According to the good people over at Merriam-Webster dictionary, the chopping block is defined as a block for chopping wood or food. Just riveting stuff; fortunately for all of you, that is not the chopping block I will be talking about today about the OKC Thunder.
The second available definition for a chopping block is likely to be fired, removed, or eliminated, and the OKC Thunder will have to remove a few players from their roster before next season.
Who is on the chopping block for the OKC Thunder going into the 2023-2024 NBA Season?
It has been well-established and discussed across various platforms that the OKC Thunder have too many players on their roster and will have to whittle down the number of players on the team from 20 to 15 before the 2023-2024 season.
Just last season, the same chopping block that is rearing its head this summer around OKC was felt by Isaiah Roby. A man victim to the numbers game who played some nice basketball for the Thunder in spurts in 2021-2022. The NBA is a business, and with that territory comes some tough decisions.
My job today is to tell you who is currently occupying the OKC Thunder chopping block and waiting for Sam Presti to swing his axe to sever a few roster members out of OKC and into free agency. The OKC Thunder currently sits at 20 rostered players. Only one two-way spot is currently filled, and his being held down by rookie Keyontae Johnson. Two-way spots are a whole new discussion I will leave on the table for now.
The topic of discussion is: which six players are on the chopping block for the OKC Thunder going into this season?
Is there any fuel left in the tank for these former Rockets?
On July 12th, 2023, the OKC Thunder made a trade with the Atlanta Hawks, sending guard Patty Mills to A-town in exchange for two former Houston Rockets first-round draft picks in Usman Garuba, Ty Ty Washington, veteran Rudy Gay (later waived by the Thunder) and a 2026 second-round draft pick from the Hawks.
Usman Garuba and TyTy Washington were both first-round picks by the Houston Rockets. Within two years of being drafted, both players now find themselves in Oklahoma City and on their third NBA stop, even if they didn’t play for the Hawks.
TyTy Washington
Coming out of Kentucky for the 2022 NBA Draft, TyTy Washington joined a long lineage of former Wildcats under coach John Calipari to be selected in the first round.
Washington achieved every basketball player’s dream to play in the NBA, but soon that sweet taste went sour in Houston. In his lone season for the Rockets, Washington only played in 31 total games and started two of those outings. He averaged 14 minutes per game in the games he did get to play while tallying 4.7 points per game, 1.5 assists per game, and 1.5 rebounds per game on 36/24/56 splits.
For reference, TyTy Washington, in his entire rookie season, played 433 total minutes. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander would only need to play 12 games all season, averaging 35.5 minutes per game to match Washington’s entire first season on an NBA floor. Washington didn’t get a lot of rope to play with the big boys, but he also didn’t exactly impress enough to warrant more minutes, even if the players above him in the rotation were guys like Kevin Porter Jr, Trevor Hudgins, and Daishen Nix.
Most of Washington’s run was with the Rockets’ G-League team, the Rio Grande Valley Vipers. In 23 games, Washington averaged 22 points, five rebounds, and 1.3 STOCKS per game. The Kentucky product shot 43 percent from the floor, 32 percent from three, and 83 percent at the charity stripe.
If Washington wants any chance to stick around in OKC, the recipe is pretty simple but may not be achievable. He must show real effort, fight, and competitiveness on the defensive end. In terms of offense, Washington occupies the same space as a guy I will discuss later in Tre Mann. Mann is undoubtedly the better shooter based on their current NBA career stats. TyTy Washington will get his chance to make it in OKC, but he will have to make huge strides both as a defender and a 3-point shooter if he wants to stay with the OKC Thunder.
Usman Garuba
A 2021 first-round pick, Garuba was a high-level defensive big man prospect who was as raw as an ultra-rare steak. He plays incredibly hard, moves his feet well in space for a 4/5 man, and sports a +6 inch wingspan to make up for his undersized NBA big man stature of 6’8.
Offensively there is a lot left to desire from Garuba. In two seasons in the NBA, he hasn’t really shown all that much on the offensive end other than being a rolling, big guy who can catch the occasional lob and crash the boards.
It is almost a requirement for the guys like Garuba, who are the undersized 4/5 that you have to be able to stretch the floor. Guys like PJ Tucker, Grant Williams, and others aren’t by any means dynamic scorers or shot creators, but they survive offensively as corner spacers who are pretty reliable both in their careers, averaging over 36 percent shooting from three.
