Predicting 6 breakout NBA players for the 2025-26 season
Let's dive into our list of NBA players we believe will break out in the 2025-26 season.
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Zaccharie Risacher, Atlanta Hawks
Credit: Dale Zanine-Imagn Images
Taken with the first overall pick in a 2024 NBA Draft class viewed as very weak, wing Zaccharie Risacher had a relatively quiet rookie season with the Atlanta Hawks. In his first 41 games, the 6-foot-8 forward averaged just 11 points per game, shooting 41.3 percent from the field and 30.2 percent from the perimeter. Once he settled in, though, RIsacher showed signs of an emerging player. In his final 34 contests, Risacher shot 50.8 percent from the field and 40.7 percent from beyond the arc, averaging 14.4 points per game. He just turned 20 years old in April and his arrow is pointing way up. Risacher is going to make the leap next season, averaging 15-plus PPG while providing above-average defense on the wing to help Atlanta become a top-four team in the Eastern Conference.
Related: NBA teams that improved the most this offseason
Toumani Camara, Portland Trail Blazers
Credit: Dale Zanine-Imagn Images
The Portland Trail Blazers struck gold in September 2023, acquiring Toumani Camara from the Phoenix Suns. After being selected with the 52nd overall pick just months earlier, the 6-foot-8 forward showed impressive flashes defensively as a rookie. He then took another step forward in his sophomore season, earning All-Defensive Second Team honors. Already regarded as one of the best wing defenders in the NBA, scoring is the next evolution of his game. After the All-Star Break, he shot 40.3 percent from beyond the arc, making 2.3 three-pointers per game and averaging 13.8 points per night. Poised to get more opportunities this season following the Anfernee Simons trade, Camara will put himself in the running for Most Improved Player, and he'll shoot 40 percent from three-point range while earning All-Defensive First Team honors with a rising Trail Blazers team.
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Related: NBA power rankings, evaluating every team
Jaylen Wells, Memphis Grizzlies
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Before suffering a fractured wrist, facial lacerations, and a concussion in April, the Memphis Grizzlies' second-round pick Jaylen Wells put himself in the mix for NBA Rookie of the Year. The 21-year-old wing was remarkable from November through January, averaging 12 PPG on strong shooting splits (45.4 percent from the field and 38.9 percent from the perimeter). He hit a rookie wall in his final 31 games, but the Grizzlies saw more than enough from him to trade Desmond Bane. Poised to receive more shots and minutes, Wells is set to be one of the best NBA players age 22 or younger next season.
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Jared McCain, Philadelphia 76ers
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Sacramento, California, could be responsible for a pair of breakout NBA players next season. Jaylen Wells, the 16th pick in the 2024 NBA Draft, looked every bit like a former five-star recruit in his rookie season. Meanwhile, Jared McCain, before suffering a meniscus tear in mid-December, led all rookies in scoring (15.3 PPG) and three-pointers made per game (2.2). He even scored 20-plus points in 35 percent of his games played during his debut season. While McCain will certainly have to share the ball more in his sophomore season on a healthier 76ers roster, his overall impact over a full season will lead to a breakthrough year.
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Read More: Best NBA players of all time
Amen Thompson, Houston Rockets
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For most of our breakout NBA player picks, it's about young talent emerging as key starters next season. With Houston Rockets wing Amen Thompson, it's about making the leap to stardom. He improved as a rebounder (from 6.6 to 8.2 RPG) and distributor (from 2.6 to 3.8 APG), but the most significant progress came as a shooter (from 53.6 percent to 55.7 percent). Across his final 37 regular-season games, Thompson averaged 16 points, 8 rebounds, 5 assists, and 3.2 stocks (steals plus blocks) per game. The 22-year-old also earned All-Defensive First Team honors. Next season, Thompson is poised to emerge as an All-Star and one of the best wings in the Western Conference.
