The Thunder’s offseason has already taken enough turns without adding a starting lineup fight to the mix.
Oklahoma City moved on from three familiar names this summer, dealing longtime fixture Lu Dort, bench scorer Aaron Wiggins and sharpshooter Isaiah Joe in separate cost-cutting moves. The return was purely financial: luxury tax relief, with the team saving $240 million against the tax.
That created the obvious opening in the first five. With Dort gone, a starting spot is there for the taking on a team that’s expected to contend at the top. The two names most commonly connected to that job are Cason Wallace, the defensive stopper, and Ajay Mitchell, the young scoring guard.
On Monday, both players were asked about it as the Thunder returned to Oklahoma City for media day, the unofficial start of the 2026-27 season. Neither sounded particularly interested in turning the conversation into a competition.
When Mitchell was asked whether the possibility of starting was on his mind, he brushed it aside.
"Not at all. Like I said, my focus is to help this team win, and I just want us to be the best team we can be. So doesn't really matter, starter, coming off the bench, I don't really care," Mitchell said with a chuckle on Monday.
Wallace had a similar response when he was asked the same question.
"It's not on front of my mind, honestly. First we got to get out there as a team and you know, once we start gelling together, and you know, Mark, he changes the lineups here and there. Whenever he puts me out there, I'm going to put my best foot forward," Wallace detailed Monday.
Thunder coach Mark Daigneault, as usual, wasn’t about to hand over the full answer. He made clear again that he doesn’t reveal his starting five ahead of time, but he did offer a revealing note about Wallace.
"I don't give out the starting lineup -- [Wallace] started a lot of games to this point, really, if you look at it. He's started a lot of games.
So I'm not going to get into any rotation stuff but he's started Finals games for us. He's somebody that I trust as much as anybody," Daigneault explained on Monday.
No one involved turned this into a spectacle, and there was no sign of the kind of public drama that has accompanied similar situations in the past. Still, Daigneault’s comments sounded like a pretty clear clue.
Wallace has started 114 of his 237 career games, which makes him look like the favorite to be in the lineup when the Thunder open on Oct. 20 in San Antonio. That idea also lines up with a quote Sam Presti gave a week ago about Wallace.
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