Current NBA Waiver Order

Waiver claims don’t happen very often in the NBA. During the 2016/17 league year, for instance, only six players were claimed off waivers. So far in 2017/18, four players – David Nwaba, Nicolas Brussino, Kay Felder, and DeAndre Liggins – have been claimed off waivers.

Nwaba, Brussino, Felder, and Liggins have something in common; they’re all on minimum salary contracts. While a player earning more than the minimum can also be claimed off waivers, not every NBA team has the ability to claim any waived player. In fact, there are only a few instances when teams can claim a player who is earning more than the minimum salary, which is one reason why waiver claims rarely happen.

A team placing a waiver claim on a player earning more than the minimum must have one of the following to accommodate the player’s salary:

• Cap room
• A trade exception
• A disabled player exception

As I noted on Sunday, a player like Mindaugas Kuzminskas is a candidate to be claimed, but his odds of being snatched up before reaching free agency would be much higher if he were on a minimum salary contract. Teams will be reluctant to take on his $3MM salary, and only half the NBA’s teams are even eligible to place a claim on him.

When considering which teams might place a claim on a waived player, it’s also worth noting that waiver priority is determined by record — the worst teams get first dibs on each waived player. Prior to December 1, waiver order is currently determined by last year’s record. That will change in a few weeks, but for now, a team’s 2016/17 record determines its waiver priority.

Taking all the details above into account, the current NBA waiver order is listed below. We’ve also noted which teams can place a claim on a player earning more than the minimum salary. If two teams that finished 2016/17 with identical records place a waiver claim on the same player, their head-to-head records would determine which team gets priority. If they split their head-to-head matchups, a coin flip determines which team gets priority.

Here’s the full list of teams, in order of current waiver priority:

1. Brooklyn Nets ($3,396,169; cap room)
2. Phoenix Suns ($8,948,187; cap room)
3. Los Angeles Lakers
4. Philadelphia 76ers ($15,120,873; cap room)
5. Orlando Magic
6. Minnesota Timberwolves
   (tie) New York Knicks ($2,381,964; TPE)
8. Sacramento Kings ($4,254,216; cap room)
9. Dallas Mavericks ($12,526,578; cap room)
   • Note: Mavericks would need to renounce their exceptions to use cap room.
10. New Orleans Pelicans ($3,853,931; TPE)
11. Charlotte Hornets
12. Detroit Pistons
13. Denver Nuggets
14. Miami Heat
    (tie) Portland Trail Blazers ($12,969,502; TPE)
    (tie) Chicago Bulls ($11,457,398; TPE)
    • Note: Bulls could get up to $15,046,009 in cap room by renouncing exceptions.
17. Indiana Pacers ($6,126,114; cap room)
    (tie) Milwaukee Bucks ($5,000,000; TPE)
19. Atlanta Hawks
    (tie) Memphis Grizzlies ($3,408,520; TPE)
21. Oklahoma City Thunder
22. Washington Wizards
23. Cleveland Cavaliers ($5,811,114; TPE)
    (tie) Los Angeles Clippers ($7,273,631; TPE)
    (tie) Toronto Raptors ($11,800,000; TPE)
    (tie) Utah Jazz
27. Boston Celtics ($8,406,000; DPE)
28. Houston Rockets
29. San Antonio Spurs
30. Golden State Warriors

Salary information from Basketball Insiders used in the creation of this post.