Next move Nuggets must make after trading Peyton Watson to Cavs

The Denver Nuggets may be the team that has been affected negatively the most by the existence of the second apron in the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement. It does become expensive to keep a championship core together, regardless of era, but the Nuggets seemingly have had to make more difficult decisions than most. On Wednesday, the Nuggets had to bid farewell to Peyton Watson, a talented forward they developed after taking him in the draft.

The Nuggets signed and traded Watson to the Cleveland Cavaliers and got the Cavs’ 2031 first-round pick along with a 2032 second-round pick. This feels like a very light return for someone who was blossoming into a legitimate star during the middle of the 2025-26 season, but the second apron and the luxury tax penalties the Nuggets were to receive had they kept Watson made re-signing him an impossible task.

Watson signed a four-year, $88 million contract, and fitting in another $22 million on Denver’s cap sheet would have jumped from a slightly manageable $68 million to an untenable $220 million after factoring in repeater penalties. This would have required the Nuggets ownership to fork over nearly $500 million in cap plus tax obligations, and they clearly did not want to do so.

Losing Watson is huge for a Nuggets team that has had depth problems over the past few seasons. They are trying to find their next big contributor from the bargain bin, but at this point, trading one of their big salaries might be the way instead if they were to extend their contending timeline with Nikola Jokic.

Nuggets’ next move: Trade 1 of Aaron Gordon/Christian Braun/Cam Johnson 

Building a contending team in the second apron landscape of the NBA requires making difficult decisions. The Oklahoma City Thunder had to dump the salaries of Lu Dort, Isaiah Joe, and Aaron Wiggins — three contributors in their championship-winning team in 2025 — just so they could duck the luxury tax. The Boston Celtics surprisingly traded Jaylen Brown away to avoid running into the problem of not having enough space under the second apron to re-sign him eventually.

The Nuggets already made their version of that difficult decision in 2025, when they traded Michael Porter Jr., a solid starting-caliber player, to the Brooklyn Nets for Cam Johnson to reduce their cap obligations. This opened up room for them to trade for Jonas Valanciunas and sign depth pieces like Tim Hardaway Jr. and Bruce Brown.

However, they should not be done making sacrifices just yet. As much as the Nuggets brass would want to keep their core together, something has to give. Next year, Jokic will be eligible to sign a five-year $359.5 million contract when he hits free agency. That would cut even further into the Nuggets’ apron space.

Adding in the fact that Murray is making over $53 million next year and Aaron Gordon is making over $34.5 million, and the Nuggets already project to be just a few million dollars under the salary cap with just three players.

That’s without taking into account Braun’s huge contract that pays him a total of $125 million, which starts next season. With just four players, Denver will already be way over the cap, with only around $15 million or so to spare before they cross the luxury tax threshold. (This is assuming that Jokic re-signs with the team. Jokic choosing to leave in free agency would be an unmitigated disaster.)

Suffice to say, the Nuggets would want to trade at least one of Murray, Gordon, Braun, or Johnson to at least spread the wealth around the roster. They would want to keep Murray, one would assume, considering that the two-man game between him and Jokic remains the beating heart of this team.

That leaves Gordon, Braun, and Johnson on the trading block.

As painful as it may be, the Nuggets will have to heavily consider trading Gordon. Gordon, when healthy, is a game-changing player — the perfect complement to Jokic. But Gordon’s health has been on the decline over the past few seasons.

He played just 51 games during the 2024-25 campaign, injured his hamstring in the playoffs after giving it his all, and he was limited all throughout the 2025-26 season, playing in just 36 contests. Gordon couldn’t even stay healthy in the playoffs, suiting up in just three games for the Nuggets in their first-round defeat to the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Gordon is an easy fit on any team with contending aspirations. Maybe the Atlanta Hawks would want to consolidate some of their depth to acquire him. Perhaps the Portland Trail Blazers revisit their interest in the 30-year-old forward. But the Nuggets will, without a doubt, be a worse team if they trade away Gordon. He is Mr. Nugget, after all, and perhaps a long offseason of rest would do his body a world of good.

At the end of the day, the most obvious trade candidates for the Nuggets are Braun and Johnson. Zeke Nnaji is also an obvious salary dump candidate, but Denver would have traded him ages ago had they actually found any willing takers for him.

Braun’s contract is looking like a bad deal for the Nuggets; he averaged 12/5/3 last season, his shooting splits got worse last season, and he couldn’t stay healthy for much of last season.

However, there may not be too many teams willing to pay that much for someone who hasn’t proven to be a self-sufficient impact player in his brief career thus far. He has only known life with Jokic; will he still be a quality role player even apart from the Nuggets system, or will he flop completely?

These are the problems the Nuggets must have run into this offseason. They must have wanted to keep Watson, especially after he averaged 20.7 points per game during a 21-game stretch from December 2025 to February 2026.

But Braun will return little to no value right now on the trade market, and they must have felt that getting whatever they can from him at that price point is better than what they would get from him in a trade (if they get anything in the first place).

Maybe trading Johnson is the way. Johnson is in the final year of his deal, so it’s not like the Nuggets will need to attach assets to get rid of him.

Perhaps Johnson could net the Nuggets at least one cost-controlled contributor who can help alleviate their luxury tax woes. Getting something of value for him might also be better instead of running into the same issues yet again next offseason as they did this year with Watson’s free agency.

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