By the time next week rolls around, the NBA’s play-in tournament will be officially underway while the 2020-21 season for the OKC Thunder will officially be over.
After five straight postseason appearances and 10 total, including four Western Conference Finals trips and an NBA Finals berth, throughout the organization’s 13-year existence, Sam Presti and co. opted to throw in the towel on their drive for contention status this year and, instead, embark on somewhat uncharted territory — a full-fledged franchise rebuild.
Seemingly ahead of the curve when it comes to the traditional trajectory of this specific phase, as they already have a franchise cornerstone in place in third-year guard, Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Oklahoma City’s immediate future seems just as eventful as their long-term one, as they find themselves coming into this offseason with quite a long to-do list.
First up on the docket will be the NBA Draft, where they will hold the rights to two first-round picks, both of which have the potential to fall within the top-5 slots on the night.
After this, they’ll have the free agency market to deal with where three of their own players will be slated to come off the books, two of which we believe the OKC Thunder should strongly consider re-signing.
Last, but certainly not least, they’ll have offseason trades to deal with, where Al Horford’s name is destined to be brought up day and night.
No matter which avenue you choose to look down, one thing tends to remain the same: this offseason, we’ll likely be seeing quite a bit of turnover in regard to the state of the team’s roster.
Making room for their draft picks, potential free agency signings, contracts that likely will come back in a potential trade, and to simply sweeten the pot in any Horford deal will be a task that Presti will need to accomplish this offseason.
Should they go about and trade some players not named Horford, we at TI believe there are 2 players, in specific, who could surprisingly find themselves on the move: