Sixers May Renew Kyle Lowry Pursuit In Offseason
The Sixers weren’t able to pry Kyle Lowry away from the Raptors at last month’s trade deadline, but they plan to renew their pursuit of the veteran guard this offseason, sources tell Sam Amick of The Athletic.
As Amick explains, while the 76ers addressed their point guard spot by acquiring George Hill at the deadline, Hill has an expiring contract in 2021/22 and only has a partial guarantee ($1.28MM of $10MM+), so he’s not necessarily viewed as a long-term answer in that role.
The Sixers project to be over the cap this summer, so they’d need to negotiate a sign-and-trade in order to land Lowry, Amick notes. Completing such a deal would be a challenge — Philadelphia wouldn’t want to include Joel Embiid, Ben Simmons, or Tobias Harris in an offer for Lowry, but those three players earn a combined $100MM next season.
Teams that acquire a player via sign-and-trade become hard-capped at the tax apron for the rest of the league year. This year’s tax apron was $139MM and next season’s won’t be significantly higher, so the Sixers would be hard-pressed to accommodate lucrative contracts for Embiid, Simmons, Harris, and Lowry and fill out the rest of their 15-man roster without surpassing that threshold.
Landing Lowry at a rate far lower than his current $30MM salary would be an ideal scenario for the Sixers, but the six-time All-Star reportedly won’t be looking to take a pay cut, and he’s expected to be a popular target on this offseason’s free agent market, one general manager tells Amick.
“There’s teams with money and not a lot of players, so I think he’s going to do really well,” the GM said of Lowry.
The Raptors are also expected to make an effort to re-sign Lowry, and the Heat were known to be interested last month — Miami should have enough cap room to make a serious play for the 35-year-old if they so choose.
Kings Sign Damian Jones To Multiyear Deal
APRIL 28: Jones’ deal is now official, the Kings announced in a press release.
“Damian provides a defensive presence and has fit in nicely with our group,” general manager Monte McNair said in a statement. “We are excited to see his continued growth in Sacramento.”
The team also announced that Silva has been officially released, which accommodated the promotion of Chimezie Metu to the 15-man roster.
APRIL 27: Damian Jones‘ second 10-day contract with the Kings expired on Monday night, but the club won’t let him get away. According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (via Twitter), Jones is signing a rest-of-season contract with Sacramento that will also cover the 2021/22 season.
Although the Kings have an open spot on their 15-man roster and don’t need to cut anyone to make room for Jones, they’ll waive forward Chris Silva, Wojnarowski adds.
Jones, 25, has played for more than half the teams in the Pacific this season, having started the year with Phoenix before he was released by the Suns in February. He later signed a pair of 10-day contracts with the Lakers, then joined the Kings for two more 10-day deals.
In total, Jones has appeared in 28 games (10.7 MPG) in 2020/21, averaging 3.1 PPG and 2.4 RPG with a .696 FG%. He had one of his best games of the season on Monday, putting up eight points and seven rebounds in a Kings win over Dallas.
As for Silva, he was acquired by the Kings in a deadline deal that sent Nemanja Bjelica to the Heat and never seemed to be in Sacramento’s future plans. He logged just nine total minutes across four games for the Kings, racking up more fouls (four) than points (two). He’ll become an unrestricted free agent if and when he clears waivers.
Once the Kings complete both transactions, they’ll still have one open spot on their 15-man roster, which they could use to complete another 10-day or rest-of-season signing.
Kings Promote Chimezie Metu To 15-Man Roster
11:33am: Metu’s deal is for three years, meaning the Kings used some of their mid-level exception to complete the signing, tweets Jones.
Metu received about $700K for the rest of the season, according to ESPN’s Bobby Marks, who tweets that the following two years are non-guaranteed.
11:17am: Kings big man Chimezie Metu has spent all of 2020/21 on a two-way contract, but with just 19 days left in the regular season, Sacramento is signing him to a standard contract, promoting him to the 15-man roster, reports Jason Jones of The Athletic (Twitter link). The team has confirmed Metu’s new multiyear deal, announcing it in a press release.
