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The opening week of NBA free agency has, for the most part, been dominated by someone who isn't even a free agent. Not only is LeBron James not a free agent, but he actively chose not to be. "We understand the difficulty in winning now while preparing for the future. We do want to evaluate what's best for LeBron at this stage in his life and career," Klutch Sports CEO Rich Paul told ESPN's Shams Charania. So where could James and the Los Angeles Lakers be headed this summer? We'll dive into L.A.'s latest saga plus other news and notes from around the association, with the first few days of free agency in the books.
Where do LeBron and the Lakers stand?After making Jake LaRavia their top priority in free agency -- there was actually a small bidding war for the young backup forward among several teams, sources told ESPN -- the Lakers were holding about $8 million with the remains of their midlevel exception and watching center options such as Brook Lopez and Clint Capela come off the board. Teams who had centers available were keeping their price for the Lakers high when they called, sources said, after they had established what they were willing to pay for Mark Williams (in February's rescinded trade). In case you forgot, that price was: a young player (2024 first-rounder Dalton Knecht) L.A.'s unprotected first-round pick in 2031 L.A.'s unprotected pick swap in 2030
That was a sign of the desperation the Lakers felt to get a center to pair with Luka Doncic. And, five months later, the Lakers still found themselves without one. That was the case until the Lakers agreed to sign Deandre Ayton on Wednesday, once he cleared waivers following his mildly surprising buyout from the Portland Trail Blazers. Ayton is far from a perfect option. There's a reason he was waived on a max deal by Portland. But at the same time, the 2018 No. 1 pick is a talent and arguably the second-best center to hit the open market this summer besides Myles Turner. But sources said Ayton could be a positive option for the Lakers, and at minimum, a significant upgrade on last year's incumbent, Jaxson Hayes, whom the Lakers agreed to bring back as Ayton's backup Thursday evening. All of that, though, will sit in the background as we wait for the next signal as to how James is feeling about things -- something we haven't learned anything more about publicly since Paul's cryptic statement to ESPN's Charania. The entire situation, on its face, is a confounding game of dueling passive-aggressive moves. James could've been a free agent had he opted out of the final year of his contract, which, as one executive said, would have been the way to truly make this a wild situation. James instead opted to collect his money, and perhaps just as importantly, maintain his no-trade clause. Doing so would seem to have indicated he expected to play his eighth season in a Lakers uniform. Paul's statement, however, left things up to interpretation. And since then, we haven't heard anything publicly -- not from James, not from Paul and not from anyone with the Lakers, be it general manager Rob Pelinka, coach JJ Redick, governor Jeanie Buss or Mark Walter, who just happened to pay several billion dollars for the right to take over for Buss as team owner. Not even a statement from the Lakers formally announcing the option pickup, which, considering James is one of the greatest players of all time, sent its own nonverbal message. So where do things go from here? It's one of the biggest topics of conversation around the league. The concept of a trade is not impossible -- nothing is impossible in the NBA after the Doncic trade -- but it is unlikely due to James' large salary and his no-trade clause. There were a few inquiries from eyebrow-raised teams, sources said, just to gauge whether this was something or nothing. For now, there is no action. But it is surely being monitored. The idea of buying out James' contract -- even if he gives back a chunk of money -- also doesn't make logical sense. This isn't the situation the Milwaukee Bucks were in with Damian Lillard, a future Hall of Famer sitting out with a torn left Achilles. This is a player who was second-team All-NBA last season for the Western Conference's No. 3 seed, and with a less than 100% version of Doncic. What good would it do for the Lakers to simply let James walk? In a league that's extremely and intimately familiar with strange circumstances, few in recent memory can rival this one. But until James, or the Lakers, slams the door on the idea of him playing elsewhere next season, speculation will continue.
How much better did Denver just get?It's been a busy week for the Nuggets and their new executive team, led by Ben Tenzer and Jon Wallace. Not only did the Nuggets swing one of the bigger deals of the summer -- Michael Porter Jr. and their 2032 unprotected first-round pick to the Brooklyn Nets for Cam Johnson -- but they also traded Dario Saric for Jonas Valanciunas and signed Tim Hardaway Jr. and former Nugget Bruce Brown to fill out the team's bench. The Porter-Johnson deal shaved $34 million off Denver's payroll over the next two seasons and took the Nuggets out of the luxury tax this season, where they were slated to be in the penal repeater tier. It was their most active offseason since 2022, the summer before they won the championship when they traded for Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and signed Brown the first time. "That was a prized asset they gave up," one general manager said to ESPN of Denver's 2032 pick. "Teams have been eyeing that one to see if they'd actually use it." "I know Cam Johnson has some past health issues, but Porter's back issues and knee issues make this move make sense to me," one league executive said. "I think Cam and Jokic will connect on the floor well. They both think the game the same way." That's a lot of veteran talent brought in to buttress the bench, something former coach Michael Malone spent years begging for, only for former Nuggets GM Calvin Booth to push him to play the team's young draft picks instead. "They've addressed shooting. Jonas is fine as a backup, THJ is great as a backup, Bruce is a good reclamation project," one scout said. "Calvin got too cute and doubled down on it. They didn't need more than that. It's just about helping Jokic." But are the Nuggets any closer to another title? Opinions were wide ranging despite Denver seemingly addressing its biggest issues. As one rival GM said, "There is only one person who needs to be impressed with their offseason. That's Jokic. Sometimes the best trades you make are the ones that engage your superstar. If Jokic is energized by those moves, then it was a great summer." One potential complication to Denver's planning is the possibility of Valanciunas returning to Europe next season after a report from European basketball site BasketNews said he is considering joining Greek powerhouse Panathinaikos. A few things would have to happen first: Denver would need to waive him and, presumably, buy out the $10 million on his contract. The NBA would then have to grant Valanciunas a letter of clearance. That is far from unprecedented. Last year, for example, Sasha Vezenkov agreed to a buyout with the Toronto Raptors to go back to Europe. But unlike Vezenkov -- a bit player for a team that wound up in the lottery -- Valanciunas was just acquired, in theory, to fill a need for a team fighting for a championship. Thus it is far from a sure thing the Nuggets would agree to allow this move to become a reality.
