Lakers Sign Brandon Bass
5:17pm: The Lakers have officially announced the signing.
THURSDAY, 9:38am: The Lakers have yet to make an official announcement, but the contract has been finalized, a source tells Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe (on Twitter).
SUNDAY, 6:33pm: The Lakers will sign free agent forward Brandon Bass, tweets Yahoo Sports’ Marc J. Spears, who cites a source. Spears, in a full story, reports that the deal is a work in progress because, according to a source, it is pending other moves. The Lakers, in a press release, have acknowledged they have engaged in negotiations with Bass.
Bass averaged 10.6 PPG and 4.9 RPG per game last season with the Celtics. Bass’ agent, Tony Dutt, previously discussed how much Bass loved Boston and said there was mutual interest in a return. Since the Celtics are set to sign Amir Johnson and re-sign Jonas Jerebko, Boston has depth at the power forward position.
The Lakers either have $2.8MM for Bass, at the room exception, or they are clearing some cap with other moves, tweets Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders. It’s already been a very busy 24 hours or so for the Lakers, who are set to acquire Roy Hibbert, and are set to sign Lou Williams.
Lakers Sign Anthony Brown
4:47pm: The deal is for three years, and includes a team option for the final season, Ramona Shelburne of ESPNLosAngeles.com reports (on Twitter).
3:41pm: The Lakers have signed 2015 second round pick Anthony Brown, the team announced. The exact terms of the deal were not released, but the press release states that it is a multiyear arrangement. The forward out of Stanford was selected with the No. 34 overall pick in this year’s NBA Draft.
Brown appeared in 37 games, including 36 starts, for the Cardinal last season, logging 14.8 points, 6.9 rebounds and 2.5 assists while shooting 43.1% from the field and 44.1% from beyond the arc. His career numbers are 10.8 PPG, 4.8 RPG, and 1.6 APG, with a slash line of .427/.403/.751.
The forward helped Stanford capture the 2015 NIT championship, and he was named to the Pac-12 All-Academic Second Team in addition to earning an All-Pac-12 Honorable mention for the 2014/15 campaign.
Blazers Ink Pat Connaughton
The Trail Blazers have officially announced the signing of Pat Connaughton. The details of the contract were not released. The rights to the swingman were acquired from the Nets in the trade that brought Mason Plumlee to Rip City.
“Pat’s character, competitive nature and ability to make shots will be a welcomed addition to our team,” said Neil Olshey, Portland’s president of basketball operations. “He is an excellent fit for our basketball system and our culture.”
Connaughton, 22, is an exceptional athlete who possesses good shooting range. He appeared in 139 career games while at Notre Dame, averaging 10.5 points, 5.9 rebounds, and 1.8 assists. His career slash line was .450/.386/.777. He was the 58th best prospect in this year’s draft according to Jonathan Givony of DraftExpress.
Wizards Acquire Jared Dudley
JULY 9TH, 4:00pm: The deal is official, the Bucks and Wizards announced. Washington is sending a protected second-rounder to the Bucks in exchange for Dudley. “Jared’s versatility and shooting ability will give us depth at both forward positions and allow us to use him in a variety of lineups,” said Wizards president Ernie Grunfeld. “We are also looking forward to the leadership and veteran presence that he will bring both on the court.”
JULY 2ND, 5:57pm: The Wizards are closing in on a deal that would net them Jared Dudley of the Bucks, Marc Stein of ESPN.com reports (Twitter link). Washington is expected to use a trade exception to accommodate Dudley’s contract, and are expected to ship out a protected second round pick in return, Stein adds. The Wizards own a pair of trade exceptions, $2.3MM and $4.6M, and Dudley is set to earn $4.25MM in 2015/16, Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders relays (via Twitter).
Washington has a void at small forward in the wake of Paul Pierce taking his game to the Clippers on a free agent deal. Dudley can certainly help fill that void, as well as provide the Wizards’ young roster with a veteran presence. The 29-year-old appeared in 72 games for Milwaukee last season, averaging 7.2 points, 3.1 rebounds, and 1.8 assists, with a shooting line of .468/.385/.716. His career stats through 595 games are 8.5 PPG, 3.4 RPG, and 1.5 APG. His career slash line is .468/.396./.736.
