On Nov. 11, 2020, I attempted to predict who would win the next 10 NBA championships. I got a few right. The Milwaukee Bucks and Golden State Warriors were both on my list, and they both won titles. Some of my predictions aren’t looking so hot. A Dallas Mavericks dynasty has not yet come to pass. In theory, “Zion Williamson’s healthiest season” hasn’t happened yet, so the New Orleans Pelicans aren’t exactly off of the board. “Whoever drafts Emoni Bates” might accidentally come to pass. He’s played only 133 total minutes, but hey, he’s technically a Cleveland Cavalier, and they could win it all!

On balance, I got much more wrong than I got right, but that’s the expectation. Looking a full decade into the future is probably unrealistic. But now, the 2020s are half over. I might not have enough mystical power to scope out a full decade, but half of one? Yeah, I think that’s well within my reach.

So here’s what we’re going to do. Below, we will divide the next five years of NBA history into a handful of categories. Some will be obvious, like “who will win the next five championships?” and “who will win the next five MVP awards?” Others will be a bit more creative, and won’t go year-by-year, but rather, will attempt to encompass the entire five-year period. By the end of this exercise, you should know with absolute clarity how the next five years of professional basketball will play out, starting with our next five champions.

Who will win the next five NBA championships?

This one is pretty self-explanatory, so let’s just dive right in:

• The 2025 NBA champions will be the Cleveland Cavaliers. We’ve had six champions in the last six seasons. We all assumed Denver was a lock last season, and all saw how that played out. Boston is certainly a viable pick, but I’m leaning toward the recent history of champions wearing down during their title defenses. That leaves the Cavaliers and Thunder as the two obvious favorites. I’m leaning Cleveland very slightly right now. Donovan Mitchell has a bit more playoff experience than Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Oklahoma City’s health scares me a bit more. The Thunder are probably too patient for a big deadline upgrade. At least at this stage, Cleveland is set up for home-court advantage. There’s not a wrong answer between them (or Boston, for that matter), but by the slimmest of margins, I think this is Cleveland’s year. I’ve written about my faith in the Cavaliers in more depth here. 
• The 2026 NBA champions will be the Oklahoma City Thunder. Even if you’re picking against the Thunder this season, you’re probably doing so by only a hair. Well, the 2026 version will be a year closer to its peak. Sam Presti will have another season of playoff data to use to improve the roster during the 2025 offseason. Oklahoma City is in the most promising overall situation in the NBA right now when you factor in talent, assets, coaching and front office. Expect them to start turning that potential into tangible results no later than 2026.
• The 2027 NBA champions will be the Oklahoma City Thunder. That’s right, I’m picking the Thunder to break our streak of different champions. That’s what happens when you spend half a decade methodically rebuilding without making a single major mistake. The Thunder are less vulnerable to most of the pitfalls that fell most champions than their recent counterparts are. They have the draft picks and mid-sized salaries to improve where needed, replace anyone lost and find fill-ins if someone gets hurt. They’re young and organizationally committed to limiting minutes totals, so in theory, they’re insulated against injuries. Their track record is nearly impeccable, so you can trust them not to actively ruin their roster like some champions (we’re looking at you, 2020 Lakers). Two championships might not seem like a dynasty in NBA history, but in the parity era, this is what sustained dominance looks like.
• The 2028 NBA champions will be the Orlando Magic. The obvious question: why not Oklahoma City? Well, each successive championship is harder to win than the last. There’s a reason three-peats are so rare. There’s also the reality of Oklahoma City’s finances. Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams will presumably start their max contracts during the 2026-27 season, and keeping the roster together from there gets harder. Lu Dort and Isaiah Hartenstein both have team-options for the 2026-27 season, but are likely gone by 2027-28. The Thunder have the tools to replace them, but this is an organization that prizes flexibility and sustainability. If they need to cut back on spending for a year or two to set up another lengthy run, that is likely what they’ll do. You’re probably expecting someone else to unseat the Thunder, and, well, we’ll get to them. For now, we’re giving some shine to a team the public hasn’t quite caught onto yet. By this point, Paolo Banchero will be in his age-25 season and Franz Wagner will be in his age-26 season. That is right around the age at which championship duos tend to hit their primes. Banchero was averaging 29 points per game before he got hurt, and Wagner was the Most Improved Player favorite. As I’ll get into a bit later, I am incredibly high on that duo. Orlando’s defensive culture speaks for itself. Despite all of the injuries, they are still 20-15 with the No. 3 defense in the NBA. They still have all of their first-round picks and plenty of young talent, so they have the ammunition needed to juice the offense. The Magic are going to contend for titles. I’m picking them to get one in 2028.
• The 2029 NBA champions will be the San Antonio Spurs. At last: Victor Wembanyama’s coronation. So, why will it take so long? Well, in short, it won’t. As far away as 2029 seems, this will be Wembanyama’s age-25 season. LeBron James and Michael Jordan won their first championships at 27. As dominant as Wembanyama already is, he hasn’t scratched the surface of what he’s going to become. It takes time to build championship-caliber rosters, and if their moves since drafting Wembanyama are any indication, the Spurs aren’t rushing this. They’re going to let their youngsters develop and see what they have before going all-in. It’s worth noting here that we don’t know who will be coaching the Spurs at this point. Plus, there’s an Oklahoma City-sized obstacle in the way here. The Wembanyama era is coming. It’s just likelier to play out mostly in the 2030s than the 2020s.