After injuries and offseason movement, what is the Eastern Conference landscape now?At the start of the playoffs, the Boston Celtics were the consensus favorites to return to the NBA Finals. Then, at the start of Game 7 of those Finals, the Indiana Pacers not only had a chance to win their first title but were already seen as the conference favorites next season after a thrilling run through the East playoffs. Achilles tears suffered by a pair of Olympic gold medalists -- Celtics forward Jayson Tatum and Pacers guard Tyrese Haliburton -- has thrown the East into complete disarray. Or, as one assistant coach said, "It's the worst it's ever been -- again." With so much uncertainty around the conference, we conducted a snap poll of eight scouts and executives to see where things stand. What's clear is that the East is seen as having three tiers: The Cleveland Cavaliers and New York Knicks are at the top; the Atlanta Hawks and Orlando Magic after that; and then a jumbled rest of the conference following from there. That Philadelphia received three votes is a reminder that if the 76ers can get their team on the court, they might have the highest ceiling of any East team. However, the chances of that ceiling being reached are lowered by the injury histories of Joel Embiid and Paul George and the overall disaster of a 2024-25 season Philadelphia suffered through. Boston, Indiana and the Miami Heat, a trio that combined for seven of the past eight conference finals appearances, received zero top-four votes. "One of the things you learn when you work in this league for a little while is how fragile everything is, even for the best teams with the best players who look invincible," one East GM said. "These last few months have really brought that home."
The middle tier of players has done very wellAs 2025 free agency has played out, there has been criticism -- notably from Golden State Warriors star Draymond Green -- that the collective bargaining agreement is negatively impacting the players and that the league is benefiting from it. "Before the deal was even signed, [I said] that this is ridiculous," Green said on his eponymous podcast earlier this week. "It is going to hurt players in the end. No one wanted to listen, and everyone wanted to act like the [National Basketball Players Association] was making a great deal. ... "Every year, the pot gets bigger and the business gets better, and the players get screwed more. That's just how this business works." What's inarguably true, though, is that in an offseason when only the Brooklyn Nets entered with meaningful cap space -- before the Bucks cleared the room to acquire Myles Turner -- we've seen a lot of the so-called "middle class" of players cashing in. Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Dennis Schroder, Dorian Finney-Smith, Caris LeVert, Duncan Robinson, Luke Kornet and Luke Kennard all changed teams on deals worth eight figures per year. Several other players -- including Brook Lopez, Clint Capela, Kevon Looney, Ty Jerome, Ayton, LaRavia, Guerschon Yabusele and Tyus Jones -- all signed for at least the taxpayer's midlevel exception of $5.7 million. Several others -- including Naz Reid, Santi Aldama, Sam Merrill, Davion Mitchell, Tre Jones, Tre Mann and Jaylin Williams -- all signed sizable midrange deals to return to their current squads. There has been a common refrain under the new CBA that the lower-level players are going to get squeezed out of the picture. Instead, this summer has shown that even in a year when there isn't cap space, those players are doing just fine. "The middle class is [alive], for sure," one executive said.
The CBA's second apron is working as intendedThe CBA, and especially the introduction of the restrictive second apron, has had a major impact on roster-building. Just this offseason, the Phoenix Suns and Celtics escaped the second apron, and only the Cavaliers are expected to finish the 2025-26 season above it. But history has shown that teams rarely operate in that realm. Since the start of the 2013-14 season, when new repeater tax penalties were put in place, there have been 37 teams to finish the season far enough above the salary cap to qualify for spending into the second apron (roughly 134% of the cap). Through the first six years of that span -- leading up to the COVID-impacted 2019-20 season -- there were 14 teams, and never more than three in a single season. But since the league finished its season inside the Orlando bubble, there have been 23 teams operating over that threshold, including 17 in a three-year span from 2021-22 through 2023-24 alone. The biggest driver: the salary cap flattening over a multiyear period because of the aftereffects of the pandemic. Last year, the league was back down to three teams over the second apron: Minnesota, Phoenix and Boston. And as the salary cap starts to regularly rise again, the increased flexibility for midtier teams lower down the salary structure will start to play a bigger role than it has the past couple of years as the market has been gummed up with little cap space to work with. "This CBA is great for the NBA," one executive said, "because it prioritizes good management and good leadership. If you don't have that, you're quickly going to be stuck with a bad team."
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