Grade the Trade: Proposed trade puts KAT w/ Hornets. But what will Wolves get?
By Bret Stuter
The myriad of NBA Rumors that have involved the Minnesota Timberwolves and primarily All-Star center and part-time power forward Karl Anthony Towns are never-ending. With the new NBA/NBPA regulations, NBA teams will be more severely penalized for exceeding the NBA salary cap. And therein lies the rub.
The Minnesota Timberwolves, currently paying premium contracts for veterans Karl-Anthony Towns, center Rudy Gobert, and now Anthony Edwards, are facing a huge fiscal fiasco by the time the 2024-25 NBA season arrives. And the team is still seeking ways to somehow get small forward Jaden McDaniels paid on a multi-year deal as well.
While that is all well and good for the 2023-24 NBA season, it gets a bit challenging over time. And so, many expect the NBA chess grandmaster strategist, Minnesota Timberwolves President of Basketball Operations Tim Connelly, to have something cooking on the back burner.
B/R Buckley pitches a new trade scenario
In a recent article by Bleacher Report Zack Buckley who suggests 5 Wild NBA Trades that could actually work, he tosses the Charlotte Hornets into the Karl-Anthony Towns sweepstakes. You see, in the first trade scenario out of the gate he has the Hornets engaging in a trade package that could make you shake your head in immediate rejection, make you pause a moment and ponder, or make you consent to give it a try:
So what does the exchange look like?
So what do the dollars look like? For the 2023-24 NBA season, the salary cap flow would look like this:
Timberwolves out: $36 million via Karl-Anthony Towns: Hornets in
Total $36 million
Timberwolves in: $23.2 million via Terry Rozier: Hornets out
Timberwolves in: $ 8.5 million via P.J. Washington (sign and trade): Hornets out
Total approximately $32 million
Must Read. 9 players the Minnesota Timberwolves gave up on too soon. light
On the surface, the dollars are close enough to get the job done, and the Timberwolves will pick up a couple of first-round draft picks in the process of breaking up a huge pay jump for Towns into two far more manageable salaries for the foreseeable future. Now let’s examine the trades through the lens of each team: