DeRozan Found a Soft Landing. Sacramento Is Still Holding Its Breath.

DeMar DeRozan signed with Denver on a one-year, $3.9 million deal, which closes the book on his time in Sacramento and puts a tidy ending on the Kings' offseason pivot. He was their leading scorer last season — 18.1 points per game on nearly 50 percent shooting across 80 games — and now he's someone else's reliable veteran. The reset is complete, at least on paper.

What replaced him is the part worth watching. Zach LaVine opted into his $49 million commitment and is the offensive cornerstone now, with his 18.9 PPG from last year serving as the production template Sacramento is banking on. The problem is that template came in 43 games. DeRozan played 80. That gap is the entire offseason argument in one line: Sacramento traded durability for ceiling, and they did it knowingly.

And LaVine is still day-to-day right now, alongside Sabonis, Murray, and Hunter. I've written that sentence enough times this month that it's starting to feel like a fixture. The injury report hasn't changed; the stakes around it just got a little clearer once DeRozan's destination was confirmed. There's no fallback perimeter scorer on the roster at that level anymore. The bet is fully placed.

Training camp opens soon enough. At some point the day-to-day designations resolve one way or another, and Sacramento finds out what this roster actually is. DeRozan in Denver is a footnote by then. LaVine's availability is the whole story.