The 10 Biggest winners and losers of the NBA trade deadline

Winner: The Buyout Market

The buyout market is a place for contending teams to look after the trade deadline when they’re still in need of an upgrade. Usually, only a couple of players from the buyout market end up contributing to a playoff run. This year, there could be many.

Players like Westbrook, John Wall, Reggie Jackson, Nerlens Noel, and many more are likely to be bought out. These players would add value to a playoff contender and are not on the buyout market because of a lack of production; they are there because whatever team they ended up with after the deadline just wasn’t a good fit.

I predict the Nuggets, Heat, Clippers, and Bulls will be some of the most active teams in the buyout market.

Loser: Teams Who Traded Their Second-Round Pick

It’s official. The second has become the late first. We saw an unbelievable amount of second-round picks traded today, and that is for a couple of reasons.

The first reason is obvious: contending teams have spent so many of their first-rounders that they must resort to seconds in trades, which is having an effect now because not nearly as many firsts were dealt in the past.

Second is the rising value of second-round picks, which is what makes the teams who traded them losers. With the one-and-done rule soon to be removed, draft classes are getting deeper, and therefore, an early second-round pick can be valued as a late first. This is a good thing as it gives contending teams more options, but it also makes trading away seconds much riskier for teams who chose to do it.