The Hornets have signed all four of the prospects they selected in the 2025 NBA draft, the team announced today in a press release.
That group is headlined by Kon Knueppel, the No. 4 overall pick out of Duke, who was one of the best outside shooters in college basketball in 2024/25, knocking down 2.2 three-pointers per game at an elite rate of 40.6% as a freshman. He was a member of the All-ACC second team and was named this year’s ACC Tournament MVP.
Assuming Knueppel receives the maximum allowable 120% of his rookie scale amount, which is a virtual lock, his four-year deal will be worth $45.49MM. The first two years are guaranteed, with team options on years three and four.
The Hornets’ other first-round pick was UConn’s Liam McNeeley, who was drafted using the No. 29 overall pick that Charlotte acquired from Phoenix as part of the Mark Williams trade. 120% of McNeeley’s rookie scale slot works out to a four-year, $14.19MM deal.
McNeeley, 19, averaged 14.5 points, 6.0 rebounds, and 2.3 assists in 32.1 minutes per game for UConn in 27 outings (26 starts) as a freshman. He made just 38.1% of his field goal attempts and 31.7% of his three-pointers, though those struggles can be attributed in part to the Huskies playing without a traditional point guard.
The Hornets also had two of the top four picks in the second round, using No. 33 on Knueppel’s Blue Devils teammate Sion James and No. 34 on Creighton big man Ryan Kalkbrenner.
James, who spent four years at Tulane before playing his super-senior season at Duke, was a member of the ACC’s All-Defensive team this season and made a career-high 41.3% of his three-point shots, albeit on a relatively small sample (31-of-75). He received a four-year, $9.97MM contract worth the maximum amount of the second-round pick exception, per Michael Scotto of HoopsHype (Twitter link). That deal will be fully guaranteed for the first two seasons.
As for Kalkbrenner, details of his contract aren’t yet known, but it sounds like he signed a standard deal using the second-round exception too. There could be a path to playing time for the last of Charlotte’s four draft picks, given that the team doesn’t have much frontcourt depth at the moment, with Mason Plumlee and Moussa Diabate the only real options at center. That could change between now and the start of the regular season, however.
Kalkbrenner, who spent five years at Creighton, won four Big East Defensive Player of the Year awards and was named the Naismith Defensive Player of the Year for all of college basketball in 2025.
The Hornets will have a roster crunch to deal with at some point before the season begins. Once they complete all their reported transactions – including re-signing Tre Mann, acquiring Pat Connaughton, and adding Plumlee and Spencer Dinwiddie – they’ll have 16 players on guaranteed contracts and three more (including Diabate) on non-guaranteed deals.
The son of former NBA forward Samaki Walker and the 57th overall pick in the 2022 draft out of Colorado, Jabari Walker has spent his first three professional NBA seasons with the Trail Blazers. He played a significant role for the team in 2023/24, averaging 8.9 points and 7.1 rebounds in 23.6 minutes per game across 72 total outings (23 starts).
Lillard has received “ample” interest from teams since word broke that he was being 
New Orleans had carried over 
Hayes, 25, signed a two-year contract with the Lakers in 2023 and has appeared in 126 games for the team since then, averaging 5.4 points, 3.8 rebounds, and 0.6 blocks with a 72.1% field goal percentage in 15.6 minutes per night.
4:40 pm: The trade between Denver and Sacramento is expected to proceed as planned, according to Jake Fischer of The Stein Line (
Beal was the subject of trade rumors throughout the 2024/25 season and those rumors have carried over to the offseason. However, the $110.8MM he’s owed over the next two years have made it extremely difficult to find a trade partner, and the no-trade clause Beal holds further limits the Suns’ leverage, since he would need to approve any move.