Who will win the next five MVP awards?

Something important to remember, as I cover every year: the NBA award, historically, has a defined age bracket. Since Derrick Rose won in 2011, every MVP winner has been between 24 and 28 years old (using Basketball-Reference’s Feb. 1 cutoff for season age). That is something we plan to keep in mind here, but won’t necessarily stick to religiously. And so, here are our upcoming MVPs:

• The 2025 NBA MVP will be Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. Nikola Jokic and Giannis Antetokounmpo have (barely) aged out of our ideal bracket. Can they still win? Sure. But Gilgeous-Alexander is gaining steam right now, as one would expect out of a younger player in a long season. The Thunder are going to run away with the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference, and his chief competitor in his age bracket (we’ll get to him) isn’t going to play 65 games and is therefore out of the running. Neither Jokic or Antetokounmpo figure to play for top seeds. That’s no longer a dealbreaker, but with Gilgeous-Alexander holding a far better statistical case than most of the competitors they faced in their MVP seasons, he’s primed to knock them off. Gilgeous-Alexander will have plenty of chances, but this is starting to feel like his year.
• The 2026 NBA MVP will be Luka Doncic. Come on, Luka’s going to win one at some point, right? If it’s going to happen, this is probably going to be his best shot considering what’s coming in San Antonio. Doncic and Gilgeous-Alexander are going to be the prime age-bracket candidates at this point, but Doncic has historically been the statistically superior candidate of the two. Gilgeous-Alexander will almost always have a seed advantage just based on his roster, but as I’ve covered, voter fatigue does exist, and if Doncic can get into the top three with superior numbers, that should be enough to get him the MVP trophy Mavericks fans have spent the past several years clamoring for.
• The 2027 NBA MVP will be Victor Wembanyama. We’re breaking the age bracket rule, as this will be Wembanyama’s age-23 season. Don’t act surprised. A few paragraphs ago I compared Wembanyama to Michael Jordan and LeBron James. If Jordan can win MVP on a flawed roster in his fourth season, why can’t Wembanyama? He’s already averaging nearly 28 points, 11 rebounds, four assists and four blocks per 36 minutes. Those are MVP numbers. He’s just doing it in fewer (but steadily rising) minutes on a bad team. The Spurs might not be championship-caliber by 2027, but stars of his caliber tend to win MVPs before they start winning titles. Jordan had one of them by his 1991 title. James had two before he won it all in 2012. Expect a similar trend line for Wembanyama. 
• The 2028 NBA MVP will be Victor Wembanyama. MVP awards tend to come in bunches. There have been six back-to-back winners this century, or seven if you count LeBron’s second set separately. We’re just following history here. James, Antetokounmpo, Jokic and Stephen Curry all reached their MVP form and stayed there. Barring injuries, there’s just no reason to believe Wembanyama won’t do the same. 
• The 2029 NBA MVP will be Anthony Edwards. James never won three consecutive MVPs. Jordan never won three consecutive MVPs. You didn’t need me to tell you this because you lived through the horror show that was the 2023 MVP race, when a handful of voters made it their narrative mission to deprive Jokic of a third-straight trophy whether he deserved it or not. For whatever reason, this has become a sacred cow in the NBA, and remember, by this point in our fictional timeline, Wembanyama hasn’t won a championship yet. I’d like to tell you we’ve moved beyond the need for playoff success to validate regular-season performance, but, well, I saw what happened to Jokic. So let’s move down the list. I’m going to spoil another point I’m covering later on by saying that I think Edwards will win this award playing for a team that is not the Minnesota Timberwolves. I’m treating Edwards’ 2029 candidacy like Charles Barkley’s in 1993. Jordan was clearly a better player than Barkley at that point, but Barkley revitalized a new team and was pretty incredible himself. That’s what I’m expecting for Edwards. He’ll get to a team with a handpicked co-star and proper spacing and have the best season of his career. This will be his age-27 season, right in the middle of our preferred age range, so let’s call 2029 his turn.

