With the NBA’s trade market heating up, and the free agency period beginning in less than two weeks, discussions are taking place all over the league as to who might wind up where. And because of a combination of forward planning and Collective Bargaining Agreement provisions, the Atlanta Hawks find themselves with an extremely useful piece of leverage that will allow them to be buyers in the market.
In their July 2024 trade that saw Dejounte Murray head to the New Orleans Pelicans in exchange for a breakout defensive star in Dyson Daniels and some peripheral pieces, the Hawks were further able to save a lot of immediate money. That trade created a giant Traded Player Exception for the Hawks, an instrument which will allow them to take back a lot of salary in a future deal, should they so desire.
It appears they intend to use it. A report by Marc Stein of The Stein Line – one of the league’s leading authorities on all things intel – states that the Hawks are preparing to use their Traded Player Exception to add talent this summer, something made possible by the saving of immediate money last summer.
Sources say Atlanta, meanwhile, is actively exploring ways to capitalize on a $25 million trade exception it still possesses as a vestige from last summerâs Dejounte Murray trade to New Orleans. Itâs a tool that puts the Hawks in play for some potential sign-and-trade scenarios once the offseason begins in earnest
What Is A Traded Player Exception?
Traded Player Exceptions are, essentially, time-delayed trades.
It is well known that when NBA teams are over the salary cap – as they almost always all are, especially mid-season – teams can only make trades when the salaries of the players involved are closely matched. What Traded Player Exceptions (TPEs) do, however, is functionally add a 12-month timeframe to that.
In its simplest form, if a team over the salary cap trades away a player to a team under the salary cap, they get a Traded Player Exception created for the amount of that player’s salary that they can use for the next year. That TPE allows them to take back additional salary via trade, as if they were under the cap, when they are not. Functionally, then, a TPE is a form of cap space, albeit one that can only be used via trade.
Trade math in the NBA is extremely complicated, even when it is simple. So perhaps the function and creation of TPEs is best explained by way of an extremely hypothetical example.
Traded Player Exceptions, Explained, Badly
If the Colorado Hagfish traded Han Solo and his $806 million contract to the Bobson Dugnutts (who for convenience’s sake have exactly $806 million in cap space in this scenario) for a future second-round pick, everyone gets what they want. The Dugnutts get Solo, the Hagfish get the pick, and the overall trade math works.
However, if the Hagfish were still over the cap at the completion of the trade, they would in the process create an $806 million Traded Player Exception, which they could use for the next 12 months. This exception – as the name suggests – would allow them to take back $806 million extra in salary in a future deal, despite being over the salary cap.
If, say, eleven months later, they were to make a different trade, in which they acquired Yuri Gagarin and his $795 million contract for the same second-round pick, they can incorporate Gagarin’s salary via the TPE, despite being over the cap. The TPE has essentially meant that Solo was traded for Gagarin, albeit with an 11-month time delay.
This is exactly what TPEs are for. And this is the exact option now available to the Atlanta Hawks.
Hawks Still Reaping The Murray Benefits
There are further intricacies to the above that are not worth going into in this space. What matters here is that the Hawks have a $25,266,266 trade exception on their books that they have until July 7 to use.
This in turn allows them to take back that much in salary, without sending any more out. And while their payroll is not unlimited, this TPE does represent an excellent wheel-greaser in the market. They also have a $13,101,561 TPE created as a result of February’s trade of Bogdan Bogdanovic to the Los Angeles Clippers, which they have until next February 6 to use. Therefore, while the Hawks are over the cap, they still have tremendous spending power.
Despite widespread predictions of a “crazy” offseason for player movement, there is going to be very little in the way of salary cap space available. And that which there is is almost entirely monopolized by the Brooklyn Nets. Teams will be moving players, but with the second apron and luxury tax starting to bite for many, several of said teams will be looking to cut salary. Therefore, those who can help them to do so will be receiving plenty of calls, and are the ones with the leverage.
This, then, is where the Murray TPE will pay the most dividends. With Daniels having broken out and Murray posted a down season in which he was unhappy with how the discombobulated Pelicans treated him, the Hawks can already say they made a successful trade. Yet if the TPE brings in more talent on top, the yield will be even greater.
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