Latest On Al Horford, Hawks
The Hawks have become more optimistic that they can re-sign Al Horford while the Celtics and Wizards fall back, , Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical reports. Boston and Washington were viewed as front-runners earlier today, but that appears to have changed. Wojnarowski then went a bit further and tweeted, Boston and Washington have rapidly lost hope of Horford leaving Atlanta. The Hawks are preparing a full max offer to keep Horford, who is being heavily recruited by Kent Bazemore, Michael Scotto of The Associated Press tweets.
The Hawks committed more than $140MM to Bazemore and Dwight Howard on Friday, and it will take a max offer to land Horford. Horford appeared in all 82 regular season games for Atlanta this past season, averaging 15.2 points, 7.3 rebounds and 3.2 assists in 32.1 minutes per night. His shooting line was .505/.344/.798.
NBA Sets 2016/17 Salary Cap At $94.143MM
The NBA has set the salary cap for the 2016/17 season at $94.143MM, as announced in a press release.
The luxury tax line is at $113.287MM. The salary cap for the 2015/16 season was set at $70MM, making this the biggest single-year jump in league history, as noted by Real GM. It’s nearly a 35% increase over last year’s cap, which is worth considering when evaluating this summer’s free agent contracts.
The minimum team salary – or the “salary floor” – is set at 90% of the cap, which amounts to $84.729MM. The non-taxpayer mid-level is set for $5.628MM, the taxpayer mid-level is set at $3.477MM and the room mid-level is set at $2.898MM.
According to Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link), the starting salaries for maximum-salary contracts will look like this:
- Players with 0-6 years of experience: $22,116,750
- Players with 7-9 years of experience: $26,540,100
- Players with 10+ years of experience: $30,963,450
Pacers Discuss Acquiring Rudy Gay
The Pacers and Kings have talked recently about a trade involving Sacramento small forward Rudy Gay, Marc Stein of ESPN.com reports (on Twitter). The Kings have interest in landing Monta Ellis, whom they eyed in free agency last summer, in return, but the Pacers prefer to deal Rodney Stuckey, Stein tweets.
The Pacers reportedly spoke to Sacramento about a possible Gay trade before they acquired Thaddeus Young last week, which suggests their interest is as strong as Stein indicates. The Kings are becoming increasingly willing to move Gay in a trade, according to multiple reports. Gay, who turns 30 in August, has been one of the Kings’ go-to scorers over the past two-plus seasons, though his PPG dipped to 17.2 in 2015/16, his lowest mark since his rookie season. Still, Gay contributed 6.5 rebounds and 1.4 steals per game, and posted decent shooting percentages, making 46.3% of his shots from the floor and 34.4% from downtown.
Gay’s contract has two years left on it, but the final year is a player option, so he looks poised to hit the open market in 2017, assuming he has a solid 2016/17 season. Teams may not be willing to give up a significant return for one year of Gay, but his $13.333MM salary certainly looks reasonable compared to some of the prices being paid in free agency.
Submit Your Questions For Hoops Rumors Mailbag
We at Hoops Rumors love interacting with our readers. This is why we provide an opportunity for you to hit us up with your questions in our weekly mailbag feature, which is posted every Sunday.
Have a question regarding player movement, free agent rumors, the salary cap, the NBA draft, or the top storylines of the week? You can e-mail them here: hoopsrumorsmailbag@gmail.com. Feel free to send emails throughout the week, but please be mindful that we may receive a sizable number of questions and might not get to all of them.
If you missed out on any past mailbags and would like to catch up, you can view the full archives here.
Kings To Sign Arron Afflalo
5:12pm: The second year is only partially guaranteed for $1.5MM, Sam Amick of USA Today reports (Twitter link).
2:02pm: The Kings and unrestricted free agent shooting guard Arron Afflalo have agreed to a deal that will land him in Sacramento, Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical reports (Twitter link). It’s going to be a two-year, $25MM pact for Afflalo, Wojnarowski adds.
There wasn’t much chatter attached to Afflalo prior to this deal coming together. The veteran opted out of his contract with the Knicks and the $8MM he was slated to earn in 2016/17, and the move has paid off with Afflalo increasing his annual salary to $12.5MM courtesy of Sacramento. One would assume he is joining the Kings as a starter, given his reported disdain for the reserve role the Knicks placed him in last season. Though, a $4.5MM per season raise may make coming off the bench more palatable, if that is to be his role.
Afflalo appeared in 71 games for the Knicks in 2015/16 and averaged 12.8 points, 3.7 rebounds and 2.0 assists in 33.4 minutes per outing. He shot .443/.382/.840 from the field on the campaign.
Kings To Sign Anthony Tolliver
The Kings and unrestricted free agent Anthony Tolliver have agreed to a deal, Sam Amick of USA Today reports (Twitter link). It’s a two-year, $16MM pact that is partially guaranteed for $2MM in 2017/18, the scribe adds.
