NBA 2024 offseason: DeMar DeRozan's tepid free agent market says more about the league than the CBA

DeRozan is aging in more ways than one

By Sam Quinn Jul 3, 2024 at 4:03 am ET• 9 min read

The rule changes from the 2023 collective bargaining agreement between the NBA and its players haven't even been fully implemented yet and they have already proven to be one of the strongest forces against player-movement in league history. The second apron broke up the Golden State Warriors. It compelled the Los Angeles Clippers to let Paul George walk for nothing instead of trading him and taking salary back. It's an "apron world" now, as Lakers general manager Rob Pelinka put it on Tuesday. All 30 teams are living in it.

With that reality is going to come a built-in excuse. Whenever a move that would have made sense in the old world doesn't happen, people are going to point to the CBA as the boogeyman that prevented it. This is happening, to some extent, to DeMar DeRozan.

DeRozan was an All-Star as recently as 2023. He nearly won Clutch Player of the Year last season. He hasn't yet experienced significant statistical decline. There was a time in NBA history that such a player would be among the most coveted on the entire free agent market. It isn't happening so far. "The kind of contract he might want just is not going to be available," ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski said Tuesday. "It's not left out there on the marketplace. The Bulls are more than willing to work out a sign-and-trade agreement to get him the years and money that he might want, but with the new salary cap rules, those are much more difficult for teams to do."

We're now several days into free agency. As of Tuesday night, only two teams have more than $20 million in cap space. Those teams are the Utah Jazz, who are either about to go into a rebuild, or use their cap space to renegotiate-and-extend the contract of Lauri Markkanen, and the Detroit Pistons who have more ball-handlers than they know what to do with and a serious lack of 3-point shooting to complement them. Neither appear to be obvious destinations.