Atlantic Notes: Russell, Sixers, Nets
D’Angelo Russell could wind up as a top-two pick if the Knicks or Sixers are that position after the results of the draft lottery on Tuesday, according to Ken Berger of CBSSports.com. While it’s widely assumed that Karl-Anthony Towns and Jahlil Okafor will go 1-2 in the draft, there was some speculation by rival executives at the draft combine that Philadelphia or New York may opt instead to transform to its backcourt with the Ohio State guard, Berger reports.
In other news around the Atlantic Division:
- Michael Qualls (Arkansas), Keifer Sykes (Wisconsin-Green Bay), Ryan Boatright (Connecticut) and Terry Rozier (Louisville) are scheduled to work out with the Sixers on Tuesday, Keith Pompey of the Philadelphia Inquirer reports. Philadelphia brought in Julian Washburn (Texas-El Paso), Seth Tuttle (Northern Iowa), Terran Petteway (Nebraska), Marcus Thornton (Georgia), Stanton Kidd (Colorado State), Juwan Staten (West Virginia) and Shannon Scott (Ohio State) for workouts on Monday, Pompey adds.
- Mike Conley and Kevin Love, if he does not opt out this summer, are potential free agent targets for the Nets in 2016, according to NetsDaily.com. The Nets will undergo many changes this offseason as they try to get under the luxury tax but they need to remain a playoff-caliber team to attract future free agents, the story adds.
- A shakeup of Dwane Casey’s staff is underway as the Raptors parted with assistants Bill Bayno and Tom Sterner today, sources told Berger (Twitter links).
Pistons Rumors: Booker, Kaminsky, Lyles
Kentucky shooting guard Devin Booker grew up as a Pistons fan and would relish the chance to play for them, Vince Ellis of the Detroit Free Press reports. Booker was raised in Grand Rapids, Mich., which is approximately two hours from Detroit. It’s unlikely he will get his wish since the Pistons hold the No. 8 spot in the draft, pending the lottery results, and Booker projects as a late lottery selection. He’s currently ranked No. 13 on Chad Ford’s ESPN Insider Big Board and No. 15 on Jonathan Givony’s DraftExpress prospect list. The team has other pressing needs, since they already have Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Jodie Meeks sharing minutes at that spot.
In other draft news concerning the Pistons:
- Frank Kaminsky interviewed with the team during the draft combine as it tries to determine whether he could replace power forward and unrestricted free agent Greg Monroe, according to David Mayo of MLive.com. Kaminsky termed the Pistons’ interview “laid back” and asked how he could fit into their system, Mayo continues. Kaminsky, ranked No. 14 by Ford and No. 10 by Givony, is a better outside shooter than Monroe and that enhances his appeal, Mayo adds.
- Kaminsky is just one of the big men on the Pistons’ radar, Terry Foster of the Detroit News reports. They are also looking at Trey Lyles and Myles Turner and could trade up for Kristaps Porzingis to fulfill their desire for a power forward that can stretch the floor, Foster adds.
- President of basketball operations Stan Van Gundy should emulate his predecessor, Joe Dumars, when it comes to evaluating lottery picks, Ellis examines in a separate piece. Dumars recovered from his disastrous decision to select Darko Milicic with the No. 2 overall pick in 2003 and drafted Andre Drummond, Greg Monroe, Brandon Knight and Caldwell-Pope with his lottery picks in recent years, though he denied the new regime a lottery pick last year when it had to be shipped to the Hornets to fulfill a prior trade obligation, Ellis continues. Van Gundy and his staff get their first chance to make a lottery selection next month.
Prospect Profile: Willie Cauley-Stein
Willie Cauley-Stein brings some clarity to a process normally based upon on projections and expectations, at least on one end of the basketball court. There’s no dispute or concern about Cauley-Stein’s ability to be a defensive impact player in the NBA. He’s got all the tools and physical gifts to become one of the league’s premier defenders. That’s why the 7-footer is ranked as the No. 2 center in the draft behind Duke’s Jahlil Okafor and a virtual lock to be selected in the Top 10. He’s currently rated No. 8 on Chad Ford’s ESPN Insider Big Board, while Jonathan Givony’s DraftExpress slots him at No. 6 overall.
The University of Kentucky product can not only defend other big men, he can handle wing players because of his quickness and length. He’s also one of the very few big men who can switch out on a point guard without that situation being an obvious mismatch. With most NBA teams relying heavily on pick-and-rolls to create space and quality looks, Cauley-Stein can switch, hedge and recover on those plays with aplomb, which will often force the offense to take low-percentage shots with the shot clock winding down.