Tolliver made 72 appearances for the Pistons this past season, averaging 5.3 points, 3.2 rebounds and 0.7 assists in 18.6 minutes per outing. His shooting line was .386/.360/.617.
The 31-year-old’s deal is the one of the few handed out since free agency commenced that includes a partial guarantee. But even if by some chance he is released prior to next season as a result of not having a full guarantee, Tolliver will be have pocketed at least $10MM for his efforts, as well as be in line to hit the open market next summer when the cap is expected to increase once again. Not a bad deal for the journeyman, all things considered.
Hoops Rumors Originals 6/26/16-7/2/16
Here’s a look back at the original analysis generated by the Hoops Rumors staff this past week.
- You can now view complete depth charts for every NBA team at Roster Resource, the newest addition to the Trade Rumors family.
- Luke Adams ran down the Top 50 free agents around the league.
- We handed out our 2016 NBA Draft grades to the teams of the Atlantic and Southwest Divisions.
- Will Joseph highlighted some of the better basketball blogs around in his weekly installment of Hoops Links.
- We ran down the unsigned draftees for the teams of the Northwest and Southwest Divisions.
- If you missed any of our daily reader-driven discussions, be sure to check out the Community Shootaround archives.
- Arthur Hill answered reader questions in our Weekly Mailbag.
- Here’s how you can follow Hoops Rumors on social media and RSS feeds.
- We reviewed our commenting policy. Play nice everyone.
- Here’s how you can follow specific players on Hoops Rumors.
Rockets To Sign Ryan Anderson
The Rockets and Ryan Anderson have agreed to terms on a deal that will bring the forward to Houston, Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical reports (via Twitter). Anderson’s pact is for four years and $80MM, the scribe adds.
Houston beat out a number of other suitors for the services of the sweet-shooting stretch four. The Kings and Wizards were among the teams vying to ink the 28-year-old, but the opportunity to play alongside James Harden in Houston, and of course, $80MM, snagged Anderson.
Anderson, a former 21st overall pick, has only played more than 66 games once in a season, but is coming off a solid year for the Pelicans. He averaged 17.0 points and 6.0 rebounds per game, to go along with a shooting line of .427/.366/.873. Anderson’s career numbers through eight NBA seasons are 13.1 PPG, 5.6 RPG and 0.9 APG.
Magic Sign Bismack Biyombo
JULY 7, 10:18am: The Magic have formally announced Biyombo’s signing (via Twitter).
JULY 2, 2:45pm: Adrian Wojnarowski of the Vertical tweets that the pact will be worth $72MM over four years.
2:27pm: The contract is estimated at four-years and approximately $70MM, per Marc Stein of ESPN.com (on Twitter).
2:15pm: The Magic and unrestricted free agent Bismack Biyombo have come to terms on a deal, Jon Krawczynski of The Associated Press reports (on Twitter). The agreement is for four years, but the amount of the pact has yet to been reported.
Biyombo’s stock rose dramatically during the Eastern Conference playoffs, when his playing time spiked after Jonas Valanciunas was injured. He averaged 5.5 points, 8.0 rebounds and 1.6 blocks while appearing in every regular-season game, then bumped those averages to 6.2/9.4/1.4 in 20 playoff games. He opted out of his deal and the $2.9MM he was set to earn next season and all but assuredly secured himself a hefty raise as a result.
Toronto reportedly wanted to retain Biyombo, but only held his Non-Bird rights, which meant it would have to use cap room to re-sign him. A number of roster moves designed to free cap space would have been needed to make that a possibility. Moves that the team was either unwilling or unable to make.
The addition of Biyombo, coupled with the trade acquisition of former Thunder forward Serge Ibaka certainly gives Orlando and imposing frontcourt defensively. It remains to be seen if these additions will prompt the team to shop center Nikola Vucevic, whose salary of $12,250,000 is looking more and more like a bargain every day.
Latest On Courtney Lee
The Knicks continue to search for a wing player to add to their roster, and to that end, are still pursuing unrestricted free agent Courtney Lee. New York’s latest offer to Lee was for four-years and approximately $40MM, or to do some quick math, $10MM per season, Ian Begley of ESPN.com reports (ESPN Now link). Phil Jackson and company are also reportedly in the mix for Eric Gordon, with potentially disgruntled Heat star Dwyane Wade lurking as a fallback option.
New York is facing competition for Lee, with the Kings ready to offer the swingman a deal valued at approximately $14MM per season, Michael Scotto of Sheridan Hoops tweets. The Wolves Kings, Nets and Hawks are also reported to be interested in Lee. After agreeing to a deal with center Joakim Noah, the Knicks project to have approximately $12MM in cap space remaining, Begley notes, which could prove problematic for the team if the bidding for Lee escalates.
Lee finished the 2015/16 season with the Hornets, appearing in 28 games after being acquired from Memphis and averaging 8.9 points, 3.9 rebounds and 2.1 assists during his time in Charlotte. He shot .445/.392/.885 from the field.