In: Dejounte Murray, Yves Missi, its own 2026 first-round pick, New Orleans’ 2026 first-round pick (top-nine protection), Indiana’s 2026 first-round pick (top-four protection), 2028 first-round pick swap (least favorable of Brooklyn, New York and Phoenix), Toronto’s 2031 second-round pick (via New Orleans)
Sending Durant to the Knicks gets a lot easier if the Suns want to pair Devin Booker with former Kentucky Wildcats teammate Karl-Anthony Towns. They apparently don’t.
Phoenix can push for a package built around OG Anunoby and Mikal Bridges or Mitchell Robinson, but if New York consolidates two players from the top of its rotation into a soon-to-be 37-year-old, team president Leon Rose needs to be fired.
This package allows the Suns to explore the merits of a gap year. Recapturing the rights to their own 2026 draft pick is huge, and they’re loading up on two others, perfectly positioning them to move up the board or broker other trades next summer, when they’ll be ready to hit the turbo button.
Missi is a legitimate big-man-of-the-future prospect for Phoenix to evaluate who brings something different from Nick Richards and Oso Ighodaro. Murray’s right Achilles injury should sideline him for a chunk of next season, but that fits the gap-year motif, he’ll be a solid fit alongside Devin Booker upon return, and the balance of his contract (three years, $96.8 million) is modest enough that Phoenix doesn’t need him to be an All-Star.
The Suns are saving over $6 million before taxes in this deal. That’s not enough to get them out of the second apron, but it comes close if they’re planning to decline Vasilije Micić’s team option and waive Cody Martin’s non-guaranteed salary. They can also try reworking this framework and compensate Washington to take Olynyk into a traded-player exception or its mid-level exception.
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