Team-By-Team Roster Flexibility Update
Fewer than five weeks remain in the season, but teams are still making adjustments to their rosters as they prepare for the playoffs, or, in some cases, get ready for next season. With the help of our Expanded Roster Counts, which Eddie Scarito of Hoops Rumors maintains, here’s a look at each team’s roster flexibility for the stretch run.
Nearly half the teams in the league have 15 contracts that run through season’s end, so the following clubs are the ones that are least likely to make any moves. They’d have to eat the remaining salary on one of their contracts to add someone else, assuming whomever they waived wasn’t claimed off waivers. However, as the end of the season approaches, it’s decreasingly costly to take the hit for the salary that remains on an expiring contract and sign another player to a prorated deal.
- 76ers
- Cavaliers
- Celtics
- Grizzlies
- Hornets
- Magic
- Mavericks
- Pacers
- Raptors
- Rockets
- Spurs
- Thunder
- Timberwolves
- Warriors
These teams also have 15 players on their roster, but one of those players is on a 10-day deal, allowing the clubs to retain a modicum of flexibility:
- Bucks
- Hawks
- Heat
- Wizards
Now we get to a group of teams that wouldn’t have to make a corresponding move and risk being on the hook for any salary at all if they signed a player. These clubs have 14 contracts that run through the end of the season, leaving one open roster spot. The Pistons are marked with an asterisk because while they technically only have 14 players, they’ve reportedly agreed to a multiyear deal with Quincy Miller. So, Detroit will soon join the group at the top with 15 contracts that carry through at least the end of the season.
- Bulls
- Kings
- Knicks
- Nets
- Pistons*
- Trail Blazers
These two teams don’t have any immediate open roster spots, but they have two 10-day contracts and only 13 players signed through the end of the season, leaving plenty of flexibility:
- Clippers
- Jazz
The following pair of clubs takes that even further, with 13 players signed through season’s end and only one 10-day contract. The Suns are marked with an asterisk since they’re apparently about to leave this group, having reportedly agreed to a deal with Earl Barron that covers the rest of the season.
- Pelicans
- Suns*
No team has more roster flexibility than the Nuggets, who have but 13 contracts guaranteed through the end of the season and no one on a 10-day contract, leaving two open roster spots. The Lakers are a one-of-a-kind case, too. They have 15 deals that run through season’s end and, thanks to the hardship exception, they also have Jabari Brown on a 10-day contract, giving them 16 players. Nick Young has missed the past eight games, and if doctors deem that he’s not expected to return for a while, the Lakers would qualify to apply for a 17th roster spot, though there’s been no indication of whether they plan to do so.
Knicks Notes: Free Agency, Jackson, Larkin
The Knicks have the league’s worst record this season, and even with a high lottery pick and plenty of cap flexibility on their way this summer, coach Derek Fisher isn’t under any illusions that the team will jump into title contention in 2015/16, as Marc Berman of the New York Post relays.
“I don’t think we can somehow look to next season and say we’re supposed to win a championship,’’ Fisher said, according to Berman. “We’re at the very bottom or below the ground level for the type of work we have to do to turn this around. We have to continue evaluate everything we do.’’
There’s more on the team’s rebuilding project amid the latest from Madison Square Garden:
- Phil Jackson indicated Thursday that he believes the triangle offense will help sell free agents on the Knicks, but the triple post has plenty of critics, as Ian Begley of ESPNNewYork.com details. Fisher offered a vague hint that the Knicks will move away from the triangle next season, Berman observes in the same piece linked above, but he also defended the system, as Berman also notes.
- The Tyson Chandler/Jose Calderon trade was a mistake for the Knicks, and Jackson failed to convince Carmelo Anthony to take a discount of much significance, as Begley opines in a separate piece in which he examines Jackson’s first year as Knicks team president.
- Jackson and the Knicks probably won’t re-sign Shane Larkin this summer, Begley surmises in the same piece.
- Fellow ESPNNewYork.com scribe Ohm Youngmisuk takes a Knicks-focused look at the implications of the union’s rejection of gradual increases in the salary cap in favor of an immediate spike for 2016/17.
Heat Ink Henry Walker To Multiyear Deal
FRIDAY, 10:14am: The deal is official, the team announced.
THURSDAY, 7:02pm: The Heat intend to sign Henry Walker to a multiyear deal that includes the remainder of this season and the 2015/16 campaign, Jorge Sierra of HoopsHype reports (Twitter link). David Pick of Eurobasket.com (Twitter link) also confirmed that a deal is imminent. Walker’s second 10-day deal with Miami ends today. It’s unclear if next season’s agreement will be a team option, or if any guaranteed money will be included.
