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Yesterday, we shared one mock trade for every Eastern Conference team heading toward the Feb. 5 deadline. Today, we'll conduct the same exercise, but move it to the West. The same parameters here apply. The deal will not necessarily be likely based on reporting, but it is meant to make sense given the needs of motivations of the team making it. 

None of the 15 trades below are repeated from the Eastern Conference edition, so all of these deals are original, but some of the names involved will overlap. However, no player will be traded more than once in this breakdown. So with that in mind, let's get started.

Oklahoma City Thunder

  • Thunder receive: 2028 first-round swap rights, 2030 first-round swap rights (least favorable of San Antonio, Dallas or Minnesota)
  • Timberwolves receive: 2026 first-round pick (least favorable of 76ers and Rockets)

The Thunder are 34-7 and just overcome the Spurs for the first time all season. There's not a win-now trade to be made here, nor are they likely to sell, and they're below the tax, so there's not a financially motivated move they need to make either. So what are they doing? Playing for some draft upside.

Here's the plan: the Thunder will have either three or four first-round picks in the 2026 NBA Draft. They don't want all of them. They don't have the roster spots for all of those rookies. So they traded the worst of them to Minnesota, who is seemingly trying to upgrade its roster through a deadline trade, but currently has no tradable picks. The Timberwolves get one they can flip for win-now help. The Thunder get two first-round swaps down the line that could give them more upside when there's less of a roster crunch to worry about.

Ideally, the Thunder wouldn't give a Western Conference rival ammunition to improve with, but remember, they did exactly this two years ago to help Dallas get Daniel Gafford. There's precedent. The swaps here aren't great. The Timberwolves will probably be good in 2028, and the 2030 pick comes with all sorts of strings attached. But better to make an upside play now than risk getting stuck trading the pick for pennies on the dollar in June when they're on the clock.

San Antonio Spurs

Atlanta is reportedly looking for a long-term center in part because Kristaps Porziņģis is so rarely healthy. With holes elsewhere, the Hawks need someone more reliable. But the Spurs don't have many holes. They need a bit more shooting and an extra big body, but they can afford to treat Porziņģis as a luxury. He'd never have to play back to backs or too many minutes for the Spurs, who already have Victor Wembanyama and Luke Kornet. The idea here would be to re-sign Porziņģis to a long-term deal in the offseason at a lower annual salary. They are so deep that they could play Porziņģis short stints to accommodate his POTS condition if it persists, making him a very valuable 15- or 20-minute player rather than a rarely healthy starter.

The price here isn't trivial. The Hawks get a good first-round pick thanks to the attached swap rights with Boston, and Barnes, aside from being a good player, is an important part of San Antonio's locker room. This sort of move is probably likelier in the offseason, when the Spurs could just sign Porziņģis outright, but if they want to make a luxury upgrade before the playoffs, this is one way to do it. The Hawks would then have another asset to use in pursuit of a healthier big man.

Denver Nuggets

  • Nuggets receive: 2027 second-round pick (protected 31-55)
  • Wizards receive: Hunter Tyson, 2032 second-round pick

Very straightforward cap dump. The Nuggets are very slightly above the luxury-tax line. Teams in that position almost always find a way to duck below it. So they use a second-round pick to dump Hunter Tyson on the Wizards to clear the tax line. We'll get into a bit more depth on Denver's tax situation a bit later, but for now, just know that the Nuggets are going to be prohibitively expensive next season and will surely want a tax dispersal this year to ease that blow.

Minnesota Timberwolves

Part of the reason we had the Wolves offering swaps to the Thunder in our Oklahoma City trade was so they could add a pick they might be able to swap specifically for White. These trades exist in a vacuum, though, so instead of a first-round pick, the Wolves send the Bulls a recent No. 8 overall pick in Dillingham and a promising young guard in Shannon to get White, the higher-level point guard they've been seeking.

Los Angeles Lakers

The Lakers are tricky to trade with. They can only give away a single first-round pick right now, and they're unlikely to do so, as they could trade three this summer and that gives them much more flexibility to chase better players. They're also not going to take on long-term money with the potential to generate significant cap space. So basically, we're looking for a way to flip some of their current expiring contracts for different expiring contracts that perhaps fit the existing roster a bit better.

