He’s not even on the official roster for the Paris Olympics, but 17-year-old Cooper Flagg is generating about as much buzz as anyone at Team USA’s training camp in Las Vegas.
The Select Team, headlined by Flagg, nearly beat the main team in a scrimmage this week, and the 17-year-old looked every bit an NBA player during the matchup.
The 6’8″ Duke commit and likely 2025 draftee was hitting jumpers over All-NBA-caliber defenders, crashing the glass and hitting teammates with hit-ahead passes.
According to ESPN’s Marc J. Spears, one head coach in attendance said Flagg was the best player on the Select Team. That roster includes Jaime Jaquez Jr., Brandon Miller, Trey Murphy, Keegan Murray, Brandin Podziemski, Payton Pritchard, Jabari Smith Jr., Jalen Suggs and Amen Thompson.
Flagg was already the consensus top prospect heading into next summer’s draft, but moments like this can motivate teams to chase the No. 1 pick even harder.
“Drag for Flagg.”
“Miss hoops for Coop.”
Whatever moniker you want to attach to tanking in 2024-25, it will be reasonable for plenty of teams. And if a front office doesn’t think it’ll compete for a title or even a deep playoff run, it should probably join that race as soon as possible.
For some, that would require the kind of rebuilding trades we’re about to detail.
Teams that should tear it down in hopes of landing Flagg can be found below, as well as the deals that could get it done.
Lauri Markkanen for Keldon Johnson, a 2025 first-round pick, a 2026 first-round pick swap (via Atlanta), a 2027 first-round pick (via Atlanta) and a 2031 first-round pick swap (via Sacramento)
The Utah Jazz are probably the most obvious candidate to be included here. When they traded Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert two years ago, a full-fledged tank job felt imminent.
But Walker Kessler and Collin Sexton were both better than most expected for the Jazz, and Will Hardy’s coaching has also helped keep them competitive. Most importantly, Lauri Markkanen has been a borderline All-NBA player since he arrived in Utah.
That’s meant too many wins (yes, wins) for the first couple months of each of the last two seasons. It cost them meaningful lottery odds in the Victor Wembanyama draft, and it’s part of why they picked 10th in this one.
Markkanen is good and young enough to justify keeping and trying to build around, but Flagg has “best player on a title team” potential, and this trade would give Utah a better shot at landing him next summer.
For the San Antonio Spurs, adding Markkanen to a roster that already includes a rising top 10-15 player (Wembanyama, of course), Chris Paul and a couple solid wings in Devin Vassell and Harrison Barnes could have them back in the playoffs as early as next season.
Even if they can’t crack that group in the loaded Western Conference, a frontcourt combo of Markkanen and Wemby would, arguably, be the league’s best and most versatile.
Zach LaVine and two second-round picks for Andrew Wiggins, Gary Payton II and Kevon Looney
It’s no secret that the Golden State Warriors are in on the Markkanen hunt. Last week, Tony Jones of The Athletic told the Bay Area’s 95.7 The Game that “Golden State has an offer on the table, and it’s substantial.”
But if Golden State gets into a bidding war for the 27-year-old with the Spurs (who are also reportedly interested in the Finnish sharpshooter and finisher), it probably doesn’t have the draft capital necessary to win.
And without Markkanen, despite a respectable rebound of an offseason after losing Chris Paul and Klay Thompson, the Warriors wouldn’t really have a bona fide second scoring option after Stephen Curry.
Perhaps that’s why they’ve been attached to Zach LaVine rumors for weeks.
The Chicago Bulls are reportedly willing to attach the second-round picks they just got in the DeMar DeRozan sign-and-trade in an effort to unload LaVine’s contract, and Golden State might be the one team that can justify taking on the rest of that deal.
It’s big, and this framework obviously costs the Warriors some depth, but if the 29-year-old is healthy, he and Curry would make up one of the league’s most explosive backcourts.
The pendulum has swung too far on analysis of LaVine. Even if you include his down 2023-24, he’s averaged 24.9 points, 4.4 assists and 2.9 threes, while shooting 38.7 percent from deep, over the last five seasons.
For Chicago, the justification is obvious. It’s already leaning toward a tank after the DeRozan deal. If the Bulls can now move LaVine and Nikola Vučević, they’ll be firmly in the hunt for the league’s worst record and a better chance to land Flagg.
Thanks to Michael Jordan and the size of the Chicago media market, this is an iconic team, but it hasn’t really had an icon-like talent since pre-injury Derrick Rose.
Flagg may be the kind of player capable of restoring some of that luster.
Jerami Grant for D’Angelo Russell, Jarred Vanderbilt and a 2031 first-round pick
The “pay cut” LeBron James took may seem insignificant for a player who’s made nearly $600 million in NBA salary alone, but there’s a pretty huge short-term benefit.
LeBron went just far enough below the max to keep the Los Angeles Lakers under the dreaded “second apron.” That means they can still aggregate players in trades (teams over that line can’t combine outgoing salaries in deals).
And all the Lakers have to do to get to Jerami Grant’s cap number is move D’Angelo Russell (which would mean more on-ball opportunities for Austin Reaves) and Jarred Vanderbilt (who was limited to 581 minutes by injuries in 2023-24).
Of course, Portland is likely going to want more than that. Russell and Vanderbilt wouldn’t be long for the rebuilding Blazers. In fact, they could probably flip either or both before February’s trade deadline. The bigger get here is a first-round pick.
Portland fans may think Grant could fetch more than one. That may be true, but his lack of rebounding and playmaking, as well as the length of his contract, could limit his value around the league.
This deal significantly increases the Blazers’ short-term flexibility and makes them worse (good for lottery odds, of course).
And for the Lakers, Grant’s shooting and multipositional defense are an easy fit on both ends of the floor. He’d pull defenders away from the LeBron-Anthony Davis pick-and-rolls in the middle of the floor, and he’d spare LeBron the trouble of having to defend some of the game’s tougher forwards.
Trae Young for Cole Anthony, Wendell Carter Jr., Anthony Black, a 2026 first-round pick and a 2028 first-round pick
The Atlanta Hawks already split up their ill-fitting backcourt of Trae Young and Dejounte Murray by sending the latter to the New Orleans Pelicans, but there are still legitimate questions about the former’s ability to lead a title contender.
He’s legitimately an all-time great offensive engine (he’s 12th in career offensive box plus/minus), but there isn’t a long history of small(ish) guards taking their teams all the way in the NBA. And Atlanta has yet to figure out how to deploy a competent defense with Young as its centerpiece player.
There’s a real argument to move him, bottom out and hope for a second straight win in the lottery. If the Hawks were able to add Flagg to a young core that now includes Zaccharie Risacher (this summer’s No. 1 pick), Jalen Johnson and Onyeka Okongwu, they might be in better shape for the future than they are now.
For the Orlando Magic, this deal costs them two important rotation players from their 2023-24 breakout campaign in Cole Anthony and Wendell Carter Jr., a promising young talent in Anthony Black and multiple picks. That’s a lot to give up for a player with the weaknesses we just mentioned.
However, the Magic are also uniquely positioned to cover for Young’s defensive flaws. They can play tons of length together with Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Jonathan Isaac. And while Banchero and Wagner both have star point forward potential, giving them some wide-open looks generated by one of the game’s best creators could do a lot for their efficiency.
This is sort of a step-skipping move and a pretty decent-sized bet on the culture already in place, but Young could take Orlando from a fun story to a team that could put a real scare in some of the East’s top contenders.