NBA G League Assignments/Recalls: 10/31/19
Every night during the NBA G League season, Hoops Rumors provides the assignments and recalls for each team. With training camps now open, here are Thursday’s assignments and recalls from around the G League:
- The Mavericks have assigned Isaiah Roby to the Texas Legends, Brad Townsend of the Dallas Morning News relays (Twitter link). Roby was selected in the second round by Dallas this past summer.
- The Jazz are sending three players to the Salt Lake City Stars, according to the team’s Twitter feed. Tony Bradley, Dante Exum, and Miye Oni are all headed to the G League.
Isaiah Thomas Taking Advantage Of New Opportunity
Isaiah Thomas recorded his first double-double since he was back with the Celtics, scoring 17 points and dishing out 10 assists in the Wizards‘ 159-158 loss to the Rockets last night. Thomas, who signed a one-year deal with Washington this offseason, believes the team gives him the right opportunity to succeed again in the league, as he told the media on Wednesday, including Hoops Rumors.
“It’s been one injury. That’s all it’s been. Like I always said, if I get the opportunity like I did in Boston, I’d do the same thing,” Thomas said. “The trades I’ve been in, I haven’t had this same opportunity. That’s the only reason that you haven’t seen me play well. I’m just going to continue to work hard, continue to do what I can to win games here. The Wizards are giving me a great opportunity and I can’t thank them enough.”
Thomas was dealt to Cleveland during the summer of 2017 in the Kyrie Irving deal, while he was still recovering from a hip injury. The LeBron James-led Cavaliers shipped him to Los Angeles later that season as part of the package that landed Larry Nance Jr. Thomas left Los Angeles during the 2018 offseason as LBJ joined the Lakers, and found a new home in Denver on a Nuggets team with a deep rotation and not much of need for Thomas’ scoring skills.
Thomas missed the first two games of this season with the Wizards because of a thumb injury, and the team is being cautious with his workload, limiting him to 44 minutes over the past two contests. However, the franchise is impressed with what the 30-year-old brings to the table.
“He was playing well before he got hurt six weeks ago,” coach Scott Brooks said. “I wasn’t expecting it after he missed six weeks, no. It’s hard to do. It’s almost nearly impossible. Especially playing that position, but you know he’s always had the heart of a champion and that’s never going to go away. He plays through injuries, he plays through a lot of difficult things that he’s been through but he comes down and plays hard every night.
“You know I expect him to play well all the time. That’s why we brought him in. Not only to play well, [but] to just be a good leader and a good teammate to all of our younger players.”
NBA Suspends Joel Embiid, Karl-Anthony Towns Two Games Each
The punishment for the scuffle between Karl-Anthony Towns and Joel Embiid has been handed down by the league. Each player will miss the next two games, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).
The two big men wrestled one another to the ground on Wednesday and were each ejected from the contest. The jabs didn’t stop there, as the star big men exchanged insults via social media later that night. Charania adds that the duo’s suspension was for their on-court altercation and “their continued escalation following the incident.”
Ben Simmons, who held Towns down on the ground as other players pulled Embiid away, will not be suspended for the incident, despite the Wolves pushing back against the notion that he acted as a peacemaker.
Embiid will lose roughly $379K as a result of the conflict while Towns will lose roughly $376K, according to ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link). The 76ers will play Portland and Phoenix over their next two games while Minnesota faces Washington and Milwaukee.
Pacific Notes: Kuzma, Kings, Curry
Kyle Kuzma will travel with the Lakers for their upcoming road trip and it’s possible that he makes his season debut over the next three games, Bill Oram of The Athletic relays (Twitter link). The team travels to Dallas, San Antonio, and Chicago over the next week.
Here’s more from around the Pacific Division:
- James Ham of NBC Sports California wonders if the Kings should replace Dewayne Dedmon in the starting lineup with Richaun Holmes. Dedmon, who came to Sacramento on a three-year deal, is struggling to make an impact and Holmes is performing admirably off the bench.
- Sacramento’s problems this season are not new, Jason Jones of The Athletic contends. The 0-4 Kings have issues on both sides of the court and Jones cites the team’s lack of energy as a major reason why the squad is underperforming.
- Don’t expect the Warriors to turn Stephen Curry into James Harden, as head coach Steve Kerr told the media in Northern California. “We could turn him into James Harden and give him the ball every play,” Kerr said (via Nick Friedell of ESPN.com). “That’s really hard to do and you have to build a team for that. Houston has put five shooters on the floor for years now with Harden to give him that space. We don’t have that kind of personnel, so there’s not the same spacing. And that kind of basketball wears you out, too.”
Wizards Notes: Brown Jr., Analytics, Wall
Troy Brown Jr. will make his season debut for the Wizards on Wednesday against the Rockets, as Candace Buckner of the Washington Post relays (Twitter link).
“I’m just happy to be back,” Brown said. “It’s just a good feeling, especially sitting out all that time and just being able to see how well we’ve been playing and just enjoying that mix of how good we’re doing right now.”
It’s unclear if Brown will start the Wizards’ home opener but it would be surprising if the second-year wing doesn’t eventually earn the nod. Here’s more from Washington:
- Fred Katz of The Athletic details how the Wizards are using statistician Dean Oliver this season. Oliver, who formally worked in several NBA offices, was hired as an assistant coach by Washington this offseason.
