The Paul George Trade Just Saved the Oklahoma City Thunder Franchise
The PG trade is only the first step in what could net as many as 13 first-round picks in a masterclass rebuilding plan
THE PAUL GEORGE TRADE SAVED THE OKLAHOMA CITY THUNDER FRANCHISE. Hyperbole? Maybe. But that doesn’t mean it isn’t true.
Rewind one week and look at the OKC franchise. What were they?
The Thunder had become as landlocked as Oklahoma. The team was locked into an overpriced core of Russell Westbrook Paul George, and Steven Adams, wayyy over the cap with no relief in sight. Denver and Utah have passed them by. The Lakers and Warriors had starrier stars. The Blazers and Rockets played in the last two Conference Finals. The Pelicans, Mavericks, and Kings are coming. Westbrook has never won a playoff series without Kevin Durant, and the team was locked into a 6-seed and a few more depressing first-round exits before George left for greener pastures and fans were left watching 34-year-old Russ putting up 33/14/11/13 (the last number is turnovers) for $47 million in 2023. They were locked into above-average-and-getting-worse, bad enough to never really contend, good enough to avoid great draft picks.
And now, everything has changed. Literally overnight.
The PG haul
The Thunder traded Paul George to the Los Angeles Clippers for a record haul, netting borderline All-Star Danilo Gallinari, star sophomore Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, two possible picks swaps, and a staggering five first-round picks.
SGA looks like a potential franchise player, with some of basketball’s finest minds like ESPN’s Zach Lowe touting him as a future multiple-time All-Star. He is the franchise’s first legitimately exciting young player since Westbrook and Durant. Gallinari was the best player on a playoff team even before Tobias Harris got traded, always an efficient scorer when healthy. Westbrook, Gallinari, and Adams are still a legit playoff contender, even in the West.
And what about those picks? Two of them are from Miami, an unprotected 2021 first and a lottery-protected pick in 2023. That 2021 pick has bounced around half the league now, and it’s no longer quite as juicy as it might have been with Jimmy Butler in tow. Those two picks look like they’ll fall in the 15-to-20 range, for now, but they could get juicier in time.
The other three picks are from the Clippers in 2022, 2024, and 2026, each one unprotected. And while the Clips are championship favorites today, a lot can change in three years. After all, three years ago, these very Clippers were essentially the Thunder, a capped-out team committed to an expensive CP3/Blake/DJ core that wasn’t good enough and was only going to get worse. Three years ago Kevin Durant was still on the Thunder (for at least another day or two). A lot can change in three years, and in five years and seven years. In 2026, PG and Kawhi will be 36 and 35 years old. Each has already missed nearly an entire season to injury, Leonard’s played more than 66 games only twice in his career, and George is coming off a shoulder surgery that clearly hampered his play down the stretch.
In the best case Clippers scenario, the team becomes a dynasty over the next three or four years. In that case, OKC might get two middling picks from the Heat and a late one from L.A. in 2022, but they’d still have tasty 2024 and 2026 picks to come after the dynasty washes away. Those picks are almost certain to be juicy, so too the 2025 pick-swap rights.
But don’t count out the 2022 pick and 2023 swap, either. PG is only signed through 2021 right now (plus a player option for 2022), and if we’ve learned anything this offseason, it’s that contract length means nothing in the player empowerment era. The Clippers could be totally blown up before these future picks even kick in. The Thunder now own the rights to the entire Clippers draft from 2022 through 2026. If this goes south, that could easily turn into four or five lottery picks. And those Heat picks could get good, too. Some of these picks will be good. That’s just simple statistical odds.
On ESPN’s The Jump this weekend, New Orleans GM David Griffin called this Paul George trade one of the best in NBA history, noting that no one has ever gotten value like this for one player. And David Griffin would know!! This is the dude that just traded Anthony Davis for like 17 young Lakers players and every future L.A. draft pick for the next decade, so if he thinks this was a huge return for Paul George, you know it’s big.
