Top Free Agent Rebounders Still Available
DeMarcus Cousins is apparently a major fan of Reggie Evans, and while that might have to do with a personal connection, perhaps Cousins just likes playing with elite rebounders. Evans has carved out a niche in the NBA as just that, and he’s far and away the most efficient rebounder still available on the free agent market. Tristan Thompson, who helped state his case for a lucrative deal in restricted free agency with his strong offensive rebounding performance in the playoffs, didn’t come close to the rate of total rebounds that Evans collected per 36 minutes over the course of the regular season.
Carlos Boozer‘s name appeared the top of the list of the best per-36-minute scorers still available, and he shows up at No. 3 below, a signal that the minimum salary isn’t going to be enough to lure the Rob Pelinka client. The shallow pool of rebounders left furthers Boozer’s case. Larry Sanders is uncertain to ever play again, health issues have dogged JaVale McGee, and Elton Brand is contemplating retirement. Only four remaining free agents averaged at least 10 rebounds per 36 minutes this past season, providing they played at least 20 games and averaged 10 or more minutes per contest. Here are the top 10 in that category:
- Reggie Evans (14.1)
- Tristan Thompson (10.8)
- Carlos Boozer (10.3)
- Larry Sanders (10.2)
- Cory Jefferson (9.8)
- Henry Sims (9.2)
- JaVale McGee (8.6)
- Jason Maxiell (8.3)
- Austin Daye (7.8)
- Elton Brand (7.4)
Honorable mention:
- Brandon Davies would be next, with 7.1 rebounds per 36 minutes.
- Jeff Adrien would have appeared at No. 2 on this list, with 12.9 boards per 36 minutes, but he only appeared in 17 games, not enough to qualify.
- Another would-be No. 2, Joel Freeland, signed to play in Russia. He averaged 11.1 rebounds per 36 minutes.
Which of these free agents would you most want to see on your team? Leave a comment to tell us.
Players Eligible For Rookie Scale Extensions
The priority for most teams in the offseason involves building the roster for the season to come, but once that’s largely accomplished, attention turns to players eligible for rookie scale extensions. This year, the scope is somewhat limited, since only 13 teams possess anyone eligible for such an extension, and that includes the Pelicans, who already signed Anthony Davis to his extension. Still, the changing landscape of the league’s salary structure makes the stakes of the negotiations that take place between now and the October 31st deadline especially high.
Agents for many of the eligible players are talking tough in early negotiations, several league sources tell Grantland’s Zach Lowe, and team executives find this year’s market difficult to gauge, Lowe tweets. Any extensions signed by the Halloween deadline would kick in for 2016/17, when the salary cap is projected to leap to $89MM. That’s also the case for any new deals the teams and players would sign next summer if they decide against extensions and instead negotiate in next summer’s restricted free agency.
Last year’s class featured nine extensions worth a total of about $450MM, but it’s a fair bet this year’s extension market will produce an even greater haul, especially with Davis and Damian Lillard already signed. See the full list of players eligible for rookie scale extensions here:
- Harrison Barnes, Warriors
- Bradley Beal, Wizards
- Anthony Davis, Pelicans — signed a five-year max extension
- Andre Drummond, Pistons
- Festus Ezeli, Warriors
- Evan Fournier, Magic
- Maurice Harkless, Trail Blazers
- John Henson, Bucks — signed a four-year, $44MM-plus extension
- Perry Jones III, Celtics — waived, no longer eligible
- Terrence Jones, Rockets
- Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Hornets — signed a four-year, $52MM extension
- Jeremy Lamb, Hornets — signed a three-year, $21MM extension
- Meyers Leonard, Trail Blazers
- Damian Lillard, Trail Blazers — signed a five-year max extension
- Donatas Motiejunas, Rockets
- Andrew Nicholson, Magic
- Miles Plumlee, Bucks
- Terrence Ross, Raptors — signed a three-year, nearly $33MM extension
- Jared Sullinger, Celtics
- Jonas Valanciunas, Raptors — signed a four-year, $64MM extension
- Dion Waiters, Thunder
- Tony Wroten, Sixers
- Tyler Zeller, Celtics
Which player on this list, aside from Davis and Lillard, do you think is most deserving of an extension? Leave a comment to let us know.