Dudley, who turns 30 on July 10th, came to the Bucks in a deal last August with the Clippers. At the time, he wasn’t happy with the move, but he said back in March that he eventually became comfortable in Milwaukee, thanks in part to Jason Kidd‘s coaching style. The forward opted in for next season, and he and the Bucks were expected to work out a long-term arrangement. The veteran appreciated that the Bucks provided him an opportunity to showcase his abilities when healthy. “The trade [to Milwaukee] was the best thing for my career, where I got with a training staff that got me healthy and when I’m healthy, I’m the player you see now and the player you saw in Phoenix,” said Dudley, who claimed that he played the entire 2013/14 season with a fracture in his right knee at the request of Doc Rivers.
Nets Rescind Qualifying Offer To Mirza Teletovic
The Nets have withdrawn their more than $4.21MM qualifying offer to Mirza Teletovic, the team announced (hat tip to Tim Bontemps of the New York Post). He’s now an unrestricted free agent, as Brooklyn has forfeited its right to match offers for him. The move is somewhat surprising, since GM Billy King said this morning that the sides had been in talks and that he was hopeful that the client of Jeff Schwartz and Mike Lindeman would sign, as Mike Mazzeo of ESPNNewYork.com passed along (Twitter link).
They can still strike a deal, but the Nets can’t stop him from joining another NBA team. King had said this spring that he would let the market dictate the terms of the forward’s next contract. Teletovic, who’s expressed a desire to return, has received plenty of interest from overseas, but it doesn’t appear as though other NBA teams are biting just yet. Still, Grantland’s Zach Lowe, as he did in April, mentions the Spurs in connection to him (Twitter link), though it’s not clear in either case whether that’s simply an educated guess or if San Antonio indeed has interest.
The Nets are poised to once more exceed the tax threshold, set at $84.74MM for this season, though King said today that the team will probably make moves designed to bring the team under that line or at least lessen the amount by which it is over, notes Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News (on Twitter). Drawing a hard line on Teletovic, who could have simply accepted his qualifying offer, falls in line with that philosophy.
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Lakers Sign Lou Williams
THURSDAY, 3:45pm: The signing is official, the Lakers announced.
SUNDAY, 3:28pm: The Lakers and Lou Williams have agreed to a deal, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). It’ll be a three-year, $21MM arrangement, Wojnarowski adds.
There was said to be mutual interest between Williams and the Heat, but ultimately he’ll be heading west to Los Angeles. The Knicks reportedly reached out to Williams earlier this month and the new client of Wallace Prather was apparently expected to hear from New York and Sacramento, as well as the Nets. The Heat were hot on his heels, but they were limited to the $3.376MM taxpayer’s mid-level exception to get him and we now know that was well short of market value since he’ll earn an average annual value of $7MM per season.
Last season, Williams averaged 15.5 PPG, 2.1 APG, and 1.9 RPG in 25.2 minutes per contest on his way to being recognized as the league’s top bench player. Williams finally looked back to his normal self in 2014/15 for the first time since tearing his right ACL in January 2013. He was a strong fit for the Raptors despite the presence of fellow guards Kyle Lowry and DeMar DeRozan, affirming GM Masai Ujiri‘s decision to absorb Williams’ salary in a swap with the Hawks just before the 2013/14 season officially ended last June. The 28-year-old earned $5.45MM last season and he’ll see a healthy pay bump with his new Lakers deal.
Nets Sign Willie Reed
The Nets have signed free agent combo forward Willie Reed, the team announced via press release. Shams Charania of RealGM first reported the deal, which is for one year. It’s partially guaranteed for $500K, according to TNT’s David Aldridge (on Twitter). Neither report indicates a salary, but since Brooklyn’s taxpayer’s mid-level appears to have been used up on deals for Wayne Ellington and Shane Larkin, Reed is almost certainly getting the minimum salary.
Assuming so, Reed’s contract is worth $947,276, the two-year veteran’s minimum, even though he’s yet to appear in an NBA regular season game. That’s because he was on the roster for the Grizzlies during the 2012/13 regular season, and the Kings carried him in the 2013/14 season. The Nets had him during preseason last fall, but they cut him before the start of the regular season.
Reed earned his way back to Brooklyn with a strong showing on the Heat’s summer league team, as he averaged 13.5 points and 7.8 rebounds in 25.8 minutes per game across his first four contests. The 25-year-old, who went undrafted out of St. Louis in 2011, will now play for the Nets summer league team.
Spurs Acquire Ray McCallum
3:27pm: The deal is official, the Kings and Spurs announced via press releases. Sacramento will receive a 2016 second round pick in return for the guard.
