Bradley Beal Is Reportedly About to Be Bought Out by the Suns and the Whole League Is Watching
Bradley Beal’s time in Phoenix is just about over. The only question is how he gets out.
According to John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7 FM Phoenix, Beal will either be traded or bought out by the Suns this offseason. That report follows the Kevin Durant trade to the Houston Rockets earlier this spring, which sent Phoenix into a full pivot away from the failed three-star roster experiment.
The complications around moving Beal are massive. He is owed nearly $111 million over the next two seasons. He has a full no-trade clause. He is 32 years old and coming off the least productive year of his career. No team is lining up to take that contract.
Beal himself is reportedly open to a trade but would prefer to stay in Phoenix. That preference may not matter. The Suns front office has clearly decided to move on. The choice is between finding a creative trade partner who would take Beal in exchange for a different bad contract, or just eating the cap hit and buying him out so he can pick his next team as a free agent.
The buyout path makes the most sense for both sides. Phoenix gets out from under a contract they no longer want. Beal gets to choose his next destination, which would presumably be a contender willing to give him a real role on a veteran minimum. The Lakers, the Heat, and the Mavericks have all been mentioned as potential landing spots once Beal hits the market.
The Lakers angle is the most interesting one. They need shooting. They need a secondary creator next to LeBron James and Luka Doncic. Beal in his prime would have been a perfect fit. The 2026 version of Beal is still a useful piece, even if he is not the All-Star he was in Washington.
For the Suns, this is the second giant contract they have had to unwind in the same offseason. The Durant trade brought back Jalen Green, Dillon Brooks, the No. 10 pick in the 2025 draft, and five future second-round picks. It was not a star return, but it was real value for a player who had clearly worn out his welcome.
The Beal buyout would be a different math. Phoenix would absorb a massive dead cap hit for two years to clear the books. The trade-off is roster flexibility, which the Suns desperately need after years of being capped out. Phoenix has young pieces in Ryan Dunn and Oso Ighodaro and needs draft picks they can actually use to build around Devin Booker.
Booker is the only star Phoenix can count on going forward. The Beal experiment broke him into one of the most maligned offensive engines in the league this past year. Getting back to a roster where Booker has the ball more and the system runs through him is the goal. The Beal buyout is the bridge to that.
For Beal, the silver lining is real. He has been miserable in Phoenix. He has been injured. He has been a punching bag for NBA Twitter for the entire two and a half years he has been with the Suns. A buyout gives him a fresh start with a contender of his choosing.
The next two weeks will tell us where this ends. Phoenix is moving. Beal is moving. The deal that gets the two of them out of each other’s lives is coming.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