He can also create turnovers and provide rim protection. He led the Wildcats in steals in both his sophomore and junior seasons and recorded 106 blocks during his sophomore campaign. That figure dropped to 67 last season, partially due to Kentucky’s ability to seal off the paint and also because Cauley-Stein had another shotblocker, Karl Anthony-Towns, patrolling the lane alongside him. With his long arms and ability to cover so much ground, Cauley-Stein should have no trouble altering and blocking shots in situations where he’s a help defender. Add up those attributes and it’s no wonder he’s already being compared to the likes of DeAndre Jordan, Tyson Chandler and Andre Drummond as a defensive force.
If there are any issues regarding Cauley-Stein defensively, it would be his frame and defensive rebounding. His needs to get stronger to compete physically with other post players on a nightly basis, though that can be said for virtually any big man entering the NBA. A slightly bigger concern is whether Cauley-Stein truly likes to mix it up underneath. As Givony points out, he can be outworked in the paint at times and he doesn’t consistently establish good box-out position. That explains why his defensive rebounding rate was a relatively modest 6.6 per 40 minutes in college.
There were no surprises regarding Cauley-Stein’s physical attributes at the draft combine. He measured a tad over 6’11” without shoes and 7’0” wearing them. His wingspan was an impressive 7’3” and he came to Chicago in excellent condition with a body fat content of 6.3%.
If Cauley-Stein had any semblance of an offensive game, he could have been the top pick in the draft. But that’s where the uncertainty regarding Cauley-Stein kicks in. The word raw is frequently mentioned by draft experts, scouts and front-office personnel when the subject of his offensive game is brought up. His contributions on that end mainly consist of dunks and layups created by guard penetration, offensive rebounds and transition opportunities. He averaged 8.9 points last season in the Wildcats’ balanced attack.
Kentucky didn’t look for Cauley-Stein to score on postups and midrange shots. As a result, he failed to develop any signature moves or carve out any sweet spots where defenders had to respect him. He made just one-third of his two-point jump shots in his junior year.
Without getting frequent touches, Cauley-Stein has not developed a knack for passing out of the post or finding open shooters and cutters. He averaged less than one assist per game during his three college seasons.
One area where he did show steady improvement was his free throw shooting. He went from a brutal 37.2% as a freshman to 48.2% the next year to 61.7% last season. Even if he only improves marginally as a foul shooter as a pro, that will be good enough to discourage opponents from intentionally fouling him.
Another knock against Cauley-Stein is his motor. He has often been criticized for looking disinterested at times and taking plays off, though he played with more intensity as his college career unfolded. The lack of focus at times has many scouts wondering if Cauley-Stein has a love for the game.
As an unnamed GM told NBA.com’s Scott Howard-Cooper, Cauley-Stein “leaves you wanting. You see the talent there, but you always think that there’s more he can give.”
Cauley-Stein has a difficult time understanding what all the fuss on this issue.
“If I didn’t love it, I wouldn’t put my body on the line, I wouldn’t run the way I do, I wouldn’t jump the way I do,” he told Scott-Cooper. “I’d be scared to do those things if I didn’t love the game. It just doesn’t make sense to me the way I play that I don’t love the game.”
There’s enough love over Cauley-Stein’s defensive prowess to quell most of the concerns about his shortcomings, perceived or otherwise. He should have a long NBA career, even if he settles for simply being a defensive stopper. Depending on team needs and draft-day trades, Cauley-Stein could even wind up moving into the top five. That’s the value of offering clarity in a sea of uncertainty.
Clippers Notes: Rivers, Roster Plans, Paul
Doc Rivers‘ failure to improve his bench last offseason was the biggest reason why the Clippers squandered a 3-1 series lead to the Rockets, Kurt Helin of ProBasketballTalk opines. Fatigue and a lack of quality role players contributed significantly to their collapse and that falls on Rivers, who holds the dual role of coach and president of basketball operations, Helin continues. Spending the team’s entire mid-level exception on Spencer Hawes, who fell out of the rotation late in the regular season, was a mistake. That killed their chances of a Paul Pierce-Rivers reunion, while Rivers’ other offseason signings — Jordan Farmar, Chris Douglas-Roberts, Jared Cunningham and Ekpe Udoh — made no impact, according to Helin. Along with re-signing DeAndre Jordan, the Clippers need more depth to take the next step, Helin concludes.
