Nets, Rockets Agree To Draft Pick Trade As Houston Eyes KD

The Brooklyn Nets are officially rebuilding after a wild few years that saw them unload almost all of their future assets to build a hopeful superteam with Kevin Durant, Kyrie Irving, and James Harden, only to trade all three away in a two-year span. They tried to find a middle path to still being a playoff contender, largely because most of their draft picks were owned by the Houston Rockets, making tanking not an option.

However, after a 32-50 campaign last year, the Nets decided to abandon that plan and figure out how to hit the reset button in earnest. On Tuesday night, they cracked the code with a truly stunning trade that sent Mikal Bridges across the river to Manhattan to play with the Knicks, with five first round picks coming back their way in return. Armed with lots of future draft capital from New York, they were able to then flip some of the picks they got back from Phoenix in the Durant trade to Houston to get the rights to their 2025 and 2026 picks back, allowing them to tank in peace this season.

That sets the Nets up for the future, but the reason the Rockets were willing to make such a deal is they have their sights set on acquiring Durant themselves, per Adrian Wojnarowski, and want to offer the Suns a chance to get their picks back in such a trade.

As Woj points out, the Suns aren’t ready to discuss a Durant trade just yet, but Houston is clearly going to be aggressive this summer to land a star of some form and will start by trying to make Phoenix an offer they can’t refuses for Durant. Woj then followed up later by noting the Suns aren’t expected to move off their stance with Durant, but ended by noting the Rockets could go after Devin Booker in the future given their control of future Suns picks, only adding to the madness.

We’ll see whether these deals lead to a domino effect of moves over the next 24 hours going into the first round of the NBA Draft, as trade season is officially underway with Bridges in New York, Alex Caruso in Oklahoma City, and a ton of picks changing hands in Houston and Brooklyn.