Report: Thunder targeting Al Horford

Via Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com, the Thunder are drawing a target on Al Horford, and have been calling around the league looking for cap-friendly teams that could absorb contracts to make it possible.

As they prepare to make their pitch to Kevin Durant, the Oklahoma City Thunder have been making calls around the league looking to clear a massive amount of salary-cap space in a move rival executives believe is an effort to go after free agent Al Horford in addition to Durant, multiple sources told ESPN.

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Over the past several days, the Thunder have sought out teams with open salary-cap space to possibly absorb Enes Kanter and Kyle Singler, sources said. The Thunder have other methods of opening cap space, including waiving Anthony Morrow, whose contract isn’t guaranteed until July 15.

Horford is drawing interest from a number of places, and there’s no strong indication about which way he’s leaning. But the Thunder have the Billy Donovan card to play, knowing the connection to his former college coach might be enough to sway him.

At the same time, this is a very un-Thunder move. And it feels a little too heavily Durant influenced. They’re obviously pulling out all the stops to impress their big fish, and there’s no question Horford would be a roster upgrade — he’s a four-time All-Star and one of the league’s best defenders — even at the expense of Kanter. But Kanter’s deal becomes more and more cap friendly, he’s 24 years old, and bought into his role entirely last season. Horford is 30 and has dealt with a number of significant injuries. To me, this sounds like posturing to bang the drum for Durant in advance of their meeting.

Then again, this is what happens when your franchise player is flirting with leaving. You start operating outside of your core values. The Thunder would need roughly $27 million in cap space to sign Horford to a max and to get there, it would take some gymnastics. With Durant’s cap hold, the Thunder are about $26 million over the cap. So they’d need to clear roughly $53 million to be able to sign Horford. Renounce Dion Waiters (making him an unrestricted free agent), renounce Randy Foye, renounce Nazr Mohammed, let go of Anthony Morrow and deal Ersan Ilyasova (or pay him his $400,000 before July 1 and waive him) and you’ve opened up about $36 million. Now you’re under the cap. But you need another chunk to be able to add Horford. That’s where you have to offload Kanter’s contract ($17.1 million). There’s really no other way.

Unless Durant signs elsewhere. Then you can go get Horford no problem. But let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.