Yahoo Sports Trade rumor rankings: Pascal Siakam, Dejounte Murray and more
With just over a month remaining until the 2023-24 NBA trade deadline (Feb. 8), we’re expanding our usual Trade Rumor Rankings (usually five players) to 10 players this week because there’s just so much trade scuttle to discuss.
For anyone unaware, the way we order these Trade Rumor Rankings is by ranking players based on the number of trade rumors they were part of over the previous week, judged by appearances on our Trade page.
With so many players and trade rumors to discuss, let’s jump right into the action.
Kyle Kuzma
With the Washington Wizards sitting at 6-28 on the season, it’s only natural veterans are going to pop up in trade rumors. One such player to be mentioned in trade scuttle already is 28-year-old Kyle Kuzma, who’s averaging 22.8 points and 6.1 rebounds on 35.7 percent shooting from three this season.
If a team does want to trade for Kuzma, however, it’s not going to come cheap, at least according to Yahoo! Sports’ Jake Fischer, who reported this week:
Perhaps Kyle Kuzma could be one answer, although he would not bring the defensive reinforcements that Indiana seems to be prioritizing. The Wizards have informed rival teams they’re open to trading veterans in search of future draft assets for Washington’s rebuild, sources said. Early impressions are the Wizards hope to receive multiple first-round picks for Kuzma, with the goal of receiving maximum draft capital for other players down their roster as well.
Kuzma is under contract through 2026-27 with his salary decreasing yearly, culminating that season at $19.4 million, a reasonable number for a player of his caliber, making him a solid trade asset.
Is he a multiple-first-round pick level of asset? That remains to be seen but we might find out over the next month.
For all of the latest Kyle Kuzma trade rumors, click here.
Gary Trent Jr.
Another struggling Eastern Conference team is the Toronto Raptors, who, despite a solid talent base, sits at 14-21 and 12th in the East this campaign. They already made waves by trading swingman OG Anunoby for Immanuel Quickley and RJ Barrett but could they be in the market for more moves?
Fischer reported that Toronto could be a potential seller and specifically mentioned Gary Trent Jr. as a candidate to be moved by the trade deadline:
Toronto, though, held firm, much to the dismay of rival front offices across the league. The Raptors had dangled each of Anunoby, All-Star point guard Fred VanVleet and All-NBA forward Pascal Siakam for weeks in the lead-up to the deadline, sources said, only for Toronto to send a protected first-rounder out the door and obtain center Jakob Poeltl instead. Then, the Raptors watched VanVleet walk to Houston in free agency and net nothing in return. And when the Raptors began this 2023-24 campaign far below preseason expectations — currently standing 12-19, good for 12th in the Eastern Conference — executives began to pinpoint Toronto as a main actor for this year’s trade activity yet again, as potential sellers of Anunoby, Siakam and veteran wing Gary Trent Jr.
Trent Jr. has had a disappointing season so far, averaging 11.3 points and 2.3 rebounds on 39.9 percent shooting… from the floor. The former Duke standout is putting up those numbers in a contract year, too, as he’s earning $18.6 million this season but will hit unrestricted free agency this summer, which could make him trickier to move, as teams these days value trade targets who are signed long-term and not contract-year players they’ll be forced to re-sign.
We’ll see what the Raptors opt to do but Trent Jr. certainly hasn’t helped his trade value with his play this campaign.
For all of the latest Gary Trent Jr. trade rumors, click here.
Karl-Anthony Towns
Sitting at 25-9 and atop the Western Conference, there seems to be little reason for the Minnesota Timberwolves to make any drastic changes. However, that hasn’t stopped the team from popping up in trade rumors, specifically concerning star big man Karl-Anthony Towns.
This week, The Athletic’s Shams Charania reported that although the New York Knicks had already made a move for Anunoby, they will always have an interest in Towns, who grew up in New Jersey.
"[The Knicks] are always going to have interest in Karl-Anthony Towns, but nothing has materialized as of yet. They have the young players that they could potentially throw into a trade."
— Shams Charania 👀
(via @RunItBackFDTV)pic.twitter.com/jQlhGqNnmF
— ClutchPoints (@ClutchPoints) January 2, 2024
That was backed up by Knicks beat writer Ian Begley, who wrote:
On Tuesday, The Athletic’s Shams Charania noted that the Knicks will always have interest in Karl-Anthony Towns. That’s true today, just as it was true on the day Knicks team president Leon Rose took over. Rose is Towns’ former agent. He and Knicks executive vice president William Wesley are close with Towns and his family. Knicks senior vice president of basketball operations Gersson Rosas ran the Timberwolves during Towns’ tenure.
Nonetheless, the odds of Minnesota trading away one of its best players when it looks primed for a deep playoff run are quite low, so don’t expect Towns to get traded anywhere in the next month.