Portland could use more shooting. Rui Hachimura can shoot, and Dalton Knecht was supposed to be able to shoot when they drafted him. What they don't bring is the defense and effort that the Lakers are looking for. Robert Williams III and Matisse Thybulle, injury-prone as they are, do when they're on the floor. We need the Nets to take on Hayes for cap purposes, but he's not only contract we're dumping here.

Obviously, Bronny James is included in the deal as well. The Lakers need to get off a bit of extra money to make this work against their first-apron hard cap. When LeBron James was this franchise's centerpiece, trading his son would have been unthinkable. But with the James era seemingly nearing its end and Rich Paul overstepping with some of his recent podcast suggestions, this trade would be a way for the Lakers to start untangling themselves from their messy relationship with Klutch Sports. Portland has several Klutch players on its roster, so it would be a soft landing spot for Bronny, but it would send the clearest signal yet that the Lakers are ready to fully move on to the Luka Dončić-Austin Reaves era.

Houston Rockets

The Rockets went over the luxury tax when building their roster because they thought, with Fred VanVleet, their championship odds were high enough to justify it even with the long-term threat of the repeater tax looming in the future. Well, VanVleet got hurt. That lowered their championship odds enough to make them potentially reconsider the luxury tax, and it also created a need at guard. So why not address both issues in one fell swoop?

Dosunmu could give the Rockets a jolt in the backcourt and has enough defensive upside to fit in with Houston even if his performance on weaker Chicago teams has been inconsistent. The Bulls need more of wing presence, and Finney-Smith obviously provides it. The Rockets, with such a surplus on the wing, can afford to give away Finney-Smith, who's barely played this year because of injury. Three second-round picks is the price it takes on top of him to secure Dosunmu, who may leave Chicago as a free agent this offseason anyway. The Bulls might demand a first-round pick considering the favor it is doing Houston in getting the Rockets out of the tax, but if that's what it takes, the Rockets have such a draft surplus that even that might be reasonable here.

Phoenix Suns

The Suns have little they need to do this season besides duck the tax. Why mess with the formula in what has become a feel-good season? Next year, however, the Suns have only $21.6 million in room below the tax line before re-signing key free agents Mark Williams, Collin Gillespie and Jordan Goodwin. The cleanest way to address that would be by trading Green, who has barely played this year anyway, for less money next year.

There likely wouldn't be too much interest in Green at his current price point. We just saw Trae Young get cap-dumped, after all. But he's a recent No. 2 overall pick who may not have reached expectations, but isn't exactly a bust either. With the Grizzlies likely trading Ja Morant, they may view Green as an upside play for their stellar player development program. So they send Caldwell-Pope and a couple of minimum deals to the Suns, saving Phoenix a nice chunk of change for next year. That the Suns could actually use Caldwell-Pope as depth this year and insurance next year if they lose one of those free agent guards is just the cherry on top. 

Golden State Warriors

The Warriors have too many needs to address in a single trade. They need more size. They need more shooting. They need more shot-creation. There's realistically not a single move that obviously puts them in championship contention, but Golden State owes it to Stephen Curry to at least try to improve for his golden years. so the Warriors check several boxes in one move: they get Gafford to be the vertical spacer they've spent years looking for, they get off of Kuminga (finally), and they give fans a feel-good story in bringing back Thompson, much like the Heat did with Dwyane Wade nearly a decade ago. Players of that stature should never have to play elsewhere.

The deal would be a home run for Dallas if it could get a first-round pick out of the Warriors. Even without one, getting Kuminga as a long-term upside play next to Cooper Flagg is worth it, especially since they get off of the Thompson contract as well, which lacks the same sentiment for them it has for the Warriors. If the bidding gets crowded enough, maybe the Warriors could push this one over the top with a lottery-protected first-round pick this year so as not to disturb their more valuable deep future picks, but this is a basic structure that works.

