Reacting to the Kings Draft & Free Agency

Written By Duncan Taylor

With the NBA draft done and the early wave of free agency now over, I wanted to take a quick look at how the Kings have done so far. They sowed up their biggest need early, but there’s been plethora of rumors about potential trades for months now. Those rumors may be warranted, as so far the Kings’ off-season has mostly been about positioning for potential transactions rather than actually making major changes from last season. Let’s check out what’s happened so far!

Key Transactions:

  • Re-signed Malik Monk to a 4 year, $78 million contract

  • Drafted point guard Devin Carter (Providence) in the first round (pick #13)

  • Traded point guard Davion Mitchell, forward Sasha Vezenkov, and two second round picks (#45 this year and Portland’s second round pick in 2025) to the Toronto Raptors in exchange for forward Jalen McDaniels

  • Re-signed Alex Len to a 1 year contract for the veteran’s minimum

Monk Comes Back, Answering the Biggest Question Early

The Kings wrapped up their most important piece of off-season business relatively early this year. Ten days before free agency even opened up, ESPN reported that sixth man Malik Monk would return to the team on a 4 year deal worth $78 million, the maximum offer that the Kings could make under the NBA’s CBA (the Kings held Monk’s Early Bird rights, a cap exception that allowed the team to offer Monk up to a 4 year contract with a starting salary of about $17.4 million—equal to 175% of Monk’s $9.95 million salary from last season—and 8% raises per year).

Keeping Monk was by far the Kings’ biggest priority for the off-season, as he’d clearly established himself as a core piece of the roster. Monk’s ability to score and create offense himself was critical for the Kings during the 2023 playoff series against the Warriors, and he’d elevated his play even further during the 2023-24 season by posting career highs in points per game (15.4) and assists per game (5.1). The Kings’ offensive struggles after Monk injured his knee in late March also made his value pretty obvious, as the team averaged just 111.3 points per game in its final 11 games (including two play-in games) despite a season average of 116.6 points per game. On top of that, had Monk left in free agency, the Kings would have had no obvious way of replacing Monk’s microwave scoring off the bench and ball-handling responsibilities. They would have been limited to the #13 draft pick and whatever they could find in free agency—where the team would’ve been limited to using the Non-taxpayer MLE (about $12.8 million) and the Bi-Annual exception (about $4.7 million)—to find replacement scoring.

Kings Snag Top-Tier Guard Depth In Draft

With Monk’s return secured, the Kings headed into the NBA Draft on June 25-26 with the flexibility to fill other needs. Going into the draft, my personal hope was that one of two players from my Five Favorites from this year’s draft might fall to the Kings at pick #13: forward Cody Williams (Colorado) or point guard Devin Carter (Providence). I fully expected both players to be off-the-board by the time the Kings’ pick came around. Fortunately, Carter made it down to pick #13 and the Kings snatched him up!

Although Williams probably would have fit the Kings’ positional needs a bit better (they desperately need help at forward), Devin Carter brings high-level defensive chops, superb length, and elite rebounding skills that should readily compliment De’Aaron Fox and Malik Monk in the Kings’ backcourt. He also showed a knack for scoring and improved three-point shooting in his final season at Providence, which the Kings will hopefully benefit from. I talked about Carter extensively in my Five Favorites post the other week, so I won’t dwell on his talent and fit, but I think he will be a tremendous addition to the Kings’ backcourt and I was happy to see the Kings scoop him up.

