{"id":92876,"date":"2025-06-12T04:18:12","date_gmt":"2025-06-12T04:18:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/92876\/"},"modified":"2025-06-12T04:18:12","modified_gmt":"2025-06-12T04:18:12","slug":"in-a-kevin-durant-trade-rockets-have-limited-outgoing-salary-options-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/92876\/","title":{"rendered":"In a Kevin Durant trade, Rockets have limited outgoing salary options"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Houston Rockets<\/a> are reportedly very interested<\/a> in a trade for Phoenix Suns<\/a> superstar Kevin Durant. However, the 15-time NBA All-Star will make nearly $55 million<\/a> in salary next season.<\/p>\n

So, to make any deal work under the league\u2019s Collective Bargaining Agreement, the Rockets will need to send out close to that much<\/a> in outgoing salary.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Between Jock Landale and Aaron Holiday, the Rockets do have a combined $13 million in expiring salaries<\/a> that they could easily trade out, if their 2025-26 contracts are picked up. Both are relatively inessential to Houston\u2019s longer-term plans, since neither was a permanent rotation player for the 2024-25 group that finished with the No. 2 record (52-30) in the Western Conference.<\/p>\n

But that still leaves at least $35 million or so that will need to go out, in order for a deal to work. And because Phoenix is projected to be above the NBA\u2019s first apron threshold for team salary<\/a>, the Suns likely cannot accept a signed-and-traded player to bridge the financial gap.<\/p>\n

So, to approach that financial ballpark, here is a look at Houston\u2019s players who will make at least $10 million in salary next season:<\/p>\n

Fred VanVleet: $44.9-million team option<\/p>\n

Dillon Brooks: $22.1 million<\/p>\n

Jalen Green: $33.3 million<\/p>\n

Alperen Sengun: $33.9 million<\/p>\n

Jabari Smith Jr.: $12.4 million<\/p>\n

Reed Sheppard: $10.6 million<\/p>\n

Considering that Durant turns 37 years old later this year, it\u2019s probably unrealistic to expect Houston to dangle Sengun, a 22-year-old All-Star. And all indications are that Houston plans on keeping VanVleet<\/a> in any win-now scenarios, which a move for Durant would be.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

So, that leaves Green, Smith, Brooks, and Sheppard as perhaps Houston\u2019s most movable assets that make salaries of significance.<\/p>\n

The Rockets also have future draft capital<\/a> that could be made available, including several first-round assets from Phoenix, but those mostly do not count for salary purposes. The lone exception would be the 2025 selection at No. 10 overall, should a deal be finalized after the June 25 draft, but that rookie-scale deal carries a starting salary of only $6.0 million<\/a>.<\/p>\n

So, even if the 2025 pick is included, draft choices won\u2019t move the needle much, financially. They could drive down the asset cost for the player(s) component, but the Rockets would still need to send out enough salaries to make the math work.<\/p>\n

With all that in mind, Houston could get close to meeting the outgoing salary requirements by including either Green or a combination of Brooks \u2014 a good veteran role player, but one lacking upside at 29 years old \u2014 and Smith or Sheppard. To that end, there have been some recent tidbits that Green and Smith could be of interest to Phoenix.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

\u201cIf the Rockets were to get involved in this, I think Jalen Green\u2019s name would be involved,\u201d ESPN\u2019s Brian Windhorst said Wednesday<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cJabari is a name that I\u2019ve heard around the league\u2026 for a team like Phoenix, they like Jabari, and that goes back to the whole Kevin Durant thing,\u201d The Athletic\u2019s Kelly Iko said Tuesday on the Rockets Collective podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n

ESPN front office insider Bobby Marks included Brooks and Sheppard (along with salary fillers and draft compensation) in his hypothetical deal<\/a>, though recent indications are that Houston remains very bullish<\/a> on Sheppard\u2019s long-term future.<\/p>\n

Durant is an elite shooter, having averaged 26.6 points per game last season on 52.7% shooting and 43.0% from 3-point range. He\u2019s also a 6-foot-11 forward, which would conceivably allow him to absorb minutes that had been going to Brooks and Smith (who are both forwards) or Green (Houston\u2019s leading scorer and starter at shooting guard).<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

Then again, Durant is 36, and Smith and Green are 22 and 23, respectively. So, there\u2019s certainly an argument in favor of sticking with the longer time window and trusting a talented young prospect \u2014 which Green and Smith both are \u2014 to improve more with time.<\/p>\n

The bottom line: If Sengun and VanVleet are off the table, a Rockets-Durant deal likely needs to start with one of these two financial frameworks:<\/p>\n

2.) Brooks and a second double-digit-million salary from the above list<\/p>\n

In theory, Houston could try expanding the deal to three or more teams and sign-and-trade one or more of its pending free agents \u2014 such as Jeff Green or Jae\u2019Sean Tate \u2014 to another team with a trade exception or space beneath the 2025-26 salary cap. But because those players weren\u2019t rotation fixtures for the Rockets last season, they likely won\u2019t be in line to attract salaries of significance.<\/p>\n

So, from Houston\u2019s perspective, the salary the Rockets need to send out in a multi-team Durant deal would likely be very similar to the two-team framework.<\/p>\n

Advertisement<\/p>\n

In the end, it likely comes down to whether general manager Rafael Stone and head coach Ime Udoka view Houston as close enough to true title contention to warrant a short-term Durant stimulus, relative to the longer-term age gap and asset cost of such a deal.<\/p>\n

Other factors include the exact asking price from the Suns and what Durant\u2019s desired contract extension terms would be. Because his current deal expires after next season, any team trading assets for Durant would likely want to ensure that he\u2019s around for more than one season.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned!<\/p>\n

More: ESPN lists Rockets first among potential Kevin Durant trade suitors with Suns<\/a><\/p>\n

This article originally appeared on Rockets Wire: In a Kevin Durant trade, Rockets have limited outgoing salary options<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Houston Rockets are reportedly very interested in a trade for Phoenix Suns superstar Kevin Durant. However, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":92877,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3794],"tags":[6251,1307,7,1195,866,292,194,4066,1346,861,10569,3692,938,6,472,1081,211],"class_list":{"0":"post-92876","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston-rockets","8":"tag-aaron-holiday","9":"tag-alperen-sengun","10":"tag-basketball","11":"tag-dillon-brooks","12":"tag-fred-vanvleet","13":"tag-houston","14":"tag-houston-rockets","15":"tag-houstonrockets","16":"tag-jabari-smith","17":"tag-jalen-green","18":"tag-jeff-green","19":"tag-jock-landale","20":"tag-kevin-durant","21":"tag-nba","22":"tag-phoenix-suns","23":"tag-reed-sheppard","24":"tag-rockets"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/114668470934016938","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92876"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92876\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}