Who will be five breakout stars of the next five years?

Breakout star can mean different things for different players. I genuinely believe some of these players have MVP potential (as I just showed you above). In other cases, we are just talking about a player who I believe will be far better than their current reputation suggests. In each, I will try to provide a comparison to a previous breakout player to help explain what I expect.

• Cade Cunningham will be to the next five years what Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was to the last. I came very close to naming Cunningham my 2029 MVP pick over Edwards, only wavering because of Edwards’ superior jump shot and the easy narrative cohesion an Edwards pick formed with some of my other predictions. But Cunningham will be in the running. Nobody expected Gilgeous-Alexander to be an MVP five years ago. He was held back by a tanking roster in his youth. That’s where Cunningham is now. His best teammate is another primary ball-handler (who was considered for this list! I almost included Jaden Ivey as someone’s Jalen Brunson, a No. 2 option-turned-No. 1 on his second team). Despite this offseason’s additions, Detroit still has pretty limited spacing and no proven veteran defenders. Cunningham is doing everything for this team. His shot may not be as reliable as Edwards’, and he’s not as athletic either, but he has MVP-level craft and his size is going to open a lot of doors for him. If you trust Trajan Langdon to run this team, you should expect the Pistons to be very good in a few years. I’m expecting Cunningham to be at the center of that growth. 
• Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner will be to the next five years what Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown were to the last. If my 2028 championship pick didn’t tip you off, I’m all-in on Orlando’s forward duo. They’re frankly more advanced as shot-creators than Tatum and Brown were at this point, and that has unlocked all sorts of interesting roster-building possibilities for the Magic. They have thus far opted against a traditional point guard, for example, and their lineups tend to be enormous. They don’t play like any other team, and once they’ve gone through a few playoff disappointments (as all young teams do), there will be inevitable calls to break them up so the Magic can play like a more “normal” team. I expect the Magic to find the right balance and eventually reach the top of the mountain with these two.
• Mark Williams will be for the Hornets what Jarrett Allen is for the Cavaliers. There’s not an easy comparison for Williams out there. I settled on Allen both from an impact standpoint (consistent low-end All-Star and All-Defense candidate, not quite Defensive Player of the Year-level rim-protector) and because of a few key similarities in their games. Williams is a sorely underrated passer for a big man, as an example, and Allen is as well. Williams doesn’t quite have Allen’s touch near the rim, but he is a much more explosive athlete. I think about this clip like once per week. It’s the combination of athleticism and ambition that makes him so tantalizing. Williams goes for many of the same ill-advised block attempts that other young rim-protectors attempt… but he actually gets them. Charlotte’s core isn’t just LaMelo Ball and Brandon Miller. Williams is going to be a vital third piece for them, the anchor of their defense and the main beneficiary of Ball’s playmaking.
• Nickeil Alexander-Walker is going to be someone’s Derrick White. I don’t think Alexander-Walker ever becomes quite the creator White has, but he’s growing quite a bit on that front for Minnesota. His defense has been elite for some time now, and his shooting is trending in that direction. Someone is going to pay him starter money this offseason, and the Timberwolves, terrified of hefty tax payments, are likely going to lose him at that point. It will be their loss and someone else’s gain. Alexander-Walker is going to wind up as somebody’s Swiss Army guard, and as White has proven in Boston, that sort of player is remarkably important in the right situations.