I also applaud the Kings decision to draft Carter over some of the younger prospects available, and certainly over reaching for a forward. Carter has the tools to contribute immediately at areas of need, and he’s got enough upside to warrant a high draft pick even though he’s already 22 years old. The younger guard prospects available—Jared McCain (whose game I like a lot), Ja’Kobe Walter, and Bub Carrington—weren’t necessarily better fits. McCain is a younger and a better shooter today than Carter, but he doesn’t have the same physical tools as Carter and lacks the same defensive prowess. With Monk back, Carter’s probably the better fit. Walter and Carrington, meanwhile, both have lots of potential, but it’s subject to a lot of projection. Walter profiles as a strong 3-and-D player, with strong physical tools and a clean stroke, but he didn’t shoot it well during his lone season at Baylor and has a ways to go to develop his handle. Bub Carrington is just 18 years old and did a fantastic job as a freshman in a lead-guard role at Pitt this year, but he’s still growing into his body, he’s not yet a floor spacer (he hit just 32% from three), and his long-term development depends on him having opportunities to play with the ball in his hands. With Fox, Monk, and Sabonis already on the roster, I’m not sure he was going to fit well with this Kings team.

At the same time, by the time the Kings #13 pick rolled around, the draft’s forward depth had already been largely depleted. Cody Williams, Ron Holland, Tidjane Salaun, and Matas Buzelis were already off the board (and I like Carter more as a prospect than several of them anyway). The Kings could’ve gone after older forwards with limited positional size and defensive question like Dalton Knecht, Tristan Da Silva, or Jaylon Tyson, but I’m not sure how that would’ve helped them more than Carter. DaRon Holmes (also one of my Five Favorites) would’ve been a stretch at pick 13. Same for high-potential prospects like Pacome Diadem.

Carter made sense as the pick to me, and I’m happy he fell to the Kings.

Drafting Carter Leads to Immediate Changes

Between re-signing Monk and drafting Carter, the Kings were looking at a team salary that would exceed the luxury tax line. In fact, the Kings were slated for just over $172.3 million in team salary at a minimum, before adding any depth to their front court. That would’ve been about $2.5 million over the NBA’s 2024 luxury tax line of $170.8 million. Obviously, that would' have bene a big deal because, as I’ve written before, luxury tax penalties can be onerous, and teams over the luxury tax aren’t eligible to receive luxury tax distributions from other teams, which can be worth more than $10 million per year. In addition, teams while teams below the luxury tax line can use the Non-taxpayer MLE of about $12.8 million to sign free agents, teams above the luxury tax line can only use the Taxpayer MLE worth under $5.2 million to sign free agents (there are other restrictions, too). Ultimately, getting under the tax line would save the Kings quite a bit of money and make it feasible to add more talent in free agency if they could find targets.

On top of the luxury tax issues, the Kings were staring at a potential log-jam in the backcourt. Presumably, the front office planned for Fox, Monk, Carter, and Ellis to be the main backcourt rotation following the draft, but the Kings also had several other guards returning in Davion Mitchell, Colby Jones, and Chris Duarte (and even though Kevin Huerter is 6’7”, he arguably plays more of a guard-style game).

To alleviate luxury tax concerns and make space for Devin Carter in the backcourt rotation, the Kings made a trade with the Raptors on the second night of the draft that can be accurately described as a “salary dump.” The Kings sent out Davion Mitchell (owed $6.5 million next season), Sasha Vezenkov (owed $6.7 million next season), the #45 pick in the 2024 draft, and a future 2025 second round pick from Portland to the Toronto Raptors in exchange for Jalen McDaniels (owed $4.7 million next season).

By making the deal, the Kings also saved a little under $8.5 million in salary, bringing their team salary number down to just under $164 million (including Devin Carter’s cap hold).

At the time of the deal, I understood the rationale pretty clearly. By drafting Devin Carter, the Kings added a guard who can play defense at a similar level to Davion Mitchell, but with more size, rebounding, and hopefully better offensive production and three-point shooting at a lower cost. Mitchell’s role was likely to shrink (again), and the Kings weren’t likely to bring him back after next season anyway. Similarly, Vezenkov reportedly was unhappy with his role in Sacramento, but his lack of athleticism and quickness on defense meant he wasn’t likely to ever be a significant rotation piece. Both guys were expendable. The cap savings also made it easy for the Kings to re-sign Alex Len at the veteran’s minimum to provide depth at center.

