In addition to the limitations they face on the trade market and in free agency, NBA teams who finish a season with a salary exceeding the second tax apron also have a future first-round pick “frozen,” meaning it becomes ineligible to be traded.
This restriction applies to the draft seven years away. For instance, a team that finished the 2024/25 season as a second-apron club had its 2032 first-rounder frozen, a team that finished above the second apron in ’25/26 had its 2033 first-rounder frozen, and so on.
A team can “unfreeze” that first-round pick by finishing below the second apron in at least three of the four subsequent seasons. For example, if a team that finished above the second apron in 2024/25 had its 2032 first-rounder frozen, that club would regain the ability to trade that pick during the 2028 offseason if it remains below the second-apron threshold in 2025/26, ’26/27, and ’27/28.
On the other hand, if that team continues to operate in second-apron territory for at least two of the four subsequent seasons, not only does that pick become permanently frozen, but the club also faces what’s referred to in the Collective Bargaining Agreement as the “draft pick penalty” — the frozen pick gets moved to the very end of the first round, regardless of where the team finishes in the standings in the season leading up to that draft.
The 2024/25 league year was the first season in which this new penalty was applied, so only a small handful of picks have been “frozen” so far, and not enough time has passed for any to “unfreeze.”
We’ll use this space as a permanent tracker for the picks affected by this rule, monitoring which first-rounders become frozen and noting if and when they unfreeze — or when they permanently freeze and move to the end of the first round.
Because this penalty only applies to teams that finish the season below the second apron, a club that operates in second-apron territory before or during a season can still avoid it by moving below that the second-apron threshold by the spring. As a result, our tracker will only be updated at the end of each season.
Here’s the current breakdown:
These teams finished the 2024/25 season above the second apron.
This team finished the 2025/26 season above the second apron.
Note: An asterisk (*) indicates that the team is hard-capped at the first or second tax apron during the current league year and is unable to surpass that threshold, ensuring they’ll finish below it.
