{"id":166105,"date":"2025-09-18T20:11:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-18T20:11:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/166105\/"},"modified":"2025-09-18T20:11:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-18T20:11:08","slug":"rockets-kevin-durant-details-how-blockbuster-trade-changed-the-nba","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/166105\/","title":{"rendered":"Rockets’ Kevin Durant details how blockbuster trade changed the NBA"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Houston Rockets made one of the biggest trades of the summer<\/a> by acquiring Kevin Durant. That said, some bigger trades were made earlier in the 2024-25 season: Trades that would change the NBA. <\/p>\n

That sounds hyperbolic. When a trade happens, players change teams. Technically, every trade changes the NBA, right? <\/p>\n

Sure – but the Luka Doncic trade really changed the NBA. It shocked the world. It’s exceedingly rare for an NBA team to trade an in-prime MVP candidate. <\/p>\n

The Rockets’ Kevin Durant says it emboldened some teams<\/a> to make other big moves. <\/p>\n

Rockets’ Kevin Durant breaks down the impact of Doncic trade <\/p>\n

\u201cYou start seeing stuff like that, as an organization, you might get a little more courage to do some stuff.” <\/p>\n

– Kevin Durant on the Luka Doncic trade <\/p>\n

Fair enough. <\/p>\n

If anything, this was a somewhat quiet summer. The Rockets’ Durant acquisition was the biggest deal of the offseason. Otherwise, the Jrue Holiday-Anfernee Simons swap was a big deal. The Hawks’ acquisition of Kristaps Porzingis matters. The Nuggets’ acquisition of Cameron Johnson in exchange for Michael Porter Jr. was possibly the biggest trade. <\/p>\n

The quiet summer likely owes to a busy deadline. That’s where the aforementioned courage was on display. The Warriors traded for Jimmy Butler. The Raptors seemingly cut their rebuild short by acquiring Brandon Ingram. The Rockets made a big splash for Cody Zellar. <\/p>\n

(OK, that last one is a joke.)<\/p>\n

It was an explosive trade deadline, but it wasn’t the first explosive deadline we’ve seen. <\/p>\n

So how did the Doncic trade really shape the league? <\/p>\n

Rockets’ rival sets wild precedent <\/p>\n

Name another in-prime MVP candidate to get moved as unceremoniously as Doncic. You can’t, because it’s never happened. <\/p>\n

Without fail, there are rumors preceding the event. It becomes clear that the player has requested a trade. Surely the organization didn’t willingly move a young, elite player – why would they? <\/p>\n

Most of us are still asking ourselves that question. The Mavericks’ decision remains puzzling. One thing is clear: it will change the league. <\/p>\n

The NBA isn’t just a competitive sports league. It’s a market. Teams respond to trends. If the Mavericks can send out Doncic because they’re concerned about his defense, we can surely move our guy, right? <\/p>\n

From a Rockets’ perspective, it’ll be interesting to see how they respond to the market. This team has several players on below-market deals, <\/a>but they also have a lot of quality players to pay. If the bar for trading a player has lowered, that doesn’t mean the Rockets need to make a trade, but fans should keep an eye out: <\/p>\n

They might want to change the league as well. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Houston Rockets made one of the biggest trades of the summer by acquiring Kevin Durant. That said,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166106,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64],"tags":[355,99],"class_list":["post-166105","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-nba","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166105","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166105"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166105\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166105"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166105"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166105"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}