The Kings roster after the trade (and re-signing Len) looks a little more balanced, especially if Kevin Huerter, Chris Duarte, or Colby Jones can fill minutes at small forward:

For better or worse, getting off salary usually requires teams to give up something of value—usually draft picks—so it’s no surprise that the Kings had to give up a couple second rounders to get a small salary dump done. But the price here was a tad high given the Kings shed just under $8.5 million in salary.

Giving up pick #45 in the 2024 draft is fine, but the 2025 Portland second round pick could end up valuable. Portland’s second round pick this year landed at #33, and it’s not obvious they’re going to be much better next season. Jalen McDaniels also has some size and athleticism (he’s the older brother of star Timberwolves defender Jaden McDaniels), but he’s already 26 and just posted by far the worst season of his career, averaging just 3.4 points per game on terrible shooting splits (34.4% / 16.9% / 73.0%). For comparison, the Dallas Mavericks dumped about $11.9 million in salary from Tim Hardaway Jr., about 40% more salary than the Kings dumped, and gave up a 2025 Toronto second rounder plus two 2028 second round picks (Dallas also got Quentin Grimes back, who, like Jalen McDaniels, just posted a career worst season but could be useful in theory). These trades aren’t wildly disparate, but I do think the Kings could have found a way to keep Portland’s 2025 pick given they were already giving up a 2024 second rounder. Though it’s not the end of the world, keeping Portland’s pick would have been nice since the Kings owe a top-12 protected first round pick next year to Atlanta.

I’m also going to miss having Davion on the team in particular. Though his tenure with the Kings was up and down offensively, he brought intensity and effort on defense every time he stepped on the court. His lack of size limited the impact he could actually have defensively at times, but you never questioned his effort. In the right match ups, he was a force defensively—and his dogged effort against Steph Curry in the 2023 playoffs really put him on the map. I hope he can continue to develop his outside shooting to open things up on offense in Toronto. If he can do that, he can be an effective player, especially in a bench role.

What Can the Kings Do Next With the Cap “Flexibility”?

To date, the Kings haven’t made splashy moves with the cap space they created by dumping the salary for Mitchell and Vezenkov, though they did re-sign Len. Accounting for Len’s new deal and Carter’s cap hold, the Kings’ expected team salary should be about $166.1 million, still below the luxury tax line. As a result, the Kings will technically have the full Non-taxpayer MLE available to use to sign free agents if they want to, plus the smaller Bi-Annual exception. But at this point, the best-fitting free agency targets are pretty much all off the table. Some of my preferred free agency targets for the Kings—front court players who can shoot and/or defend reasonably well—have already agreed to deals with other teams:

At this point, the front-court free agency market is reed-thin. LeBron James was never actually going to leave LA, and the Kings didn’t have the money to sign him regardless. Miles Bridges is still floating around, but that’s because of off-the-court issues I wouldn’t want to bring into the team anyway. Saddiq Bey is coming off an ACL tear and likely won’t be ready to start next season. Caleb Martin and Haywood Highsmith could be decent fits as defensive wings (Martin more as a perimeter player, Highsmith with more ability to guard power forwards), but they’re probably not worth chasing for more than about $5-6 million per season. Isaac Okoro could be a solid addition in theory, but he’s a restricted free agent and the Cavs could match any offer the Kings extend to him. Simone Fontecchio is also a restricted free agent, but you’ve got to assume Detroit will match any remotely reasonable offer for him given they just traded for him last season.

The net result is that the Kings may not even want to use the Non-taxpayer MLE ($12.82 million) or the Bi-Annual exception ($4.7 million) to sign any of the remaining free agents because doing so would carry them over the luxury tax and hard-cap them at the first apron ($178.1 million). If the Kings use only the smaller Taxpayer MLE ($5.17 million) to add someone, they would only be hard-capped at the second apron ($188.9 million).

The Current Cap Picture

After accounting for drafting Devin Carter re-signing Malik Monk and Alex Len, the Kings will have 13 players on the NBA roster, with an obvious need for more firepower at the small forward and power forward positions.

