Does this trade make sense for the Sacramento Kings?
While they are interested in moving both Buddy Hield and Marvin Bagley III, going after Kristaps Porzingis may not necessarily be the best thing for the Sacramento Kings to do. Talent-wise, he would fit in nicely next to De’Aaron Fox in pick-and-roll situations given his abilities to shoot from the perimeter, but money is a big problem.
The Kings are only $6M under the luxury tax threshold for this season and with both Fox’s and Holmes’ contracts set to increase next season, Sacramento does not have much “wiggle room” in terms of bringing in big contracts.
Adding Porzingis would have the Kings on the edge of going over the luxury tax line both this year and next year, not giving them any room to potentially add other key talents in future offseasons/free agencies. Adding Porzingis and Burke definitely brings some value to this team, but at the same time, they could probably trade Hield and Bagley separately and get more value than they are getting from the Mavericks.
Not to mention, the Kings would be giving up two second-round picks and a protected first-round pick in this trade, which is a lot of draft assets for a losing team to sacrifice, especially since they do not have a solidified young core in place.
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Winning is something the Kings would like to do as soon as possible and they would like to end their playoff drought this season, but they just are not in a position to succeed right now.
Leveraging current assets for future assets is definitely something they should look to do at this year’s trade deadline, but doing so for a $101.5M contract over the next three years is not too favorable for them, even if Porzingis is a talented player that can help them win right now.