In other news involving the Clippers:
- Rivers acknowledged to Sam Amick of USA Today the challenge the Clippers face to upgrade their roster with limited resources, given their constraints against the cap. “I want to fix it,” Rivers told the USA Today scribe. “I want to win. That’s why I came here. I knew when I came here that roster-wise it was going to be very difficult. The first thing I did before I took this job, I looked at the roster and we laughed. I was like, ‘What the [expletive] can we do with this?’ It was more the contracts. But we have to try to do it somehow. I don’t know how yet, but something will work out.”
- The Clippers could open some flexibility via trade, but Rivers seemed to indicate a preference for keeping the core together, as Arash Markazi of ESPNLosAngeles.com relays. “You don’t rule out anything, but I like our group,” Rivers said. “I really do. Teams that have stuck it out, in the long run if you look at sports history, have done better than teams that have blown it up. We’re really close, clearly. It might be a defensive guy; it might be one more guy. I don’t know yet.”
- Rivers affirmed he has no desire to overhaul the roster since the team was so close to making the Western Conference Finals, Ben Bolch of the Los Angeles Times tweets.
- Trading Chris Paul would allow Blake Griffin to expand his game, refresh the team’s talent base and give it a new identity, Kevin Ding of Bleacher Report speculates. The team gets overly emotional and loses its composure in the most difficult of situations and a radical step might be needed to change that dynamic, Ding concludes.
Clippers Want New Deal With Austin Rivers
Clippers coach/executive Doc Rivers would like to re-sign son Austin Rivers this summer, as Doc made clear during his end-of-season press conference and as Arash Markazi of ESPNLosAngeles.com relays. Doc Rivers said he regretted putting up resistance to GM Dave Wohl‘s urging that he trade for Austin Rivers this past summer before finally allowing Wohl to win him over in January, when the Clips acquired him from the Celtics in a three-team trade with the Suns.
“People who want to criticize him don’t [realize he’s 22],” Doc Rivers said of his son. “That’s the way I always look at them. He’s young and he clearly helped us, I think we all have to agree with that. And I think he loved it here. I even think he liked the coach at times. You know, it’ll be interesting. I really want him back and I think it would be great to have him back and I think he’s a great fit for this team. But business is business and it’ll be an interesting thing this summer.”
Doc Rivers quipped that his son will be the easiest of the team’s free agents to re-sign since it would simply require putting in a call to Austin Rivers’ mom, but the Clips are financially hamstrung in part by a decision they didn’t make. Before the season, the Pelicans declined the team option on his rookie scale contract, worth $3,110,796, for 2015/16. New Orleans traded Austin Rivers to the Celtics, who flipped him to the Clippers, but the Clips are nonetheless barred from re-signing him to a contract with a starting salary of any more than that option amount.
Austin Rivers, who reportedly split with agent David Falk earlier this season, had his moments in the playoffs, but it’s nonetheless unclear if the former No. 10 overall pick would warrant a salary greater than what the Clippers could pay him. Still, Doc Rivers seemed to indicate Sunday in comments to Sam Amick of USA Today that his son is in the team’s long-term plans, as Grantland’s Zach Lowe observes (Twitter link).
“You’ve got to give [Chris Paul] just some more support, you know?” Doc Rivers said to Amick. “I think bringing Austin here helped us. We’ve got a 22-year-old [Austin], and now to me we’ve got to get another guard who’s in the middle age group. So now you’re growing with Austin and C.J. [Wilcox], and we need another defensive guy, too.”
Spurs Expected To Pursue Aldridge Before Gasol
The Spurs are widely expected to focus their attention on LaMarcus Aldridge first before turning their attention to fellow free agent target Marc Gasol, according to Marc Stein of ESPN.com. The understanding as of two months ago was that Gasol would be San Antonio’s No. 1 target, as Sean Deveney of The Sporting News reported then, though that was before a series of reports that made it clear that Portland’s star is strongly considering a move elsewhere. Stein indeed deems Aldridge as the more “gettable” free agent, though it’s not entirely clear whether San Antonio would prefer Aldridge over Gasol, all things being equal.
The Spurs are the team that Memphis fears most, Stein writes, cautioning that it’s premature to anoint San Antonio the most likely non-Memphis destination for the Spanish center given the expectation that the Spurs will attempt to woo Aldridge first. Most teams around the league predict that Gasol will wind up re-signing with the Grizzlies given his strong ties to the city of Memphis and his desire to win a title, according to Stein. Still, Gasol has given little precious little indication of his thinking, Stein notes.
The Knicks have long been linked to Gasol as a suitor, but former Knick and current Gasol teammate Beno Udrih recently posited that New York is out of the running. Many of Gasol’s comments about Memphis have made his love for the city undeniable, but Gasol in February refused to rule out the Knicks or any other team.
