Draymond Green will hit the open market in just a few days, and the NBA world is already speculating where he could draw interest.
The Kings have been one of the teams thrown in a lot of those conversations.
Green, who played his entire 11-year NBA career with the Golden State Warriors, will become an unrestricted free agent on June 30 for the first time after declining his player option for the 2023-24 NBA season.
“The Kings can now go hunting for Draymond Green if they wish,” ESPN NBA insider Brian Windhorst said Friday. “And that would be extraordinarily interesting because it’s the exact type of player that they need.
“It would be interesting with [Domantas] Sabonis, that would be an interesting first practice. “That would be an extraordinarily interesting situation.”
Sacramento reportedly traded its No. 24 pick and center Richaun Holmes to the Dallas Mavericks in Thursday’s draft in a move that cleared up significant cap space. Holmes was due $12 million in 2023-24 and had a $12.8 million player option for 2024-25.
Per Spotrac’s Keith Smith, the Kings now have the fourth-most cap space in the NBA, estimated to be over $35 million. While they didn’t make a major move in the draft, they now have the cap space to make a huge splash in free agency.
Sacramento, too, has a number of players entering free agency at the end of the month: Harrison Barnes, Terence Davis, Alex Len, Trey Lyles and Chimezie Metu.
Green is already familiar with the Kings and Sacramento, but maybe not in the best way. The most recent impression he left on the team and the fanbase was when the Kings and Warriors faced each other in the first round of the 2023 playoffs. Green and Kings star Domantas Sabonis shared a physical exchange that resulted in Green being suspended for one game in the series.
But Green’s ties to Sacramento aren’t all negative.
Kings owner Vivek Ranadivé is the former co-owner and vice chairman of the Warriors, and their newest head coach and reigning Coach of the Year Mike Brown was the Warriors’ lead assistant coach up until last year.
Basketball-wise, it seems like the perfect fit. If the Kings don’t re-sign Barnes, they would have a desperate need for a new power forward. Plus, their defense needs a dramatic makeover — and Green certainly could help with that.