Biggest winners and losers in free agency: 76ers now surging as rivals fall off

Winner: Oklahoma City is playing with the entire NBA

Oklahoma City, the second-youngest team in the NBA last season, notched the first seed in what was one of the most difficult Western Conferences in history. Naturally, they just became a much better team this summer without really moving a valuable assets that would make their fans flinch at the slightest.

As if trading Josh Giddey for Alex Caruso, one of the league’s premiere defenders, isn’t enough, the Thunder proceeded to rightfully overpay for Isaiah Hartenstein, a very impactful player last season for the Knicks. Now, they have addressed two of their most glaring weaknesses, and those players’ contracts are interspersed in between the limbo period where the front office is not yet on the clock to hand out massive extensions to Jalen Williams and Chet Holmgren.

OKC has Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, an MVP runner-up, a ton of assets to make a big swing in the near future, a squadron of three-and-D rotation players, two of the league’s brightest co-stars, and apparently, every single thing good on the planet right now. Name a team better equipped to succeed for more than a decade.