Thunder should be terrified about losing Sam Presti in this NBA shifting event

The OKC Thunder just won the 2025 NBA Championship and, a few days later, found themselves killing the NBA Draft. Both of these accomplishments are, in large part, thanks to the genius of GM Sam Presti.

As a result of his exceptional past trade dealings and elite prospect vetting, throughout his 17 years with the organization, the storied executive has built this Oklahoma City squad up to potentially become the league's next great dynasty. The addition of Thomas Sorber with the 15 overall selection only increases their odds of becoming one.

However, despite all this success, fears of his departure seem to be growing at a rate many fans may not have expected.

Thunder may have competition from expansion teams to keep Sam Presti

During a recent episode of The Ringer's Bill Simmons podcast, both the eponymous host and guest Chris Mannix discussed the recent rumblings of possible league expansion over the next few years.

Admitting that they feel the NBA is "going to step on the gas" to facilitate such a happening, once new organizations start to take shape, Mannix believes that Presti will likely be "the potential biggest free agent that could be out there."

Now, while both Simmons and Mannix assured listeners that they have no insight into or knowledge about whether Presti is even remotely interested in bolting from the Sooner State, especially now that the Thunder are officially league champions, they did note that there were whispers of the executive eyeing different organizations around the association just a few short years ago.

"When Boston was open before Brad Stevens got it, Sam was interested in that job," Mannix said.

On top of this, the concept of there being a personal link to a possible expansion team like the new Seattle SuperSonics, for example, is also something that could theoretically play a factor in his decision-making.

As pointed out by Simmons, Presti received his start as general manager with Seattle back in 2007, before the team relocated to Oklahoma City as the Thunder.

With this in mind, Simmons noted that the Sonics' mindset could be that they "lost this guy to Oklahoma City," and now they could seriously consider looking into ways to bring him back to "be our architect" for the future and finish what he originally set out to do with the club in the first place.

Again, all of this is merely speculative at this point in time. There's no guarantee that the NBA will even grow to more than 30 teams anytime soon. Considering how some owners like James Dolan are adamant against such a concept, expansion is simply just a pipe dream.

However, if said dream were to ultimately become a reality, it was already understood that the Thunder would be at risk of seeing a few key individuals be plucked away.

Now, it appears they may have to add Sam Presti to this flight risk list.