“Chimezie has worked hard this season and done a terrific job to earn his place on the team,” Kings general manager Monte McNair said in a statement. “He provides toughness and energy to the group. We are happy to watch his career develop in a Kings uniform.”
Metu, 24, initially came to training camp in December on a non-guaranteed contract, and while he didn’t earn a spot on the 15-man roster to start the season, the Kings liked him enough to bring him back on a two-way deal after he cleared waivers.
Metu has since emerged as a regular rotation player, appearing in 28 games (10.1 MPG) and averaging 5.1 PPG and 2.5 RPG. The former USC standout missed a chunk of the season after breaking his wrist on February 14, but he has appeared in all but one game since returning to action on March 24.
The Kings had one open spot on their 15-man roster before promoting Metu. They also intend to waive Chris Silva, opening up another spot in order to sign Damian Jones to a rest-of-season contract. Once all those moves are official, Sacramento will have a full 15-man roster, with an open two-way slot.
Although the exact terms of Metu’s new multiyear deal are unclear for now, the Kings could theoretically use their mid-level exception to sign him to a contract that goes beyond 2021/22 and/or exceeds the minimum. If they do, it would be the second time this season they’ve used a portion of their mid-level on Metu — his non-guaranteed camp deal was a three-year pact that took $1.6MM out of Sacramento’s $9.26MM MLE.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Raptors Sign Freddie Gillespie To Two-Year Deal
10:54am: The Raptors have officially signed Gillespie, the team announced in a press release.
According to Blake Murphy of The Athletic (Twitter link), next season’s salary is non-guaranteed. It has a $50K partial guarantee trigger date at some point, then would become fully guaranteed if Gillespie makes the regular season roster.
8:33am: The Raptors are set to sign big man Freddie Gillespie to a new contract after his second 10-day deal expired on Tuesday night, according to Shams Charania and Blake Murphy of The Athletic (Twitter link). Gillespie will receive a two-year contract from Toronto, per The Athletic’s duo.
Gillespie, who has appeared in 10 games for the Raptors this month, has made a strong impression both on and off the court during his first 20 days with the club. He averaged 5.3 points, 3.6 rebounds, and 1.0 block per game in 16.0 minutes per contest, racking up five blocked shots in just 14 minutes of action during Monday’s victory over Cleveland.
Last offseason, the Raptors re-signed Chris Boucher and added Aron Baynes and Alex Len to shore up a frontcourt rotation that no longer included Serge Ibaka and Marc Gasol. However, Len was waived early in the season, Baynes is no longer in the rotation, and Boucher is injured, leaving Gillespie as the team’s current backup center behind another recent addition, Khem Birch.
Because the Raptors used their full mid-level exception to sign Baynes and Len and don’t have a bi-annual exception available this season, they’re limited to the minimum salary exception on Gillespie, meaning they couldn’t have offered him more than two years or more than the rookie minimum.
Assuming he finalizes his new deal today, Gillespie will earn $116,903 over the final 19 days of the regular season. His salary for 2021/22 will be $1,517,981, though that figure likely won’t be fully guaranteed.
The Raptors will have a full 15-man roster once they officially re-add Gillespie. The club does still have an open two-way contract slot that could be filled before the end of the regular season.
For more on Gillespie’s unorthodox journey to the NBA, be sure to read our feature on the former Baylor standout from earlier this year.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Cavs Sign Jeremiah Martin To Two-Way Contract
APRIL 28: The Cavaliers have officially signed Martin to his two-way deal, a source tells our JD Shaw (Twitter link).
APRIL 22: The Cavaliers intend to fill their open two-way slot by signing free agent guard Jeremiah Martin to a two-way contract, sources tell Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).
Cleveland promoted two-way player Lamar Stevens to the 15-man roster last week, and a report at the time suggested that the club would sign a new two-way player soon.
Martin, 24, spent part of the 2019/20 season on a two-way contract with Brooklyn, averaging 7.1 points and 2.0 assists in nine games (11.0 MPG) for the Nets. He joined Brooklyn’s G League affiliate, the Long Island Nets, for the ’20/21 bubble season and played well, recording 18.5 PPG, 5.1 APG, and 2.3 SPG in 15 contests (31.8 MPG).
Once his deal with the Cavs is official, Martin will join Brodric Thomas as the team’s players on two-way contracts.
