NBA free agency is all but dead as July fireworks have been reduced to soft jazz

Free agency is all but dead in the NBA.

With one powerful collective bargaining agreement and a few years spent slowly creeping in this direction, the league has successfully managed to choke out what once was the most exciting time of the year.

Theres still an occasional tremor, but the booming fireworks that once illuminated the NBA sky during the first few days of July have been replaced by soft jazz and a sterile waiting room, anxiously anticipating the next big move that may not come.

Advertisement Much of this is by design.

There has been a noticeable shift in trying to move away from transactions season and returning the focus to the play on the court.

The leagues current CBA, meanwhile, incentivizes its stars to remain with their current teams, and a general lack of cap space around the league has suppressed movement.

Add it together and the death of the super teams has been accompanied by the death of the super summer season.

The only team that entered this summer with a max contract slot was the Brooklyn Nets.

Juxtapose that against 2019, for example, when teams across the league worked feverishly to create cap space and at least 10 teams entered that free agent season capable of offering a max contract.

Its no coincidence that summer was also one of the most explosive in league history: Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving teamed up in Brooklyn, Kawhi Leonard and Paul George landed with the Los Angeles Clippers, Anthony Davis was traded to the Los Angeles Lakers and Jimmy Butler went to the Miami Heat.

Some of those were trades, some were free-agent signings.

All were completed within the first few days of July.

In hindsight, that might have been the summer that broke the old way of doing business.

The pandemic ensued, costing teams millions in lost revenue over multiple seasons, and eventually, the most restrictive CBA in league history was enacted.

"Free agency is dead.

It's bad for the league because it's usually one of the league's biggest attractions.

We have to remember that this is entertainment and we can't take that away" -An NBA Exec to Chris Haynes pic.twitter.com/T2Cn0VkiD7 Ahmed/The Ears/IG: BigBizTheGod (@big_business_) June 30, 2025 Not all of this is necessarily bad, but its certainly noticeable.

If Adam Silvers goal was wrestling control away from the players and restoring it with the owners, he certainly seems to have accomplished it.

The biggest move this week has been Myles Turner spurning the Indiana Pacers for the Milwaukee Bucks and Turner has never even made an All-Star team.

Advertisement (As a side note: To create the space necessary to sign Turner, the Bucks had to waive Damian Lillard and swallow the remaining $113 million on his deal the most dead cap money in league history.

There is no clearer sign of Jimmy Haslams influence on the Bucks than this transaction.

Haslam is the only one within the Bucks ownership group with the liquidity to make Lillards contract disappear.

He also knows plenty about historic dead cap hits after his experience with Deshaun Watson and the Cleveland Browns.) Its fair to point out that Kevin Durant was just dealt a couple of weeks ago and Giannis Antetokounmpos future remains murky in Milwaukee despite the Turner signing.

And nothing shook the NBA quite like the Luka Doncic trade in the middle of last season.

Big moves are still possible, but rarely do they occur now in early July.

Much of the Durant trade was forced by the second-apron constraints the Phoenix Suns foolishly flew into before their roster was ready.

The Minnesota Timberwolves moved Karl Anthony-Towns over similar cap concerns.

There will be more cap-forced moves in the future, but the players no longer seem to be driving their fate quite as furiously as they once did.

The shift away from the July frenzy has been ongoing for a few years.

The top names to change teams last year were DeMar DeRozan and an aging Klay Thompson, two guards much closer to the end of their careers than the beginning.

Fred Van Vleet was the biggest prize among the 2023 free-agent class, and Jalen Brunson was the top star to change teams in 2022, long before he became JALEN BRUNSON with the New York Knicks.

As the leverage plays continue to shift between the players and owners, the owners have clearly retaken control, at least for now.

Soft jazz never sounded so boring this time of year.

(Photo of Myles Turner: Emilee Chinn / Getty Images).

This article has been shared from the original article on theathleticuk, here is the link to the original article.