  • PG: De’Aaron Fox, Devin Carter

  • SG: Kevin Huerter (SG/SF), Malik Monk, Keon Ellis, Chris Duarte, Colby Jones

  • SF: Keegan Murray, Jalen McDaniels

  • PF: Harrison Barnes, Trey Lyles

  • C: Domantas Sabonis, Alex Len

With this roster, the Kings’ team salary should be just under $167 million when you account for Devin Carter’s expected rookie deal and the $1.3 million in likely incentives that Sabonis can earn in 2024. That’s well over the salary cap and about $3.8 million below the luxury tax line.

[Note that I’m using an estimated $5.63 million for Devin Carter’s salary because he hasn’t yet signed his rookie contract. The NBA has a “rookie scale” that sets salaries for each first round draft slot, but under the CBA, players can sign contracts for up to 120% of that amount—which they typically do (the rookie scale amount for pick #13 is $4.69 million, 120% of that is about $5.63 million). Regardless of what permissible first year salary you assign to Carter, the Kings will be well over the salary cap and safely below the luxury tax line.]

The Kings should also safely below the first apron and the second apron, but it’s a bit complicated. The NBA actually uses different accounting when calculating a team’s “apron salary,” as they require teams to account for even unlikely incentives too. Sabonis and Lyles have $2.5 million in possible unlikely incentives for 2024, so for apron salary purposes, the Kings number will be a tad higher at about $169.5 million. With the current roster, the team will have about $8.6 million of breathing room below the first apron and $19.4 million of room below the second apron.

I’ve tried to lay this all out in an eas(ier) to read chart below:

[Based on data from Spotrac]

Shedding the salaries for Davion Mitchell and Sasha Vezenkov (about $8.5 million salary in total) made sure the Kings were safely below the first apron line—if they hadn’t done that deal, there would be a real risk of the Kings exceeding the first apron. That would’ve prevented them from even having the option to use their Non-taxpayer MLE. It also would’ve brought the Kings closer to the second apron, which comes with additional restrictions.

What Can the Kings Do?

Since the Kings are safely below the first apron, they have some added lee-way to do transactions that might trigger the first apron hard cap, and even more safety to perform transactions that will trigger the second apron hard cap, both this year and going forward. The flexibility is most important when thinking about potential trades, especially if the Kings want to consider trading for some of the marquee names that might be on the market.

If the Kings want to take back more salary in a trade than they send out (which is permitted, subject to certain restrictions, under he NBA’s salary matching rules for trades), they would trigger a hard cap at the first apron—so having some breathing room there is important. This could be relevant for a couple potential trade targets in particular like Brandon Ingram, Kyle Kuzma, or Lauri Markannen.

Ingram will make just over $36 million this year, so the Kings would probably need to trade away both Harrison Barnes ($18 million) and Kevin Huerter ($16.8 million) to make the salary matching work, in addition to whatever draft capital they might send out. Even then, the Kings would be taking back about $1.2 million more salary then they send out, which would trigger the hard cap at the first apron. Having some breathing room makes that feasible—if the Kings were instead right up against the first apron hard cap, the trade would probably need to involve another player (such as Chris Duarte), which would complicate things further.

Kuzma’s salary is $23.5 million. Under the NBA’s trade salary matching rules, the Kings could theoretically send just Kevin Huerter plus draft capital and make the deal work. The Kings would take back an extra $6.7 million in salary (the difference between Kuzma’s salary and Huerter’s salary for next year) and trigger the first apron hard cap, but they could absorb the difference into the $8.6 million in space they have below the first apron.

Markannen will make just over $18 million this season. Sending out Huerter or Barnes plus picks is feasible given the Kings have room below the first apron hard cap. While it’s hard to imagine the Kings winning the bidding war for Markannen (the Jazz’s asking price seems wild at the moment), he’s going to be a free agent at the end of the year and I can see why the Kings want to maintain the ability to deal for him if the price changes over the course of the year.

