Rumors

Lillard’s locker will be next to third-year guard Scoot Henderson, whose selection as the third pick in the 2023 draft prompted Lillard to request a trade. At the time, Lillard wanted the Blazers to use the pick to lure in more NBA-ready talent who could help satisfy his thirst for a title. Now, Lillard will compete against and mentor Henderson, along with veteran Jrue Holiday, whom Portland acquired in an offseason trade.

New York Times

Again, team and league sources said no discussions about a buyout have occurred between the Lakers and James, the option merely being a pathway discussed by rival teams as they survey the situation.

New York Times

Shaquille O’Neal is tired of seeing Robert Griffin III post about Angel Reese. O’Neal called out Griffin, a former NFL quarterback turned media personality, saying on Bailey Jackson’s “Off the Record” podcast that if Griffin continues “messing with her,” he would punch Griffin in the face. O’Neal’s comments come after Griffin shared a racist edit of Reese’s “NBA 2K26” cover in an attempt to highlight and stop the racist treatment toward Reese. However, Griffin drew backlash for amplifying the image with his message on X on July 10, to his 2.2 million followers. “RGIII, tweet another monkey post about my girl Angel Reese, and I’m gonna punch you in your f—— face. OK? It’s enough. Like, I don’t usually do stuff like this, but just stop it, bro,” O’Neal said Tuesday. “You got your job, you got your podcast, leave my Angel Reese alone. I’m the one calling her and telling her not to respond.”

New York Times

One team linked to James — the Dallas Mavericks — does not have interest in gutting its roster to match James’ salary in a trade, a team source told The Athletic. And if there were a potentially better trade out there for the Lakers — one that would create cap flexibility while also addressing some of the team’s other needs — James has a full no-trade clause in his contract and could veto any deal that would send him somewhere he doesn’t want to go.

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In the sections filled with employees from other teams, scouts and executives around the NBA buzzed with speculation about where else James might play, tossing around trade and buyout scenarios that, league and team sources told The Athletic, have never been discussed between James and the Lakers.

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Amid the constant speculation recently about his future, both the Lakers and people close to the NBA’s all-time leading scorer expect that he will be with the organization for training camp once the season begins this fall, league sources told The Athletic. Those same sources said the Lakers have received no indication from James or his representatives that he would request a trade or ask to be bought out of the final year of his contract, which will be his eighth season with the Lakers, the longest consecutive stretch spent with one organization in his career.

New York Times

Those same league and team sources pointed out that Paul has made similar comments in the past, when James was playing for either the Cleveland Cavaliers or Lakers, when it was time to renegotiate a contract. The difference in this case: James had a deadline of June 29 to pick up his option or decline it and become a free agent, and there was only one team — the rebuilding Brooklyn Nets — with the cap space to even approach James’ salary.

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The Lakers have additional roster work to do. The team can create a roster spot by waiving guard Shake Milton, and team sources have said that improving the team’s point of attack defense is a priority. But the addition of Ayton answers the Lakers’ questions at center at least in the short term — the most obvious area of growth from last year’s team that finished third in the West before being bounced in five games by the Minnesota Timberwolves in the first round.

New York Times

Jon Horst on Damian Lillard buyout: We looked at the opportunity to acquire a highly productive, elite free agent, who is in the prime of his career, and who is an incredible fit next to Giannis, as an opportunity for these next two seasons in particular, instead of what would have been Dame on our books at a full salary, as really opportunistic, more than anything.

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Jon Horst: The carry for the following three years, there’s no question that if you want to call it an impediment or another hurdle, that’s fine. But we were dealing with a really big hurdle and complication that we had to figure out how to deal with now, and the now matters more than anything. Maximizing Giannis’ prime, our opportunities to win, I feel like that’s our responsibility always. So it was really a now versus future decision. That being said, Myles is an incredible player in the prime of his career for four years. So four of those five years, we have Myles Turner, so it wasn’t like we just did something now and then we have to take four years of risk beyond this year and four years of carry without any production. We have four years, at least, of Myles Turner at elite production while that’s on our books. And there (are) other things that we did, there (are) other moves that we made, other players we’re able to acquire because of this move now that I believe will outweigh the carry of the 20-plus million dollars that we have.

New York Times

Jon Horst: Have we done enough? We’ve done everything, I’ve done everything within my human possible power this offseason. I feel like our group works our butts off. I’ve got to shout out Dave Dean, Ryan Hoover, Milt Newton, Pat Haneman, Samer Jassar, David Mincberg, and Arjun Mahendroo, the whole group, we do everything we can to get better. We do everything we can to put the next version of this thing out there, to give Doc and Giannis and Bobby and Scoot (Kevin Porter Jr.) and the guys on our team every chance that they can to win every night. And so have we done enough? I don’t know. We’ll find out. Have we done everything that we possibly could? Absolutely. And have we done more than anyone else could possibly do? I believe we have. And that’s not an arrogant thing to say. In a very humble way. I think we’ve done as much or more than anyone else could possibly do, and I’m proud of that.

New York Times

Jon Horst: I think the reason why I still love working with Doc and I’m excited to work with Doc is because I think we have a chance to win with Doc. I think he’s a championship-level coach. He’s the right coach to get us to where we want to go. We haven’t had the results yet in our two years together that we wanted. But it’s been two of the most adversity-filled seasons that I’ve been part of. And we’ve had two really successful regular seasons. To go through the things that we went through, if people actually look at the facts of what we went through over two years — we still finished with a fifth seed and a third seed. Near 50 wins in both seasons. And then we lost to the team that lost in the conference finals two years ago and the team that lost in Game 7 of the finals this year. We lost to a really, really good Indiana Pacers organization that deserves everything that they’ve got. I mean, that team had an unbelievable two-year run and they beat everybody; they didn’t just beat us.

New York Times

Multiple senior team officials and people with knowledge of at least some owners’ thoughts have told The Athletic in recent days that while Seattle remains a top candidate for a new or potentially relocated team among owners, there is not overwhelming momentum among governors to immediately expand past the current 30 teams.

New York Times

Central to that reticence is the league’s new 11-year, $76 billion media rights deal, beginning next season, with new partners NBC, Peacock – NBC’s streaming service – and Amazon Prime, along with existing partners ABC and ESPN. Warner Bros. Discovery, which had broadcast NBA games since 1989, was left out of the new deal. Several owners would, at present, rather begin collecting and splitting the massive new revenues among the existing teams, rather than bringing in new partners that would also receive a cut of the financial pie.

New York Times