotected swap.

Read the rest of my analysis here.

It became clear early in free agency that Klay Thompson and the Warriors would not find a path to a new contract that would keep him in the Bay, something Steve Kerr said hasn't "hit" him yet.

"These things rarely go like you want…where everybody goes out together," Kerr said Saturday during a group interview following Team USA's first practice in Las Vegas. "We were hoping that could happen, but it didn't. And, we wish Klay well, but we love him."

Kerr said he spoke with Thompson as the player and team were splitting, and Thompson gave Kerr a "really good description of his frame of mind."

"I completely understand," Kerr said. "Sometimes in life, we all need a shift, just a fresh start, whatever it is, no matter what profession. Sometimes you just need a change. I think that's it, that's the easiest way to describe why Klay is leaving."

Read more here.

Before agreeing to a deal with the Kings, even with the sign-and-trade teams in place, DeMar DeRozan wanted to visit the city and facility. Assistant coach Jay Triano brought him in late Saturday morning, and DeRozan spent much of the day hanging out with head coach Mike Brown, assistant coach Luke Loucks and Triano. They toured the practice gym, weight room and arena. They chatted basketball.

DeRozan watched De'Aaron Fox go through one of his offseason workouts with Loucks, then Fox and DeRozan went to lunch. Fox was a crucial part of the recruitment process, league sources said, and an advocate of the move. That’s an important note considering Fox's own contract situation. He has two seasons left on his current deal but has opted not to sign an extension this summer (as The Athletic reported), in part, because he’d like to see how the roster and future take shape.

DeRozan enjoyed his visit enough to agree to the deal later in the day.

Read more here.

DeMar DeRozan's professionalism might have been all that topped his durability and fourth-quarter dominance the past three seasons in Chicago. He brought leadership to the Bulls as a legend many of his teammates watched as they were growing up. In January 2021, DeRozan drove to then-rookie Ayo Dosummu's jersey retirement at the University of Illinois. DeRozan also graciously and giddily invited younger teammates like Patrick Williams and Dalen Terry to work out with him each summer.

Meanwhile, the sentiment in Chicago could be described as one of relief. Had the Bulls re-signed DeRozan, who repeatedly expressed his desire to return, it would have represented a safe route toward respectability. Chicago could have been penciled in for 40 wins and a third straight season in the Play-in Tournament. Bulls chief basketball executive Artūras Karnišovas promised changes to a roster that had maxed out, and DeRozan's seven-day wait carried critical questions for the Bulls' direction.

When the Bulls traded Alex Caruso to the Thunder the week before the NBA Draft, DeRozan's fate was sealed. Chicago chose to chart a new course by acquiring 21-year-old point guard Josh Giddey, the sixth pick in the 2021 draft. Chris Duarte, the 6-foot-6 swingman with 3-and-D potential who heads to the Bulls from the Kings, was the 13th selection that year.

After the Bulls agreed to sign Williams to a five-year, $90 million contract on the eve of free agency, DeRozan would have had to take a massive pay cut to remain in Chicago — where he'd be playing on a rebuilding team. The deal gives the Bulls a chance to reset while allowing DeRozan a chance to return to deep playoff contention.

Read more here.