4:17pm: The move is official, with the Suns issuing a press release to announce that they’ve waived Williams.
12:19pm: The Suns are waiving big man Alan Williams, reports John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7 (Twitter link). Williams will become an unrestricted free agent if and when he clears waivers.
Williams, 25, played well for the Suns in 2016/17, averaging 7.4 PPG and 6.2 RPG in just 15.1 minutes per contest (47 games). His performance earned him a three-year, $16MM+ deal with Phoenix last summer, though only the first year’s salary was fully guaranteed.
Williams’ 2017/18 season was derailed before it began, as a meniscus injury sidelined him for nearly the entire year. He appeared in just five games for the Suns down the stretch.
By waiving Williams, the Suns will no longer be on the hook for his $5.52MM salary for 2018/19. According to Basketball Insiders’ data, the language in the contract called for a $1MM partial guarantee if Williams met certain minute, weight, and body fat requirements, but considering he only played 70 minutes in 2017/18, he presumably didn’t meet those criteria.
Williams’ release will create enough cap room for the Suns to finalize Trevor Ariza‘s reported one-year, $15MM deal, but not much beyond that. By my count, if Phoenix also cuts Shaquille Harrison, who has a non-guaranteed salary, the team could get up to about $4MM in space after signing Ariza.
According to Scott Bordow of The Arizona Republic (via Twitter), the Suns haven’t ruled out the possibility of re-signing Williams to a smaller deal after he clears waivers.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
I’d love to see him go East and help a playoff team
I feel that he would be a good fit for the Knicks.
And possibly the Wizards.
I hope they can resign the salsa
Celtics could use his rebounding
nice If he’s coming to Dallas…
He played with toughness. Too bad he had that injury.
How much space could they create by stretching/buying out Dudley and Troy Daniels, and renouncing the rest of their FAs? They could theoretically still poison pill Marcus Smart. I can also see Rondo being possible there. If Patrick Beverly ends up getting cut by the Clippers, that would also be a very good fit
…Avery Bradley also makes a lot of sense for them
Of course Boston could do with some rebounding & a lot more than that too, they will need to improve a lot to keep competing with Philly.