Southeast Notes: Richardson, Williams, Gordon
Heat trade candidate Mario Chalmers and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, who’s eligible for an extension from the Hornets until October 31st, are among the five players Jessica Camerato of Basketball Insiders believes must show improvement this coming season. Chalmers will have motivation to bounce back after a poor shooting year that featured his career-worst 29.4% three-point percentage with his contract set to expire at season’s end, while Kidd-Gilchrist has to contend with trade acquisition Nicolas Batum at his position. While we wait to find out whether either of them will break through this coming season, see more from the Southeast Division here:
- The deal that No. 40 pick Josh Richardson signed with the Heat features minimum salaries for all three seasons and no guaranteed money beyond this season’s fully guaranteed salary, as Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders shows (Twitter link). His 2016/17 salary becomes guaranteed if he sticks through August 1st, 2016, Pincus adds.
- Elliot Williams received two years at the minimum salary with an $80K partial guarantee for this season and no guaranteed money for 2016/17 in his camp deal with the Hornets, Pincus also reports (Twitter link).
- Aaron Gordon is among the players from the 2014 draft class who appear on the verge of a breakout, according to Sean Deveney of The Sporting News. A fractured bone in Gordon’s left foot helped limit him to 47 games last season and made it tough to see why the Magic invested the No. 4 overall pick in the combo forward.
Magic Sign Melvin Ejim For Camp
7:42: The signing is official, the team announced via a press release.
11:43am: Ejim still must free himself from a contract he signed earlier this summer with Medi Bayreuth of Germany before he can join Orlando, writes Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel.
8:31am: The Magic have invited summer-leaguer and former Iowa State standout Melvin Ejim to training camp, a source tells David Pick of Eurobasket.com (Twitter link), adding that some guaranteed money is involved. Pick confirmed to Hoops Rumors that Ejim has accepted the invitation.
Ejim put up 9.2 points and 6.8 rebounds in 30.1 minutes per game for the Magic’s summer league team last month after spending this past season with Virtus Roma in Italy. The 6’7″ small forward went undrafted in 2014 in spite of a breakout senior year in 2013/14, when he averaged 17.8 PPG and 8.4 RPG in 32.1 MPG for the Cyclones.
Orlando has already been carrying 15 deals, including a partially guaranteed arrangement with Keith Appling and Devyn Marble‘s non-guaranteed pact. The other 13 players have guaranteed salaries, and the Magic have yet to strike a deal with Tyler Harvey, whom they drafted 51st overall this year. Thus, it wouldn’t be surprising if the Magic view Ejim with the D-League chiefly in mind. Orlando can retain the D-League rights to as many as four players it cuts at the end of the preseason.
Do you think Ejim has what it takes to stick on an NBA roster? Leave a comment to tell us.
Top Free Agent Scorers Still Available
Most would probably agree that Tristan Thompson is the most prominent free agent among those still on the market, but that’s not because of his scoring ability. He averaged only 11.4 points per 36 minutes this past season, putting him well behind many others who haven’t signed yet. Thompson took on a more expansive role in the playoffs, and his per-36-minute scoring shrunk even further, to 9.5.
The former No. 4 overall pick brings plenty to the floor, but teams in need of scoring can find better options much more cheaply. Carlos Boozer leads the way. He won’t command anywhere close to the $16.8MM he saw last season in salary and amnesty payments, but the former All-Star was, by a wide margin, a better per-minute scorer than any other free agent who played in the NBA in 2014/15. He’s fielding interest from multiple teams, as Will Joseph of Hoops Rumors examined Sunday.
Here are the top 10 remaining free agents, ranked by points per 36 minutes. To qualify, the players must have averaged at least 10 minutes per game and have appeared in at least 20 contests this past season. Those who’ve committed to overseas deals aren’t included.
- Carlos Boozer (17.8)
- (tie) Michael Beasley (15.1)
- (tie) Henry Sims (15.1)
- JaVale McGee (14.9)
- A.J. Price (14.8)
- J.R. Smith (14.7)
- Ish Smith (14.6)
- Nate Robinson (14.5)
- (tie) Darrell Arthur (13.9)
- (tie) Rasual Butler (13.9)
Honorable mention:
- Austin Daye would have been next on the list, with 13.5 points per 36 minutes.
- Jason Richardson, who scored 14.9 points per 36 minutes this past season for the Sixers, would have been in the top five here, but he barely missed the qualification cut, playing only 19 games. Similarly, Sebastian Telfair averaged 14.8 points per 36 minutes but only saw action in 16 games for the Thunder.