For all of the latest Karl-Anthony Towns trade rumors, click here.
Mikal Bridges
As the Brooklyn Nets continue to sift through a disappointing 16-20 campaign, trade rumors have started to circulate around the team. One of the players mentioned in such scuttle is star swingman Mikal Bridges, who is averaging 20.7 points, 5.2 rebounds and 3.7 assists on 35.3 percent shooting from three.
Bridges has proven over the 50 or so games that he’s got way more scoring punch than he showed with the Phoenix Suns. At the same time, 2023-24 has somewhat proven that although Bridges possesses a ton of two-way talent, if he’s your team’s best player, your team might not be a championship contender. Bridges might be the type who can thrive on a contender as its second or third option, not as the lead guy.
Even so, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, the Nets have no intention of trading Bridges, who is under contract through 2025-26, when he’ll earn $24.9 million.
The Nets have no intention of trading Mikal Bridges, per @wojespn.
Brooklyn wants to continue to add talent around Bridges as a foundational piece to their roster. pic.twitter.com/8j4FmD7qYg
— Evan Sidery (@esidery) January 3, 2024
Maybe those intentions will change if the team continues on the mediocre path it’s been on in 2023-24 but for now, don’t expect the Nets to trade their best player.
For all of the latest Mikal Bridges trade rumors, click here.
Evan Fournier
With two games under his belt and a total of 33 minutes played in 2023-24, Knicks swingman Evan Fournier has basically been begging out of New York since last season.
For his part, Fournier has lost all hope of earning a role for head coach Tom Thibodeau:
Evan, first question: how are you? Evan Fournier: [laughs] Not too bad. We joke, but we’re a bit worried about you, since you’re not playing at all… Evan Fournier: As long as I’m here, it will be like this. I’ve known it for a long time. I’m just waiting. That’s it. I’m waiting to see what will happen. Then, I try to focus on what I have to do and we’ll see where it leads me. It’s not easy every day, let’s not lie, but that’s the job. It’s just how it is.
Even so, he’s not causing a ruckus about wanting out, telling the media that he’s not eagerly checking his phone in hopes of finding out he got traded:
“The thing is the way I learned [about the trade], I think all it said was it was a trade package surrounding RJ. So of course you see that, and you’re like, ‘Oh.’ So you check your phone and stuff,” Fournier said after the game. “I sleep well at night. I don’t check my phone to see if there’s a trade or anything. I just focus on the moment because that’s the business.”
Luckily for Fournier, he’s basically on the final year of his contract because his 2024-25 season, worth $19.0 million, has a team option on it, one that the Knicks will surely decline, allowing the French veteran to hit unrestricted free agency this summer to potentially find playing time elsewhere.
For all of the latest Evan Fournier trade rumors, click here.
Jonathan Kuminga
In what was one of the most bizarre pieces of reporting in recent NBA history, third-year forward Jonathan Kuminga went to the media to announce he had ‘lost faith’ in head coach Steve Kerr after he was benched in a tough Golden State Warriors lose to the Denver Nuggets:
After sitting for the final 18 minutes of Thursday night’s loss to the Denver Nuggets, Golden State Warriors forward Jonathan Kuminga has lost faith in coach Steve Kerr, and the 2021 lottery pick no longer believes Kerr will allow him to reach his full potential, sources close to Kuminga tell The Athletic, adding another layer of turbulence to an already complex Warriors season. “(Thursday night) was the straw that broke the camel’s back,” one of the sources said.
Kerr responded by saying he wished Kuminga had gone to him directly instead of through the media, though Kuminga probably felt he had no choice in the matter:
Here’s a more extended soundbite from Steve Kerr on Jonathan Kuminga. Said he spoke with Kuminga today and wished any displeasure remained in-house.
“You have an issue, I’m here. I’m the most accessible coach in the league probably. My door is always open.” pic.twitter.com/nVYW76b7HB
— Anthony Slater (@anthonyVslater) January 6, 2024
Kuminga then said he never complained about playing time, muddying up the situation even further.
Kuminga played a season-high 36 minutes against the Pistons. He didn’t rest a single second in the fourth quarter. He had 11 points and six rebounds and spent the majority of crunchtime as the primary defender on Cade Cunningham. It was his 12th consecutive game in the starting lineup, but Kuminga is still yet to play 30-plus minutes in consecutive games in his career. So the playing-time tracker will continue to be monitored. “I never complained about playing time (during the meeting),” Kuminga said. “We were just talking about if I do great at something, just go back and remind him, ‘Yo, coach, what do I need to do to get better at this? What do I need to do to gain more trust or more minutes?’ Like I said, it’s more about communication and better understanding from both of us.”
