It’s academic at this point, but the Phoenix Suns have just two more games left before this season will mercifully be put to bed. They’ve been officially eliminated from postseason contention, ending any dreams of a miracle playoff run.

That means Suns fans have turned their eyes towards the offseason. It should be an eventful summer in Phoenix, because Kevin Durant seems likely to be traded. That’s the kind of mega-deal that will see things reset for the team in a major way.

However, even after moving Durant, the Suns will still have Bradley Beal and his contract to deal with. At this point, Beal’s contract is considered one of the worst deals in the NBA. As a reminder, here’s what we’re looking at:


2025-26: $53,666,270
2026-27: $57,128,610 (player option)
Total: Two years, $110,794,880

Whew, boy.

If that wasn’t enough, you’re probably aware that Beal also has a full no-trade clause. The combination of max salary, NTC, player option, plus injury history and waning production combine to make this the worst contract in the NBA.

So, what can Phoenix do? Is there any hope for working around this onerous contract?

Straight Waiver

Some Suns fans are so desperate to shed Beal that they’ve suggested simply waiving the veteran guard. That would be a drastic and extremely unwise move.

For one, even with the NTC, Beal is more valuable as a $53.6 million salary in a trade than he ever would be as $53.6 million in dead money on the books. You can trade salary. You can’t trade dead salary. It’s that simple.

Will it be hard to find a team that wants to take on Beal’s salary, while also being a destination Beal will approve a trade to? Absolutely. Is it impossible? No. We see crazy things happen in NBA trades all the time.

If Phoenix was to waive Beal, that’s it. It’s over. He’s not getting claimed on that contract, so Phoenix would have $53.6 million in dead salary on their books for next season and $57.1 million in dead salary for 2026-27 too. (In a case where there’s a player option involved, the option is considered exercised before the waiver, unless specifically stated. In this case, it’s highly unlikely Beal would decline to exercise his player option before being waived.)

Taking in the above, it’s easy to see why Phoenix would rather have Beal, rough as the contract may be, on the roster. Dead money is just that: dead. You want to avoid that as long as possible.

Buyout

A buyout is another form of waiver, but in a buyout the player agrees to reduce the salary he’s owed. This would be an ideal path for Phoenix, but it’s probably not ideal for Beal…at least not yet.

Except in pretty rare situations, players don’t take buyouts until they are in the final season of their contract. And they usually agree to a buyout when there are two things at play:


They really want to leave the team they are currently on and have no other path to getting free.
They have another deal lined up with a new team.

Sometimes the two above items overlap. And for the second bullet, the salary for the lined-up new deal is usually how much the player will give back to the incumbent team in a buyout. For example, let’s say Beal knew he had a new contract lined up for $10 million. He could agree to give that much back in a buyout with the Suns, while not losing any money himself. It’s kind of a win-win situation.

In a buyout, the player is still waived. So, even with a salary reduction, the team ends up with dead money on their books. As covered above: you can’t trade dead salary. As also covered above: Beal wouldn’t get claimed on his current deal, unless he agreed to an absurd salary reduction. (Stop dreaming, Suns fans. It’s not happening.)

That means the Suns would be on the hook for less dead salary on their cap sheet, but still a hefty amount of dead salary.

Waive and Stretch

In a waive-and-stretch transaction, the player is waived just like in a Straight Waiver or a Buyout. However, the team then takes the dead salary owed to the player and spreads it across several years. That formula for the Stretch Provision is remaining total salary divided by two times the number years left on the contract, plus one year.

In Beal’s case, that would be the $110.8 million he’s owed for the remaining two seasons (again, the player option is considered exercised here) stretched over five seasons (2 x 2, plus 1). That would equal a dead money cap hit of $22,158,976 per season from 2025-26 through 2029-30.

However, there is a quirk with the Stretch Provision to prevent against a team just loading up on bad salary, then stretching it to no ends.

In any given season, the amount of stretched salary a team has on its books can total no more than 15% of the salary cap in the year the player was waived.

This is the catch for the Suns.

As covered above, Beal would count for roughly $22.1 million in dead salary on the books if he was waived and stretched. The Suns already have the following in stretched dead salary on their books for the 2025-26 season:


Nassir Little: $3,107,143
E.J. Liddell: $706,898
Total: $3,814,041

If you add Beal’s stretched $22.1 million to that, you get $25,973,017 in stretched salary.

The projected salary cap for the 2025-26 season is currently $154,647,000. That means that the total stretched money would be about 16.8% of the cap, which is above the allowable amount of 15%. That means it’s a no-go on waiving and stretching Beal’s salary.

Now, the Suns could work a buyout followed by a waive-and-stretch transaction. But that gets into a complicated sort of space that we haven’t seen in the NBA. Especially when this would seemingly solely benefit Phoenix and not Beal.

Summary

As you can see, the Phoenix Suns have no easy outs with Bradley Beal. His contract is difficult to trade for all of the reasons we laid out. Simply waiving Beal has little benefit for Phoenix. Waiving and stretching Beal isn’t even possible for the Suns.

That means that Phoenix could ride out Beal’s contract, at least for one more season. When he’s an expiring contract in 2026-27, things will flip to some extent.

Expiring contracts always have some value. Beal may be more willing to accept a trade, knowing the clock is ticking on his time with the Suns. And, buyouts are lot more likely to occur when there’s only one season left on the contract. And, finally, a waive-and-stretch transaction would work for Phoenix in 2026-27, because the cap will have gone up enough to fit all of the Suns stretched salary in under the 15% allowable mark. On that last one: The Suns should just wait it out. No reason to add a lot of dead salary to your cap sheet for two more years, if you can avoid it.

When you put it all together, Phoenix is far more likely to try to find a workable trade for Beal than they are to do any sort of waiver. That’s true even if things hit a point where Beal and the Suns agree to separate for the season while a trade is found. That’s a somewhat regular thing in the NBA.

In a trade situation, Phoenix isn’t going to get any sort of amazing return for Beal. But the Suns can likely break up Beal’s contract into smaller, more easily tradable contracts. That has value in and of itself, as it removes Beal’s deal from the Phoenix cap sheet, eliminates having to deal with the NTC for the Suns, while giving the team some flexibility moving forward.

There are no easy outs for the Phoenix Suns when dealing with Bradley Beal’s contract. But to try to take the easiest path of waiving him and wiping their hands clean would cause far more damaging issues than continuing forward as is. Nothing stops Phoenix from working with Beal to find a trade he’ll agree to. Waiving him removes that possibility and leaves the Suns sitting on a mountain of dead salary. Not exactly ideal while trying to retool a playoff team around Devin Booker.