- Alexey Shved, who signed a deal with Khimki Moscow that makes him the highest-paid overseas player, is the top scoring free agent who didn’t land an NBA deal, with a per-36-minute average of 20.4 from this past season.
Which of these free agents would you most want to see on your team? Leave a comment to tell us.
Southwest Notes: West, Marjanovic, Ndour
David West had kept the Spurs on his radar as a potential destination for years prior to his surprising decision to sign with San Antonio last month for the minimum salary, as the power forward told WRAL-FM in Raleigh, North Carolina (audio link; transcription via Dan McCarney of the San Antonio Express-News).
“At this point, I just want to win games,” West said. “I feel like I’m in a position to where I had a choice to make. I just chose to give myself a chance to win. The Spurs have an unbelievable culture. I just want an opportunity to be in that system and experience it and see what comes of it.”
Among those who signed new deals this summer, West will see the third greatest decline in pay this coming season compared to last. See more on the Spurs amid the latest from the Southwest Division:
- The Serbian national team said it will challenge a decision the Spurs have made to pull newly signed center Boban Marjanovic out of international competition this summer, as the Serbian Basketball Federation announced and as Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia translates. Serbia provided a copy of a letter the Spurs sent informing the national squad that it had exercised its right to unilaterally withdraw the center from international play because doctors had found a congenital defect in his feet that makes them more vulnerable to breaking. Marjanovic played on a broken foot this spring to help his club team, Red Star Belgrade, win the Serbian KLS League title, as David Pick recently chronicled for Bleacher Report.
- Grantland’s Zach Lowe is willing to cautiously bet that the Rockets won’t sign rookie scale extensions with either Terrence Jones or Donatas Motiejunas out the desire for greater cap flexibility next summer. Still, Lowe sees the extension candidacy of Jones as especially fascinating (Twitter link).
- Mavs signee Maurice Ndour has a partial guarantee worth $437K on his $874,636 salary for the 2016/17 season, as Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders reveals (Twitter link).
Kobe Bryant On Retirement, Cap, Lakers
Kobe Bryant continued to leave the door ajar for playing beyond this coming season in an interview with Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports, saying that he thinks it’s a decision that he’ll need to make after this season is through and not before it. It jibes with what he said in March, when he wouldn’t rule out continuing to play but said he probably wouldn’t decide until his contract is up at season’s end.
“[GM Mitch Kupchak and I] haven’t set anything in stone and I’ve talked about it before. But could this be the last [season]? Absolutely,” Bryant said to Spears. “It’s tough to decide. It’s really tough to make those types of decisions. Players I have spoken to say, ‘Kobe, you will know.’”
The ability to tap into the rising cap next summer for a new contract will have “zero” bearing on his decision, Bryant told Spears. The 19-year veteran, who turns 37 this month, will once again make the NBA’s highest salary this season, with $25MM coming his way.
The end of his NBA career might not be the end of his time as a player, as Bryant said in response to a question that he can envision himself playing in Italy or China at some point. For now, Bryant is optimistic about the Lakers’ chances of making the playoffs and praised the team’s offseason, as Spears relays.
“They have really set themselves up for a promising future going on years.” Bryant said. “I think they drafted very well. The free agents that we picked are extremely solid, [Roy] Hibbert, [Brandon] Bass, Lou [Williams]. We have a very good mix of young and veteran leadership. The challenge is going to be blending the two and cutting down the learning curve. How quickly can we get going? How quickly can we bring up [D’Angelo] Russell, [Julius] Randle. [Jordan] Clarkson got valuable experience last year in playing that will benefit us tremendously. I’m looking forward to it. I’m looking forward to running with these young guns.”
Hibbert was a trade acquisition, not a free agent signing, but it nonetheless seems like Bryant is on board with what the front office is doing, and it appears that Bryant’s spirit of cooperation extends to the coaching staff, too. Lakers coach Byron Scott said recently that Bryant, who turns 37 this month, will probably see time at power forward, and while Spears asked Bryant’s thoughts about playing small forward, the Mamba made it clear that position matters little to him.
Knicks Among Teams Interested In Norris Cole
The Knicks have joined the Sixers and incumbent Pelicans as teams interested in restricted free agent Norris Cole, but New Orleans seems likely to either re-sign him or match another team’s offer sheet, according to Hoops Rumors contributor Sam Amico of AmicoHoops.net (Twitter link). However, New York has reportedly agreed to a deal with fellow Rich Paul client Kevin Seraphin for the apparent cost of the $2.814MM room exception, limiting the Knicks to the minimum salary if they can’t engineer a sign-and-trade.
