Raptors make out like bandits as final trade details are revealed

It was hardly a blockbuster, but the Toronto Raptors made an important trade in the midst of the 2024 NBA Draft.

Under the new two-day format, the time between the end of the first and second rounds, roughly 17 hours this year, allowed teams to evaluate their rosters and make trades based on the moves in the first round. That is what happened with the Sacramento Kings and Toronto Raptors.

The Raptors and Kings made a trade

The Kings drafted Providence guard Devin Carter, an elite defensive prospect with real shot-making upside, and thus made Davion Mitchell expendable. Sacramento was likely already looking for a trade partner with which to clear some salary to go after a player in free agency, and adding Mitchell to the deal allowed them to open up the trade possibilities.

That led them to Toronto, a team that knew it was going to operate as an over-the-cap team by picking up Bruce Brown's team option but had salary flexibility underneath the luxury tax line. They were an ideal trade partner to take advantage of the increased salary-matching rules in the new Collective Bargaining Agreement and help the Kings out.

Here are the details of the deal between the two teams:

At the time it looked like an excellent piece of business for the Raptors. They got to move off of Jalen McDaniels after a truly abysmal season in the 905, they added a recent lottery pick in Davion Mitchell to help them address their point-of-attack defense, and they got a pair of second-round picks, all for the cost of taking on the salary of second-year forward Sasha Vezenkov.

Since the deal things have only gotten better.

The Raptors made out like bandits

It was reported at the time of the trade that Vezenkov was unhappy with his time in Sacramento and was considering a return to Europe, where he was the MVP and featured in a way he wasn't, and wouldn't be, in the NBA.

After negotiating with the Raptors, Vezenkov this week agreed to give back his entire $6.65 million salary for 2024-25 in a buyout, and the Raptors subsequently waived him. He agreed to a five-year deal to return to his former Greek team Olympiakos, who will pay him an average of $3.7 million per year. Vezenkov, it appears, really wanted to leave the NBA.

For Toronto it was something of a coup. They certainly would have loved to see Vezenkov playing minutes this year to try and rehabillitate his value, and he played a position of need. Keeping him around was perfectly reasonable.

Yet after waiving Vezenkov, the Raptors now have an open roster spot and the flexibility to use nearly all of the Mid-Level Exception and still stay under the luxury tax line. Whether they use that flexibility to sign a player or trade for someone they have plenty of options available to them.

The full details of that trade are now in view, and it looks like a slam dunk for the Raptors. They got two second-round picks for essentially free, as swapping Jalen McDaniels for Davion Mitchell is at worst an even swap, if not another clear win for the Raptors.

Sacramento likely still had to make the trade because of the timing, as they needed the room to pull off a sign-and-trade for DeMar DeRozan. Yet if they had just worked out the buyout with Vezenkov themselves they could have kept the draft picks; instead, the difference of a month earned Toronto some valuable draft capital.

The perspective on trades in the NBA changes all of the time as hindsight comes into focus, and right now this deal looks like even more of a win for Toronto.