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New York Post
17 minutes ago
- New York Post
Basketball pillar Rucker Park will forever have a long legacy through NBA stars
Marvin 'Hammer' Stevens surveys the court at Rucker Park from the shade of a tent by the baseline, shaking his head at the game of streetball before him. A player misses a layup, then grabs his own rebound and misses again. The bleachers are about half full on this warm summer evening. 'When we played, this was all different,' Stevens says, looking around. 'This is nothing compared to our games. No comparison.' That's not exactly a groundbreaking declaration. These days, Rucker mostly hosts summer youth leagues and local streetball tournaments. Fifty years ago, when Stevens played there, it was the summertime center of the basketball universe. 7 NBA draft prospects Victor Wembanyama and Bilal Coulibaly visit Rucker Park during 2023 NBA Draft week on June 21st, 2023. NBAE via Getty Images The legendary venue at 155th Street and Frederick Douglass Boulevard shaped the way basketball is played as we know it, according to many of the icons who passed through — including Julius 'Dr. J' Erving, one of the greatest to ever grace the Rucker courts. 'I would think Rucker had a great influence on the NBA,' Erving, 75, told The Post. 'Up-tempo style. Even defensively, there were isolations that you had to step up. You had to man up, or get booed. It was action-reaction, which is a fun style for fans.' In its golden era, the Rucker Pro League featured a mix of pro superstars and playground legends. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (then Lew Alcindor), Wilt Chamberlain and Willis Reed made appearances in the 1960s, before Erving and Nate 'Tiny' Archibald shared the court with local icons like Pee Wee Kirkland, Joe 'The Destroyer' Hammond and Stevens in the '70s. When Dr. J first played at the venue in 1971, he had just finished his second and final season at UMass, where college basketball regulations made it illegal to dunk, and impossible for Erving to put his athleticism on full display. 7 Julius 'Dr. J' Erving at Rucker Park Rucker Pro Legends The Rucker league provided the opposite experience. Fans waited in hourslong lines to see players like Erving dunk, and they'd boo if a player passed up a slam for a layup on a fast break. Erving thinks the environment helped him develop into the player basketball fans came to revere. 'It was like the chains coming off,' Erving, who played at Rucker for five summers, said. 'OK, not worried about what the coach has to say. We're not worried about what, really, the officials have to say, because they're on our team now.' Dr. J played for the Westsiders, a team coached by longtime basketball columnist Peter Vecsey, alongside point guard Roland 'Fatty' Taylor, a quick, shifty point guard who loved to run the floor. 'He really could push the ball,' Erving said. 'So getting used to that, my college experience wasn't filled with that. I don't think I remember catching the ball at full speed the way I was able to at the Rucker.' 7 Michael Jordan looks on as young athletes practice during the World Basketball Festival at Rucker Park on August 13, 2010 in New York City. Getty Images for Nike Erving took that style to the ABA when he joined the Virginia Squires in 1971, and he helped bring a run-and-gun brand of hoops to the NBA when he joined the 76ers after the 1976 NBA-ABA merger. 'He became a franchise player in the NBA from playing at Rucker,' said Kirkland, who had several highly anticipated battles with Dr. J in Harlem in the early '70s. 'Because just as much as he brought to people there, that's what they were bringing to him.' Vecsey, then a young, ambitious sportswriter, deserves much of the credit for making it happen. Vecsey became infatuated with the Rucker after reading Pete Axthelm's 1970 book 'The City Game,' which covered the title-winning 1969-70 Knicks, but also the Rucker tournament and the city's culture of playground basketball. He wanted in. A former Hofstra basketball player, Vecsey convinced co-commissioners Bob McCullough and Freddie Crawford to let him start a team, and he persuaded Nets owner Roy Boe to put up $300 for the squad before the summer of 1971. Vecsey then met with Erving and his best friend, Dave Brownbill, at Rucker to see if the then-21-year-old wanted to play on his team, which would become the Westsiders. 7 Rucker Park legends Joe Hammond, left, and Pee Wee Kirkland, right, are seen during a preview of the upcoming playoffs of the Entertainer Basketball Classic, Monday, Aug. 11, 2003, at the NBA store in New York. Rucker Park is the legendary home to New York's great street ball tournament. AP Photo 'How much are we going to get paid?' Erving asked Vecsey, who replied that as far as he knew, nobody would be getting a penny. After taking a walk around the park to discuss, Brownbill and Erving told Vecsey: 'OK. Let's go.' Almost instantly, Erving's presence brought the Rucker atmosphere to a new level. Fans did anything and everything to catch a glimpse. Kids crawled along tree branches. Schoolboys dangled off the roof of the neighboring elementary school and perched on top of the fence lining the court. Residents of the nearby Polo Grounds Towers watched from windows. The unlucky ones? They peered down from the elevated portion of 155th Street. 7 Shaquille O'Neal speaks with reporters while guest coaching Team MMG at Rucker Park on July 9, 2013. Getty Images 'Other than Madison Square Garden,' Erving said, 'there didn't seem to be any more significant a place to play.' Erving would use extra caution to navigate the court, because the first few rows of seating often bled onto the floor itself. 'The court was reduced in size, even in the feel of the size of the court, because people were so close to you,' Erving said. 'That was a real live experience that I think made a difference in terms of the energy level, action, reaction.' To replicate that experience today would be almost impossible. For one, the then-small oak trees surrounding the court now tower over the park, blocking the view from the elementary school and the 155th Street overpass. And although Kobe Bryant (2002) and Kevin Durant (2011) played in one-off pickup games at Rucker, NBA players are far more hesitant to play on pavement because of the potential for injury. 7 Kevin Durant celebrates after dunking during EBC Basketball game against Sean Bell Allstars, at Rucker Park (155th Street), August 1st, 2011. Robert Cole Still, the spirit of the place remains. On a recent summer evening, a live DJ spun remixes of Drake and Lil Wayne songs at a game of organized streetball, with an on-court emcee, Larry King Agee, acting as a hybrid of a play-by-play announcer and a comedian. 'Shoutout to all the beautiful people out here tonight,' Agee exclaimed into the mic before tipoff. 'And if you're ugly, we appreciate you too.' 7 Kobe Bryant attends the World Basketball Festival at Rucker Park on August 14, 2010 in New York City. Getty Images for Nike That quip had Maurice Portis, a Bronx resident, chuckling from the stands. He's a personal trainer who visited Harlem to watch his friend play, and to scout things out before making his Rucker debut in a few weeks. Like everyone else in attendance, he's well aware of the history. 'It's probably not like it used to be,' Portis said, 'but when you come in here and you put on that uniform, it's something to be proud of.'
