The NBA announced that the salary cap has been set at $154.647 million for the 2025-26 season, while the tax level is $187.895 million. The first apron level is set at $195.945 million, and the second apron level is $207.824 million. The salary cap and tax level went into effect at 12:01 a.m. ET on Tuesday.

Because of new rules regarding trade exceptions and other factors, we can expect deals like this to happen much more often.

Happy midweek, everyone! John Breech is taking the day to process our wild trade idea involving the Bengals (more on that below), so today's Pick Six newsletter is brought to you by Cody Benjamin, with tidbits on all the latest from around the NFL.

Kristaps Porziņģi said he's "super, super excited" about his post-trade prospects. After two years with the Boston Celtics , Porziņģis was traded to the Atlanta Hawks in a three-team trade that saw the Celtics receive George Niang and a second-round draft pick.

The Houston Rockets moved Heaven and Earth to land Kevin Durant. Here are the full details from this insane seven-team trade.

Got all that? Good. As the Thunder have neither paid the tax nor gone above the second apron yet, this means they are still four taxpaying seasons away from the repeater penalty and three second apron seasons away from seeing a first-round pick drop to No. 30 overall. This begs the question of when that cycle will actually start for them.

The Utah Jazz recently engaged in a three-team trade with the Miami Heat and the Los Angeles Clippers, where they parted ways with John Collins to receive Kyle Anderson, Kevin Love, and a 2027 second-round pick.

The Detroit Pistons recently traded Italian forward Simone Fontecchio to the Miami Heat as part of a sign-and-trade to acquire Duncan Robinson. In a recent interview with Italian newspaper Il Centro, Fontecchio opened up about the trade and a key memory of his early days with the Pistons.