Blazers Sign Ed Davis
JULY 9TH, 9:22am: The deal is official, the team announced.
JULY 2ND, 1:56pm: The Blazers are finalizing a deal with Ed Davis, sources tell Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). It’s for three years and $20MM, according to Shams Charania of RealGM (on Twitter). It doesn’t include any options, reports Ken Berger of CBSSports.com (Twitter link). The deal appears to be small enough so that Portland can sign him using the mid-level exception if it retains LaMarcus Aldridge and Robin Lopez, though it appears more likely the Blazers will use cap space.
Agent David Bauman took to Twitter to confirm the deal (hat tip to Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders). The Lakers made a concerted push to retain him even as they chased star free agents, but Davis’ commitment to the Blazers was too quick for L.A. to catch up to, a source indicated to Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Daily News (Twitter link). The Knicks, Pistons and Celtics apparently showed interest, too, but Davis wound up with salaries lower than the ones Medina had earlier reported he was seeking.
Davis made 79 appearances for the Lakers this past season. He notched averages of 8.3 points, 7.6 rebounds, and 1.2 blocks in 23.3 minutes per game, with a slash line of .601/.000/.487. His career numbers through 354 contests are 7.2 PPG, 6.3 RPG, and 1.0 BPG.
Blazers Sign Al-Farouq Aminu
JULY 9TH, 9:20am: The deal is official, the Blazers announced.
11:48pm: Aminu confirmed the agreement with the Blazers on Twitter (h/t David Aldridge of NBA.com on Twitter).
JUNE 30TH, 11:29pm: Al-Farouq Aminu will sign a four-year, $30MM deal with the Blazers, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. The figure means that Portland will be using cap space unless it can engineer a sign-and-trade, and it also represents a significant raise on the minimum salary the forward made this past season.
The Mavs had been concerned that Aminu would land a lucrative offer, and so they were reportedly poised to try to convince him to sign a one-year deal that might have allowed him to further up his value. Blazers GM Neil Olshey drafted Aminu when he was with the Clippers, so he is quite familiar with the fifth-year player.
Aminu proved a valuable part of the Mavs rotation even as he recorded his fewest minutes (18.5) and points (5.6) per game since his rookie season. His 14.4 PER set a new career high, and ESPN ranks him sixth among small forwards this season in its Defensive Real Plus/Minus metric. He saw equal time at small forward and power forward, according to Basketball-Reference, and he’d rank seventh in Defensive Real Plus/Minus among players at the four. Even though he was mostly used in a reserve role in the regular season, he was featured more prominently during the playoffs. He started two of five postseason games against the Rockets, averaging 11.2 points and 7.2 rebounds per game, while shooting 64% from 3-point range.
Aminu had visits scheduled with the Knicks, Celtics, Raptors, and Pelicans, but apparently the nationwide tour has been called off just minutes into free agency.
Raptors Waive Luke Ridnour
The Raptors have waived Luke Ridnour, the team announced, ending the odyssey that saw him traded four times in one week. The point guard had been expecting the move, as his $2.75MM non-guaranteed salary was to become fully guaranteed if he didn’t hit waivers by Friday.
Ridnour, who told TNT’s David Aldridge this week that he’s still thinking of retiring, finished this past season with the Magic, who traded him to the Grizzlies last month. Memphis flipped him to the Hornets, who in turn sent him to the Thunder. Oklahoma City sent him to Toronto, the final destination for his contract, barring the unlikely event a team claims him off waivers.
The 34-year-old had career lows in points, assists and minutes per game this past season. Still, he’s just two years removed from having started all 82 games for the Timberwolves in 2012/13.
Pelicans Sign Anthony Davis To Max Extension
JULY 9TH, 11:13pm: The signing is official, the team announced. “Words cannot describe the excitement of the New Orleans Pelicans to have Anthony Davis as the cornerstone of our organization,” said Pelicans GM Dell Demps. “Anthony is a great person, a phenomenal player and the ideal representative of his family, the Pelicans and the New Orleans community. We are thrilled to have Anthony commit to the Pelicans as we continue to build our team to have sustained success.”