Forbes
19 minutes ago
- Forbes
How Many Max Contracts Should The NBA Have Each Year?
As frequent readers of my work are well aware, the financial side of the game is nearly as important as the actual product on the court. Time and time again, we see that the best teams are those that get the best value for their investment. Recently, in an article focused on examining De'Aaron Fox's new extension, I discussed the 'Flawed Star' dilemma that is killing teams around the league. By my definition, a flawed star is a player who is being paid maximum-level money but doesn't necessarily produce at that level. This got me thinking: How many players truly deserve a max contract? Our Methodology For this exercise, we are going to reverse engineer the formula I normally use to estimate a player's yearly monetary value (production*value of a win = estimated production value). First, we will take the maximum salary cap each team is allotted in a given season. For example, in 2024-25, that number was 140.6 million. Then, we divide that number by 41 (since the average team would theoretically go 41-41 in a given season). From there, quick math tells us that a win was worth 3.4 million dollars that season. FEATURED | Frase ByForbes™ Unscramble The Anagram To Reveal The Phrase Pinpoint By Linkedin Guess The Category Queens By Linkedin Crown Each Region Crossclimb By Linkedin Unlock A Trivia Ladder After that, we take the 30% max salary for that season (42.2 million in 2024-25) and divide it by 3.4, which gives us 12.4. So, to be 'worth' a max contract in 2024-25, you need to provide your team with at least 12.4 wins. According to the website Dunks & Threes, seven players eclipsed that threshold in 2024-25, yet 24 players were paid at least 30% of their team's salary cap. We then rinsed and repeated this arithmetic for every season all the way back to 2012-13 (Spotrac's leaguewide salary data only goes back to 2011-12, and that season was a lockout, so we cut our analysis off at 2012-13 to keep things nice and clean). What We Found Now, without further ado, here is what we found: There are two interesting epochs at play here. From 2019 to 2025, we had an average of 17.7 players per year being paid max contracts, despite only 7.7 players providing enough value to warrant that type of payment. Juxtapose this with the data we gathered from 2012 to 2019, and during that period, only eight players per year were earning max money. However, based on our equation, 14.3 players deserved to be paid the highest dollar amount teams can offer. Right now, the league has something of a salary cap epidemic – there are more max contracts out there than there are max players; hence, the emergence of the flawed star category that gave rise to this entire article in the first place. But it wasn't always like this. For most of the 2010s, there weren't enough max contracts for the number of max players in the league. So, what's going on? The league's tendency to over-index on precedent has led to the current financial conundrum we are seeing teams face today. In negotiations, a player can cite a past player of similar caliber getting a max contract and demand that they receive the same. It doesn't matter that said player wasn't qualified for this illustrious designation. The fact that they got it is convincing enough. In the future, a smart team would be wise to reject the status quo and not automatically give a very good player a contract they can't meet the expectations of simply because that is the perceived going rate of a player in today's financial landscape. Not only are there more max contracts out there than there were a half decade ago, but there are also fewer max-level performers. What's causing this? Unfortunately, I don't have as firm an answer to this riddle. My guess is it is some combination of an increase in load management causing players to miss more games/play fewer minutes (remember, contracts are handed out for regular season production, not the playoffs) and the growing injury crisis many fear is taking shape. Examining this subject matter further would be a great follow-up to this article. In any event, one thing is clear after this experiment: there are too many max contracts circulating around the NBA world right now, and teams need to tighten up their spending.
Yahoo
35 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Twins reinstate Byron Buxton from injured list to start series vs. Yankees
NEW YORK (AP) — The Minnesota Twins reinstated center fielder Byron Buxton from the 10-day injured list on Monday before beginning a three-game series against the New York Yankees, after the All-Star missed 13 games with inflammation in his left rib cage. Buxton was sidelined just before the Twins tore down their roster leading to the trade deadline. He was batting .282 with 68 runs, 23 homers, 59 RBIs and a .905 OPS in 85 games when he went on the IL, all team-leading totals and averages among players with a qualifying amount of at-bats. The Twins sent outfielder Carson McCusker to Triple-A St. Paul to make room for Buxton, who also has stolen 17 bases in 17 attempts. Despite the rib cage issue and a concussion that cost him time earlier, Buxton has been as healthy as he has in several seasons. He's on pace for the second-most games in his 11-year major league career, behind the 140 games he played in in 2017. ___ AP MLB: The Associated Press
