Are the 2020 LA Clippers the best NBA team money can buy?

Lou Williams – $8,000,000

We are not entering another interesting range of player salaries where the Clippers’ players earning in these ranges will be solid veteran role players which we’ll be evaluating against a mix of the same type of player as well as young, top draft picks on their rookie deals. Of course, many of these would be hands-down one-way swaps where we’d trade the Clippers away for a young, up-and-coming superstar, but the other team would never even thinking about making such a deal.

Lou Williams $8.0 million contract means that we’ll be evaluating him against players making between $10.0 million and $6.4 million this season.

The full list of players in that salary range:

Tomas Satoransky, DeAndre Jordan, Taj Gibson, Zion Williamson, Markelle Fultz, John Henson, Matthew Dellavedova, Dante Exum, Deandre Ayton, Delon Wright, Jerami Grant, Al-Farouq Aminu, George Hill, Kyle Anderson, Fred VanVleet, Ja Morant, C.J. Miles, Lonzo Ball, E’Twaun Moore, Marvin Bagley, Bogdan Bogdanovic, Tyus Jones, P.J. Tucker, Cristiano Felicio, Ben Simmons, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Maxi Klebar, Elfrid Payton, Thomas Bryant, RJ Barrett, Jayson Tatum, Jae Crowder, Wayne Ellington, Luka Doncic, Joe Harris, Seth Curry, Doug McDermott, Langston Galloway, Derrick Rose, Brandon Ingram, D.J. Augustin, Darrius Miller, De’Andre Hunter, Josh Jackson, Davis Bertans, Ersan Ilyasova, Jaren Jackson, DeMarre Carroll, Nemanja Bjelica, Jaylen Brown, Jabari Parker, Ivica Zubac, Darius Garland.

We’ll quickly list the no-brainer, one-way deals for young stars here. Of course the Clippers would swap Williams straight-up for proven young stars: Zion Williamson, Ja Morant, Ben Simmons, Jayson Tatum, Luka Doncic, Brandon Ingram, Jaren Jackson, and Jaylen Brown. The same goes for not-yet-proven but major upside players: Deandre Ayton, Marvin Bagley, RJ Barrett, and De’Andre Hunter.

What we’re more interested in in the veteran-for-veteran swaps. It would take a lot to convince the Clippers to part with their two-time defending Sixth Man of the Year. Here’s who we’d say yes to:

Fred VanVleet

The 26-year-old point guard is making $9.0 million this year but is due for a major salary increase when he hits free agency this offseason. We say yes to this swap before his price goes up.

Bogdan Bogdanovic

The 27-year-old guard brings a little more size and versatility to the team that Williams, and is five years his junior. We wouldn’t blame you if you said no here, though.