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With the 2021 NBA Trade Deadline in the rearview mirror, which teams decided to build for the future?
The 2021 NBA Trade Deadline saw a league-record 16 deals go down, and while there weren’t any signature, blockbuster moves, plenty of playoff-caliber teams improved their rotations and made a wide-open title race even more up for grabs.
However, not everyone went all in on adding talent for the here and now. The harsh reality is that not every team in the NBA can be competitive year in and year out, and in any given season, there will always be clear division between the contenders, playoff hopefuls and bottom-feeders.
While that third group isn’t our only focus today, it’s worth taking a look at which teams decided to build for the future at Thursday’s trade deadline in order to understand the logic behind the moves they made, how those decisions might pan out in the long run, and how they could backfire.
Without further ado, here are three teams that built for the future at the 2021 NBA Trade Deadline.