The Sydney Kings of the Australian NBL have signed guard Derrick Walton Jr. to a one-year deal that includes NBA outs, the team announced in a press release.
After going undrafted out of Michigan in 2017, Walton signed a two-way deal with Miami and appeared in 16 games. He’s bounced around a bit in subsequent years, appearing in a total of 45 NBA games with the Heat, Clippers and Pistons, holding career averages of 2.2 PPG and 1.4 APG in 11.2 MPG.
Walton, 27, spent the majority of last season with Detroit’s G League affiliate, the Motor City Cruise, averaging 16.8 PPG, 5.6 RPG, 9.5 APG and 1.5 SPG on .505/.386/.813 shooting in 25 regular season games (36 MPG). He also had a brief 10-day hardship stint with his hometown Pistons, averaging 6.3 PPG, 3.3 RPG, 7.3 APG and 2.3 SPG on .231/.231/1.000 shooting in three games.
Here’s more from around the basketball world:
- Kok Yat, who wasn’t selected in the 2022 draft a couple of weeks ago and became an unrestricted free agent, plans to return to Overtime Elite next season, a source tells ESPN’s Jonathan Givony (Twitter link). Yat’s deal with OTE includes a free out that can be used at any time to sign a two-way or 10-day contract with NBA teams, per Givony. Yat is ranked No. 36 on ESPN’s list of the best undrafted prospects.
- Cydney Henderson and Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today (subscriber link) list their early winners and losers of free agency thus far. According to Henderson and Zillgitt, the Warriors and Nets are among the early losers, while the Timberwolves and Sixers are among the early winners.
- Sources tell Marc J. Spears of Andscape (Twitter link) that the G League Ignite could be on the move. The Ignite squad is currently headquartered in Walnut Creek, California, but “are likely” relocating to Henderson, Nevada, a suburb of Las Vegas, says Spears.
Why are the warriors losers ?
Because USA Today says so.
For losing Payton Jr? Irreplaceable I tell ya!
Because the national media never stops pushing Bron and anti-Steph/GSW narratives, not even for a second. Can’t even win the title without them clamoring to see who can be the first to hand them yet another hypothetical L online…took them like a week, huh?
With this L, GSW falls to 0-99873637 in online hypotheticals in the Curry era, what a tragedy.
Because they lost like 4 guys and made what like one maybe two moves??
Lost Payton, JTA, Porter and Lee I believe.
Not superstars but good key role players a locker room guys.
Haven’t made much noise in terms of signings.
However I thought they got a good guy in the draft, Wiseman will return and it’ll also open up more minutes for Kuminga and Moody.
I guess they just need to find good replacements that a more locker room fits, and hard workers than amazing players.
I don’t think they are that bad a losers.
Boston Celtics have to be one of the biggest winners. Added Brogdan and Gallo for next to nothing. They should be really really strong next season. They are one of those sides like the clippers who come the trade deadline might swap out a bunch of role players for another superstar
I would consider Boston more of a wait and see team since Brogdon will have to remain healthy for that trade to be considered a win and Gallo is a defensive liability which makes him difficult to play for extended minutes in the playoffs.
Lee was legitimately awful almost all season long, he’s a 1-tool player (shooting) and he isn’t even a flamethrower, he’s mid at that. Glad he’s not on my team now.
DiVincenzo is literally an upgrade over Lee, so that’s actually a W for GSW, why are they the “big losers” if they improved one of the spots they lost? Sure GP2 and Otto were huge losses, but that just means more time for Moody, Kuminga and Wiseman, not to mention Looney, Wiggins and Poole are all in varying stages of ascending….oh noooo, might as well win a bunch more titles!!
If they sign Iggy and Melo for veteran presence, 2022/23 will be a wrap.
It’s tough to call Minnesota a winner so far. Yes, they got Gobert, but they paid a HEFTY price for him. 3 unprotected 1st rounders from a team that has been in the lottery 23 out of 33 seasons in their existence. And of the 10 playoff appearances, they only made it out of the first round once. Yes, they COULD be on an upswing, but they also COULD have set their franchise back another decade if it doesn’t work as expected.