Deveney’s Latest: Conley, Heat, Lakers, Celtics
With the Grizzlies reportedly zeroing in on point guard Ja Morant at No. 2 in this year’s draft, Mike Conley‘s future in Memphis appears very much up in the air.
Kevin O’Connor of The Ringer, who reported in March that the Jazz are candidates to re-engage the Grizzlies in Conley trade talks this offseason, reiterated that point this week. However, according to Sean Deveney of Sporting News, Memphis is in the market for “quality” draft picks. Utah holds the No. 23 pick and may not pick in the top 20 anytime soon, so it could be tricky for the club to entice the Grizzlies with a package.
One team to watch in the Conley sweepstakes is Miami, according to Deveney, who writes that Heat president Pat Riley has “long coveted” the veteran point guard. The Heat may not be able to draft a difference-maker at No. 13, and acquiring Conley would allow the club to avoid rolling the dice in free agency in 2020, when few impact players are expected to hit the market.
Here’s more from Deveney on Conley and a few other topics:
- Deveney also identifies the Pacers and Mavericks as possible suitors for Conley, though Indiana’s cap flexibility may be compromised if the team decides to re-sign a few of its own free agents, making Conley’s contract undesirable.
- Even if the Lakers can’t acquire Anthony Davis, there’s a sense that they’ll be active on the trade market, writes Deveney. The team has several potential targets in mind, with Bradley Beal at or near the top of that list, depending on whether the Wizards make him available. According to Deveney, Kyle Lowry may also be a target if the Raptors lose Kawhi Leonard in free agency and retool their roster. The Lakers like Derrick Favors too, Deveney adds. Favors could be either a free agent or trade target, depending on what the Jazz do with his $17.65MM team option.
- There’s some skepticism that the Celtics will use all three of their first-round picks in this year’s draft (Nos. 14, 20, and 22). The type of deal(s) that Boston will pursue may depend on what they expect to happen with Kyrie Irving.
Draft Notes: Reddish, Clarke, Paschall
Cam Reddish met with the Lakers during the draft combine, Tania Ganguli of the Los Angeles Times reports (Twitter link). Los Angeles owns the No. 4 overall pick and the organization apparently sent all stakeholders to the meeting. When asked who was there, Reddish replied, “Everybody, you name it.”
Reddish also sat down with the Bulls this week, K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune tweets. He has a meeting set up with the Cavaliers on Friday, as we passed along earlier today.
There are more draft notes to pass along:
- Brandon Clarke (Gonzaga) met with the Timberwolves today and the forward feels like they had a “really, really good talk,” as Dane Moore of Zone Coverage tweets. “Obviously, I think I would love playing with KAT,” Clarke said. The 22-year-old will work out for Minnesota in June.
- Clarke’s first workout will be with the Hornets and Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer reports (Twitter link) that the team “clearly” has interest in him. Clarke, who met with Charlotte during the combine, will also meet with the Suns, per Gina Mizell of The Athletic (Twitter link).
- Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe tweets that Clarke will work out for the Celtics. The forward also has a workout set up with the Heat, per Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel (Twitter link).
- Villanova’s Eric Paschall is performing some personal PR, checking through his social media to make sure he hasn’t tweeted out anything a team might deem as a red flag. “I thought I was in the clear… In today’s age, social media is everything,” Paschall said, as Mike Vorkunov of the Athletic passes along (Twitter link). Paschall has met with the Suns, Wizards, Spurs, Warriors, Nuggets and Lakers. He’ll add the Pacers to that list on Friday.
Kevin Durant Expected To Miss Entire Western Conference Finals
Kevin Durant is unlikely to play until the NBA Finals should the Warriors make it that far, a source tells Monte Poole of NBC Sports. Durant returning at any point during the postseason remains in question.
Durant won’t make the trip to Portland for Game 3 and 4. Instead, he will stay behind to work with the team’s medical staff. Golden State announced today that Durant has shown progress as he recovers from a strained calf, but he is not ready to participate in on-court activity.
The Warriors were hoping Durant would be able to return during the Western Conference Finals so that he could get re-acclimated with the team before a possible NBA Finals appearance.
DeMarcus Cousins has progressed to on-court activity, per the team. He’s not quite ready for live action, but his status appears more favorable than Durant’s at this time.
Both players are expected to be re-evaluated in a week, according to the Warriors.
Pelicans Notes: Zion, Culver, Davis
Those concerned about Zion Williamson‘s game being dependent on his athleticism are overthinking the evaluation process.
