In the end, the Miami Heat did not trade away its first round pick in this year’s NBA Draft. Instead, the Heat used its first-round selection to add to its young core.
The Heat took Illinois guard Kasparas Jakucionis with the 20th overall pick in Wednesday night’s NBA Draft held at Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
With the Heat making a first-round selection in each of the last three drafts (Nikola Jovic in 2022, Jaime Jaquez Jr. in 2023 and Kel’el Ware in 2024), this marks the first time in two decades that the Heat has come out of four consecutive drafts with a first-round pick. The last time it happened came when it took Caron Butler in 2002, Dwyane Wade in 2003, Dorell Wright in 2004 and Wayne Simien in 2005.
Jakucionis (6-foot-5 and 205 pounds), who grew up in Lithuania, just turned 19 in May and comes with upside. He was projected by many before the draft to be a lottery pick, but ended up falling to the Heat at No. 20.
Jakucionis averaged 15 points, 5.7 rebounds and 4.7 assists per game while shooting 44% from the field and 31.8% from three-point range as a freshman at Illinois last season.
Jakucionis is a skilled player who checks a lot of boxes on offense end, as he’s an excellent playmaker, has the potential to be a quality outside shooter and has a knack for drawing fouls as an attacker.
One of the biggest questions surrounding Jakucionis is whether his lack of elite athleticism limits his upside at the NBA level. According to The Athletic, Jakucionis had zero half-court dunks at Illinois last season.
Among those the Heat bypassed to draft Jakucionis at No. 20 were Colorado State wing Nique Clifford, Saint Joseph big Rasheer Fleming, Spanish wing Hugo Gonzalez, Illinois guard Kasparas Jakucionis, Creighton big Ryan Kalkbrenner, UConn wing Liam McNeeley, Georgia big Asa Newell, French wing Noah Penda, North Carolina wing Drake Powell, Stanford big Maxime Raynaud, Michigan State guard Jase Richardson, Illinois wing Will Riley, Israeli guard Ben Saraf, Arkansas wing Adou Thiero and Michigan big Danny Wolf.
According to the NBA’s scouting report on Jakucionis, he’s “an adept playmaker capable of scoring or passing from anywhere on the floor. At 6-foot-6 with good footwork, feel for the game and shooting touch, he can play many roles, including that of a primary playmaker. He easily sets up his teammates, threading the needle for easy scoring opportunities. Despite not being an elite athlete, Jakučionis can also create his shot with quality dribbling, hesitation moves and a developing stepback jumper. His understanding of angles and advantages allowed him to average 5.1 free throw attempts per game. On defense, he isn’t elite but is solid enough to thrive in a scheme.”
The NBA’s Scouting Report added Jakucionis “projects as a combo guard in the NBA, though one who may be more comfortable as a passer than a scorer out of the gate. That gives him a high floor as a potential sixth man early on, if not a starter. In terms of play style, he shares similarities with players like Austin Reaves and Goran Dragic.”
Jakucionis is still eligible to be included as part of a potential trade this offseason. However, Jakucionis won’t be eligible to be traded for 30 days after signing his rookie contract, which can happen starting on Tuesday.
Jakucionis is slotted to make about $3.7 million this upcoming season as the 20th pick and will be under team control for five seasons. Next up for Jakucionis is likely summer league basketball with the Heat in San Francisco and Las Vegas, with the team scheduled to travel to the West Coast next week to begin summer league practices.
As for other teams around the Eastern Conference who picked ahead of the Heat, the Philadelphia 76ers took Baylor guard VJ Edgecombe at No. 3, the Charlotte Hornets selected Duke wing Kon Knueppel at No. 4, the Washington Wizards drafted Texas wing Tre Johnson at No. 6, the Brooklyn Nets took BYU guard Egor Demin at No. 8, the Toronto Raptors selected South Carolina big Collin Murray-Boyles at No. 9, the Chicago Bulls drafted French big Noa Essengue at No. 12, and the Brooklyn Nets took French guard Nolan Traore at No. 19.
Florida guard Walter Clayton Jr. entered the night with multiple mock drafts projecting him to go to the Heat at No. 20. But Clayton was off the board before the Heat’s selection, as the Utah Jazz acquired him with the 18th pick.
The Heat took Jakucionis with the 20th overall pick that it acquired from the Golden State Warriors in the February Jimmy Butler trade. Meanwhile, the Heat’s own pick at No. 15 on Wednesday was used by the NBA champion Oklahoma City Thunder to select Georgetown big Thomas Sorber.
