OKC Thunder: Should they have gotten more from their recent trades?

The OKC Thunder have made several big trades already this season. Today, we look at if they really got enough value back in return.

The OKC Thunder had a busy offseason. When Sam Presti does things, he doesn’t do them by halves.

Last year he saw an opportunity to get maximum value in a Paul George deal and he took it, essentially setting in motion a full rebuild in Oklahoma City. The deal saw us gain a return in the form of draft capital, young players, and assets the likes of which the NBA had never seen.

Many thought the tank was on, but the OKC Thunder once again defied expectations and made it all the way to the fifth seed in the West — which is no easy feat — before bowing out in the first round of the playoffs to the Houston Rockets.

This offseason, Presti decided that now was the time to start over and threw himself a big ol’ garage sale which no doubt had a sign out the front reading “everything must go, make me an offer”.

By the time the dust had settled on this shortened offseason, we had moved Chris Paul, Danilo Gallinari, Dennis Schroder, and (*sigh*) Steven Adams.

The Rebuild was on and even though the OKC Thunder amassed a record-setting number of picks over the next six years, many fans are still asking the question: “Did we really get enough back?”

The answer really depends on what you are actually asking.

If the question is “did we get enough draft capital back for the level of talent we moved (Paul, Gallinari, Schroder, Adams” and, if you want to get technical, Kelly Oubre then the answer is an unequivocal NO!

The thing is, the point of these trades were for more than just draft capital, as there was another, arguably more important asset that the team coveted — Trade Exceptions.

What is a trade exception?

Traded player exceptions can sometimes become confusing, but the simple explanation is this: it is created when a team trades for a player without sending salaries of equal value back in return.

This is evident in the Danilo Gallinari trade where a team under the salary cap (Atlanta) is happy to take on the forward’s contract ($19.5 million) to their roster without the Thunder taking that amount of salary back from the Hawks.

This creates a benefit for both teams, as Atlanta gets a near All-Star level forward in Gallinari, and the Thunder get a trade exception which they have 365 days to use before it expires.

It is in this piece of information we find out why the OKC Thunder have done the deals they have this year. Cleary Presti has had confirmation from above that during this rebuild, and with Covid 19 crippling attendance revenue, that the team wants to save as much money as possible.

So, Mr. Presti does what he always does, and pulled a rabbit out of his hat.

He has not only satisfied the budget end of the decision-making, but he was also able to continue to build our war chest of assets at the same time.

A magician never reveals his tricks but this Narrator would sure love to have a cup of coffee with Sam and ask him how in the world he pulled it off.

By the end of the offseason, The OKC Thunder General Manager had somehow managed to get around $70 million worth of trade exceptions.

Trade exceptions have two main uses: one is for teams hard capped to be able to bring in a useful player for a championship tilt, i.e. the trade exception the Golden State Warriors used to absorb Kelly Oubre’s contract to help them win now.

The second is for rebuilding teams to dump salary and save money which is exactly what a small market team like the OKC Thunder is looking to do now.

I highly doubt Sam uses many, if any of these exceptions and, instead, lets them all of it expire next year and save the team millions in the process.

So the question isn’t really “did we get enough draft capital back for the level of players we traded?”

The real question is, “did we achieve the goals we set out to achieve by moving on all these expensive contracts”, and the answer to that is an unequivocal YES!