“So (Williamson) is 18 now,” a non-Pelicans executive explains to Sam Vecenie of The Athletic. “He’ll play his first NBA season at 19. He’ll be 23 when his second contract starts. Even if we get him for eight seasons and that takes us all the way through his team-controlled years, that only gets us through his age-26 season. And if he ends up being good enough to be with us for eight years as a No. 1 overall pick, we probably won’t complain because he’ll have been a good player. I don’t think we should worry about his athleticism falling off by then unless he gets hurt.”
A few of the front office analytic executives who spoke with Vecenie told him that Williamson’s projection is actually more favorable than Anthony Davis‘ was coming out of college. Opinions throughout the league are split. Some executives believe Davis was the better prospect while others feel it’s extremely close.
The Pelicans are selecting Williamson after winning the draft lottery, barring an upset of massive proportions. Let’s take a look at more notes from New Orleans:
- The Pelicans met with Jarrett Culver (Texas Tech) at the draft combine in Chicago, NBA writer Jim Eichenhofer tweets. “You never know what could happen. Anything could happen. You just have to be ready,” Culver said. New Orleans could be looking at a second top-5 selection if they trade Davis to the Knicks or Lakers.
- Pelicans owner Gayle Benson called Davis’ trade request “disappointing” during a commencement speech she made for Loyola University. Benson referred to the team’s on-court performance as “frustrating” and said that the franchise has “not adapted to the reality of today’s NBA,” as Christopher Dabe of The Time-Picayune passes along.
- The Pelicans hired David Griffin to lead a more analytical approach in the front office. It wasn’t easy for ownership to dismiss former GM Dell Demps, as Dabe relays in the same piece. “I must be honest with myself in making painful decisions because my ultimate responsibility is to the fans,” Benson said.
Atlantic Notes: Crabbe, Draft, Sixers’ No. 24
The Nets are heading into the most crucial offseason under GM Sean Marks. The franchise is armed with cap space, owns a bevy of draft selections (Nos. 17, 27, and 31 overall picks), and has young talent on hand, all parts that make Brooklyn a reportedly desirable destination for marquee free agents.
Michael Scotto of The Athletic examines what strategy the Nets should take with their picks. Attaching a draft selection to Allen Crabbe in order to shed his $18.5MM salary via trade makes sense, especially if the team intends to pursue two marquee free agents. Without making moves like this, the Nets only project to have roughly 30.4MM in salary cap space, as our Salary Cap Digest shows.
Here’s more from the Atlantic Division:
- Oregon’s Bol Bol is a name to keep an eye on for the Nets, Scotto adds in the same piece. Bol, who is getting attention from the Cavaliers at No. 5 overall, could drop out of the lottery because of medical concerns. Brooklyn could find itself with a similar opportunity to the one it had in 2017 with Caris LeVert.
- Jarrett Culver (Texas Tech) has met with the Knicks. Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News relays (Twitter link). Culver, who is reportedly on the Hawks’ radar, is a top-10 prospect and New York owns the No. 3 overall pick.
- North Carolina’s Cameron Johnson and Purdue’s Carsen Edwards could be options for the Sixers in the first round, Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer writes. Philadelphia owns the No. 24 overall pick in addition to four second-rounders.
Eastern Draft Notes: Cavs, Wizards, Bulls
The Cavaliers will cast a “wide net” when searching for the right prospect to select with the No. 5 overall pick, Chris Fedor of Cleveland.com writes. Kevin Porter Jr. (USC) and Bol Bol (Oregon) are two of the players the team will consider in that spot.
Porter, who was suspended during the 2018/19 season for a “personal conduct issue” at USC, met with the Cavs on Wednesday. The team plans to bring him in for a pre-draft workout in the coming weeks.
Bol underwent measurements at the combine in Chicago but is not expected to workout or conduct interviews. The 7’2″ center suffered a foot injury back in December and was unable to play the remainder of the campaign for the Ducks.
Here’s more from on the draft from teams in the Eastern Conference:
- Cam Reddish will meet with the Cavaliers on Friday, Fedor adds in the same piece. Reddish is a candidate to be a top-five pick.
- The Wizards hold the No. 9 overall pick and they have interviewed several top prospects, according to Candace Buckner of the Washington Post (Twitter link). Reddish, Coby White (North Carolina), Brandon Clarke (Gonzaga), Jarrett Culver (Texas Tech), and Jordan Poole (Michigan) were interviewed by Washington. Other players who the team sat down with included Eric Paschall (Villanova), KZ Okpala (Stanford), and Ty Jerome (Virginia).