Garuba is anything but a shooter or spacer. Although Garuba, in two years, has shot roughly 37 percent from three, the issue is it is on an incredibly small sample size of 79 attempts. For reference, in Grant Williams’ rookie season alone, he launched 96 shots from deep.
Could Garuba actually be a shooter finally rounding the corner? Maybe, but I doubt it. As previously mentioned, the OKC Thunder are going to give all of these guys a chance. Still, for Garuba to stick, he will have to consistently come through on his draft potential as a defender and shoot the ball way better than his competition in Jeremiah Robinson-Earl if he wants to have a fighting chance to stay in OKC for 2023-2024.
Viable veteran options?
The Thunder last season were the second youngest team in NBA history, only trailing the 2021-2022 OKC Thunder. Vasilje Micic, while being a rookie, managed to help boost the Thunder’s average as he joined the team at 29 years old.
Veteran voices are incredibly important to the culture of a locker room, being role models and the heartbeat or the soul of the locker room, as Mark Daigneault described Kenrich Williams’ impact on the team off the floor.
The chopping block doesn’t have an age preference, but these next two players are definitely fighting an uphill battle in pursuit of staying on the Thunder for the upcoming season.
Victor Oladipo
Reunited, and it feels so good? Victor Oladipo was a big part of two of the more infamous trades in Thunder history. He joined the Thunder after being traded along with Domantas Sabonis in exchange for Serge Ibaka. Oladipo was thrust into being the second banana to Russell Westbrook after Kevin Durant’s departure to Golden State. Oladipo was Westbrook’s running mate on his journey to winning an MVP. Unfortunately, the playoffs proved to be a different story, where Oladipo looked a little stunned by the bright lights of the postseason. That offseason, the Woj Bombs hit OKC as the Thunder traded Oladipo and Sabonis for Paul George.
Six years later and Victor Oladipo was traded back to the Thunder by the Miami Heat. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Oladipo will have a chance to play for the Thunder. Between the current roster crunch, young guys who need developmental minutes, and debilitating injuries, it feels hard to imagine Oladipo in a Thunder jersey on the floor this season.
April 23rd, 2023, in the first round of the Eastern Conference playoffs, Victor Oladipo suffered a torn patellar tendon in his left knee. This would lead to Oladipo’s third major surgery in four years.
Oladipo’s best bet to stay on the roster is as a locker room voice, veteran presence, and salary that could be moved later in the season. Oladipo is owed roughly $9.45 million this year on an expiring deal. Sam Presti has made a living flipping expiring contracts for longer-term bad money that teams attach draft compensation to. This could be another example of Presti’s habits, or it could lead to what many fans are clamoring for in trading Oladipo’s salary and draft compensation in exchange for a player who could be a more immediate help to OKC on the floor.
Regardless of the outcome, the best case that Oladipo has to remain on the roster is if the Thunder believe in their ability to flip him later this season or at the trade deadline and that he provides experience and knowledge to a young locker room. Oladipo is not the player he was, but he was an All-Star player, most improved player award winner, all-defensive player, and a one-time All-NBA player. Just looking at things from a positive viewpoint, if he can avoid the chopping block, I think that Oladipo could bring a unique perspective to the locker room that could really add to the current developing young core in OKC.
Jack White
A four-year player at Duke, Jack White was known as a tough defender, a great teammate, and described as “He’s good,” according to fellow Aussie Josh Giddey.
White is not the highest-profile player with tons of super-accessible tape. The 25-year-old has done the brunt of his recent work at the G-League level with the Denver Nuggets affiliate, the Grand Rapid Gold. At the G-League level, White averaged 18 points, nine rebounds, two assists, and 1.8 STOCKS per game.
The OKC Thunder are no strangers to tough-minded defenders who can knock down a few shots from deep. See Aaron Wiggins and Kenrich Williams, for example. White’s path to a roster spot is all about the deep ball. At 25 years old, he is already at a disadvantage; historically, there aren’t many NBA players who break out at 25 years or older who weren’t high-level prospects.
This is not to say that White can’t do it, but the odds aren’t in his favor. OKC Thunder fans will get a taste of White on the floor in the upcoming World Cup as he will play alongside Josh Giddey for Team Australia.
