The Mavericks have re-signed Bernard James to a contract that covers the balance of the season, as Earl K. Sneed of Mavs.com tweets and as the team announced via press release. The news is no surprise, since Mavs owner Mark Cuban said even before the club’s second 10-day contract with James was official that he would eventually sign him for the rest of the season. That second 10-day pact expired Monday. Neither the team nor Sneed indicate that it’s a multiyear pact, which suggests that it doesn’t contain any non-guaranteed salary for next season as such contracts often do.
The move locks Dallas into 15 contracts that run until at least season’s end, so the team would have to eat one of them to make another signing. So, that likely precludes any lingering chance that Jermaine O’Neal would join the team, and the Mavs don’t appear likely to end up with JaVale McGee, either.
Of course, Dallas didn’t mind taking the full hit for James’ guaranteed full-season minimum salary when the Mavs waived him at the end of the preseason to make room for Charlie Villanueva, who was then on a non-guaranteed pact. Still, James, a 30-year-old former Air Force Air Force staff sergeant, filled a prominent role for the banged-up Mavs on his 10-day deals, averaging 4.4 points and 4.4 rebounds in 17.4 minutes per game across five appearances, two of them starts. That’s significantly more minutes a night than the Happy Walters client saw in either of his first two seasons in the NBA, both of which were with the Mavs.