Oklahoma City is trying to reduce its massive upcoming tax bill, and Atlanta has become the beneficiary.
The Thunder are trading Aaron Wiggins to the Hawks for two second-round picks, a trade first reported by Shams Charania of ESPN. Officially, the trade is Wiggins for the Hawks’ 2030 second-round pick and the least favorable of the 2032 Hawks or Lakers pick.
For Oklahoma City, this is essentially a salary dump. Wiggins is set to make $9.2 million next season, and that now comes off OKC’s books (and creating a roster spot if the Thunder decide to use both first-round picks they control). Most importantly, the trade lowers the team’s expected $213 million luxury tax bill down to $152 million. Expect more moves by the Thunder to try to lower that bill even further in the coming weeks.
Atlanta picks up a quality wing player, one who averaged 9.4 points a game last season for the Thunder, but his minutes were getting squeezed by the rise of Ajay Mitchell and the arrival of Jared McCain.
Wiggins is a testament to the Thunder’s player development. They drafted him No. 55 but helped him grow into a quality rotation player, and during the Thunder’s championship season, he averaged 12 points per game.
This trade will not become official until July 6 (the day the NBA’s free agent moratorium is lifted) because of the money involved. The Hawks will absorb Wiggins’ salary into an $11 million trade exemption they have, but this will hard-cap them at the first tax apron. Which is not that big a deal because they aren’t expected to go near that anyway.
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