The dust has settled, at least to a degree, on the 2025 NBA offseason. While other moves will trickle in over the coming weeks, the focus of the league has largely shifted to vacation in the short term and training camp in the longer term. With that brings hope to a lot of NBA markets, and particularly teams that hope for rebound years from players who struggled in 2024-25.
Today, we will highlight five players in search of "bounce-back" campaigns in 2025-26 for various reasons. Some are star players who didn't have their best stuff last season. Some are role players looking to level up this year. Regardless, all five need to be better and more effective for their teams this season, and it begins in Philadelphia.
Paul George, Philadelphia 76ers
For the first time in more than a decade, Paul George was quite ordinary in 2024-25. Injuries contributed to George's suboptimal season, as he appeared in only 41 games, but the former All-Star saw his production and efficiency fall off a cliff in his first season in Philadelphia. To be fair, some of that can be traced to a change in role, but some is also clearly tied to age.
Because of that, the expectation should not be a full-fledged return to stardom for George, but it does feel safe to project a bounce-back in overall effectiveness. Perhaps the Sixers can surround him with a positive ecosystem, particularly if Joel Embiid can play semi-regularly.
Lauri Markkanen, Utah Jazz
To be fair to Markkanen, the 2024-25 Utah Jazz were never trying to win basketball games. That has to be difficult for the best player on the team, though Utah paid Markkanen in advance of that campaign to soften the blow. Still, his production and efficiency dropped markedly from two straight years of star-level output, and Markkanen's once-elite true shooting percentage dropped to just 57.1 percent. Utah seems to still be in a rebuilding mode, but they will need Markkanen to be better, if only to potentially evaluate his future in terms of trade value.
Kyle Kuzma, Milwaukee Bucks
From 2022-24, Kuzma averaged 21.7 points per game on reasonable efficiency for the Wizards. That certainly overstated his actual impact, but at the very least, Kuzma was a productive player who could give a team scoring punch and athleticism at either forward spot. Then, he collapsed in 2024-25, especially when it came to 3-point shooting (30.7 percent). The Bucks don't need the Wizards version to return, but Kuzma is important to Milwaukee, putting a competitive product on the floor around Giannis. Kuzma's advanced metrics last season were troublingly bad, but in his age-30 season, Kuzma should be able to be better.
Scottie Barnes, Toronto Raptors
After a 2023-24 breakout that netted him an All-Star appearance, Scottie Barnes regressed across the board in 2024-25. Barnes was still a quality player, but his per-game averages dipped in points, rebounds, assists, and blocked shots. On top of that, his shooting efficiency dropped, both inside and outside the arc, and the more advanced "catch-all" metrics agreed that Barnes took at least a mild step back. On the bright side, the Raptors will almost certainly be healthier in 2025-26 than they were in 2024-25, giving Barnes a better ecosystem in which to operate. He is also just 24 years old, and Barnes is in line for improvement back to something closer to his 2024-25 levels.
Bruce Brown, Denver Nuggets
It hasn't been that long since Bruce Brown was a crucial piece of an NBA championship team. Less than 30 months ago, Brown was playing nearly 27 minutes per game in the 2023 NBA Playoffs, helping to key the Denver Nuggets to a title, and he was clearly a valuable two-way cog for that group. In fact, Brown played so well that he priced himself out of Denver, inking a big deal with the Indiana Pacers, and he has been somewhat in the wilderness since then. Last season, Brown slipped to 50.4 percent true shooting in Toronto and New Orleans, battling injuries and ineffectiveness.
But now he's back in Denver, where the theory of his game fits perfectly next to Nikola Jokic. Brown can perhaps find some of the 2023 mojo and help the Nuggets in a unique way.