Memphis has Gasol’s Bird Rights and can give the 30-year-old a five-year deal with 7.5% raises, while other teams are limited to four-year contracts with 4.5% raises. Still, the expected leaps in the salary cap over the next couple of years stand to mitigate that advantage if the Arn Tellem client is confident he can still warrant maximum-salary consideration in another year or two. The Spurs will have the flexibility to make a maximum-salary bid on Aldridge, Gasol or another sought-after free agent this summer, but it may well require Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili to retire or take drastically reduced salaries, as I explained.
The Spurs believe they can sign Aldridge, who’s considering them as well as the Mavericks and a new deal with the Blazers, as Stein recently reported. The Knicks and Lakers are apparently planning to become Aldridge suitors, too, as are the Celtics.
Latest On Clippers, DeAndre Jordan
1:50pm: Rivers more or less confirmed that the Clippers will offer Jordan a max deal when asked at the team’s season ending press conference today, as Markazi relays (Twitter link).
“Yeah, I think I can say that,” Rivers said.
12:51pm: Reiter expands on the alleged rift between Jordan and Paul in a full story.
12:31pm: Jordan and Chris Paul have had a falling out this season, sources tell Bill Reiter of Fox Sports 1, who suggests it’s a factor that’s liable to sway the center to sign elsewhere (Twitter link).
9:16am: It’s “obvious” that the Clippers will do whatever it takes to retain DeAndre Jordan this summer, coach/executive Doc Rivers said postgame Sunday to reporters, including Dan Woike of the Orange County Register. The Clippers are expected to offer Jordan a five-year max contract, sources tell Arash Markazi of ESPNLosAngeles.com. It’ll take such an offer to bring him back, writes Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports, and chatter has persisted for a while that Jordan is anxious to move someplace where he wouldn’t be seen as the third cog, according to Sam Amick of USA Today.
“DJ loves us, but you’ve always got to be concerned,” Rivers said to Amick. “DJ would be great. We’ve got to try to do whatever we can. He’s obviously a free agent, and he has earned that right to be free. I don’t want to say much on it, but we love him.”
Jordan, who comes in eighth in the latest Hoops Rumors Free Agent Power Rankings, has expressed through back channels that he’ll be “extremely interested” in signing with the Mavs this summer, as Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com reported last month. The center, a Texas native, told Amick and USA Today colleague Jeff Zillgitt in March that the Clippers weren’t necessarily the favorites to retain him, despite their ability to offer five years and 7.5% raises while other teams, the Mavs included, are capped at four years and 4.5% raises. Still, in that same interview, Jordan called Rivers “my biggest supporter and the best coach I’ve ever had” and expressed his satisfaction with playing for the Clippers. Jordan said after Sunday’s loss that free agency wasn’t on his mind, as Woike notes.
“I’ve been here for seven years, so this is what I’m used to,” Jordan said Sunday. “But I’m not thinking about that, man. [The loss is] still so fresh tonight. It’s tough.”
Rivers cited Jordan’s affection for the franchise to Wojnarowski, injecting a level of optimism into the team’s pursuit to retain the defensive stalwart and league-leading rebounder, who’ll turn 27 in July.
“You can’t take anything for granted, but DJ loves being a Clipper,” Rivers said to Wojnarowski. “DJ loves being here. We have an amazing relationship.”
The Clippers are under pressure to re-sign Jordan, since they already have more than $58MM in guaranteed salary for next season against a projected $67.1MM salary cap. It would cost the Clips almost $6.72MM in salary that’s currently non-guaranteed to keep Jamal Crawford and Matt Barnes under contract. All that means is that the team wouldn’t have the resources to come up with a center anywhere as valuable as Jordan if he were to walk.
Hawks Optimistic They’ll Re-Sign Paul Millsap
The Hawks are quietly optimistic about their chances to sign Paul Millsap when he hits free agency this summer, Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today says on the A to Z podcast (audio link at 21:31 mark; hat tip to fellow USA Today scribe Sam Amick, on Twitter). Zillgitt and Amick implied in a January podcast that the sides had mutual interest in a return, and that jibed with comments that Millsap and acting GM Mike Budenholzer made earlier in the season. There is no such confidence from Atlanta with fellow soon-to-be unrestricted free agent DeMarre Carroll, as Zillgitt details, though there’s no indication that Carroll is leaning toward playing elsewhere, either.