Michael Scotto of SheridanHoops identified the Sixers as a suitor in mid-July, around the same time that John Reid of The Times Picayune heard that the Pelicans remained interested. New Orleans has only been willing to go so far, as Reid reported about a month ago, and the most recent dispatch from Scotto indicated that Cole saw the prospect of signing his $3.037MM qualifying offer as a viable option.
New York is relatively thin in the backcourt, with Langston Galloway and Jerian Grant poised to become the primary backups for Jose Calderon and Arron Afflalo. Galloway and Grant have just a half-season of NBA experience between them, while Cole was in the rotation for back-to-back champs as a member of the Heat. The Wizards, Thunder, Bucks and Cavs all reportedly had interest in trading for Cole while he was still with the Heat as the February trade deadline approached, but as a restricted free agent months after Miami sent him to the Pelicans in the three-team Goran Dragic trade, the market for him has seemed cooler.
Do you think Cole will sign an offer sheet with the Knicks, Sixers or another team, or do you think he and the Pelicans will work something out? Leave a comment to share your thoughts.
Latest On J.R. Smith
The Sixers earlier expressed interest in signing J.R. Smith, but that interest has faded, reports Hoops Rumors contributor Sam Amico of AmicoHoops.net (Twitter link). Cleveland still wants to re-sign him and is letting the market dictate his price, Amico adds.
Smith most recently expressed a desire to play somewhere he could be a difference-maker, and while he also said he’d like to start, he mentioned the Cavs as an example of a team for which he’d be willing to come off the bench. The former Sixth Man of the Year started in most of his regular season appearances for the Cavs this past season but returned to a bench role in the playoffs. The Leon Rose client said to Joe Vardon of the Northeast Ohio Media Group in mid-July that he “definitely” wants to return to Cleveland, adding that while he had engaged in talks with the Blazers, that discussion didn’t go anywhere.
The Cavs have wanted Smith back on a modest one-year deal, as Terry Pluto of the Plain Dealer wrote last month, and Smith had been looking for a three-year deal, according to Chris Haynes of the Northeast Ohio Media Group, both of whom cast a reunion between the sides as unlikely. Still, LeBron James wants him back in Cleveland.
A key stumbling block no doubt involves the exponential tax penalties that Cleveland faces with every signing. The Cavs are about $4MM above the tax threshold for now, but they still haven’t re-signed Tristan Thompson, a move they seem likely to make. A deal around the max for Thompson would mean Smith’s contract would cost the Cavs $3.75 or more in tax penalties for every dollar it’s worth. However, only the Sixers, Blazers and Jazz have the cap room available to give Smith a salary comparable to the nearly $6.4MM option he turned down in June, so Cleveland doesn’t have to worry about too many suitors.
How much do you foresee Smith ending up with in a new deal? Leave a comment to tell us.
Hoops Rumors Community Shootaround 8/3/15
The Warriors and Sixers hooked up on a late Friday afternoon trade last week, with each team flipping a newly acquired player. Golden State sent Gerald Wallace, who had arrived in the David Lee trade, to Philadelphia for Jason Thompson, one of the three players the Sixers received in their deal with the Kings in early July. The Warriors also sent cash — $1MM worth, as Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders reports (Twitter link) — and gave the Sixers the right to swap the less favorable of the 2016 first-rounders the Heat and Thunder owe them for Golden State’s 2016 first-round pick. The move gave the Warriors a trade exception of more than $3MM, and perhaps most importantly, it allowed the team to save some $8MM in luxury tax payments.
The trade looks like a positive for the Warriors, but with the margin for error so razor thin in the Western Conference, every move carries risk. For the Sixers, the trade allows for the collection of another draft asset, but unless the Thunder or Heat finish with a better regular season record than the defending champs, who are coming off a 67-win season, Philadelphia won’t see any benefit from the pick swap. The Sixers may well have simply rented out $3MM worth of cap space for a cash payment of $1MM. So, how would you grade the trade for both teams?
The Warriors and Sixers are in opposite places in the NBA hierarchy, so it would be difficult to grade them on the same rubric. Still, you’re free to give any grade you wish. To leave your comment, just enter your name and email address, write what you want to say, and submit it; there’s no need to become a registered user. Just make sure you comply with our commenting policy.