- Prior to the combine, the Bulls worked out six prospects, Darnell Mayberry of The Athletic relays (Twitter link). Alpha Diallo (Providence), Fletcher Magee (Wofford), Isaiah Roby (Nebraska), Justin Turner (Bowling Green), Quinndary Weatherspoon (Mississippi State), Zach Norvell (Gonzaga/Simeon) all participated in drills with the team.
Five Key Offseason Questions: Chicago Bulls
The Bulls entered the 2018/19 season hoping to take the sort of steps forward that fellow rebuilding teams like the Kings and Hawks did. Instead, the team got off to a slow start, fired head coach Fred Hoiberg, and installed Jim Boylen in his place en route to a 22-60 finish.
Having doubled down on Boylen with a multiyear contract extension, the Bulls will enter the 2019/20 campaign counting on another year of prospect development – and Boylen’s bond with his players – to begin translating to on-court success.
Here are five key questions facing the franchise this summer:
1. How will the Bulls address their point guard position?
Kris Dunn was one of the key components of the trade that sent Jimmy Butler from Chicago to Minnesota in 2017, but unlike the two other players the Bulls acquired in that swap – Zach LaVine and Lauri Markkanen – Dunn hasn’t established himself as a crucial piece of the team’s future.
After a pair of up-and-down seasons in Chicago, Dunn will at the very least find himself facing competition for his starting point guard job this fall, if he’s not usurped outright by a newcomer. It’ll be a big offseason for the former No. 5 overall pick, who will be extension-eligible for the first time.
With about $20MM in projected cap room at their disposal, the Bulls have the flexibility to pursue a veteran on the free agent market to address the point guard spot. They won’t be in play for Kyrie Irving, Kemba Walker, or D’Angelo Russell, and investing big money in a second-tier restricted free agent like Terry Rozier may be ill-advised, but there are a number of options available.
All the way back in January, one report identified Ricky Rubio and Darren Collison as two free-agents-to-be who will be of interest to the Bulls. Collison’s teammate Cory Joseph could be another option, as could Chicago native Patrick Beverley.
Two of the more intriguing players to watch on this front are Derrick Rose and Rajon Rondo — Rose, is of course a former Bulls MVP, while Rondo was well-liked by the team’s young players during his lone year in Chicago. A reunion with either player might not be out of the question.
Of course, the Bulls hold the No. 7 overall pick in the draft and could use it to draft a point guard. However, Ja Morant appears likely to come off the board at No. 2, and Darius Garland may not be available for Chicago either. After those two prospects, there are probably no true point guards worth considering that high in the draft.
Based on the team’s timeline for contention, it seems like Selden and Arcidiacono are the players more likely to be back, but we shouldn’t entirely rule out a new deal for Lopez. After all, the lottery-bound Bulls could have traded him at the deadline or bought him out before March 1, but opted to keep him around instead. He’s unlikely to earn $14MM+ again, so if the Bulls have some cap room left over, perhaps they’ll explore keeping him in the mix as a veteran leader on a young roster.Terry Rozier, Patrick Beverley On Bulls’ Radar
The Bulls figure to be in the market for a point guard this summer, and Terry Rozier and Patrick Beverley are two veteran free-agents-to-be who are on their radar, according to Darnell Mayberry of The Athletic.
Mayberry cites Rozier’s “fearless play and hard-nosed defensive effort” as traits that intrigue the Bulls, writing that there are people within the organization who believe that the Celtics point guard “could be exactly who the team needs.”
However, Rozier will be a restricted free agent this offseason and won’t come cheap. As Mayberry points out, he’s also the same age as Kris Dunn, so if the Bulls don’t believe there’s more room for Dunn to improve, it’s worth questioning whether the same is true of Rozier.
[RELATED: Knicks have interest in Terry Rozier]
As for Beverley, he’s another tough defender who would be a solid fit under head coach Jim Boylen, and he’ll be an unrestricted free agent this summer. It doesn’t hurt matters that he’s a Chicago native, per Mayberry, though he notes that it’s unclear whether the Bulls’ front office prefers Rozier or Beverley.
