OKC Thunder: 4 rising-stars worth trading draft picks for

OKC Thunder trade candidate No. 4) John Collins, Atlanta Hawks

Last but certainly not least, we have perhaps the best player found on this list as well as the one most often found of late on the trade rumor mill.

Now, a little over a month ago my co-expert Tamberlyn Richardson penned a piece discussing three players the OKC Thunder could target using their $27.5 million trade exception and, one of said players was John Collins.

Her reasoning for why he makes sense as an option read as follows:

"There is a compelling argument to add Collins. First, he fits the timeline of the core group who’ll comprise the future era.  The other overwhelming reason is the Hawks added Danilo Gallinari and while Travis Schlenk stated he signed to come off the bench I’m not sure anyone is buying Atlanta paid Gallo $61.5 million to be a bench player."

Despite her reasonings, however, fans took to the comments section to chastise her, with one asking the rhetorical question: Trae [Young] was [second] in [the] league in assists and [is] an elite passer, but you think Collins doesn’t like that? 

Fast-forward several weeks later and you’ll find that the answer to this question has been publicized — he doesn’t, Derrick!

At just 23-years-old Collins finds himself boasting impressive career averages of 16.3 points, 8.8 rebounds, and a block per game on 57 percent shooting from the field and 37 percent shooting from deep.

Fitting the timeline that the OKC Thunder are currently on, coupled with his specific skill set, trading draft capital to land a potential 1B player in John Collins alongside SGA’s 1A role moving forward is certainly something Sam Presti should pounce on if the Atlanta Hawks place the big man on the block.