The Thunder received the Heat’s No. 15 pick this year because Miami owed a 2025 lottery-protected first-round selection to Oklahoma City — a pick first sent out by the Heat in the 2019 trade to acquire Butler.
The Heat does not hold a pick in the second round of this year’s draft, which will take place on Thursday (8 ET, ESPN). There remains the possibility of the Heat buying or trading for a second-round selection, but the fact that any team that purchases a second-round pick becomes hard-capped at the second apron for the entirety of that upcoming season will likely create some pause for Miami.
WHERE HEAT’S ROSTER STANDS
The Heat’s current salary-cap breakdown includes 13 players on standard contracts with partially guaranteed or fully guaranteed salaries for next season: Bam Adebayo ($37.1 million), Tyler Herro ($31 million), Andrew Wiggins ($28.2 million), Terry Rozier ($24.9 million of $26.6 million salary currently guaranteed), Kyle Anderson ($9.2 million), Haywood Highsmith ($5.6 million), Jovic ($4.4 million), Ware ($4.4 million), Kevin Love ($4.2 million), Jaquez ($3.9 million) Jakucionis ($3.7 million), Pelle Larsson ($978,000 of $2 million salary currently guaranteed) and Keshad Johnson ($2 million).
If three-point shooting forward Duncan Robinson bypasses the early-termination option on his $19.9 million salary for next season, as expected, he would become the 14th Heat player on that list and put the Heat just one player short of the 15-man regular-season limit for an NBA standard roster. Robinson has until Sunday to exercise the early-termination option on his $19.9 million salary for next season and become an unrestricted free agent this summer.
If Robinson doesn’t exercise the early-termination option in his deal by the Sunday deadline, he would then have $9.9 million of his $19.9 million salary for next season guaranteed and the the final $10 million of his salary would become guaranteed if he’s still on the Heat’s roster after July 8.
Assuming Robinson skips the early-termination option in his contract and the Heat then guarantees his full $19.9 million salary along with the full salaries of Rozier and Larsson, the Heat has about $182.2 million in salaries committed to 14 players for next season.
When adding the $2.5 million in unlikely bonuses for Herro that need to be included for apron calculations, that Heat will have about $184.7 million in salaries committed to 14 players for next season.
With the projected salary cap for the 2025-26 season set at $154.6 million and the projected luxury tax set at $187.9 million, that means the Heat is just $3.2 million away from entering luxury tax territory for the third straight season and still has one roster spot to fill. But the Heat does have some breathing room from the punitive first apron of $195.9 million and the dreaded second apron of $207.8 million.
With no cap space, this leaves the Heat with only minimum contracts, one of the mid-level exceptions (either the $14.1 million non-taxpayer midlevel exception or the $5.7 million taxpayer million mid-level exception) and possibly the $5.1 million bi-annual exception to offer outside free agents. The Heat can also make a trade to add outside talent to the roster.
But using any portion of the larger $14.1 million non-taxpayer midlevel exception or the $5.1 million bi-annual exception would hard cap the Heat at the first apron for all of this upcoming season and erase some of its financial flexibility. Using the smaller $5.7 million taxpayer midlevel exception would hard cap the Heat at the second apron for all of next season.
Considering that the expectation is the Heat will try to get under the luxury tax line this upcoming season, being hard capped at either apron shouldn’t be a problem for Miami. After finishing each of the last two seasons as a luxury tax team, the Heat needs to find a way to avoid the luxury tax in at least one of the next two seasons to avoid the the onerous repeater tax that’s triggered when a team crosses the luxury tax threshold in four straight seasons or four times during a five-season period.
The list of players from the Heat’s season-ending roster who will be free agents this summer includes guard Josh Christopher (unrestricted free agent), guard Alec Burks (unrestricted free agent), guard Davion Mitchell (restricted free agent), guard Dru Smith (restricted free agent) and guard Stevens (unrestricted free agent). Robinson could join that list and become an unrestricted free agent this summer if he exercises the early-termination option in his contract before Sunday’s deadline.
One way to free additional room under the luxury tax threshold is for the Heat to waive Robinson before the July 8 deadline, creating $10 million in savings since only $9.9 million of his $19.9 million salary for next season would then be guaranteed. The Heat could also make a trade to slash some salary.
NBA teams were allowed to begin negotiating with their own impending free agents this past Monday after the NBA Finals ended. But free agents can’t begin negotiating with outside teams until this upcoming Monday at 6 p.m.