For two years of Paul George production that would’ve capped out with a first- or second-round exit, the Thunder could get as many as six lottery picks if things bounce their way, plus Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who would’ve easily been a top-5 pick had he been in this year’s class.
If the Clippers or Heat go sour, this could be really good. If they both go south, this could be one of the greatest trade coups in NBA history. It’s possible someday we won’t refer to this as the PG trade anymore. Because if things go really south for the Clippers, this trade could be rated NC-17.
Up next: Russell Westbrook
But wait! There’s more!
There’s so much more. Because the Thunder aren’t done yet. Not even close.
Today OKC traded Jerami Grant for a 2020 Nuggets first-round pick. That one will be late, but it’s one more pick to add to the war chest. It’s also a clear signal that Thunder GM Sam Presti is nowhere near finished. He’s going to burn this thing all the way to the ground.
Russell Westbrook is next.
Zach Lowe agrees with me: Westbrook is the second worst contract in the NBA (until you factor in these new contracts, come on down, Tobias Harris and Khris Middleton!). But not everyone agrees with Zach and me, notably the Heat and Pistons. And that makes sense. Those teams are totally capped out, so there’s little downside in trading for Westbrook. They’re already all-in right now around aging stars, so they might as well push a few more chips in and at least improve from a 7-seed to a 3-seed. Pistons writer Mohamed Haji reports that Detroit is offering Reggie Jackson, Tony Snell, and two mostly unprotected picks for Westbrook. He also reports that Miami is offering Goran Dragic, James Johnson, Tyler Herro (this year’s #13 pick), and a future first.
In both deals, the Thunder would get two lottery picks for Westbrook! I’ll be shocked if either of those deals is really on the table, but if they are, OKC makes out like bandits. And yes, the Heat do still have future picks to trade, including their ability to remove the protection off the 2023 pick they now owe the Thunder, if they so choose. Other Westbrook suitors could include the Knicks, Magic, or Timberwolves. Or, if Daryl Morey would have his way, maybe even the Rockets. That could mean him offering The Full PG, since he was rumored to have offered four firsts multiple times for Jimmy Butler.
Russell Westbrook will not finish this season in a Thunder uniform. He may not even start it there. So if you’re keeping track, that’s now eight first-round picks for the Thunder: five from the PG trade, 1 from Jerami, and 2 from Russ.
The Thunder have only just begun
But we’re not done yet! Oklahoma City has only just begun.
Danilo Gallinari is really good and on an expiring deal. He is absolutely getting traded for something valuable. Looking around the league, I can see him making sense for at least 10 different teams (in no particular order: BOS BKN GSW HOU MIA MIL MIN NOP PHX POR). Every team wants a stretch four, and Gallo is about as good a stretch four as you can hope for. Gallinari can probably be had for an expiring contract and a first, which by the way, makes the Tobias Harris, Harrison Barnes, and Bojan Bogdanovic overpays that much more egregious. I’d love to see Portland get their hands on Gallo, a much cheaper, much easier purchase than Kevin Love.
Steven Adams is under contract two more years for $54 million. I’m not sure I see a home for Adams right now. He’s very good but expensive. But in a year, when Adams is expiring and the market is weak, he’ll absolutely net a first in a deal. Even Dennis Schröder could return a first-round pick on a moderately-priced expiring deal a year from now, though we won’t count on that.
So now the Thunder have added first-round picks for Grant, Gallinari, and Adams, plus two for Westbrook, plus five more for PG. That’s as many as 10 first-round picks for this roster, and don’t forget about Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and the pick swaps too.
The other two picks OKC “traded” for
But we’re still not done!