Other potential trade targets with bigger salaries like Zach Lavine (personally not interested) and Jimmy Butler (very skeptical he moves) would also only be realistically possible if the Kings stay far enough below the first apron to take back more salary than they send out. Lavine will make $43 million this year and Butler will make $48.8 million, but it’s going to be tough for the Kings to get to that kind of outgoing salary—especially if they were already up against the first apron. Barnes + Huerter gets you to about $34.8 million, but the Kings would need to add players like Lyles ($8 million) and/or Duarte ($5.9 million) if they wanted to get high enough to not take back more salary than they send out.

For this off-season and through the upcoming season, the Kings are far enough below the second apron that it probably won’t affect them much. That means they can aggregate salaries in trade, trade cash, and use the Taxpayer MLE if they want to (including during the season). The second apron will eventually become a concern if/when De’Aaron Fox signs a new deal and Keegan Murray gets extended, but they’re pretty safely away from it for now.

What’s Next?

In the short term, I am hoping the Kings find a way to snag some depth at forward in free agency. I’m not looking for them to sign a big name (at this point, there aren’t really any), just someone who can help shore up the rotation behind Keegan Murray and Harrison Barnes, even if they’re coming in at the veteran’s minimum. If you’re curious, here are some names that interest me from who’s left:

  • Probably Too Pricey:

    • Isaac Okoro

    • Precious Achiuwa

    • Simone Fontecchio

    • Caleb Martin

  • More Realistic Targets:

    • Haywood Highsmith

    • Reggie Bullock

    • Robert Covington

    • Cedi Osman

    • Oshae Brissett

  • Maybe They’ve Got Something Left?

    • Jae Crowder

    • Gordon Hayward

    • Markieff Morris

There are a number of trade targets, too. The big names are obvious, but the ones I’d be most excited about—assuming the Kings don’t need to wildly over-pay to get them (a big assumption)—are below:

  • Probably Too Pricey:

    • Lauri Markannen (anything short of Keegan seems palatable)

    • Jimmy Butler (he’s not actually moving)

  • More Realistic Targets:

    • Brandon Ingram (not my favorite fit and may be better slotted in the “too pricey” category)

    • Kyle Kuzma (two firsts seems like too much?)

    • Jerami Grant (two firsts seems like definitely too much given his contract)

    • Bobby Portis (maybe Milwaukee would move him? I’m skeptical—same thing for Brook Lopez)

    • De’Andre Hunter (probably not available)

    • Tari Eason (sadly, the Rockets ain’t giving him up)

  • Smaller Swings, But Do They Move the Needle?

    • Dorian Finney-Smith

    • Cam Johnson

    • Grant Williams

You’ll notice I didn’t list a couple names, most notably Zach Lavine and Demar Derozan. Both Bulls players have been in a lot of rumors lately, and some folks would like the Kings to trade for them. I’m not as interested in Lavine particularly.

Lavine’s contract is too big for his availability and production, plus his skillset overlaps too much with Fox, Monk, and now Devin Carter to make him the highest use of cap space and trade capital. If the team has any concerns about the first or second apron being a hindrance to future deals, Lavine’s contract is going to be an issue. You can swallow that kind of deal for someone like Markannen, who fits a clear need role and is younger and less injury prone, but it’s tough to do for Lavine.

Derozan’s fit would be better since he’s a bit bigger and can (I think?) slot in at small forward in some line-ups. Plus, Derozan’s end of game shot creation in particular is incredibly valuable. But he’ll be 35 at the start of next season, he’s never been a prolific three point shooter, and his defense isn’t particularly notable at this point in his career. He could be a value add to the Kings even with Monk and Fox, though, and because he’d probably only be available in a sign-and-trade, it’s possible he might come cheaply. I’d be happy to add Derozan in a sign-and-trade if he signs a 2-3 year deal worth about $20 million per season, so long as the Kings don’t have to give up a ton to get him (perhaps Huerter and second round draft capital).

That’s it for now! We’ll have to wait and see what the Kings do next—I’m certainly eager to know. Thanks for reading!

Duncan Taylor
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