There will be a number of other point guard options available this offseason for the Bulls, who have previously been linked to veterans like Ricky Rubio and Darren Collison. While it remains to be seen which direction Chicago will go, it seems safe to assume that the team will be prioritizing the position as it debates how to use its cap room, which could amount to about $20MM.
Draft Notes: Morant, Garland, Suns, Bucks
While he seems very likely to be selected by Memphis with the No. 2 overall pick, Murray State point guard Ja Morant covered his bases at this week’s draft combine in Chicago, according to Jeremy Woo of SI.com, who reports (via Twitter) that Morant met with the Pelicans, Grizzlies, and Knicks. Those, of course, are the teams with the top three picks in this year’s draft.
While Morant is in attendance at the combine, he’s not participating in the 5-on-5 games this week, per an Associated Press report. That’s no surprise, since it’s rare for top prospects to play in those games and put their stock at risk.
Here’s more on the 2019 NBA draft:
- If point guard prospect Darius Garland received a promise from a team near the top of the draft, as has been speculated, it seems unlikely it came from the Cavaliers. According to Joe Vardon of The Athletic (via Twitter), Garland left the combine without having met with Cleveland.
- John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7 suggests that Garland, Coby White (UNC), and Jarrett Culver (Texas Tech) are the three players worth keeping a close eye on as possibilities for the Suns at No. 6.
- USC guard Kevin Porter Jr. is among the players who have met with the Knicks at the combine, tweets Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic. The No. 14 prospect on ESPN’s big board, Porter probably isn’t a target for New York unless the club makes some sort of trade.
- The Bucks are believed to be keeping a close eye on shooting guards at this year’s combine, tweets Gery Woelfel of Woelfel’s Press Box. Milwaukee has the 30th overall pick in the 2019 draft.
Hoops Rumors Glossary: Base Year Compensation
As Larry Coon explains in his invaluable CBA FAQ, the term “base year compensation” technically no longer shows up in the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement, and hasn’t since 2011. A relic of past agreements, the base year compensation rule was intended to prevent teams from signing free agents to new contracts that were specifically intended to facilitate salary-matching in trades.
While the base year compensation rules have mostly been adjusted and/or removed from the CBA in recent years, there’s still one situation where they apply. Teams have to take them into account when completing sign-and-trade deals.
The BYC rules apply to a player who meets the following criteria in a sign-and-trade:
- He is a Bird or Early Bird free agent.
- His new salary is worth more than the minimum.
- He receives a raise greater than 20%.
- His team is at or above the cap immediately after the signing.
If the player meets those criteria and is included in a sign-and-trade deal, his outgoing salary for matching purposes is considered to be his previous salary or 50% of his new salary, whichever is greater. For the team he is being signed-and-traded to, his incoming figure for matching purposes is his full new salary.
Here’s a specific example to help make things a little clearer: Let’s say the Celtics want to sign-and-trade Kyrie Irving this offseason. He’s a Bird free agent, his new salary will be well above the minimum, and the Celtics project to be an over-the-cap team. Having made $20,099,189 in 2018/19, Irving will also receive a raise significantly higher than 20% if he inks a maximum salary contract, which is projected to start at $32,700,000. So he meets the BYC criteria.
In that scenario, Irving’s salary for matching purposes from the Celtics’ perspective would be $20,099,189, since his previous salary is greater than 50% of his new salary. From his new team’s perspective, Irving’s incoming figure would be his actual salary, $32,700,000.
Typically, a team acquiring a player via sign-and-trade doesn’t have the cap room to sign the player outright, or else there would be little need to negotiate a sign-and-trade. That means salary matching is often required, and is complicated by base year compensation rules.
In this example, the Celtics wouldn’t be able to take back more than $25,223,986 in exchange for Irving, due to the league’s salary-matching rules. However, in order to take on $32,700,000 in salary, Boston’s trade partner would have to send out at least $26,080,000 in order to account for those salary-matching rules themselves. The discrepancy between those two figures would complicate sign-and-trade talks, likely requiring both teams to include additional pieces to make the deal work.
The base year compensation concept doesn’t surface frequently, as there have only been four sign-and-trades completed around the NBA in the last four offseasons. However, it looms large over most sign-and-trade attempts, reducing the likelihood of teams finding a deal that can be legally completed.
Note: This is a Hoops Rumors Glossary entry. Our glossary posts will explain specific rules relating to trades, free agency, or other aspects of the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement. Larry Coon’s Salary Cap FAQ and salary information from Basketball Insiders was used in the creation of this post.