The NBA trade deadline is, for most teams, an exercise in resource-management. Take the Phoenix Suns. They are so desperate for the flexibility to make moves that they just traded one great first-round pick for three bad ones. Not everyone is as strapped as the Suns are, but we live in the all-in NBA. Most contenders have a limited number of assets available to trade. Almost everyone is financially constricted thanks to the CBA. 

For the majority of teams that fall into these camps, this time of year is about figuring out not only whether or not spending to improve is worth it, but what sort of upgrades they should prioritize. If you have one first-round pick left to trade, would you rather have a guard or a wing? Is it worth going into the luxury tax to potentially turn a first-round team into a second-round team? If we add that new starting center, can we afford the third year on his contract? These are the conversations getting held in most front offices right now. Almost everyone is facing difficult choices.

But the Oklahoma City Thunder? They aren’t, at least not in the ways their competitors are. For them, the trade deadline is an exercise in restraint. With a historic cache of draft capital sitting in their war chest, there are only a handful of players in all of basketball the Thunder lack the assets to trade for. With Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams still on rookie deals through the end of next season, there is virtually no contract in all of basketball they couldn’t reasonably fit onto their books before the aprons really start to become a problem. And with the NBA’s best record and a chance to set a new league-wide net rating record, they just don’t have many needs to fill. What do you give the team that has everything?

According to the rumor mill, not much. It’s been a relatively quiet transaction period for the Thunder so far. The only especially notable name they’ve been linked to thus far has been Brooklyn Nets wing Cam Johnson, but the noise surrounding a match has died down considerably of late. To some extent that’s related to Brooklyn’s high asking price, but remember, the Thunder gave up three first-round picks for the right to draft Ousmane Dieng. They are not gun shy when it comes to spending picks for the right targets. No, Oklahoma City’s hesitance is a matter of organizational philosophy.

“We have to finish our breakfast before we start acting like we’re on the cusp of something,” Thunder general manager Sam Presti told ESPN’s Tim MacMahon in November of 2023. To most teams, 37-8 would qualify as lunch time. For the Thunder? The sun has barely risen yet. Their eight most-used players this season are all 26 or younger and it’s entirely possible that they win their first championship before Holmgren and Williams finish their rookie deals. If the Thunder play this right, they have a chance to compete for the next 10 championships rather than pushing all in for a few here and now.

If that is the goal, prudence makes sense. Draft picks can be used in a multitude of ways for a contender. The last era of league history was largely defined by teams using them as trade chips. The next one, given the crushing effects of the aprons, will likely be defined by the teams that are hoarding them. Sure, it’s easy for the Thunder to maintain depth right now. That changes when Williams and Holmgren start earning their fair market rates. At that point, their currently cheap role players are going to become too expensive to retain. All of those draft picks are Oklahoma City’s pathway to replacing them.

There’s a balance to this, of course. If a couple of picks could shore up a singular weakness ahead of a title run, a trade is probably worthwhile. It just isn’t clear if that is the case yet. We don’t even know how good the Thunder are yet. They are 8-1 in games Holmgren has both started and finished and 23-2 with Isaiah Hartenstein on the floor. Oklahoma City hasn’t had both of them together yet, so the Thunder could credibly claim that getting Holmgren back qualifies as their mid-season improvement.

Is there another dire hole here? One could argue that it’s shooting. The Thunder led the league in 3-point percentage a year ago and have fallen to No. 15 this season. Missing Holmgren means quite a bit in that respect, but it’s also worth pointing out that the Thunder ranked 21st in October and November and have shot at roughly a top-10 level ever since. Only the Timberwolves are shooting better in January, so it seems fair to say that the beginning of the season was the fluke here.