Portland Trail Blazers

  • Trail Blazers receive: 2026 first-round pick, (via Trail Blazers, protected 1-14)
  • Bulls receive: 2029 first-round pick (least favorable of Trail Blazers, Bucks and Celtics), 2027 second-round pick (via Hawks), 2028 second-round pick

Portland owes a lottery-protected pick to the Bulls that can convey in 2026, 2027, 2028 or not at all. Normally, that wouldn't be much of a concern. However, Portland also has swap rights with the Milwaukee Bucks in 2028 thanks to the Damian Lillard trade. Those swap rights are immensely valuable considering the uncertainty surrounding Giannis Antetokounmpo. If the Blazers miss the playoffs in 2026 and 2027, but make them in 2028, they lose the pick and therefore the right to exercise those swap rights. That's a nightmare scenario the Blazers need to address now.

So here's the compromise: the Bulls get a guaranteed pick in 2029. That would be the least favorable of the three Portland could have: its own, Milwaukee's and Boston's. Washington already gets the second-best of those picks, so Portland will still have the most valuable of the three. This way, the Bulls don't have to worry about never getting a first-round pick even if they lose a bit of upside, and the Blazers throw in some second-round picks to seal the deal.

Memphis Grizzlies

Very straightforward trade. The Heat take an upside swing on Morant. The Grizzlies replace him with a more reliable but less talented guard in Herro. Fontecchio is cap filler. Do I think Morant necessarily makes sense for Miami? No. The Heat are running the very offensive system that Morant seemingly disliked in Memphis last year. But the Heat have been linked to Morant more than perhaps any other team. 

This is what a Miami deal would probably look like. The Heat couldn't justify giving up draft picks or real young talent for Morant given his play this season, but if they're just swapping out Herro, it's little more than an admission that the current team isn't working and needs a shakeup. For Memphis, it's just a fresh start without the distractions Morant has created in recent years.

Los Angeles Clippers

What have the Clippers lacked this season, even as they've turned things around over the past month or so? A Norm Powell replacement. They thought Bradley Beal would provide one. He didn't even when he was playing. The Clipper offense falls apart without James Harden. The Kings, meanwhile, have been trying to dump Malik Monk's contract since the summer. So we have a very simple trade here: the Kings get two expiring deals and clear a contract they don't need off of their books. The Clippers get a high-level bench scorer who could hopefully replicate some of what they lost without Powell as they try to sneak into the playoffs through the Play-In Tournament.

Dallas Mavericks

There are two possible forms an Anthony Davis trade could take. The first is the simpler one. If the Mavericks are willing to do what the Hawks did with Trae Young, they could probably move him just for expiring money. The Clippers, with a roster full of impending free agents, would make sense in this regard. If they want real value back, they're probably going to have to take back bad money.

That's where the Raptors come in. They'd give up value for Davis, yes, but a lot of this boils down the Dallas taking back Barrett, whose contract is short but a bit bloated, and Poeltl, whose deal is far too long after a totally unnecessary extension last offseason. If they take on this money that most teams wouldn't want, then they could generate some meaningful pick value. Toronto's pick this year would be in the middle of the first round. In 2028, who knows, but even with that protection, remember that the Raptors handed the Spurs the No. 8 pick on a top-six protected choice for Poeltl a few years ago. Even if it lacks "win the lottery" upside, a pick can still be pretty useful.

The best trade fit for Anthony Davis is a team no one is talking about
Sam Quinn
The best trade fit for Anthony Davis is a team no one is talking about

Utah Jazz

  • Jazz receive: Zeke Nnaji, 2030 first-round swap rights, 2031 first-round swap rights
  • Nuggets receive: 2027 first-round pick (via Lakers, protected 1-4)

I promised more details on Denver's cap situation, so here goes. At present, based on their current draft pick, the Nuggets are already over next year's projected second apron. That doesn't include Peyton Watson, who is in the middle of a breakout season. The Nuggets should do everything in their power to keep him. They're going to have to shed money to do that. Nnaji, making around $8 million, is a way to start. He has fortunately played a few good games lately as Denver has dealt with injuries, so he might be more movable now than he was a few weeks ago, but that's still bad, multi-year money.

