OKC Thunder: 3 players worth trading draft capital for this offseason

After a grueling 2020-21 campaign where they finished with the fourth-worst record in the entire league at 22-50, the OKC Thunder now find themselves nearly two weeks into an offseason that, as a whole, has a ton of potential to see a great deal of success.

Because of their place in the standings, Oklahoma City finds itself with the fourth-best odds of nabbing the No. 1 overall pick in July’s NBA Draft and, on the night, will be in possession of two first-rounders (the best two of their own, Houston’s, and Miami’s).

Out of all teams currently in a tanking phase, it’s essentially an accepted fact that the Thunder are easily in the best shape moving forward, as they already find themselves with a franchise building block in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and, through the next six years, hold the rights to 34 total picks.

Unlike other teams still looking for one star, the next step in OKC’s rebuilding process is to simply find another star to pair alongside SGA.

While many are under the impression that General Manager, Sam Presti will continue on the safer course of action and try and nab one (or several) through the draft over the next several year, there are many who believe that the OKC Thunder front office should strongly consider using some of their capital to pursue a second stud by means of trade.

With the number of picks they have coming up through the year 2027, it’s unrealistic to think they’ll wind up keeping them all.

With this in mind, should Presti and co. look to the trade route, we at TI believe there are 3 players that could easily be worthy of parting ways with draft capital for:

OKC Thunder trade target No. 1) Cade Cunningham

Just because Cade Cunningham isn’t currently in the NBA, this is not to say we don’t believe he’s not a player worthy of trading for or, rather, acquiring the draft rights for.

As we’ve already established, the OKC Thunder find themselves with the fourth-best odds of landing the No. 1 overall pick in this upcoming draft or, in other words, they have an 11.5 percent chance of winning the draft lottery.

Of course, ahead of them in the odds department are the likes of the Houston Rockets, Detroit Pistons, and Orlando Magic.

Now, virtually all season long, the consensus thought process has been that Cunningham should be viewed as the top prospect in this incoming rookie class and, thanks to his averages of 20.1 points, 6.2 rebounds, 3.5 assists, and 1.6 steals per game on 44 percent shooting from the floor and 40 percent shooting from deep during his one-and-done season at Oklahoma State, this still remains to be the case.

What this means is, whoever lands at first overall will likely be taking the do-it-all prospect, and, based on the odds, the Thunder could easily find themselves landing on the outside looking in on such a draft slot.

However, should the ping pong balls not bounce their way, being that they will have a high-end pick themselves in this coming draft and 33 others between now and 2027, should Presti believe Cunningham to be the “can’t miss” talent that seemingly everyone believes him to be, the Thunder could realistically package together a deal to move on up to nab him.