Either the San Antonio Spurs or the Houston Rockets could pretty easily end the Kevin Durant trade sweepstakes with a single phone call. Durant wants to play for them — perhaps San Antonio slightly more so, but Houston enough. The best offer on the table at the moment for the Suns seems to revolve around a 32-year-old Rudy Gobert, Donte DiVincenzo and perhaps whatever meager draft capital the Minnesota Timberwolves can scrounge up.
Houston and San Antonio could top such an offer without even putting their best proposals on the table. Among the non-Thunder class of normal NBA teams, the Rockets and Spurs might have the most tradable assets in all of basketball. They can end this here and now. Sure, their packages would largely be pick- and youth-based, but so what? If the Rockets or Spurs need a center to send the Suns, they can go get Nic Claxton or Kristaps Porziņģis for them. They can turn their picks and youth into whatever sorts of veterans Phoenix might want. They can both plausibly provide cap relief (though, again, it’s easier for San Antonio). But by all accounts, they’ve been reluctant to do so.
On Monday, The Athletic’s Sam Amick and Jon Krawczynski reported that the Rockets have made a firm offer that is currently underwhelming to the Suns. The Spurs, meanwhile, are being conservative with their offers. Essentially, the only reason Durant hasn’t been traded yet is because neither the Rockets nor the Spurs have decided that they want him badly enough to make serious offers yet. The real question here is whether or not they should. The answer, in both cases, is going to be subjective.
Houston almost certainly has a path to the 2026 championship with Durant. The Rockets just earned a No. 2 seed in the Westm ranking No. 1 in rebounding, No. 5 in defense and No. 7 in fast-break points. Their only real flaw last season was a half-court offense that ranked 22nd in points per play. As of Game 5 of the NBA Finals, they didn’t have a single player rank in the top 20 in playoff points per game. They lost to the Warriors because they couldn’t score. That’s what Durant does. Given the pick-value at their disposal, the Rockets could fairly easily get him without compromising their defense, rebounding or speed in transition.
The short-term path isn’t quite as clear for the Spurs. Only three players currently on the roster (Victor Wembanyama, De’Aaron Fox and Jeremy Sochan) had positive Estimated Plus-Minus figures last season, and Sochan would likely be in the trade. They’d have a terrific star trio, but it’s not yet clear how ready their young players are to seriously contribute to a contender. Rookie of the Year Stephon Castle does a lot of things well. He cannot shoot. Neither can Sochan. Presumptive No. 2 pick Dylan Harper is a rookie point guard and rookie point guards — despite what their counting stats will tell you — are almost universally bad when it comes to actually winning basketball games. The Spurs don’t have a contending team yet. They have the outline of a long-term contender, and if they plan to win seriously in 2026, they’d probably have to go out of their way to get older shooters in the building as well.
That’s pretty doable, though, especially over a multi-year time horizon. They’re currently so far below the luxury tax line that they could easily spend both the full mid-level exception and the bi-annual exception on role players. They have plenty of chips to trade with as well, and with Wembanyama two years away from his market-rate contract, they have plenty of time to add money. If we assume Durant is signing a two-year extension upon any trade, it’s hard to imagine Wembanyama alone won’t be enough to get him into contention by the end of it.
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Sam Quinn
If your goal is strictly competing as much as possible as soon as possible, the Rockets and Spurs probably should trade for Durant. Teams like Miami and Minnesota probably should operate with that as the primary goal. They are operating at asset-deficits because of previous trades, so they can’t afford to be picky. The chance to get a Durant-level player at below the price it would typically cost to do so is really their only chance of making the leap into true championship contention.
But the Spurs and Rockets can, frankly, afford to think bigger. They are so young, so flush with assets and so immediately enticing that even if they’d need a Durant-level addition to compete for the 2026 title, they’re more than capable of competing for future championships with no significant additions. The Rockets just won 52 games. There really isn’t that much further to climb. If Wembanyama is the perennial MVP we expect him to be, the Spurs are going to get there by default. The 2026 championship is not inherently more valuable than the 2027 championship or the 2028 championship or the 2035 championship. All of them are realistically in play for the Spurs or Rockets if they play their cards right.
This is essentially why they were linked so heavily to Giannis Antetokounmpo. Durant gets you two or three bites at the championship apple. Antetokounmpo could’ve generated five or six. And patience could yield even more, either through the development of incumbent youth, successful drafting with their pick surpluses or capitalizing on a rare opportunity to trade for a star in his early-to-mid 20s should one arise.
None of this is by any means automatic, of course. Durant is the bird in the hand. He and the championship window he’d generate are available now, and the NBA is such a random and unforgiving league that little beyond next season is really assured. But we exist in an NBA that is about to crown its seventh champion in seven years. The odds are never in your favor. The benefit of planning for a longer window is that it creates insurance against such randomness. Injuries or a bad bracket might cost you one or two playoff runs. It’s likelier than in a six- or seven-year span, things break right for you at least once.
And then there’s the matter of the competition. Given their place in the league landscape, the Spurs and the Rockets have to be conscious of what the other is doing, not to mention the Oklahoma City Thunder. These teams are going to be competing with one another on the court for the foreseeable future, but they’re probably going to be competing with one another off of it as well. What happens in two years if the Spurs and Rockets want to trade for the same star? Any assets one of them used on Durant are suddenly gone and unable help land that next star. They’d be setting themselves up to lose a potentially more important bidding war down the line.
And that bidding war, as hypothetical as it is in this moment, is probably the one Houston and San Antonio will prioritize winning. That doesn’t mean they should be out on Durant. The upside here is considerable enough to take the swing at the right price. Neither of these teams has to be entirely devoted to a specific timeline. Wembanyama is 21. The bulk of Houston’s core is 23 or younger. They have time to make one big move, replenish their asset base and then make another later.
That’s the balance Houston and San Antonio are trying to strike here. Getting Durant can impact their future, but it can’t compromise it. So they’ve both seemingly drawn a line in the sand. If Phoenix wants their C-offer, then great, they’ll happily nab an all-time scorer. But if not? Oh well. They’ll just move on to the next available star.
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