So here's the pitch. Utah takes on Nnaji. They even send the Nuggets a weak 2027 first-round pick, from the Lakers, to help them maintain and improve the existing team with cheap depth. In exchange, the Jazz get unfettered control over Denver's pick in 2030, provided it does not go to Oklahoma City through a prior trade, and 2031. At that point, Nikola Jokić will be in his mid-30s. He may be worse. He may have gotten hurt. He may have even retired to Serbia and his horses by then. It's an enormous long-term risk for Denver in the name of maximizing the present. The Jazz, meanwhile, have shown a willingness to trade draft certainty for upside. Last deadline, they gave up three bad first-round picks for one potentially great, unprotected one from the Suns. This move would be similar. The Jazz don't need late picks like that Laker selection. They need chances for top selections, even if they come years down the line.

Sacramento Kings

  • Kings receive: Guerschon Yabusele, 2026 first-round pick (via Thunder)
  • Knicks receive: Keon Ellis
  • Wizards receive: 2026 first-round pick (via Wizards, top-8 protected)

Here we have yet another somewhat convoluted draft situation. The Kings want a first-round pick for Keon Ellis. It's important to them that they get an actual first-round pick for the sake of the press release. They badly bungled the Ellis contract situation over the summer and need to make it look like they're only moving him because they got a great offer as opposed to doing so because they knew they'd likely lose him in the offseason.

The Knicks don't have a first-round pick to trade. Most of the teams who really need the cheap, valuable Ellis don't. But they do have a fake first-round pick: Washington's top-eight protected selection this year. That pick will fall in the protected range, but when it does, the Knicks will instead get Washington's second-round picks this year and next. Washington's second-round pick is essentially a late first-rounder. Right now, it's No. 34 overall. The Wizards happen to have Oklahoma City's first-round pick, which will be No. 30.

So the Knicks effectively trade up four spots by giving the Wizards back their 2027 second-round pick. They then give that Thunder pick to the Kings for Keon Ellis, who gives them another defensive-minded guard that can make 3s, and they save enough money by getting off of Yabusele to go sign a 15th player for round out their roster. While the Kings could have easily just made Ellis a restricted free agent last offseason and re-signed him on team-friendly terms, they at least get a first-round pick here rather than losing him for nothing.

New Orleans Pelicans

It's the last trade of this set of stories, and we're going out with a bang. There is a pretty narrow set of big men who make sense next to Derik Queen. Ideally, you want someone who can shoot 3s, because Queen will have the ball in his hands and doesn't need a teammate clogging the paint, but he has to be able to protect the basket, which Jackson does quite well. As Memphis seemingly considers all of its options in the wake of Ja Morant rumors, Jackson seems gettable for the first time. Could New Orleans potentially secure him by throwing all of its draft picks at Memphis? Maybe, but as the Pelicans may hand the Hawks the No. 1 overall pick in June, they're probably going to try not to give away more picks any time soon.

So what about a player-for-player swap? Everyone wants Jackson, but everyone wants Trey Murphy as well. The Grizzlies ironically traded the pick that became Murphy in 2021 to the Pelicans and took Ziaire Williams instead, a decision they obviously regret. This could be a chance for redemption. Memphis, with Zach Edey and Santi Aldama in place, have a front court pair it could move forward with. The combination of Murphy and Cedric Coward on the wing would give the Grizzlies a great duo to build around. The Grizzlies would just need to settle point guard. Maybe that means keeping Morant and trying him out with this new-look roster. Maybe it means trading him and getting a different sort of player back. As we've learned with Morant and Trae Young, though, it's reasonably easy to trade for point guards nowadays. They'd be able to find someone.

Jackson is older than Murphy, and his contract is bigger after renegotiating and extending last offseason. New Orleans would probably need a first-round pick to consider this, so we'll send the Pelicans one of the spares that the Grizzlies got for Desmond Bane last offseason. We rarely see trades like this, but that doesn't mean it doesn't make sense. The Pelicans need someone with Jackson's specific skill set more than the Grizzlies do. Memphis, going into a bit of a retool, would likely prefer to get younger and cheaper. It's an unconventional idea but an interesting one if the two sides are creative enough.