In a way, the NBA trade and free agency season reaches farther than it ever has. Once upon a time all the action would happen between the end of the NBA Draft and Summer League, leaving August and early September as a dead zone during which everybody in the league went on vacation. Now trades and signings come in dribbles and drabs all summer long. The major action, such as it is, still happens early, but you never know when the next transaction is coming down the pike.
That extra length belies the lack of actual impact that free agency holds in the modern NBA.