Taurean Prince Undergoes Arthroscopic Ankle Surgery
Cavaliers forward Taurean Prince has undergone arthroscopic surgery on his left ankle, the team announced today in a press release. The procedure took place on Tuesday in New York.
Prince had been experiencing ongoing discomfort in his left ankle for several weeks, and there had long been an expectation that he’d undergo surgery during the offseason. However, as was reported last week, he and the team opted to move up that procedure, completing it before the end of the 2020/21 season.
The Cavaliers didn’t provide a specific timeline for Prince’s recovery, simply stating that he has been ruled out indefinitely. It’s safe to assume his season is over and that he’ll aim to be ready by the fall, but the club says his return to basketball activities will be updated as appropriate.
Prince, who started the season in Brooklyn, was sent to Cleveland in the four-team James Harden trade in January. He has appeared in a total of 41 games for the Nets and Cavs this season, averaging 9.5 PPG and 3.5 RPG with a very solid .400 3PT% in 22.1 minutes per contest.
Prince will be entering a contract year in 2021/22 — his expiring $13MM salary could make him a trade candidate either in the offseason or at next year’s deadline.
2020/21 NBA Reverse Standings Update
Throughout the 2020/21 NBA season, Hoops Rumors is maintaining a feature that allows you to keep an eye on the tentative 2021 draft order. Our 2020/21 Reverse Standings tool, which lists the NBA’s 30 teams from worst to first, is updated daily to reflect the outcomes of the previous night’s games.
Our Reverse Standings are essentially a reflection of what 2021’s draft order would look like with no changes to lottery position. We’ve noted each club’s odds of landing the No. 1 overall pick, based on the league’s current lottery format.
[RELATED: Hoops Rumors Glossary: Draft Lottery]
In instances where two non-playoff teams or two playoff teams have identical records, the order in our standings isn’t necessarily definitive — for draft purposes, the NBA breaks ties via random drawings, so those drawings would happen at the end of the year.
Of course, the 14 non-playoff teams all draft before the 16 playoff teams, even if some non-playoff teams have better records than those that made the postseason. Our reverse standings account for playoff seeding, though for now they assume that the Nos. 7 and 8 teams in each conference will earn those final two postseason spots. Since the NBA’s new play-in format opens the door for the Nos. 9 and 10 seeds to sneak into the postseason, we may have to account for a little movement in the draft order at season’s end.
Traded first-round picks are included via footnotes. For example, the note next to Portland’s pick says the Trail Blazers will send their pick to the Rockets if it’s not in the top 14. As of today, the Blazers’ pick projects to be 19th, meaning Houston would receive it.
Those same Rockets are currently in the driver’s seat at the “top” of our reverse standings — their current 4-37 run has dropped their overall record to 15-47, giving them a comfortable 3.5-game “lead” over the league’s next-worst teams, the Magic (18-43) and Timberwolves (19-44).
The league’s bottom three teams will all have an equal chance at the No. 1 overall pick (14.0%) and a top-four selection (52.1%), and the Rockets and Wolves will be especially invested in claiming one of those top lottery positions. Minnesota will send its first-round pick to Golden State if it falls outside of the top three, while Houston will have to swap its own pick for a lesser first-rounder (Miami’s) if it lands outside of the top four.
The Thunder, currently fifth in the lottery standings at 21-41, will also be worth watching closely on lottery night, since they control that Miami pick and the potential Rockets swap. The Thunder’s dream scenario would be moving into the top four themselves, bumping out Houston and claiming a pair of top-five picks.
Our Reverse Standings tracker can be found at anytime on the right sidebar under “Hoops Rumors Features” on our desktop site, or on the “Features” page in our mobile menu. It’s a great resource not just for monitoring a team’s draft position, but also for keeping an eye on whether or not traded picks with protections will be changing hands in 2021. So be sure to check back often as the season progresses!
Note: Mobile users are advised to turn their phones sideways when viewing the Reverse Standings in order to see team records and lottery odds.
Atlantic Notes: Blake, Dwight, Knicks Vets, Raptors
Recent Nets addition Blake Griffin has found himself impressed by the club’s depth, according to Peter Botte of the New York Post.
