Although currently under contract with Milwaukee through the 2026–27 season and a player option worth $62.8 million for 2027–28, Giannis Antetokounmpo has been pointedly clear about his desire to compete for championships every year, not just stay for the sake of comfort. In 2023, for instance, he said, “If there is a better situation for me to win the Larry O’Brien, I have to take that better situation”. And well, the Bucks have now gone three straight seasons without a Conference Finals appearance and despite speculation about Giannis’ future, no trade request has emerged. 

The Bucks, despite retaining Brook Lopez on a one-year, veteran-heavy deal and extending Jae Crowder, have waived Damian Lillard, ending a costly partnership less than two seasons after acquiring him. With Khris Middleton still under contract through 2026 at over $30 million per year, and no unencumbered first-round picks until 2031 due to the Lillard and Holiday trades, Milwaukee’s roster now skews older, thinner, and asset-depleted. Their 2025 playoff exit in the first round marked the second straight year they failed to advance past Round 1.

Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Lakers have taken an unusually quiet approach to the 2025 offseason. They’ve declined to use their non-taxpayer mid-level exception, passed on replacing mid-tier salary slots vacated by players like Taurean Prince, and avoided multi-year deals, despite acquiring Luka Dončić earlier this year. Their financial restraint stands in contrast to most contending teams. Complicating matters further is LeBron James’ $51.4 million salary for 2025–26, the final guaranteed year of his deal. While James has expressed interest in finishing his career in Los Angeles, no formal extension or succession plan has been communicated by the team. Many speculate if Lakers might be keeping their cap space free to acquire the Greek Freak. Only Rob Pelinka. Could navigate a maze like that. Except, this time, Pelinka has a speculative framework in hand from Anthony Irwin, host of the Lakers Lounge podcast. 

“To me, I think the best approach to landing those players is to actually employ as many good basketball players as the Lakers can on good contracts that a team would then trade for,” Irwin explained. Under the NBA’s salary-matching rules, teams over the cap can only take back salaries within roughly 125% + $100K of what they send out. By accumulating contracts—regardless of fit—that expire soon, the Lakers could assemble significant trade leverage, even if it appears at first to impede current rotation quality. He added a pointed critique of public messaging:

“Because whenever all of these guys get traded, the owner always releases the statement, ‘We aren’t tanking, we’re trying to win right away, we’ll show you, you son of a bee’—it’s always really cute.” Continuing, Irwin highlighted a specific potential piece: “I wouldn’t mind trading for Wiggins… that you could use to match salaries if Giannis did ask to go to the Lakers,”

Andrew Wiggins is on a $30.4 million contract for 2025–26, with a player option for 2026–27. Acquiring that deal would give the Lakers a clean, matchable asset for a blockbuster Giannis trade, far more valuable to that end than most current role players.  Co-host Pete Zayas then reminded listeners of a key nuance: “Well, you don’t actually have to match salary with Giannis.” But Irwin followed with a sober clarification: “No, I know—like whatever I would need to use, I don’t think the Lakers can open up, especially if Ayton plays well; I don’t know if they’ll have $70 million in cap space—I don’t know.”

With DeAndre Ayton earning $34 million next season, and both LeBron and Luka consuming much of the cap, the Lakers are far from generating the $70M+ in flexibility needed to absorb a max-level contract like Giannis’s outright. Which means, unless they offload multiple large deals, contract leverage—not cash—may be their only path.

Giannis’s “Probably” Was Strategic, Not Sentimental

On a June livestream with YouTuber IShowSpeed, Giannis Antetokounmpo delivered a succinct yet loaded statement in response to whether he’d stay in Milwaukee: “Probably. Probably, we’ll see. Probably, I love Milwaukee.” The repetition of “probably” flanked by “we’ll see” is being read by league insiders not as a definitive declaration, but rather strategic hedging. NBC Sports’ Kurt Helin observed that this pattern echoes Giannis’s 2020 and 2023 summers, strategic moments when he deployed calculated ambiguity to push Milwaukee into roster upgrades. Indeed, shortly after expressing similar sentiments in past seasons, he received core reinforcements: the Bucks traded for Jrue Holiday in 2020 and signed Myles Turner in 2025—moves widely seen as direct responses to his passive signals. 

Brian Windhorst echoed this in Get Up, explaining that teams interpret this as a live wire: “The thing about it is… he didn’t give a definitive answer… the ‘we’ll see’ is essentially what five or six NBA teams are banking on.” And yet, Lakers, Clippers, and Spurs might just be preparing trade models based on just this type of wording in past offseasons. For L.A., this means internal conversations aren’t fueled by hope—they’re grounded in the logical anticipation that “I love Milwaukee” could turn into “I’m open to moving”, and they’re ready to act.