DALLAS — Despite a flurry of moves across the NBA, the San Antonio Spurs remain unchanged after Thursday’s trade deadline. Most people around the Spurs are relieved. This team has exceeded expectations in just about every way and it’s been a good season for just about every player.
Except for Jeremy Sochan.
The Spurs’ lack of action at the trade deadline came as a surprise, as the team was widely expected to find a new home for Sochan. The former lottery pick has fallen out of Mitch Johnson’s rotation ahead of restricted free agency this summer. Sources around the league told The Athletic throughout deadline week that activity surrounding Sochan remained relatively quiet, leading teams to increasingly expect the Spurs would not relinquish him without receiving value in return.
The Spurs engaged in discussions with the New York Knicks over a deal that would have sent Guerschon Yabusele and Pacôme Dadiet to San Antonio, but did not want to take on Yabusele’s player option, sources told The Athletic. They also came close to a deal with the Chicago Bulls for Dalen Terry and Julian Phillips, as well as a trade with the Phoenix Suns that would have sent center Nick Richards to the Spurs, according to sources. All of those players, aside from Dadiet, ended up being traded elsewhere.
Sochan does not intend to negotiate a buyout with the Spurs and plans to finish the season in San Antonio, according to a league source.
The Spurs tend to operate quietly on the trade market, leaving an element of suspense as the deadline reached the buzzer. But pending free agents Sochan, Kelly Olynyk and Harrison Barnes — whose 10-year, 775-game starting streak ended in Charlotte on Jan. 31 — remain with the Spurs. San Antonio joined Houston and Miami as the only teams that didn’t make a deal ahead of the deadline.
While Sochan sticking around is a surprise, the Spurs’ patient approach has been well-choreographed this year. In the summer, they signed Luke Kornet as the backup five — which pushed Sochan out of the rotation — and kept the roster together. While the team exceeded expectations and has the third-best record in the league, it is seventh in net rating at plus-5.2. The Spurs first three wins against the Thunder gave them a sheen of arrival as the preeminent threat to the defending champs, but the 20 games since then have shown their offense still needs work.
The team is stacked with solid shooters, but nobody is lights-out this season. Keldon Johnson and Julian Champagnie are the only Spurs shooting above league average from deep and the team is 24th in 3-point shooting on the season. The team also is ranked 21st in shooting at the rim this season, as Victor Wembanyama struggles to get there without an assist from one of his point guards.
These are all limitations inherent to an overachieving team led by a bunch of players on their rookie contracts and one former All-Star in De’Aaron Fox. The Spurs’ primary creators — Wembanyama, Stephon Castle and Dylan Harper — are all just getting a feel for how to run an offense. GM Brian Wright and the front office recognized that there were few moves out there that would elevate them to surefire contenders this season without compromising what should be a long and prosperous contention window if they play their cards right.
League sources maintained throughout the last few weeks that the team was not pursuing Giannis Antetokounmpo, preferring to develop Castle and Harper to stay aligned to Wembanyama’s timeline. Defining that timeline has become trickier this season, as the team has seemed like a contender for stretches and Wembanyama has looked capable of leading a winner at times. Considering his general injury risk, the Spurs have to continually evaluate whether they should wait for him to peak before making more aggressive moves.
It’s unlikely that future will include Sochan, who has shown enough in the past to have some sort of market in free agency. He has been in a tough position this season, a starter for several years in San Antonio who was surpassed by rookie wing Carter Bryant in the rotation.
The fourth-year Spur has generally only played when Johnson wants to play extra small and put him at the five, or when injuries have taken out several of the wings ahead of him in the rotation. Sochan’s agent worked with the team to explore trade opportunities, but the Spurs did not find anything that would return positive value while clearing the books next season.
The 6-foot-8 power forward was a full-time starter for the rebuilding Spurs in his first two seasons, but saw his role dwindle as the team prioritized spacing wings around its franchise cornerstone, Wembanyama.
“Jeremy has been here now for four years and built up a lot of equity within this organization,” Johnson said. “I’ve appreciated his approach and his willingness to participate in every way we’ve asked him to this year.”
Sochan hoped to find a new home where he could get minutes and showcase himself for free agency, looking to remind the NBA why he was a starter for the Spurs while they were still in rebuild mode. While the Spurs would have preferred to move him for something of value at the deadline, they can still facilitate a sign-and-trade this summer to get some draft capital or a player in return.
He had flashes as an effective small-ball center earlier this season and can work on teams that want to play five-out and use him as a screener. Sochan’s defensive versatility and finishing off cuts are his two best strengths, but he had trouble figuring out how to move effectively in the Spurs’ offensive system. A team that plays with more shooting on the floor should give him better seams to play through, especially when they don’t have a center in the lane.
With Champagnie playing well heading into extension-eligibility this summer, there was no path forward for Sochan in the Spurs rotation without a major trade that consolidated the team’s depth. The Spurs project to be well below the luxury tax this summer, leaving plenty of room to make tweaks or, at the very least, decline Champagnie’s team option to give him a new long-term deal.
This summer will present the first checkpoint in their evaluation of the point guard depth chart, where Harper will remain a sixth man until the team moves on from Fox or Castle. Fox just agreed to a five-year max extension before the season and has played well enough to be a viable trade candidate, but he has been a good leader for a team that needs a veteran on the ball.
The Spurs have steadily built up their core after the lottery gifted them the greatest prize the league has seen in decades. They have time to hone the franchise’s direction. The front office’s job today is mostly to just not screw it up. For the Spurs, that was simply doing nothing.