This signing will give the Heat 14 players on the roster who have guaranteed salaries for this season. Miami also has Michael Beasley, who is on his second 10-day deal, which is set to expire on March 17th. At that point the team will need to re-sign the forward for the remainder of the season or else he’ll become a free agent immediately.
In 10 appearances for the Heat this season, including five as a starter, Walker is averaging 8.5 points, 3.4 rebounds, and 1.0 assists in 27.4 minutes per game. The swingman is only hitting 34.1% of his shots from the field, which is well below his career number of 45.7%.
Pacers, Rodney Stuckey Interested In New Deal
Pacers coach Frank Vogel said Thursday that the team’s plan all along has been to keep Rodney Stuckey for the long term, and the 28-year-old combo guard is enthusiastic about returning to Indiana next season, reports Mark Montieth of Pacers.com. Stuckey signed a one-year deal for the minimum salary with the Pacers this past summer.
“I love it here, man,” Stuckey said. “I’m staying in the city, close to everything. I love it here. My family loves it here. I love the people in this organization. Definitely, I want to come back. That’s a no-brainer. Having a guy like Paul George here, of course I want to come play with an All-Star. Who doesn’t? Definitely want to be back here.”
The eighth-year veteran started 36 games for the Pacers this season but lately, he’s embraced a sixth-man role as Indiana has won seven in a row. Stuckey is pouring in a career-best 39.8% of his three-point attempts, and his 13.1 points and 26.6 minutes per game are close to his career averages.
Montieth speculates that Stuckey is in line for a raise, but the Pacers only have his Non-Bird rights, meaning they’d have to use another exception or open cap space to pay him more than 120% of the minimum salary he’s making this season. Indiana has only about $36MM in guaranteed salary on the books against a projected $68MM salary cap for next season, but that figure for the Pacers doesn’t include a total of more than $28MM in player options for Roy Hibbert and David West. If they opt in, it’ll be difficult for the Pacers to dip below the cap, so it would seem the biannual and mid-level exceptions are the team’s likeliest avenues for giving Stuckey a significant raise.
Stuckey is in his first pro season away from the Pistons, who drafted him 15th overall in 2007, but he harbors resentment about his parting from the team, as Montieth details. Stuckey believes someone in the Pistons organization was spreading the idea that he was a poor teammate, had character problems and wouldn’t be a fit on a winning team, according to Montieth. No team offered him more than the minimum last summer, Montieth writes, linking the dearth of more lucrative offers to the defamation that Stuckey alleges.
“It’s just unfortunate,” Stuckey said. “I’m not going to say names, but I know who it was. It’s just unfortunate for that person to throw me under the bus.”
Central Notes: Sanders, J.R. Smith, Pistons
Kyrie Irving exploded for 57 points in an overtime win for the Cavs against the Spurs on Thursday. Even before that, it was clear that Irving has maintained his value as the talent around him has improved, as Bradford Doolittle of ESPN.com wrote in an insider-only piece before Thursday’s game. Cleveland signed Irving to a five-year maximum-salary extension this past summer. Here’s more from the Central Division:
- There’s been a ton of conflicting information about the precise amount of Larry Sanders‘ buyout and whether the Bucks used the stretch provision, but Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders confirms that Milwaukee indeed spread the remainder of his deal over seven years (Twitter link). The Bucks will pay him $1,865,546 a year from 2015/16 all the way through 2021/22, which jibes with what Gery Woelfel of The Journal Times reported last week when he said Sanders would receive approximately $1.9MM. That means the Bucks have only about $2.266MM on the books for 2016/17, vaulting them into third place for the most cap flexibility for the summer of 2016, when the cap is set to spike to about $90MM. Sanders is getting $9,005,882 this season, as Pincus shows on the Basketball Insiders Bucks salary page. So, he gave up precisely $21,935,296 of his $44MM contract.
- J.R. Smith has a player option worth nearly $6.4MM for next season, and while he hasn’t decided on whether to exercise that, he seems to want a long-term future with the Cavs, as Joe Vardon of the Northeast Ohio Media Group details. “I am enjoying myself more here than anywhere I’ve been,” Smith said. “I want to be here, hopefully we can have the same team next year if everything goes well.”