• Reed Sheppard is going to be the C.J. McCollum to whoever Houston’s Damian Lillard turns out to be. I would have taken Sheppard No. 1 overall in last year’s NBA Draft. His slow start for the Rockets this season means absolutely nothing to me. He’s a rhythm shooter. How on Earth is he supposed to succeed playing 12 minutes per game? Ime Udoka is making him earn minutes, and he’s not ready to do so defensively yet. That’s OK. My suspicion is that at some point in the next year or two, Jalen Green will miss a few weeks due to injury, Sheppard will get a chance to play 30 minutes, and he’ll never cede his spot. I don’t expect Sheppard to ever be a good enough creator to be Houston’s primary scorer, but he’s going to absolutely feast on the open shots created by the inevitable superstar they acquire in the next few years (I’ll get to that prediction shortly). I’m a big enough fan of his that I consider using Klay Thompson and Stephen Curry for the comparison instead of Lillard and McCollum, but ultimately decided I didn’t want to project a Houston dynasty. I do think the Rockets will be eventually be better than Portland ever was with Lillard and McCollum, though. They’ve already built a far better defense, and when they get the offense right, they’ll compete for the Finals.

Who will be the surprise contenders of the next five years?

We’re going to split these next two categories into two parts. We will have both a surprise contender and biggest disappointment for the next quarter of the 2020s (essentially, teams that will either come on or fall off right about now and be a big story over the next few years) and then another for the final quarter of the 2020s (teams that will either rise into or fall out of national prominence a few years from now and be big stories in 2027, 2028 and 2029).

And so, our immediate surprise contender will be the Atlanta Hawks. Atlanta has found a real formula this season: surround Trae Young with athletic wings. It’s working wonders. Their 18-16 record doesn’t do justice to what is happening here. They’re beating great teams and developing a culture that’s sustainable, and remember how young the core pieces are. Jalen Johnson has a real chance to make an All-Star team at 23. Dyson Daniels could win Defensive Player of the Year at 21. Zaccharie Risacher is only 19 and getting better by the day. None of them are shooting especially well. If any of them improve and Young gets back to his peak levels on that front, the Hawks are going to be a scary playoff team. There is a chance the Hawks play the Bucks in the first round this season as the No. 4 and No. 5 seeds in the Eastern Conference. If that matchup comes to pass, I’m telling you now that I’m picking the Hawks. I don’t know if they ever make it back to the conference finals, but a few months ago we were worried about the Hawks sending multiple lottery picks to the Spurs. That’s not really on the table anymore. The Hawks look very good.

Our upcoming surprise contender will be the Utah Jazz. Their ceiling is higher than Atlanta’s, but it’s going to take a little bit of luck. As soon as the Jazz get the right high lottery pick, they’re off to the races. It took Danny Ainge three years to build a team bad enough that Will Hardy and Lauri Markkanen couldn’t save it. Just imagine what they can do with the right incoming rookie and a front office that’s actually, you know, trying to win. The Jazz are as loaded with draft assets as the Thunder and can go get more if they decide to trade their few remaining worthwhile veterans. This team is a slumbering giant. The only piece they’re waiting for is the prospect with All-NBA talent. Once they get that player, they’ll pivot into contention mode quickly and start spending those assets they’ve been accumulating. 