There’s two more first-round picks the Thunder quietly traded for in the PG deal — their own!! Oklahoma City owes its pick this year to Philadelphia, but it’s top-20 protected one time before turning into a pair of second rounders. The Thunder will easily pick inside the top 20 now, so that pick stays put. OKC also owes a 2022 pick to Atlanta that’s lottery-protected once before turning into 2s. Do you see this Thunder team making the playoffs in 2022? I don’t either. That pick stays too.
And not only do those picks stay… they get good!
Because that’s one last thing the Thunder just traded for. They just “traded up” from #20 to #12 in the draft the next few years, and once they dump Westbrook too, they’ll “trade up” again from #12 into the top-5. The West is loaded, and OKC is instantly the worst team in the conference once Russ is gone. Oklahoma City’s best assets now are their own draft picks, and every move that makes the team worse now helps them long-term.
The Thunder didn’t just trade PG for a bunch of Clippers and Heat picks. They also traded for a few top-5 picks of their own.
The Clippers traded all that for 2 players, not 1
You’ll hear a lot of talk in the upcoming days about how this was all worth it for the Clippers. And make no mistake about it: it absolutely was.
The Clippers are championship favorites now. If they win even one title, their first in franchise history, all of this was worth it. Every pick, every swap, all the future pain, it will all be worth it for just one title — just ask Toronto.
And as every analyst will tell you, the Clippers didn’t just trade all that stuff for Paul George. They traded it for PG and Kawhi, cuz they weren’t getting Leonard without the second star. Five picks and two good players are too much for George, but it’s a veritable bargain when you’re getting Kawhi Leonard too. Leonard is a two-time Finals MVP with a real argument as the best player in the league. How much would you trade if Giannis or LeBron were available? There is no price too high. Heck, the Clippers would have given up even more future picks if the NBA didn’t have rules against it.
Here’s the thing for OKC, though. The Clippers traded away their future for two players. But the Thunder only traded one.
The Raptors and Lakers lost out on Kawhi Leonard, but he was never even in Oklahoma City’s picture. Sam Presti cost the Raps and Lakers Kawhi Leonard and then kept all the spoils for himself. Only three teams were in the running for Kawhi, but somehow Presti thrust himself into the conversation and essentially traded Kawhi Leonard to the Clippers himself.
Think about that.
A completely unrelated third party managed to butt himself into the middle and essentially trade a free agent he had literally nothing to do with.
It’s astounding really.
Behold, the magnificent Thunder rebuild
Let’s tally up everything the Thunder are going to get in this rebuild-in-process one more time, just to behold its beauty:
- 2021 and 2023 Heat first-round picks
- 2022, 2024, and 2026 Clippers first-round picks
- 2023 and 2025 Clippers first-round swap rights
- Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, a 2018 lottery pick
- 2020 Nuggets first-round pick, in exchange for Jerami Grant
- Two future first-round picks for Westbrook
- A future first-round pick for Gallinari
- A future first-round pick for Adams
- Retaining their own 2020 and 2022 picks, against traded protections
- “Trading up” their own picks the next few years from #20 to top-5
That is an absolute masterclass.
It’s a staggering 12 first-round picks, a couple monster trade-ups, and a possible franchise point guard in Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, all of it in exchange for a roster that was going absolutely nowhere as the 6- or 7-seed out West the next few years. Maybe this PG trade will someday turn into the PG-13 trade — as in, PG for 13 first-round picks. Are we really going back to the same movie-ratings joke twice in one column? Yes, yes we R.
You hear a lot of talk these days about “blowing it up,” every NBA fan’s dream when a team gets locked into that treadmill of mediocrity. The Thunder were just getting onto the treadmill, or maybe they’ve already been there a couple years. Things were going to get ugly in OKC. Think Washington Wizards or Charlotte Hornets ugly. Think can-this-team-even-survive-in-a-small-market-with-a-huge-tax-bill-and-no-talent-omg-are-they-headed-back-to-Seattle ugly.
Instead, with one overnight masterstroke, Sam Presti has set the rebuild forward a full five years and sent this team zooming into the future. ■
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