- Offseason addition C.J. Miles has about 1-2 weeks to go before he returns to the court, Grant Paulsen of 106.7 The Fan passes along (Twitter link). Miles came to Washington in the Dwight Howard trade.
- John Wall was seen at Wizards‘ practice running and taking part in individual drills, as Chase Hughes of NBCSports tweets. The Wizards were recently denied a disabled player exception by the league for Wall’s injuries.
NBA G League Assignment/Recalls: 10/29/19
Every night during the NBA G League season, Hoops Rumors provides the assignments and recalls by each team. With training camps now open, here are Tuesday’s assignments and recalls from around the G League:
- The Wizards have assigned Admiral Schofield and Justin Robinson to the Capital City Go-Go, according to a team press release. Schofield has appeared in all three games for the Wizards this season, while Robinson saw time in one.
- The Lakers have assigned Talen Horton-Tucker to the South Bay Lakers, per the team’s Twitter feed. Horton-Tucker was No. 46 overall pick in the 2019 draft.
Cavaliers Pick Up Collin Sexton’s 2020/21 Option
The Cavaliers have picked up Collin Sexton‘s third-year option, sources tell Kelsey Russo of The Athletic (Twitter link).
Sexton will make approximately $4.99MM during the 2020/21 season. He has another team option on his contract for the following campaign. Assuming it’s exercised as well, he’ll become eligible for a rookie scale extension during the 2021 offseason.
Cleveland selected Sexton with the No. 8 overall pick in the 2018 NBA Draft. He started 72 games for the club during his rookie season and has started all three games this year next to 2019 first-rounder Darius Garland.
Sexton isn’t the only Cavaliers player with a rookie scale option for 2020/21. Cleveland will have until Thursday to make a decision on Ante Zizic’s fourth-year option, worth approximately $3.87MM.
Central Notes: Bledsoe, Giannis, Rose, Hutchison
Eric Bledsoe is expected to be ready for the Bucks‘ opener on Thursday, Matt Velazquez of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel relays.
“I kind of knew what it was, in a sense,” said Bledsoe, who suffered a rib cage injury earlier in the preseason. “I knew it wasn’t nothing serious… I knew I was going to bounce back.”
Bledsoe will join Brook Lopez, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Khris Middleton and newcomer Wesley Matthews in the Bucks’ starting lineup, Velazquez adds in the same piece. Matthews will take over for Malcolm Brogdon, who was traded to the Pacers this offseason.
Here’s more from around the Central:
- Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today argues that the Bucks have done everything right to keep Antetokounmpo around long-term. Milwaukee can offer Giannis the super-max next summer.
- How Derrick Rose performs will go a long way toward whether the Pistons make the postseason, Rod Beard of The Detroit News writes. Rose signed a two-year deal with the club this offseason.
- There are plenty of questions surrounding second-year Bulls forward Chandler Hutchison, according to Joe Cowley of The Chicago Sun-Times, who notes that it may be hard for the club to find rotation minutes for Hutchison even once he’s recovered from his hamstring injury.
David Griffin Discusses Zion Williamson’s Injury, Conditioning
Zion Williamson is slated to miss six-to-eight weeks with a torn meniscus in his right knee. While some have speculated that Williamson’s injury occurred because of his weight, GM David Griffin made it clear he doesn’t buy into that theory.
“The notion that this happened because Zion is in poor condition is asinine,” Griffin said of Williamson (via Andrew Lopez of ESPN.com). “He wasn’t in poor condition when he went 12 of 13 last week against Utah. That’s not what it is. He’s just a very unique body type and certainly from a physics perspective.”
Exactly when Williamson sustained the injury is unclear. He let the team know of knee discomfort in mid-October, a couple of days after the Pelicans’ preseason game against the Spurs.
The team’s medical staff is working with the No. 1 overall pick to learn more about his body, as there have been few players with Williamson’s particular type of athletic build.
“He can be 274 pounds with 8.5% body fat and he can be 280 pounds with 9% body fat,” Griffin said. “As we have gone through the process for our medical team, learning how to keep him lean and give him the core strength and stability and control he needs to handle all that torque he generates, typically that means you are going to do things to strengthen those areas.
“In this case, he gains muscle mass so fast and gains weight so fast, no one has ever dealt with anybody like him. He’s 19 and it’s going to be a learning experience for all of us.”
Williamson played in four preseason games this fall. He averaged 23.0 points and 6.5 rebounds while shooting 71.0% from the field.
While the team has set Williamson’s recovery timetable at six-to-eight weeks, Griffin said today that he expects the former Duke star to try to make it back sooner than that.
Spurs, DeMar DeRozan Not Close On Extension
DeMar DeRozan and the Spurs continue to talk about the possibility of a contract extension, Sam Amick of The Athletic hears. However, the two sides are far apart.
DeRozan’s current deal runs through the 2020/21 season, though the final year is a player option worth roughly $27.7MM.
DeRozan could opt to hit the open market next summer or wait until the 2021 offseason. In either situation, he’s likely be considered one of the best players on the market. A max extension for the shooting guard would come in a roughly $150MM over four years, though it would require him to turn down his player option (as in it would run through the 2023/24 season).
San Antonio would prefer a two-year extension, which would give the franchise flexibility in the future. DeRozan previously indicated that he hasn’t spent much time worrying about an extension with the Spurs.
“That’s not on my mind,” DeRozan said. “My focus is to go out there and hoop. How everything will unfold, that’s how it will unfold.”