Who will be the biggest disappointment of the next five years?

Our immediate disappointment will be the Phoenix Suns. Granted, expectations for the Suns have certainly waned over the past year or so, but I am going to take a bold and deeply personal risk by reviving potentially the worst take of my career and going double-or-nothing: just as I once claimed that Chris Paul would never won a playoffs series with the Suns, today I will predict that Kevin Durant never wins another playoff series with the Suns (he has technically won one already). The Suns are 3-9 in their last 12 games as of this writing. Despite all of their shot-creation, they still rank only 9th in offense. Their centers are the worst position group any aspiring contender has. Jusuf Nurkic might as well lay out a red carpet to the rim, because that’s what drivers see when he’s protecting the basket. Bradley Beal is a $25 million player making more than $50 million. As I’ve written, this is an old-world super team playing in a league that has outgrown them, and they really don’t have the assets to fix this. My prediction is that they lose in either the Play-In or first round this season, delude themselves into running it back one more time, and then Durant finishes his career elsewhere. Come and get me, Old Takes Exposed.

Our longer-term disappointment will be the Minnesota Timberwolves. Success starts at the top. Right now, there is an ongoing battle for ownership of this team between one of the NBA’s cheapest owners over the past three decades and a new ownership group that could reportedly be even cheaper. Minnesota has already made one unsuccessful mega trade for financial purposes recently with its Karl-Anthony Towns swap. Do you trust whoever ends up with the team not to make another? Alexander-Walker and Naz Reid will be unrestricted free agents this offseason. Julius Randle could be as well, but given the season he’s had and the limited market he’s likely to see in free agency, he could just as easily pick up his player option and leave Minnesota in the desperate position of not having enough money to keep both of their key reserves. As I wrote above, I expect Alexander-Walker to be the odd man out and thrive elsewhere. Maybe they turn Randle into something useful, but they’re out of draft capital to trade, and odds are, their priority will be long-term savings. Rudy Gobert is 32. How much longer will his prime be? The Timberwolves have a few narrow avenues back into the championship race. If they could trade Randle for someone that fits better now, while they still have their affordable depth, maybe they could get into the conversation this year. If Rob Dillingham becomes the star they hope he’ll be, suddenly Edwards has a long-term partner. The likeliest outcome, though, is that the Timberwolves never make it as far as they did a season ago with so many young teams ascending in the West. I think that is eventually going to cost them Edwards. Speaking of which…

Who will be the best player traded in each of the next five years?

Straightforward here. We’re going year by year:

• The best player traded in 2025 will be Zion Williamson. Remember, the language here we’re using is best, not most valuable. I think there’s a reasonable chance De’Aaron Fox gets traded, but his ceiling is lower than Zion’s. I’m reasonably confident that Jimmy Butler gets traded, but at his age, his ceiling is lower as well. Ignore all of the other factors at play here. How often does a player with MVP potential become available for a trade in such a way that basically any team could be a viable destination? The Pelicans currently have the worst record in the NBA at 5-29. My suspicion is that, after receiving a high lottery pick, they decide to lean into a youth movement around that player, Herb Jones and Trey Murphy and pull the plug on the Williamson-Brandon Ingram era. Given Williamson’s injury issues, the asset cost likely wouldn’t be absurd, and he doesn’t have the leverage right now to demand a specific destination. A small market could bet its future on him knowing it has no other chance at adding a veteran with such a talent. More tantalizingly, an organization with a history of rehabilitating flawed players could take a crack at him (hello, Miami) at the moment in which his value is lowest. For the record, I am emphatically of the opinion that any team with the chance to trade for Williamson should do it. Talents like him don’t come around very often. That’s why it’s hardly a guarantee that he gets traded, but I suspect the Pelicans are fed up wasting seasons waiting for him to get healthy.
• The best player traded in 2026 will be Giannis Antetokounmpo. The rumors have come and gone over the years. In fairness, Antetokounmpo tends to drive them himself. They got very loud during Milwaukee’s slow start this season. The Bucks have since bounced back and look reasonably competitive, but let’s be honest with ourselves here, this thing is coming to an end pretty soon. Damian Lillard is 34. Khris Middleton is 33 going on 43. Brook Lopez couldn’t move at his peak. At 36, he’s basically a stationary player. Maybe they can muster a decent enough run to talk Antetokounmpo into one more go of it. By 2026, the writing will be on the wall. He might love Milwaukee to stay through a rebuild, but he’s said himself winning more championships is his goal. That isn’t happening with the Bucks, and whether it’s at the 2026 deadline or in the offseason, the split will come. Antetokounmpo will pick out a preferred co-star, force his way to that team, and the Bucks will start over from there. 
• The best player traded in 2027 will be Devin Booker. We covered the Suns above. The eventual Durant trade will come first. That will be Phoenix’s last bullet. Ownership will try to sell it to Booker as a chance to build a more balanced and versatile team, but Durant is already 36. He’s just not netting enough back in a trade anymore to completely refashion a broken team into a contender. Booker will give the new version of the roster a shot because the Suns are the only team he’s ever known and they have generally invested in winning with him, but by 2027, it will be obvious that contention is no longer possible. The Suns will want to rebuild in earnest with Bradley Beal’s contract coming off of their books, and the only way to do that will be to trade Booker to the Houston Rockets for control of their own future first-round picks back in addition to other assets.
• The best player traded in 2028 will be Anthony Edwards. Again, we covered the Timberwolves above. Minnesota has a bit more time than Phoenix because Edwards is under contract through the 2028-29 season. That means the summer of 2028 will be Minnesota’s last real chance to trade him for value before he reaches unrestricted free agency, and as I’ve written, I’m expecting free agency to return as a vehicle for star movement in the near future. If the Timberwolves aren’t contending for championships at that point, what is his incentive for remaining in Minnesota? Kevin Garnett says frequently that he regrets staying with the Timberwolves as long as he did. Edwards isn’t making that mistake. If he has to use the threat of free agency to get to a winner, he certainly seems like the sort of player who would do it. It’s much too far out to predict where he’d go with any accuracy, but here’s a terrifying possibility: the Spurs control Minnesota’s first-round picks in 2030 and 2031, so their road to tanking goes through San Antonio. We did predict the Spurs as our 2029 champions. Maybe it’s an Edwards trade that gets them over the top.
• The best player traded in 2029 will be Luka Doncic. I’ll be honest, I have some measure of confidence in the first four players named. The details might not be exactly right, but the circumstances align in ways that make trades viable. By 2029, we’re throwing darts at a board. Here’s the argument for Doncic, and it’s a very soft one: look at the teams we predicted as champions for the rest of the decade. Notice that the Mavericks (once upon a time my 2020s dynasty!) are not among them. If we reach 2029 and Doncic has not yet won a championship, trade rumors are inevitably going to follow him, and remember, the Mavericks don’t control any of their own first-round picks between 2027 and 2030, so reloading would be challenging. By 2029 Kyrie Irving will be 37 and Klay Thompson will be 39. Dereck Lively will likely still be around, but he’ll be making a market-rate salary. Doncic could easily win a title before 2029. He could also potentially scheme with another unhappy star to get to Dallas, using Lively as the primary trade bait (he and Nikola Jokic are awfully friendly…). Predicting trades five years out is pure fan fiction. The truth is that I have no idea where Doncic or the Mavericks will be in five years. This just fits the overall narrative we’ve constructed thus far. 

What will be the five biggest changes in the NBA over the next five years?

