The Josh Giddey era in Oklahoma City has come to an end.
Oklahoma City and Chicago agreed to a trade that will send guard Alex Caruso to OKC in exchange for Giddey according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.
The trade signals that OKC is ready to move into a new, more competitive direction, and it signals Chicago is ready to focus on acquiring young, more developmental players.
Sam Presti on the trade:
“We want to thank Josh for his many contributions to our team and know he will capitalize on the opportunities before him in Chicago.
When we drafted Josh in 2021 he was an essential aspect of our vision for the next iteration of the Thunder. Since then, our team has evolved rapidly and dynamically in ways we could never have anticipated. Therefore, as we began our internal discussions this off-season, it was determined that bringing Josh off the bench next season was our best option to maximize his many talents and deploy our team more efficiently over 48 minutes.
As we laid out to Josh how he could lean into his strengths and ultimately optimize our current roster and talent, it was hard to for him to envision, and conversations turned to him inquiring about potential opportunities elsewhere. As always was the case, Josh demonstrated the utmost professionalism throughout the discussions. Josh has All-Star potential, but accessing that in the current construct of the Thunder would not be optimal for the collective. Based on these discussions we decided to move forward and prioritize what was best for the organization.
Alex Caruso is a player we have always highly valued and followed. He is the quintessential Thunder player; he is an exceptional competitor and teammate with a multi-dimensional skillset. His presence and game will help elevate the core of our team as we continue to strive to build a sustainably elite program in Oklahoma City. Alex is a player that began his professional career with the Thunder/Blue and the opportunity to add him was something we felt would truly enhance our team and culture. We could not be more excited to see Alex in Thunder blue (again).”
Wojnarowski also reports that OKC made the deal with the mindset that it would be extending Caruso and making him a long term part of the equation for a team that hopes to compete for the next decade.
Caruso adds to what was already an elite defense, and takes OKC up to another level on that end of the floor.
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