7:17pm: Gutierrez has officially joined the Charge, the team announced.
10:40am: Former Nets, Sixers and Bucks point guard Jorge Gutierrez has signed with the D-League affiliate of the Cavaliers, a league source tells Chris Reichert of Upside & Motor (Twitter link). The team has yet to make an official announcement. Milwaukee waived his non-guaranteed contract in October, before the start of the regular season. He remains eligible to sign with any NBA team.
Cleveland’s D-League affiliate, the Canton Charge, has had Gutierrez under contract for part of each of the last three seasons, so the Charge are able to sign him directly. Gutierrez would have been subject to D-League waivers and up for grabs among all 19 affiliates if not for the Charge’s returning player rights on him.
The former University of California standout who turns 27 later this month has played a limited role during his two NBA seasons, compiling 3.3 points, 1.5 assists and 0.7 turnovers in 12.0 minutes per game across 35 total appearances. Friday is the one-year anniversary of the trade that sent him, along with Andrei Kirilenko, from Brooklyn to Philadelphia, but the Sixers waived Gutierrez the next day, reportedly while he was sitting on the team bus and even though they’d assured him that they’d keep him. He resurfaced in the NBA later in the 2014/15 season on a pair of 10-day contracts with Milwaukee, which ultimately signed him to a deal that covered the balance of the season with a non-guaranteed salary for 2015/16.
Gutierrez averaged 13.5 points, 5.1 assists and 2.5 turnovers in 29.7 minutes per game across 15 appearances for Canton last season in between his NBA stints. Those numbers aren’t eye-popping, but he’s made his mark on defense. He was a D-League All-Defensive First Team selection in 2013 and 2014 and Pac-12 Defensive Player of the Year in 2012, his final collegiate season.