NBA free agency 2026: Winners, losers, big questions for teams - ESPN

The NBA will look very different next season thanks to a whirlwind summer of player movement: Giannis Antetokounmpo, Kawhi Leonard, Jaylen Brown, Paul George, LaMelo Ball and Ja Morant have all been traded, while free agents Walker Kessler, Mitchell Robinson, Norman Powell, Marcus Smart and Tobias Harris have all found new homes.

Meanwhile, LeBron James continues to weigh his options after he informed the Los Angeles Lakers earlier this week that he would depart in free agency.

With so much action to digest already, let's sort through the early winners and losers of a busy NBA offseason:

Jump to a team:
Blazers | Celtics | Clippers
Heat | Hornets | Jazz
Knicks | Lakers | Pistons | Raptors

The Eastern Conference arms race escalates by the day, but Miami can still claim to have landed the top prize: Antetokounmpo. The Heat parted with Tyler Herro, three first-round picks and additional players and draft assets to land the two-time MVP from the Milwaukee Bucks, but they should be glad they did after watching the Toronto Raptors and Philadelphia 76ers make splashy trades of their own.

While Toronto landed Leonard and Philadelphia snagged Brown in hopes of climbing in the standings, Antetokounmpo should be the most productive of the three stars next season. He also looks like the best investment when it comes time to hand out lucrative contract extensions.

Antetokounmpo is three years younger than Leonard and has appeared in 75% of his team's games over the past five seasons, easily surpassing Leonard's 54% availability rate during the same period. What's more, Antetokounmpo has averaged more points, rebounds and assists than Brown collectively over the past five seasons, and he has handily outperformed the 76ers' new star in