What’s most interesting about all this is that Kuminga didn’t even ask for a trade – he just felt like leaking that he didn’t have faith in Kerr to help him succeed as a player.
Bizarre.
Nevertheless, Kuminga probably won’t be the one getting traded even if Golden State continues to struggle. He’s barely 21 years old and averaging 12.8 points and 4.1 rebounds on 50.6 percent shooting.
But who knows?
If more playing time-related drama pops up in the next month, we’ve already seen Golden State trade one problematic young player (Jordan Poole)… would it be all that shocking to see the Warriors do it again?
For all of the latest Jonathan Kuminga trade rumors, click here.
Donovan Mitchell
For whatever reason, ever since the Cleveland Cavaliers traded for star 2-guard Donovan Mitchell, the rumors about his future only continued to circulate. And that hasn’t changed the season as the Cavaliers enjoy a solid 20-15 start to the campaign.
Making the rumors even weirder is the fact that according to all accounts, Mitchell is happy in Cleveland. That was reported once again just this week:
The Cavs aren’t in a situation where they are even interested in listening to what teams are going to offer them for Donovan Mitchell. They’re not even considering that at the moment. Beyond that, and I’ve talked to Donovan about this multiple times, he is happy right now where he is at. He is happy being a Cleveland Cavalier. He believes in this team. He believes in this roster. He helped recruit George Niang and Max Strus because he knew after going through that playoff series against the Knicks that the Cavs, if they were going to take the next step as an organization, needed to improve their shooting and their floor spacing.
The report continued on to say the Cavaliers have no interest in trading Mitchell:
My sources tell me that the Cavs have zero interest in trading Donovan Mitchell. They haven’t even thought about that. In fact, my sources tell me that there are members of this front office that are sitting here today wondering why the hell people are even talking about the possibility of the Cavs trading Donovan Mitchell.
ESPN’s Zach Lowe reported similarly just this week:
Zach Lowe: And I continue to hear that Cleveland, which has done a decent job sort of staying afloat without Evan Mobley and Darius Garland and Donovan Mitchell in some recent games, just doesn’t want to entertain the notion of trading Donovan Mitchell as I always say, and his people and other people have reported. That changes in one phone call from Donovan Mitchell’s representation or agent or whatever, but like as of now, I think the Cavs have done pretty well gutting it out.
Even the Knicks, once considered a potential suitor for Mitchell, were reported this week not to be planning an all-out Mitchell pursuit:
Marc Stein: Initial indications are that the Knicks do not intend to mount an all-out pursuit of Donovan Mitchell. The Cleveland Cavaliers, for that matter, signaled to rival teams throughout December that they aren’t prepared to entertain Mitchell overtures anyway.
That’s all to say: Don’t expect a Mitchell trade in the next month. He’s playing at a high level and the Cavaliers are playing solid basketball, so there’s no reason to expect a huge change in Cleveland any time soon.
For all of the latest Donovan Mitchell trade rumors, click here.
Dejounte Murray
Finally, we arrive to a player who does have a potentially high likelihood of getting traded by the upcoming deadline, Atlanta Hawks guard Dejounte Murray.
According to Bleacher Report’s Chris Haynes, there is ample trade interest in Murray to the point he believes the dynamic guard will be traded in the next month:
In a @BleacherReport video, @ChrisBHaynes reported there is “ample interest” around the league in Dejounte Murray.
Also, Haynes said “I do believe Dejounte Murray will likely be traded by the deadline. That’s my belief.”https://t.co/rs7OGP1vin https://t.co/niWWvCyUC7
— Brad Rowland (@BTRowland) January 5, 2024
What’s more, Haynes mentioned the Los Angeles Lakers and Philadelphia 76ers as potential landing spots for Murray:
The Sixers and Lakers are amongst the teams to have registered interest in Atlanta’s Dejounte Murray ahead of the trade deadline, per @ChrisBHaynes.https://t.co/wY4tbtoq31
— Austin Krell (@NBAKrell) January 5, 2024
Meanwhile, Stein reported that the Hawks are exploring all trade options for Murray after just a season and a half of a partnership between him and Trae Young.
Sources with knowledge of the Hawks’ thinking indicated Friday that A) Atlanta is actively exploring all Dejounte Murray trade possibilities that could well dissolve Murray’s backcourt partnership with Trae Young after just a season-and-a-half together and B) Atlanta is determined to, as one source described it, “build around Trae and Jalen Johnson” going forward under new coach Quin Snyder.
Trading for a high-usage point guard when you already had one on the roster was a… bold move by the Hawks. Hopefully, no one is all that surprised this experiment appears close to being over.