These can be any major league changes. We’ll go in order from likeliest to least likely:

• The NBA will expand to 32 teams, with new teams in Las Vegas and Seattle. This one feels like it’s more or less just a matter of when, not if. Expect bidding for the new teams to start after the Boston Celtics are sold, as that will set a starting point for negotiations. It takes a few years to turn a franchise from an idea into reality, so the revived Seattle Supersonics and the Las Vegas Name to be Determineds won’t be playing until 2028 or 2029, but they are coming. 
• The NBA Cup will become a single-elimination event. The NBA keeps trying to replicate soccer with the In-Season Tournament. Why not try to replicate the most successful tournament in the United States? Make it a single-elimination bracket, and to ensure that every team plays the same number of games, create loser’s brackets after each round. An idea I’ve posed would be to use NBA Cup finish as the only tiebreaker for playoff seeding, giving the games an extra sense of urgency. While the NBA Cup has thus far created a few fun moments, it hasn’t yet penetrated the culture beyond basketball diehards. “March Madness in December” is just the easiest way to do that. 
• The Minnesota Timberwolves will move to the Eastern Conference. Seattle and Las Vegas are Western Conference cities. That’s non-negotiable, which means that someone has to move to the East to balance out the conferences. Fortunately, the NBA is geographically imbalanced eastward as it is, so there are plenty of candidates. Memphis is the furthest east geographically of any team currently playing in the West, but Minnesota and New Orleans are closest to pods of other East teams. So, why is Minnesota the pick? Because the current ownership battle taking place there creates an easy opportunity for back-channeling. A move to the East is going to be seen as desirable given how much better the West has been for going on three decades now. Perhaps as some sort of settlement, Lore and Rodriguez agree to pay more to get the Timberwolves, but move to the East in the process? 
• The NBA and NBPA will agree to amend the CBA to make trades slightly easier. Here’s a fun fact I’m guessing most NBA fans don’t realize: every single trade that does not feature an equal amount of salary down to the dollar hard caps at least one team at the first apron. There’s no allowance whatsoever. If you bring in more salary than you sent out, you are hard-capped. This has created an environment in which a decent chunk of the league literally cannot trade with each other unless a third party agrees to help out with the money (which isn’t always possible). Doesn’t that seem ridiculous? The point of the aprons and the revamped luxury tax rules was to curb spending at the highest levels. The league has done that. But modern basketball discourse is pretty reliant on player-movement, especially at the star level, and a few dull offseasons and trade deadlines aren’t helpful. What happens when a star wants to get traded to a team, the two teams want to make a trade, but the finances simply don’t allow it? I’m not expecting a CBA overhaul or anything too extreme. But eventually everyone involved is going to realize these rules are too draconian. The old rules universally allowed teams to take in 125% of the salary they were sending out, provided they weren’t hard-capped. Giving teams a permanent 5-10% buffer outside of hard-cap situations seems like such an obvious compromise. Nobody wants teams to get completely frozen out of the trade market. That’s happening right now. 
• The NBA will take some actual step towards reducing 3-point volume. You might not think 3-point volume is out of hand yet. That’s a matter of opinion, ultimately. What I’ll suggest to you is that recent history has shown no upper limit for it. Volume has steadily increased for basically two decades with no end in sight. The Celtics are shooting almost 10 more 3s than 2s per game right now. That can’t be a canary in the coal mine. The NBA doesn’t want the entire league doing that in five years when so many fans have voiced displeasure at the current 3-point rate. Both Adam Silver and LeBron James have spoken publicly about this problem. There’s no easy solution. I’ve offered a dozen possible answers, but none of them are perfect. I am not predicting that the NBA will have directly changed the rules by 2030, just that it will have taken a step in that direction. Something will get tried at the G-League level, or in Summer League, or at an All-Star Game. Meetings will be held. Press conferences will be given. Whether or not the NBA has reached it, there is an upper limit of 3-pointers fans will tolerate. The NBA wants balance, and it is going to try to create it.