While fans may gloss over the names of draft-rights players included as placeholders in minor NBA trades, the players themselves certainly take notice, even if they don’t expect to ever play in the NBA. Australian wing Brad Newley, who never came stateside after being selected in the second round of the 2007 draft, is one of those players — he had his rights sent from the Lakers to the Knicks in the three-team Rajon Rondo trade earlier this week.
The deal gave Newley an opportunity to reconnect with Knicks president of basketball operations Leon Rose, who was his agent when he first entered the draft 14 years ago, according to Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic. Newley knows he won’t ever play for the Knicks, but he and Rose remain friends, and he joked that he’d be ready if he gets the call.
“If the Knicks are rebuilding around a 36-year-old, I’m not sure,” he told Vorkunov. “But I’m open to anything.”
Newley admitted in his conversation with Vorkunov that he probably didn’t prioritize the NBA enough earlier in his career, but he was happy to spend his career playing in international leagues and said he doesn’t have any regrets.
“I played the whole of my career in Europe as a stash guy, thought maybe one day you’d get a chance, but I was on some pretty good contracts over there,” Newley said. “So the NBA, at that time, the guarantees weren’t around as much as they are now, with the way things operate. It would be interesting if you could rewind and do it all again, it might be done a little bit different.”
Let’s round up a few more odds and ends from around the basketball world…
- Taylor Jenkins of the Grizzlies and Erik Spoelstra of the Heat were named the NBA’s December Coaches of the Month for the West and East, respectively, the league announced on Tuesday (Twitter link). Jenkins led Memphis to a 12-4 record despite missing star guard Ja Morant for 10 games, while Spoelstra navigated a series of injuries and COVID-19 cases to lead Miami to a 10-5 mark.
- In an Insider-only story, Kevin Pelton of ESPN looked into which teams have been hit the hardest by the health and safety protocols this year, concluding that the Cavaliers, Sixers, and Bucks have lost more WARP (wins above replacement player) than any other clubs so far. Zach Kram of The Ringer explored the other side of the health and safety equation, examining how the players signed using hardship exceptions have performed and how they’re affecting the NBA.
- Looking ahead to the 2022 NBA draft, ESPN’s Jonathan Givony and Mike Schmitz (Insider link) profiled some players whose stocks are rising, including Iowa’s Keegan Murray and Wisconsin’s Johnny Davis, while Jonathan Wasserman of Bleacher Report has published a new mock draft.
Nice story on the Aussie stash pick. I always wonder what their situation is, these traded 30somethings that never came to the league.
The heat won 5 games in a row with as many as 4 starters out, and in 2 games.. with only 5 healthy members of the active roster. I don’t think an NBA team in history has had to deal with that… on top of those things, the Heat have played the 2nd most road games in the NBA so far.. and are still 9-10 games over .500… only a few games out of first in the east. If Spo doesn’t get coach of the year this year… something’s very off. He’s deserved it before and not given it.. I think there’s a Miami bias on this.