The somewhat known commodities
In many ways, the 2022-2023 season and sophomore years in the NBA for Tre Mann and Jeremiah Robinson-Earl was the season from hell. Mann even mentioned earlier this year that this was the worst season of his life and extremely hard. Jeremiah Robinson-Earl had his season derailed by an ankle injury that kept him out for two straight months of game action. Can these returning roster members avoid the chopping block?
As I previously mentioned, Tre Mann’s sophomore season was a year he would like to throw away and burn the remains. After his rookie season, there were a lot of flashes from Mann as a quintessential 6th man microwave scoring guard off the bench. This led to some hype for Mann going into this season, which, unfortunately, Mann was not able to capitalize on.
Tre Mann
It felt like comfort, rhythm, and confidence were all issues that hindered Tre Mann in 2022-2023. His three-point shooting could be considered inconsistent. That kind of comes with the territory of being a microwave bench scorer who can catch fire at any point.
There are going to be highs and lows throughout the season. In his rookie season, these highs and lows were much more stable, this season, it was a lot more lows for Mann as his three-point percentages went down by 4.5 percent to 31.5 percent. For context, Russell Westbrook shot 31.1 percent from 3 last season on essentially the same number of attempts per game. (Mann: 3.8 and Westbrook: 3.9)
Mann was in constant limbo bouncing between the OKC Thunder roster and getting extended time with the Oklahoma City Blue in an attempt to work through any confidence issues to get back to the player many people believe that he could be.
Mann has the benefit of having experience with the coaching staff, the front office, and his teammates. It may not seem like a big deal, but I think the Thunder could look to prioritize keeping a guy around who looked way better in the recent Summer League who they invested a first-round pick in three seasons ago.
Mann, in my estimation, will be able to avoid the chopping block for now, but that doesn’t mean that Mann is safe long-term. Going into a contract year where the OKC Thunder have a team option on his deal, the spotlight will be on Tre Mann to produce. Not to mention the Thunder currently could end up owning up to four first-round picks in next year’s draft. This roster crunch is not going anywhere and will be staring guys like Tre Mann in the face as they fight for their spot on the Thunder and maybe for their next NBA team.
Jeremiah Robinson-Earl
Coming into last season, there were high hopes for Jeremiah Robinson-Earl after he played in 49 NBA games in his rookie season and even started 36 of those games. Robinson-Earl showed his potential as a stocky 4/5 man who could switch onto guards in space at times, bang down low with big bodies in the post and stretch the floor from three, shooting 35 percent from deep.
Many people, myself included, were really excited to see Robinson-Earl and his fit next to incoming rookie Chet Holmgren. It felt like a great fit where Holmgren could provide rim protection and shot blocking while Robinson-Earl handled the bigger post-up players that were projected to give Holmgren problems.
This dream was extinguished quickly when Holmgren had an off-season injury and was ruled out of his rookie year with an injury. Robinson-Earl was healthy for the start of the season, but soon the tides changed and went sideways for him. On December 12, 2022, Jeremiah Robinson-Earl sprained his ankle and would miss the next two months of games.
For weeks fans and media, members wondered when he would return. Ankle injuries are unique and can keep guys out for varying timetables. Jeremiah Robinson-Earl was on the bad end of this and missed way more time than most would have expected. Thunder head coach Mark Daigneault even described the sprain as “impressive.”
By the time Jeremiah Robinson-Earl returned to action, the OKC Thunder had somewhat already filled his spot in the rotation through the rise of Jaylin Williams, who even later became the team’s starting center.
Jeremiah Robinson-Earl looked entirely out of rhythm and out of sorts after he returned. No question the injury was still impacting him and hindering his game. Just like Tre Mann, I think Robsinon-Earl’s past and experience within the Thunder system will put him in good standing to avoid the chopping block.
The pressure on Mann will also be directed at Robinson-Earl if he wants to stick around OKC between the positional competition and the aforementioned potential four first-round picks in the upcoming draft.
Let’s be honest, most of Jeremiah Robinson-Earl’s sophomore season was rough too bad. It is hard to judge him coming back from his injury, but I would like to see the OKC Thunder give him another shot and see what he can do with new roster members he hardly got to share the floor with last year.