The Oklahoma City Thunder entered the offseason with one goal in mind: to reduce their ginormous luxury tax bill as much as humanly possible. On Sunday, they took one step to alleviating their cap burden, trading Aaron Wiggins to the Atlanta Hawks without taking on any player in return (they got two second-round picks for their troubles).
Wiggins has three more years left on his deal ($9.02 million in 2026-27, $8.2 million in both 2027-28 and 2028-29, with a player option for the final season), and he was an obvious trade candidate way before the Thunder even pulled the trigger. He had fallen out of head coach Mark Daigneault’s rotation, and considering OKC’s depth, he had become expendable.
Before making the Wiggins trade, the Thunder already had nearly $250 million in active salary cap obligations, putting them around $28 or so million over the projected second apron. ESPN’s Bobby Marks had OKC’s luxury tax bill at $213 million before the Wiggins trade. With the 27-year-old wing on his way to Atlanta, the Thunder’s luxury tax bill is now down to $152 million.
The job is far from over for the Thunder as far as shedding salary goes. They have two first-round picks in this year’s draft (#12 and $17), which will add even further to their cap burden.
One of the most obvious maneuvers the Thunder could pull off is to decline Isaiah Hartenstein’s $28.5 million team option for next season and re-negotiate a less expensive, yet still fair contract. Luguentz Dort, Isaiah Joe, Kenrich Williams, and Nikola Topic are also major candidates to be on different teams to start next season.
The Thunder’s cap situation is going to be even more difficult to sustain next season, when Shai Gilgeous-Alexander’s supermax contract extension kicks in. Gilgeous-Alexander’s cap hit is going to rise by around $20 million, restricting even more movement on the Thunder’s part.
OKC would prefer to duck the second apron altogether, but that may require them to gut the team, which they may not be very inclined to do.
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