“When you look at this team you see the big three there, but I think something that kind of goes overlooked is how solid the supporting cast is to our three main guys,” Griffin said of his Brooklyn comrades. “Joe Harris, DeAndre Jordan, Jeff Green, Bruce [Brown], Tyler [Johnson], all these guys are solid, solid basketball players.”
There’s more out of the Atlantic Division:
- Veteran Sixers reserve center Dwight Howard said on Monday that he feels like he is being “targeted” by league officials, per Marc Narducci of The Philadelphia Inquirer. Narducci notes that the former Defensive Player of the Year will get a one-game suspension with his next technical foul. He currently has 15 technical fouls.
- Bench Knicks players Derrick Rose and Taj Gibson are looking forward to helping New York in the playoffs, writes Steve Popper of Newsday. “They’re great guys, they’re team-first guys,” said head coach Tom Thibodeau, who also served as both players’ head coach in Chicago and Minnesota. “So if you want team-first guys, you want hard-playing guys, you go out and find them. They both have proven that.”
- Standout Raptors power forward Freddie Gillespie has inspired Blake Murphy of The Athletic to assess all 31 players the Raptors have signed to 10-day contracts in team history to determine where Gillespie ranks. A hint: Gillespie does crack the top five.
Southwest Notes: Wall, DeRozan, Pelicans, Porter
Rockets point guard John Wall, now waylaid indefinitely with a right hamstring strain, believes he is still a high-level player, telling reporters over the weekend that he feels he’s still “an All-Star in this league,” per Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle.
Wall appeared in 40 games for Houston, his first on-court action since December 26, 2018, and averaged 20.6 PPG, 6.9 APG, and 3.2 RPG, while connecting on 40.4% of his field goal looks.
“Nobody really thought he would be able to play at a level, probably, too close to what he’s playing right now,” head coach Stephen Silas said of Wall’s play this season. “He’s proving a lot of people wrong and proving a lot to a lot of people. I’m his biggest fan.”
Feigen adds in a separate story that Silas remains hopeful Wall can still return to the court for the Rockets before the end of the year.
There’s more out of the Southwest Division:
- Spurs guard DeMar DeRozan has been reliably solid on offense in late-game scenarios, writes Mike Finger of the San Antonio Express-News. “I’m pretty sure San Antonio — as fans, the organization — appreciates him,” fellow Spurs guard Dejounte Murray noted of his veteran teammate, who will reach free agency this summer.
- Despite 2019 No. 1 draft pick Zion Williamson making his first All-Star team and Brandon Ingram, an All-Star in his own right last season, having another strong year, the Pelicans will almost certainly fall short of their playoff expectations for this season, as Scott Kushner of NOLA.com details. The Pelicans are currently four games behind the tenth-seeded Warriors for a crack at the play-in tournament, with just 11 games left to play for both teams.
- It took multiple knee surgeries, but Grizzlies power forward Jontay Porter finally made his NBA debut last month, nearly three years after his last college game. Evan Barnes of The Memphis Commercial Appeal examines Porter’s journey to this point. The 21-year-old out of Missouri, younger brother to Nuggets forward Michael Porter Jr., has now appeared sparingly in eight games for Memphis.
Possible Lottery Pick Josh Giddey Will Enter 2021 Draft
7:10pm: Giddey confirmed the news on his official Instagram page in a lengthy post.
6:17pm: Agents Daniel Moldovan and Alex Saratsis of Octagon Sports have announced that Adelaide 36ers guard Josh Giddey will enter the 2021 NBA draft, per Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.
The 6’8″ Giddey is currently ranked as the No. 13 prospect on ESPN’s big board, fourth among shooting guards. Across 21 games with Adelaide during the 2020/21 season, the ball-handling guard posted averages of 10.9 PPG, 7.1 APG and 6.9 RPG and 1.2 SPG in the Australian NBL, on .411/.308/.686 shooting.
“The 36ers have done a great job developing me, and have put a lot of work into my game over the entire time I’ve been here,” Giddey said in an announcement. “My teammates and the coaching staff here in Adelaide have helped my game reach a new level, and that’s only given me more confidence that this is the right decision for me.”