De’Aaron Fox could have been forgiven for feeling a little dizzy after the 2026 NBA Finals.
That kind of career whiplash takes some getting used to.
The San Antonio Spurs traded for Fox as their theoretical second fiddle to Victor Wembanyama in February 2025 and promptly handed him a four-year, $229 million max extension that offseason.
Smash cut to an injured Fox underperforming in the Finals while rookie teammate Dylan Harper effectively announced himself as a superstar in waiting, and everything is different.
Now, Fox is viewed as duplicative in San Antonio—or, even worse, as standing in the way of better, younger and cheaper options. Harper and Stephon Castle are the Spurs’ backcourt of the future, and however much head coach Mitch Johnson might say he wants to play all three guards together, it’s pretty easy to see that flipping Fox for a high-priced forward could unlock an elevated version of the team.
This seems like an appropriate time to note that Fox is a very good player—one whose failures in the Finals owed largely to an ankle injury. That said, he’s never proved himself worthy of a max salary, never led his previous team to meaningful playoff success and could quickly find himself on the trade block if his younger teammates ascend as expected.
Fox is basically playing for his job, which is a wild turn of events given how recently he was viewed as the Spurs’ missing piece.
Grant Hughes covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Bluesky and subscribe to the Hardwood Knocks podcast, where he appears with Bleacher Report’s Dan Favale.