JUNE 30TH, 11:03pm: The Pelicans and Anthony Davis have agreed to an extension moments after they became eligible to do so, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (on Twitter). It’s a five-year max deal worth an estimated $145MM, Wojnarowski writes in a full story. The full value won’t be known until next July, when the NBA sets the salary cap and max salaries for 2016/17. It’ll have either a player option or an early termination option on the final year, according to Marc Stein on ESPN.com (Twitter link). Davis took to Twitter to confirm the deal (hat tip to Sean Deveney of The Sporting News).
Davis was an All-NBA selection this season, and if he is again so honored in 2015/16, or if he wins MVP, he’ll trigger the Derrick Rose rule and be eligible for a maximum salary of approximately 30% of the cap instead of just 25%. That 30% max will be an estimated $25MM, or thereabouts, for 2016/17, while the 25% max would be about $21MM. Davis will presumably receive the maximum 7.5% raises on whatever the starting salary in his new deal is.
New Orleans has been planning a max extension for its budding star for a while, and John Reid of The Times-Picayune wrote today that the Pelicans intended to act quickly. They did just that, securing the Wasserman Media Group client for at least five more seasons, since the extension won’t kick in until after 2015/16.
Clippers Likely To Re-Sign DeAndre Jordan
9:19pm: Cuban has begun to notify people within the Mavericks organization that Jordan is remaining in Los Angeles, Stein tweets.
7:33pm: Jordan has indicated to the Clippers that he intends to remain with the team, and team representatives intend to remain with the center until he can put pen to paper on a new deal at midnight, Stein and Ramona Shelburne of ESPN.com report (Twitter link).
7:13pm: At least three league sources have disputed the claim that Fegan steered Jordan to agree to sign with Dallas, Stein tweets.
5:30pm: The Mavericks are not optimistic about Jordan signing with the team, Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders tweets.
2:55pm: Jordan won’t decide until he meets face-to-face with the Mavs, as Stein hears (Twitter link).
2:26pm: The idea of Fegan demanding the Clippers trade Paul “is very much not true and ridiculous,” a source told Turner (on Twitter).
2:23pm: The Clippers expect Jordan will pick them, Eaves tweets. On the Dallas side, recruiter extraordinaire Chandler Parsons will indeed be at the Mavs’ meeting with Jordan, as Amick and Zillgitt write, and as Parsons had indicated on Twitter.
1:59pm: Eaves adds that Jordan decided the Clippers were the better option once he sat back and compared their roster against that of the Mavs, according to a source (Twitter link). Ballmer is indeed in the meeting, too, Wojnarowski tweets.
1:54pm: Jordan told Rivers on Monday that he’d made a mistake, and the feeling within Jordan’s family, who want him to stay with the Clippers, is that Fegan pushed him to sign in Dallas, according to SportsCenter’s Michael Eaves. Fegan made an ultimatim to Rivers prior to Jordan’s agreement to sign with the Mavs that the Clippers would have to trade Paul to keep Jordan, a source also told Eaves (All five Twitter links here).
1:42pm: Jordan is increasingly leaning toward the Clippers, Stein and Shelburne write. Paul has been among those pushing hardest to convince the center to stay with the Clips. The Clippers believe they’ll bring Jordan back to L.A. with them tonight, Stein tweets.
12:58pm: The renewed push from the Clippers began when Jordan started having second thoughts on Monday and called Rivers, reports Ramona Shelburne of ESPN.com (Twitter link).
12:50pm: Mavs owner Mark Cuban has traveled to Houston to try to fend off the Clippers’ efforts, sources tell Stein (Twitter link).
12:48pm: Paul Pierce and J.J. Redick will be in the meeting, too, Woike tweets.
12:40pm: Jordan appears to be 50/50 on either forging ahead with his Mavs deal or re-signing with the Clippers instead, Markazi reports (on Twitter).
12:21pm: Some people within the Mavs organization are indeed concerned, as the Clippers pose a legitimate threat, according to Amick (Twitter link).
12:16pm: The Clippers felt Jordan’s representatives were pushing him to sign with Dallas, Markazi tweets. Fegan and the Mavs have long had a close working relationship.
12:07pm: It sounds like Paul will be part of the Clippers’ party traveling to Houston to meet with Jordan, tweets Dan Woike of the Orange County Register. Stein follows with a similar tweet, and it seems like the Clippers contingent will indeed get that meeting with Jordan. The Clippers expect the meeting to happen, according to Amick (Twitter link).