- Pistons owner Tom Gores isn’t dismayed even as his team once more slips from playoff contention, as MLive’s David Mayo relays. “The thing is, Stan [Van Gundy] has a plan,” Gores said. “The guys we lost at the All-Star break, it was hard to lose them. They were part of the culture. But we’re trying to build for the future now and we believe in everything that’s going on.”
- K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune delves into Tom Thibodeau‘s relationship with Bulls management, among other Bulls-related issues, in a mailbag column.
D-League Notes: Stokes, Nogueira, McAdoo
The D-League has become an integral part of the NBA’s process of developing younger players, as well as a source for locating hidden gems to bolster rosters during the course of the season. You can easily stay on top of which players are coming and going from the D-League all season by checking out our 2014/15 D-League Assignments, Recalls tracker, which is updated daily. You can also find this page anytime on the right sidebar under “Hoops Rumors Features.”
Here are the latest D-League moves:
- The Grizzlies have recalled Jarnell Stokes and Russ Smith from the Iowa Energy, their D-League affiliate, the team announced via Twitter. This was the fifth sojourn to Iowa of the season for Stokes, and Smith’s third.
- Center Lucas Nogueira has been assigned by the Raptors to the Fort Wayne Mad Ants of the NBA D-League, the team has announced. The big man has played a total of 23 minutes in six games with Toronto this season, recording a total of six points and 11 rebounds. This will be his first jaunt of the season to the D-League.
- The Warriors have recalled forward James Michael McAdoo from the Santa Cruz Warriors, their D-League affiliate, the team announced. The rookie has appeared in 32 games with Santa Cruz this season, averaging 19.4 points, 8.8 rebounds, and 2.3 assists in 32.9 minutes.
- The Mavs have once again assigned Dwight Powell to the Texas Legends, Dallas’ D-League affiliate, the team announced via a press release. This will mark the ninth trek of the season to the D-League for Powell.
Eastern Notes: Knicks, Jackson, Robinson III
Even though the Pistons have dropped eight of the nine games that they have played since acquiring Reggie Jackson, the point guard is optimistic about the team’s future and loves the young talent that’s around him, Alex Kennedy of Basketball Insiders writes. Jackson is also a fan of playing for coach/executive Stan Van Gundy, Kennedy adds. “Playing for Stan has been a change,” Jackson said in an interview with Pistons.com (video link). “He’s a great basketball mind, he sees a lot of what’s going on in the game and how to take advantage of things. He knows what it takes to get everyone involved and going, and we constantly talk about what we see on the court. I think he can only help my game expand that much further and help me on this journey to be one of the best point guards ever.”
Here’s more from the Eastern Conference:
- Given the advancing age of Carmelo Anthony and a lottery pick not being guaranteed to turn into a star player, Knicks president Phil Jackson would be wise to try and deal away the team’s first-rounder this year for an established star, Howard Beck of Bleacher Report writes.
- An Eastern Conference scout gave Beck another reason the Knicks should consider dealing their first round pick — the lack of a true superstar player in this draft. “I’m not sure either guy [Jahlil Okafor or Karl-Anthony Towns] is a franchise player,” the scout said. “Is it LeBron James, Kobe Bryant, Russell Westbrook, Kevin Durant, Tim Duncan? I’m not sure about that. But they should be very good players. The downside would be above-average starters, just based on [their] talent. And they’re only 19. You’d think they’re going to get better.“
- The Sixers are in no hurry to play Glenn Robinson III, whom they claimed off of waivers from the Wolves last week, Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer writes. “I got a gut feel to what we are going to do,” coach Brett Brown said, “and I don’t see Glenn being a part of it tomorrow. As I said right when we got him, my plan is to get him a little bit more comfortable. I don’t feel the need [to play him], because I do have an abundance of wings.”
2015/16 Salary Commitments: Nets
With the NBA trade deadline now passed, teams are focusing on locking down playoff spots or vying for a better chance in the draft lottery. Outside of the players who are added on 10-day deals, or those lucky enough to turn those auditions into long-term contracts, teams’ rosters are relatively set for the remainder of the season.
We at Hoops Rumors are in the process of taking a look ahead at each franchise’s salary cap situation heading into the summer, and the free agent frenzy that occurs every offseason. While the exact amount of the 2015/16 salary cap won’t be announced until July, the cap is projected to come in somewhere around $68MM, with the luxury tax threshold projected at approximately $81MM. This year’s $63.065MM cap represented an increase of 7.7% over 2013/14, which was well above the league’s projected annual increase of 4.5%.