Murray is averaging 20.6 points, 5.2 assists and 1.5 steals this season while shooting 46.0 percent from the floor and 38.3 percent from three. He’s under contract through 2027-28 when he’ll earn $31.5 million, which could end up being somewhat of a team-friendly number if he’s still a borderline All-Star by then.
That’s to say, trading Murray within the next month shouldn’t be all that difficult of a task for the Hawks.
For all of the latest Dejounte Murray trade rumors, click here.
Zach LaVine
Chicago Bulls guard Zach LaVine recently returned from an injury layoff and posted a solid game in his return, scoring 15 points to go with five rebounds and four assists on six-of-11 shooting in a 13-point Bulls victory.
If LaVine returns to form, will that be enough to quiet trade rumors surrounding him? It’s possible but either way, Chicago probably doesn’t have much of a choice but to help LaVine find his prior All-Star form because right now, his trade value is about as low as it could be.
Wojnarowski recently broke down what it would take for the Bulls to trade LaVine while saying that there’s no market for the former UCLA standout right now:
“Two things have to happen for the Bulls and for Zach LaVine to even have a chance, I think, really, for a trade at the deadline,” said Adrian Wojnarowski on Wednesday evening. “He has to show teams that he’s healthy. And he has to show them he can impact winning. This team has played much better without him. And with his contract, in this new salary cap, at a deal if you have to take him on just under $200 million left on his contract. You’ve got to believe this player is healthy and can impact winning. “There’s no market for Zach LaVine right now. There’s not been. And even him playing maybe increasingly better closer to the deadline, it just may not be there.
LaVine is under contract through 2026-27 when he’ll be owed $49.0 million, an enormous figure for a player with a tough injury history and who will be in his early 30s by then.
According to Stein, one team that has been rumored to be interested in LaVine in the past, the 76ers, are no longer expected to pursue the athletic 2-guard. The Lakers, likewise, are reportedly hesitant to take on LaVine’s contract, according to Fischer.
For all of the latest Zach LaVine trade rumors, click here.
Pascal Siakam
After surviving last year’s trade deadline unscathed, Raptors All-Star Pascal Siakam enters another period of uncertainty with regards to his future in Toronto.
According to Raptors beat reporter Josh Lewenberg, the Raptors are keeping their options up, from trading Siakam to offering him an extension:
The belief is that they are listening to offers for Siakam, and will continue to listen ahead of the deadline, but at least to this point, none of those talks have gained much traction. “Nothing is close,” said a source, which is why the possibility of an extension is very much in play. If the Raptors can’t find an offer that meets their asking price, which has been and remains steep, they’re not going to trade Siakam just to trade him, nor should they. But they also can’t risk losing another key piece – and the last remaining player from their championship core – for nothing in free agency this summer.
Siakam is on the final year of his contract, which pays him $37.9 million this season.
According to Charania, the Kings and Raptors held some deep talks about a potential Siakam trade this week before Sacramento pulled out of the trade talks:
The Sacramento Kings are deciding to pull out of the Pascal Siakam talks, sources say. Things can be fluid, but Kings-Raptors talks are now over. https://t.co/oQtwcbKtjF
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) January 6, 2024
Another team in the West, the Golden State Warriors, were mentioned as being a potential dark horse for Siakam:
The Golden State Warriors are a team to watch for Pascal Siakam 👀
“There’s a wild horse team out there that I’ve been told to look out for by rival executives…The Golden State Warriors… I do think ultimately, this will be the trade deadline where Pascal is eventually moved… pic.twitter.com/axOKpOVupc
— BASKETBALL ON 𝕏 (@BasketballOnX) January 5, 2024
Meanwhile, Fischer mentioned the Hawks, Indiana Pacers and Detroit Pistons as being other potential Siakam suitors:
Atlanta was once considered the most aggressive suitor for Siakam’s services, holding serious conversations with Toronto last offseason, sources said. But the chatter among NBA executives surrounding Pascal Siakam’s potential landing spots has now centered on Indiana, Sacramento and Detroit. Yes, the Pistons keep signaling to opposing executives an interest in buying, sources said, instead of selling off veterans from the league’s lowest team. Other teams mentioned, such as Dallas and Philadelphia, don’t appear as viable destinations at this juncture, although Toronto officials have suggested to inquiring front offices as many as 10 teams hold legitimate interest in Siakam, sources said
After the Anunoby trade, it was clear the Raptors were opening the door to a potential quick rebuild around Scottie Barnes. Siakam, at almost 30 years old and set to be owed a lot of money on his next contract, doesn’t fit that timeline.
So will the Raptors potentially lower their asking price for their All-Star wing? Or will they re-sign or extend him to not lose him for nothing this offseason?
Toronto’s front office has a fascinating month up ahead.
For all of the latest Pascal Siakam trade rumors, click here.
