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The murmurs amongst league sources started late Friday night, bleeding into Saturday morning. Something was close. Keon Ellis’ time with the Sacramento Kings was coming to an end.

The Kings are in agreement on a trade that sends Ellis, along with veteran point guard Dennis Schröder to the Cleveland Cavaliers in exchange for De’Andre Hunter. As part of the trade, the Chicago Bulls are taking on the expiring contract of Dario Saric and a pair of second round selections, one each from the Kings and Cavs.

Michael Scotto from Hoops Hype was first with the framework of the deal and ESPN’s Shams Charania broke the official trade.

The nuts and bolts of the deal are pretty simple. The combined contracts of Ellis ($2.3 million), Schröder ($14.1 million) and Saric ($5.4 million) equal roughly $21.8 million. Hunter makes $23.3 million this season and another $24.9 million next season.

Hunter’s $24.9 million for next season is an issue that the Kings will have to figure out. It’s an increase of $10.9 million over the $14.8 million Schröder was set to make. Both Ellis and Saric were on expiring contracts. As of now, the Kings project as a tax paying team next season with Keegan Murray’s extension kicking in, although the team has plenty of time to address that situation.

To finish off the trade specifics, Sacramento sent the 2029 second round pick they acquired in the Schröder sign-and-trade to the Bulls to compensate for taking on Saric’s money. The second rounder is the least favorable of the Pistons, Bucks and Knicks picks in 2029, and projects as a selection in the 50’s.

If you are a Keon Ellis fan, this is a tough pill to swallow. Ellis was a diamond in the rough who Monte McNair found as an undrafted free agent out of Alabama. He worked his way up from a two-way player, to a rotational player, to a full contract player and fan favorite. He also represented a connection to the original Beam Team that is now down to just a handful of players.

Here is a tough tweet to look at from a Kings fan:

Ellis’ time with the club was put on life support during the summer when the decision was made by new general manager Scott Perry to pick up a team option for this season. Ellis and his team were hoping the Kings would decline the option, making Ellis a restricted free agent, which would allow him to negotiate a long term contract at a much higher salary. When that didn’t happen, the wheels were set in motion for this outcome.

Instead of signing Ellis to an extension, the Kings used their limited salary cap space to acquire Schröder in a sign-and-trade with the hopes that he would hold down the starting point guard spot. That lasted all of 12 games before Schröder was replaced in the starting lineup by 37-year-old Russell Westbrook.

Saric was a non-factor this season after being acquired in a cost savings move that sent Jonas Valanciunas to the Denver Nuggets. The squandered assets used to acquire Valanciunas only to see another second round pick included to move Saric is enough to make your blood boil, but again, this series of events came over two different front office regimes.

You hate to see Ellis go, especially after seeing his rise within the organization. You also hate to see Ellis be used as the sweetener to move off of Schröder’s contract. After weeks of build up with more than half the league interested in Ellis, there was hope for more of a return.

The Schröder experiment will go down as a swing and a miss. He was wildly inconsistent from one game to the next. In his last four games in a Kings uniform, he shot 5-of-10 from the field, followed by a 1-of-8 performance, a 9-for-16 game and a 1-for-11 outing in his final contest. Flat out, that’s not good enough for a veteran player.

Perry may have overbuilt the value of Ellis. He clearly overvalued Schröder in free agency, but at the end of the day, Perry also realized his mistake and moved quickly to rectify the situation. Now he needs to find another Keon Ellis and figure out how to continue to reshape his roster while adding assets without one of his prime trade pieces.

Lastly, with both Ellis and Schröder gone, the log jam in the backcourt has been alleviated. Expect to see plenty of minutes for rookie Nique Clifford at both the point guard and shooting guard position as we trudge through the second half of a disappointing season in Sacramento.

Taken with the No. 4 overall selection in the 2019 NBA Draft, Hunter has turned into a solid 3-and-D wing. He’s struggled with injury issues throughout his career and is in the midst of a down year, but at 6-foot-7, 220 pounds, he is a player archetype that good teams have on their roster in the modern NBA game.

Cleveland acquired Hunter at last season’s trade deadline and he was a big part of their team success down the stretch as they posted a 64-18 record. The 28-year-old has career averages of 14.7 points, 4.1 rebounds and 1.6 assists while shooting 44.8 percent from the field and 36.5 percent from 3-point range.

Hunter’s struggles mirror the Cavs this season. After posting strong defensive numbers across the board last year, he is around league average this season. He’s also shooting just 30.8 percent from 3-point range after hitting 40.5 percent from deep last season.

According to a league source, the Kings are excited to put Hunter alongside Keegan Murray at the forward position as a pair of switchable defenders. What that means for DeMar DeRozan is still in question, but we still have a few days before the NBA trade deadline.

With five days remaining before Thursday’s NBA trade deadline, the Kings now have two open roster spots after the 3-for-1 trade. According to a league source, one of those spots is earmarked for upgrading rookie Dylan Cardwell from a two-way contract to a standard contract, but that will come after the deadline.

Between now and February 5, the Kings have options. They can take on additional pieces to acquire assets, although they are dangerously close to the luxury tax after taking on an additional $1.5 million in salary in this trade.

Rumors persist of a potential trade with the Toronto Raptors for former All-Star center Domantas Sabonis. According to a league source, the Kings have zero interest in acquiring Jakob Poeltl and the four years remaining on his contract after this season. The Kings also have very little interest in Immanuel Quickley and his 3 years and $97.5 million remaining on his contract.

If a trade is going to happen between Sacramento and Toronto, it will likely be built around RJ Barrett and two or three additional players. This is where those extra roster spots might come into play for the Kings.

Barrett has deep ties to Scott Perry, who selected the 6-foot-6 wing out of Duke with the No. 3 overall pick in the 2019 NBA Draft when he was running the New York Knicks. Again, nothing is imminent between the two clubs, but as of Saturday morning there were murmurs that the Raptors were looking for a third team to take on a minimum contract to facilitate a trade.

Perry has been working the phones and there is a possibility that he isn’t done. Players like Sabonis, DeRozan, Zach LaVine and Malik Monk are all available for the right price.

If you follow me on social media, you may have seen the news that I am making some career changes. I have taken over as the host of Locked On Kings where I will have a Morning Cup of Kings every Monday-Friday in the form of a 30-minute podcast.

With an expanded role on Locked On, I am also taking a bit of a step back at ESPN 1320, transitioning back to the Insider role with multiple radio hits weekly. This means that The Insiders on ESPN 1320 is going away, but I will have a bigger role as a guest on The Jump from 7-9am, and D-Lo and KC, who are moving to a 2-6pm drive show.

While I loved having a daily radio program, it has taken a toll on my ability to cover the Kings in the way that I would like. Moving forward, I will be back at practice covering the team and I am excited to get back to writing with the expanded bandwidth.

The goal moving forward is to continue The Kings Beat Podcast with Sean Cunningham and Brenden Nunes, but also to provide daily updates with links to my latest podcasts at Locked On.

Here is the latest Locked On Podcast breaking down the trade. Bear with me as I learn the Locked On format and butcher my live reads!