NBA: Kings probably want to be in the butler trade

Is the possible trade of Jimmy Butler from Minnesota getting more complicated? According to media reports, the Sacramento Kings can imagine being part of the deal to take a bad contract.

This is what Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN reports. According to this, the Kings are “aggressive” in convincing the Wolves as well as possible interested parties of Butler of this idea.

The Kings have around 11 million dollars of Cap Space available for the upcoming season, but don’t have their own first round pick 2019. The Kings would like to get such a pick in a butler trade. However, Sacramentos Assistant GM is said to have told other teams that they would only accept expiring contracts.

That would for example remove Gorgui Dieng (still 3 years, 48 million) from the list. On the other hand, the Kings have some expiring contracts with Zach Randolph (11,7 million), Iman Shumpert (11 million), Kosta Koufos (8,7 million) or Ben McLemore (5,5 million) which could be used as fillers in deals.

At the same time, however, the potential butler trade is also stagnating. One reason is that the teams don’t know exactly who to negotiate with at all. According to Woj, the teams suspect discrepancies in the franchise between owner Glen Taylor and front office managers Tom Thibodeau and Scott Layden.