Johnson could obviously improve the shooting, but at what cost? Put aside possible draft picks for a moment. The Thunder still have to match money. Are they sending out Isaiah Joe in such a deal? He’s their best shooter as it is, and it’s not clear how much of an improvement Johnson would be. If it’s not Joe, it’s Aaron Wiggins, the team’s tertiary creator. As it stands, Williams and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander are the only two reliable dribblers on this team. Wiggins may be a distant third, but as Dallas proved last postseason, individual shot-creation means quite a bit. The Oklahoma City offense bogged down when the 3s stopped falling and only two players could still attack. Either of them alone still falls short of the Johnson contract. Kenrich Williams is an important locker room figure. He won’t be included in any deal lightly. Are the Thunder ready to give up on Dieng?

There’s a careful alchemy to this team as it currently exists. Part of what makes the defense historic is that it lacks weak links. Johnson wouldn’t exactly be a “weak” link. His size is an asset, but he’s a bit of a tweener in that he lacks the foot speed to stay in front of guards but can get bullied inside by any strong forward. Without much shot-creation, the Thunder would mostly be paying a premium for shooting exclusively.

If the Thunder are paying that premium, it’s worth at least considering doing so for a creator instead. Collin Sexton is having a great season for the Jazz, has mostly gotten over his early career ball-hogging issues, and while he hasn’t been a great NBA defender, the tools exist and he projected as a good defensive player coming out of the draft. That’s a sensible fit and a pretty clear upgrade on Wiggins if the Thunder want to go that route. Coby White is even friendlier on the balance sheet. He makes $12 million this season and a hair less than $13 million next year. He’s a defensive negative, but at least he covers all of your offensive question marks instead of just one.

Neither player is coming cheap. No one ever does coming from a Danny Ainge team, and while the Bulls are reportedly more open-minded ahead of the deadline, their aversion to full-on tanks complicates matters. If they move Zach LaVine, are they really going to torpedo their offense entirely by separately dealing White? Doing so would be out-of-character at the very least. Both players probably cost multiple first-round picks. The Thunder have the chips to make trades like that without feeling the impact as severely as other teams would, but doing so adds up.

Oklahoma City’s experience with Gordon Hayward a season ago was instructive in that respect. No, the Thunder didn’t pay much in terms of picks, and yes, the deal helped them shed enough long-term salary to go sign Hartenstein over the summer. But Oklahoma City aggregated several small contracts to go get one big name who proceeded to give them almost nothing in the postseason. Maybe the Thunder could have figured out the fit given more time, but that is time they won’t have this season either. Integrating a significant piece in the middle of the season is tricky. Doing so when you haven’t invested picks in that player is one thing. Paying up for anything like the Hayward experience is another. 

There are more expensive players on the market that might make more sense for the Thunder. Lonzo Ball at $21.4 million stands out here, a shooter and defender whose full-court playmaking would fit like a glove with Oklahoma City’s existing transition attack. But the Thunder aren’t going to want to give up several players for one in the middle of February.

These moves are easier to make over the summer. Sure enough, that’s when the Thunder got Hartenstein and Alex Caruso. In fact, the only players on their roster who were acquired mid-season rather than during an offseason are their two-way players. This shouldn’t surprise anyone given Presti’s background. He came from San Antonio. Until recently, the Spurs were infamous for rarely making midseason trades.

Besides, the Thunder do have one notable advantage over the field if they ultimately elect not to make a trade. Any team above the first apron is effectively barred from the buyout market, assuming the player in question earned more than the non-taxpayer mid-level exception before his buyout. That clears quite a bit of competition away from the Thunder if there is a mid-season free agent they like, and as they have their $8 million cap room mid-level exception available to them, they can afford to outbid the teams that only have minimum salaries to offer. For now, the buyout market looks quiet. If Jimmy Butler and De’Aaron Fox get traded in the next week, that can change quickly. The obvious target for the Thunder here, if Fox indeed gets the Spurs trade he is seemingly hoping for, would be a reunion with Chris Paul to stabilize their bench lineups.

The Thunder are diligent enough to explore all of these options, but patient enough not to force any of them. Everybody else has to be desperate this time of year. Jobs are at stake. Championship windows are closing. Stars are getting frustrated. But these aren’t problems that really apply to the Thunder. They get to be picky, so if they make a trade, you can feel relatively certain that it’s going to be a good one.