We’ll continue by taking a look at the Nets’ cap outlook for 2015/16…
Here are the players with guaranteed contracts:
- Bojan Bogdanovic — $3,425,510
- Jarrett Jack — $6.3MM
- Joe Johnson — $24,894,863
- Sergey Karasev — $1,599,840
- Mason Plumlee — $1,415,520
- Deron Williams — $21,042,800
Here are the players with non-guaranteed contracts:
- Markel Brown — $845,059
- Cory Jefferson — $845,059
- Darius Morris — $1,015,421
Players with options:
- Alan Anderson (Player Option) — $1,333,484
- Brook Lopez (Player Option) — $16,744,218
- Thaddeus Young (Early Termination Option) — $10,221,739
The Nets’ Cap Summary for 2015/16:
- Guaranteed Salary: $58,678,233
- Options/Non-Guaranteed Salary: $31,004,980
- Total: $89,683,213
The Basketball Insiders salary pages were used in the creation of this post.
Western Notes: Lee, Durant, Jazz
Some around the Warriors think David Lee‘s return from injury in December disrupted the team’s rhythm, as Tim Kawakami of the Bay Area News Group hears, and the team has essentially squeezed him out of the rotation for now. The Warriors were steadfast at the deadline that they didn’t want to simply shed Lee in a salary dump, Kawakami writes, nonetheless adding that he expects Golden State to make a push to trade him this summer.
Here’s more from the Western Conference:
- No one believes that Thunder GM Sam Presti would ever trade Kevin Durant, a league executive told Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders. Presti dismissed the idea he’d make such a move after ESPN analyst and former team exec Tom Penn suggested that he would.
- Jay Yeomans of the Deseret News reviews how Jazz draft-and-stash picks Ante Tomic, Tibor Pleiss, and Raul Neto are faring overseas this season.
- Jazz rookie Rodney Hood is providing some much needed scoring from the wing for the team, which was a big reason why Utah drafted him last June, Kareem Copeland of NBA.com writes. “He makes shots and has the ability to space the floor. He’s also gets to the rim, too,” coach Quin Snyder said of Hood. “The plan, really in the beginning, Rodney was going to play. Whether he was going to start or how many minutes, you never know. He’s good enough and we need him.“
- Though Enes Kanter is receiving similar playing time with the Thunder as he did with the Jazz, the big man is more content thanks to being on a more successful team, Anthony Slater of The Oklahoman relays. “Well, the thing is we are winning here,” Kanter said. “We are playing for something. We are playing for playoffs, we are playing for ring. There [in Utah], I still respect them and I don’t want to say nothing bad about them. But this is just way different than what I’ve been seeing. It’s a whole different level. This is like I realize what NBA is when I came to Oklahoma City.”
Chuck Myron contributed to this post.
2015/16 Salary Commitments: Celtics
With the NBA trade deadline now passed, teams are focusing on locking down playoff spots or vying for a better chance in the draft lottery. Outside of the players who are added on 10-day deals, or those lucky enough to turn those auditions into long-term contracts, teams’ rosters are relatively set for the remainder of the season.
We at Hoops Rumors are in the process of taking a look ahead at each franchise’s salary cap situation heading into the summer, and the free agent frenzy that occurs every offseason. While the exact amount of the 2015/16 salary cap won’t be announced until July, the cap is projected to come in somewhere around $68MM, with the luxury tax threshold projected at approximately $81MM. This year’s $63.065MM cap represented an increase of 7.7% over 2013/14, which was well above the league’s projected annual increase of 4.5%.
We’ll continue by taking a look at the Celtics’ cap outlook for 2015/16…
Here are the players with guaranteed contracts:
- Avery Bradley — $7,730,337
- Kelly Olynyk — $2,165,160
- Marcus Smart — $3,431,040
- Jared Sullinger — $2,269,260
- Isaiah Thomas — $6,912,869
- Evan Turner — $3,425,510
- Gerald Wallace — $10,105,855
- James Young — $1,749,840
- Tyler Zeller — $2,616,975
Here are the players with non-guaranteed contracts:
- Chris Babb — $947,276
- Phil Pressey — $947,276
Players with options:
- N/A
The Celtics’ Cap Summary for 2015/16:
- Guaranteed Salary: $40,406,846
- Options/Non-Guaranteed Salary: $1,894,552
- Total: $42,301,398
The Basketball Insiders salary pages were used in the creation of this post.