On Wednesday, Shams Charania and Josh Robbins the athlete reported that the Wizards and All-Star guard Bradley Beal have a mutual understanding that they intend to work together to find a deal for Beal to a contender – should the team choose to reset the organization.
After their initial report, Charania also added that Coins “loomed as a potential student” for Bell as well.
“Expect the Miami Heat to emerge as important suitors for Bradley Bell… I’m told another team is looming as a potential freshman… the Milwaukee Bucks.”
Our NBA insider @employee Provide an update on processors that may be looking to transfer Beal. pic.twitter.com/uLJXltDQSd
– Stadium June 14, 2023
Trading for Beal would be a huge move for the Bucks, and one that would dramatically change the way the team tries to win another championship with Giannis Antetokounmpo at the height of his fame in Milwaukee. But it would also be a complex move to make due to the state of Beal’s contract and the current state of the Bucks roster.
So here’s an in-depth look at how Beal, Bucks, and the Wizards are trying to strike a deal.
Bill contract
Any conversation about the Bucks potentially trading for Beal should include a detailed look at his contract.
Last season was the first in Bell’s five-year, $251 million deal. Here is a breakdown of that contract year by year:
salary | age | |
---|---|---|
2023-24 |
$46,741,590 |
30 |
2024-25 |
$50,203,930 |
31 |
2025-26 |
$53,666,270 |
32 |
2026-27 |
$57,128,610 (PM) |
33 |
As noted in the table above, Beal has a player option in the final year of that deal as well.
In addition to the $207.8 million left on the contract and his player option in the final year of the deal, Bale also has a full no-trade clause, meaning he’ll have the final say on where he’s traded in the Wizards’ case. In fact he decided to deal with him in this off-season.
Also, if he agrees to a trade and is transferred, the no-trade clause remains in effect with his new team. And under the new collective bargaining agreement, the rules that dictate salary requirements for deals have become more complex for teams operating on the salary cap arena.
The mechanics of the deal
We’ll cover quite a few assumptions in this section, so let’s start with some important notes:
- This article will cover the rules that will govern a potential trade before the 30th of June. On June 30, a new fiscal year begins, a new collective bargaining agreement begins and the positions of a number of the players discussed in this article begin to change.
- It is difficult to complete the signing and trading processes. They require player cooperation, team signing, player trading away, and the team getting the player. If any of these three parties become unhappy, the transaction will not be completed. It is often difficult to find a situation where branding becomes the perfect and obvious outcome for all three parties.
With that out of the way, let’s take a closer look at how to accomplish this with a Q&A session that guides us through all scenarios from simple to complex.
Could the Bucks acquire Bradley Beal using players who are currently under contract, but not part of the Bucks’ Big 3?
no.
Because of Beal’s huge contract and the NBA’s salary cap rules, the Bucks can’t put together a deal that doesn’t include at least one member of the Bucks’ Big 3 of Giannis Antetokounmpo, Jrue Holiday, and Khris Middleton.
Could the funds use Brook Lopez in a deal to acquire Bradley Bell?
no.
Lopez is currently an imminent free agent. And as recently covered here at the athleteLeague rules prevent Lopez from signing the type of extension he’s eligible for before June 30 and then being traded.
Could the funds use Jrue Holiday in a deal to take over Bradley Beal?
Yes. This is one of the few simple scenarios on the board.
While a direct Beal-for-Holiday swap wouldn’t work, adding any other Bucks player currently under contract for less than $12 million to Holiday’s contract would satisfy salary cap rules.
Could Chris Middleton’s dollars be used in a deal to acquire Bradley Bell?
Yes, but it’s complicated by Middleton’s current contract situation.
If Middleton chooses to accept his $40.4 million player option for the 2023-24 season before June 21, he could be traded directly to Bale. The Bucks will also be able to add other assets to the deal as well. That can satisfy the magicians with more assets or the bucks can insist on it to make their payroll situation more manageable.
If Middleton elects to withdraw from his deal and then signs an extension with the Bucks, the deal will also work as long as the Bucks and Wizards have met all salary cap requirements in the current CBA.
However, the difficulty in every situation is finding scenarios that all parties involved find acceptable. Not only will the Bucks and Wizards find a deal they love in these scenarios — Middleton has to be on board, too.
Could the dollars be used by Giannis Antitokonmo in a trade deal for Bradley Bell?
