The Sacramento Kings didn’t set off fireworks this summer, but they also didn’t do enough to land among the NBA’s worst offseason groups. Their quiet approach left them outside the top-10 worst offseason rankings, even as the front office continued trimming money and reshaping the roster.
That restraint came after a rough financial setup heading into the offseason. Sacramento was staring at more than $200 million committed to next season’s roster and could only hand free agents the veteran’s minimum. With the Kings rarely a big draw in free agency anyway, general manager Scott Perry leaned into a different route: subtraction.
The biggest move was sending Devin Carter and a 2033 second-round pick to the Atlanta Hawks in exchange for salary cap relief. Sacramento had owed the 2024 first-round pick $12.5 million over the next two years.
Carter’s time with the Kings never really got rolling because of injuries. His rookie year was underwhelming, with 3.8 points in 36 games, though he showed more last season when Zach LaVine was out, averaging 8.3 points across 38 games.
Still, parting with a lottery pick this quickly says plenty about where Sacramento stands on developing and keeping young talent. Perry’s priority, though, is clearly to ease the team’s financial strain as fast as possible.
The Kings also moved on from DeRozan in a last-ditch effort to avoid carrying his full deal. Sacramento tried to find a trade partner before waiving the 17-year veteran, whose $25.7 million salary would have become fully guaranteed in January. The hope is that teams may be more interested in him once his contract number drops.
Russell Westbrook, meanwhile, is also a free agent after the summer, and reports have surfaced that he is unlikely to return. Perry said the 6-foot-3 point guard outplayed the veteran’s minimum he was being paid last season. Westbrook finished with 15.2 points, 5.4 rebounds and 6.7 assists, and he logged five triple-doubles.
His experience also mattered for Maxime Raynaud, especially in one standout performance against the San Antonio Spurs. Westbrook assisted 17 of Raynaud’s career-high 32 points, helping Raynaud earn Western Conference Rookie of the Month honors.
Sacramento lost three players over the offseason, but balanced that out by adding three rookies in the draft. Darius Acuff Jr., Alex Karaban and Emanuel Sharp are the new names in the mix, with Acuff leading the class as the seventh overall pick and a candidate to become the next franchise point guard.
In Other News...
Kings Face A Costly De'Andre Hunter Decision This Summer
By the 2026 trade deadline, Sacramento held onto the veterans many around the league thought might be moved, keeping Domantas Sabonis, Zach LaVine and DeMar DeRozan in place while still making a notable swing for De'Andre Hunter. The addition was meant to give the Kings another useful piece, but it came with a heavy price tag, and Hunters early-season injury only made the investment feel more complicated as the year went on.
Hunter is making nearly $25 million this season, and that salary has turned his future into one of the bigger roster questions hanging over Sacramento heading into the summer. Whether the Kings can find a trade or ultimately decide to let him reach free agency, the appeal is the same: opening up more cap room and creating more flexibility for a team that has already committed significant money to its core. [Read more 🡒]
Keegan Murray Has Become A Huge Question For The Kings
Keegan Murray was supposed to be one of the cleanest answers in Sacramentos rebuild, the kind of young forward who spaces the floor, fits with almost anybody and gives a team something stable to build around. He arrived with a rookie three-point mark that set a franchise standard and immediately looked like a long-term piece, which is why the Kings still view him that way even after a few seasons of uneven shooting and a year that never really got off the ground.
Murrays recent stretch has only sharpened the question around him because the shot that once made him such a valuable presence has not held up the way the Kings expected, and his availability has been part of the problem too. He dealt with a torn UCL in his finger, an ankle sprain and a later procedure, leaving Sacramento to sort through what he is now and what he still might become as it tries to push forward. [Read more 🡒]
Kings Could Finally Add The Defensive Edge This Roster Lacks
The Kings have spent enough time chasing scoring to know what they still need, and Dillon Brooks keeps coming up as the kind of edge-piece this roster has often lacked. He brings real defensive bite and the sort of vocal, culture-setting presence that can change the tone around a team, which is why he makes sense as a target whether Sacramento is thinking about the open market or a bigger roster shuffle.
Brooks is under contract with Phoenix for now, so any path to him would require patience or creativity. Sacramento could wait and see how the market develops, but there is also a more immediate framework being floated around the league that would send Zach LaVine to the Suns and bring Brooks back the other way, a type of deal that would tell you exactly how seriously the Kings are weighing defense as a roster priority. [Read more 🡒]