10:01am: The Spurs and Kings have agreed to a deal that sends Ray McCallum to San Antonio and a future second-round pick to Sacramento, reports Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter link). McCallum is making the minimum, but he’s on a three-year deal, so the Spurs can’t take on his salary without using cap space or a trade exception unless they end up sending salary to the Kings when the deal is finalized. That doesn’t appear to be happening, and the Spurs don’t have any trade exceptions. San Antonio is poised to go under the cap to sign LaMarcus Aldridge and others, so the use of cap space seems most likely for this McCallum deal.
The point guard, whose salary is non-guaranteed, ostensibly replaces free agent Cory Joseph, who’s agreed to join the Raptors, as Stein notes. McCallum is set for restricted free agency a year from now, but he at least provides temporary depth. The 24-year-old started 30 games for the Kings last season.
Sacramento has agreed to sign Rajon Rondo, and Darren Collison‘s still on the roster, so McCallum wouldn’t have been in line to do that again this year. The Kings picked the former Detroit Mercy standout 36th overall in 2013.
Kevin Love Re-Signs With Cavs
3:22pm: The Cavaliers have released a formal announcement regarding Love’s deal.
3:12pm: The Cavs still haven’t made any formal announcement, but a message with emojis on the team’s Twitter account indicates that Love has signed.
JULY 9TH, 10:07am: The Cavs have yet to make a formal announcement, but Love said in video for The Players’ Tribune that his contract is “inked and official,” as Chris Haynes of the Northeast Ohio Media Group transcribes.
9:35pm: Love’s deal includes a player option for the fifth year, Zach Lowe of Grantland reports (Twitter link).
JULY 1ST, 1:32pm: Kevin Love will re-sign with the Cavaliers, as he says in a self-authored piece on The Players’ Tribune. Love has long insisted that he would remain with Cleveland, in spite of plenty of stories indicating that he would look elsewhere, and a meeting he apparently had planned with the Lakers. It’ll be a five-year deal for about $110MM, tweets Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com, in what appears to be a long-term commitment at the max.
“Yeah, of course I’ve heard the free agency rumors,” Love wrote. “But at the end of the day, and after meeting with my teammates (it turns out pools are great meeting places) and with the front office, it was clear Cleveland was the place for me. We’re all on the same page and we’re all in. We have unfinished business and now it’s time to get back to work.”
Love’s revelation brings to a close months of back-and-forth as rumors that Love would leave Cleveland continually surfaced and Love consistently denied them. The power forward did change his mind about declining his player option, as he said in January that he planned to opt in, but opting out was always the more financially sensible proposition, since the max will almost certainly entail more money for this coming season than he would have made on the option, worth only about $16.744MM.
The Lakers and Celtics were most often connected to him, but the Rockets and Blazers were also identified as teams with interest in recent days, and indeed, he seemingly remains a sought-after commodity around the league even in the wake of a down season that ended with a shoulder injury in the first round of the playoffs. He struggled to mesh with LeBron James both on and off the court, but James apparently still wanted him to stay.
Suns Sign Tyson Chandler
JULY 9TH, 2:55pm: The deal is official, the team announced.
“Tyson Chandler will be a leader on and off the court,” president of basketball operations Lon Babby said. “His physical stature is matched by his immense presence as an individual of high character who is highly respected by the NBA community. It is an honor to welcome this NBA Champion and All-Star to Phoenix.”
JULY 1ST, 2:15pm: The Suns have agreed to a deal with Tyson Chandler, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (on Twitter). It’ll be a four-year contract worth $52MM, according to Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter link). Chandler will attend the team’s pitch meeting with LaMarcus Aldridge, Wojnarowski adds (Twitter link).
The Mavs and Bucks seemed like the teams with the best shot at the Jeff Schwartz client initially, but they faded, which was seemingly a positive sign for the Lakers and Clippers, who were other reported suitors. Instead, the Suns swoop in and score one of the league’s premiere defensive centers. Chandler, who turns 33 in October, no doubt saw the Suns’ renowned training staff as a draw, though that’s just my speculation.
Dallas wanted to bring back Chandler if it missed out on DeAndre Jordan, as Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com reported this spring, but that won’t be happening now, applying greater pressure on the Mavs to reach a deal with Jordan. The Suns are using most of their cap space on Chandler, so a pursuit of Aldridge or any other marquee free agent will be difficult barring a salary-clearing trade. Phoenix is also re-signing Brandon Knight to a five-year, $70MM deal using his Bird rights.