Yes. His contract will work out in a direct deal with Bale.
The rationale behind a potential deal
As explained above, the Bucks won’t be able to get Beal while also keeping a big three, which would be the best possible scenario for them.
And even if they twist the CBA every way and find a way to make it happen, their young tradable assets (Beauchamp and their 2029 first-round pick) are limited, so there’s probably no scenario where the Bucks can put together a package attractive enough for the Wizards to get Beal in. roster without giving away a single Big 3 member. And that doesn’t even begin to examine the luxury tax hell the Bucks would create for themselves by adding Beal to the Big 3, so that’s a foolish situation to even think about.
For this trade to make sense for the coin, the Bucks also avoid giving up Antetokounmpo. So, that would mean dealing with either Holiday or Middleton to get Bill.
This leads this conversation to the most important questions regarding this hypothetical deal:
Is Bill actually better than Holiday or Middleton?
Bell was named to the NBA Third Team in 2021, an honor that no Bucks player has received during their careers. That career season, Beal averaged 31.3 points, 4.7 rebounds and 4.4 assists per game, while shooting 48.9 percent from the field and 34.5 percent from the 3-point line, leading the Wizards to the playoffs for the first time since 2018.
The three-time All-Star guard is a prodigious scorer capable of being the team’s first offensive choice every night. While Middleton and Holiday have occasionally done it for the Bucks, neither has proven capable of pulling off such a task. There’s plenty of reason to think Bell would be better suited to scoring against tough playoff defenses than Holiday or Middleton, which have been a real struggle for the Bucks in recent seasons. Like Middleton, he’s a solid shot-maker and under-par passer, so he can help the Bucks at the end of the shot clock, too.
Bale, who turns 30 in two weeks, is also younger than both Holiday and Middleton, which helps as the Bucks try to keep their window open to compete with Antetokounmpo, who turns 29 in December.
Would transferring any of the players to Bell put the Bucks in a better position to compete for tournaments moving forward?
While getting a more consistent scorer might be the best possible thing for the Bucks, there are other parts to the game. In the latest Tiers workout by Seth Partnow here at the athleteHoliday (3A) and Middleton (3B) appear in higher tiers than Beal (3C), so there is at least some that think Beal may not be the best choice out of the three.
Holiday is a much better defender than Bale. Throughout his career, Bell has never been seen as more than an ordinary defender. Over the past five years, Bell’s defense has fallen apart, but that may just be a product of playing for the Wizards during that time. At 6-foot-5, Bell would likely be big enough to hold out through a grueling, deep postseason, but Bell has yet to appear in the Conference Finals with the Wizards and hasn’t played in a playoff game since 2021, so it’s hard to know with any level of certainty.
And while Middleton is not a shutout defender, he is generally more useful as a playoff defender due to his larger 6-foot-7 frame and ability to make a difference as a team defender. Offensively, while Middleton hasn’t shown the ability to fill in quite like Bale, he’s been a more ready passer and an effective No. 2 option at Antetokounmpo over the past five seasons.
It’s reasonable to think that Bell is a better player than both Holiday and Middleton, but the gap between the three may not be too great and that may not be true once Bell starts playing alongside the two-time Bucks MVP. Furthermore, Bell’s contract will be more difficult to fit into the Bucks’ current salary cap configuration, which is already problematic as they try to put together their own offseason plan this summer.
Does a Bucks deal make sense for the Wizards?
The problem with giving a player a no-trade clause is that it may not matter whether a deal with the Bucks makes sense for the Wizards. Bill has a complete no-trade clause. He doesn’t accept a trade to anywhere he doesn’t want to go, so, if he eventually says to the Wizards that the only place he will go next is Bucks, they have the option of either making a deal that works or just not trading Bill.
For the Wizards, if the goal is to rebuild and start over, the Bucks roster doesn’t offer all of those opportunities.
The Wizards could be interested in picking Beauchamp or picking the Bucks in a 2029 first-round pick, but Holiday and Middleton, players who could easily be included in a potential trade, are both older than Beal. They will not be able to help witches become younger, unless a third party is involved. And that three-team deal is, in the end, perhaps the most logical path for the Wizards to take on a potential deal with the Bucks.
(Photo by Jrue Holiday and Bradley Beal: Patrick Smith/Getty Images)