Hawks’ Mike Muscala Exercises Option

Mike Muscala has picked up his $5MM option and will return to the Hawks next season, tweets ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.

The fifth-year center/power forward is coming off a career-best year, averaging 7.6 points and 4.3 rebounds in 53 games. An ankle injury limited his availability for the first two months of the season, but he played well once he recovered. Muscala, who turns 27 next week, was the 44th pick in the 2013 draft and has remained in Atlanta ever since.

Muscala follows teammate Dewayne Dedmon, who exercised his $7.2MM option on Wednesday. Their decisions leave the Hawks with about $20MM in cap space heading into free agency, notes ESPN’s Bobby Marks, who adds that Atlanta could be a popular spot for teams willing to give up draft picks to unload unwanted contracts (Twitter link).

As our list of player option decisions shows, Muscala becomes the 16th NBA veteran to exercise a 2018/19 option this offseason, after just five vets picked up player options last summer.

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