Budenholzer said before this season that the team wanted to keep Millsap, and even though most of the 30-year-old’s numbers have either declined or held steady, it would seem surprising if the coach/executive’s stance had changed, particularly given Atlanta’s rousing success this year. Still, there’s uncertainty about whether Budenholzer will continue to have the final say with Tony Ressler leading a group that finalized a deal to buy the franchise last month, pending NBA approval. Millsap, a DeAngelo Simmons client, said in November that he intended to look at his options this summer but made it clear that remaining with the Hawks was his top choice.
Millsap signed a two-year, $19MM deal with Atlanta in 2013 and turned down the team’s offer of a four-year, $36MM contract with the thought that he’d have a better chance to secure a more lucrative deal this summer than he would two years from now, according to Zillgitt. It’s not clear whether Millsap is indeed better off hitting free agency this year, since the salary cap is projected to spike to $108MM by the summer of 2017, but it nonetheless suggests that Millsap is ready to cash in after having spent the past two seasons as a relative bargain.
The Hawks have Early Bird rights on Millsap and Carroll, so they won’t be able to go all the way to the max to re-sign either of them without using cap space to do so. Atlanta can go as high as $16.625MM with Millsap via Early Bird, while the most they could give Carroll using those rights will be 104.5% of this season’s average player salary, a figure that won’t be known until the end of the July Moratorium but which figures to come in around $6MM.
Wiggins, Mirotic, Noel Lead All-Rookie Teams
Andrew Wiggins was a unanimous All-Rookie First-Team selection, the league announced as it revealed the media voting results for the honors. Nikola Mirotic was the second-leading vote-getter, followed by Nerlens Noel, Elfrid Payton and Jordan Clarkson, all of whom comprise the first team. Marcus Smart, Zach LaVine, Bojan Bogdanovic, Jusuf Nurkic and Langston Galloway make up the second team.
Wiggins far outpaced all other contenders for Rookie of the Year honors after averaging 16.9 points in 36.2 minutes per game this season for the Timberwolves, who acquired the 2014 No. 1 overall pick in the Kevin Love trade. Minnesota, which finished with the league’s worst record this season and has a 25% chance to win the No. 1 pick in this year’s draft, is the only team to place two players on the All-Rookie teams, with LaVine on the second team despite having garnered 22 first-team votes. Every member of the second team received at least three first-team votes.
Payton, the 10th overall selection, is the only first-round pick from 2014 to appear on the first team. Mirotic was a draft-and-stash selection from 2011, Noel was the sixth overall pick in 2013 but qualified as a rookie this season because he sat out all of 2013/14 with injury, and Clarkson was the 46th pick last year, having gone overlooked through all of the first round and half of the second.
Galloway made the second team despite having gone undrafted and not having made his debut until January 7th, after he had signed a 10-day contract with the Knicks. New York followed up with another 10-day deal and finally a multiyear pact for the surprisingly effective point guard.
Draft Notes: Upshaw, Russell, Payne, Young
Several NBA executives told Chris Mannix of SI.com they wouldn’t dare draft Robert Upshaw in the first-round, leading Mannix to conclude that it’s unlikely that any team guarantees the troubled center any salary. Two seasons of guaranteed salary come with the rookie scale contracts that go to first-round picks. People from three different teams with lottery picks told A. Sherrod Blakely of CSNNE.com that Upshaw would be a certain lottery pick if not for his troubles in the past, which have involved drugs, but none of those teams are willing to draft him that highly, Blakely adds. Upshaw, who tells Blakely that he’s working with Bill Walton, among other mentors, is 29th in Jonathan Givony’s DraftExpress rankings but 38th with Chad Ford of ESPN.com. Here’s more on the draft, which takes place just a week and a month from tonight:
- Multiple executives told Mannix for the same piece that they think D’Angelo Russell plans to accept workout invitations only from the teams that hold the top three picks. Mannix also cites multiple execs who told him that they believe former Kentucky sharpshooter Devin Booker will go within the top 10 picks.
- Cameron Payne, who spoke with Zach Links of Hoops Rumors, is quickly lifting his stock, having become a strong candidate for the lottery, according to Mannix. Rakeem Christmas, J.P. Tokoto and Jordan Mickey were standouts in the five-on-five drills at last week’s combine, Mannix adds.
- Jabari Young of CSNNW.com adds the Blazers to the list of the teams that have interviewed Oregon shooting guard Joseph Young, and he’ll also be working out with Portland, as the CSNNW.com scribe has reported. Still, Young the writer suggests it’s nonetheless unlikely that the Blazers will end up drafting Young the player.