12:00pm: Clippers officials weren’t pleased with the way the Mavs recruited Jordan, part of the reason they’re breaking protocol and continuing to go after him, tweets Sam Amick of USA Today. The Clippers weren’t pleased that Jordan had only one meeting with them while Dallas both dined and met with him, as Broderick Turner of the Los Angeles Times hears (on Twitter).
11:57pm: The Clippers have gone directly to Jordan, rather than Fegan or other representatives at Relativity Sports, as Stein wrote, and one source close to Jordan called it an underhanded maneuver, tweets Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today. The relationship between Paul and Jordan isn’t perfect, but they have spoken with each other throughout Jordan’s free agency and have a mutual respect, a source told Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link).
11:51am: Jordan and Griffin have already spoken, and it’s possible that Paul joins the recruitment, too, sources tell Stein. Paul and Jordan reportedly haven’t seen eye to eye, though conflicting reports make it tough to get a read on just how much of a factor that’s been in Jordan’s thinking.
11:45am: Jordan started having second thoughts early this week, as Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports indicates (on Twitter). The Clippers have been pushing to meet with Jordan today in Houston that would involve Rivers and perhaps owner Steve Ballmer, and some Clippers players have been in contact with Jordan as well, sources tell Stein for a full piece. Broussard hears that Jordan has told people close to him that since choosing Dallas, he’s still feeling “torn” and “unsure,” as Stein passes along in the same piece.
11:29am: The Clippers continue to try to convince DeAndre Jordan to sign with them, even though he’s already agreed to sign with the Mavericks, reports Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter link). The deal between Dallas and the Dan Fegan client can’t become official until the July Moratorium ends at 11pm Central tonight, but it would be highly unusual if Jordan were to reverse course.
The loss of Jordan would be devastating to the Clippers, who are without the cap space necessary to sign a comparable replacement for the defensive stalwart and league’s leading rebounder. Still, an about-face from Jordan would be perhaps equally damaging to the Mavs, who’ve since committed to sign four other players with the thinking that Jordan would be theirs.
Clippers coach/executive Doc Rivers has told Jordan that he didn’t know he wanted a larger role, and the Clippers are offering to hire a big man coach and increase Jordan’s number of touches, according to Alex Kennedy of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). Chris Broussard of ESPN.com reported June 30th that Jordan was tired of being a third wheel behind Chris Paul and Blake Griffin and wanted a larger role on offense, so Rivers should have been aware when free agency began.
Jordan has financial motivations to choose the Clippers, since they can give him 7.5% raises on the max salary he’s set to receive in his deal with Dallas, as opposed to the 4.5% raises the Mavs are limited to doling out. The Clippers can also tack a fifth year onto the deal, as opposed to the four he’s getting from the Mavs, but Jordan didn’t appear to be seeking a five-year contract.
Fegan also represents Dwight Howard, who’s indecision was a near-daily story before he signed with the Rockets two years ago. He’s also the agent for Austin Rivers, Doc’s son, who’s a free agent this summer, as Arash Markazi of ESPN.com points out (on Twitter).
Salary Cap Higher Than Expected For 2015/16
The NBA’s salary cap for 2015/16 will be $70MM, an 11% increase from this past season, and the luxury tax line will be $84.74MM, as sources tell Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo Sports (Twitter links) and as the NBA confirms (hat tip to Sam Amico of Amico Hoops). The last cap projection from the league had been $67.1MM, and while Ken Berger of CBSSports.com reported last month that the cap might end up higher than that by $1-2MM, it appears the cap wound up surpassing even the most optimistic of expectations. The projection for the tax had been $81.6MM.
The figures mean the maximum salaries for this coming season are also higher than estimated, so LaMarcus Aldridge, Marc Gasol, Kawhi Leonard and others who’ve agreed to max contracts this month will see more than they thought. Leonard, among those eligible for the max reserved for players with fewer than seven years of experience, will see $16,407,500 as a starting salary on his deal, tweets Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today. The maximum starting salary for players with seven to nine years of experience, like Aldridge and Gasol, is $19,689,000, according to Zillgitt. No player with 10 or more years of experience has agreed to a max contract yet, but LeBron James almost certainly will. The maximum starting salary for those in his bracket is $22,970,500, as Zillgitt reveals in his tweet.
The higher cap will likely have a significant effect on the structure of the trade agreement that is to send Roy Hibbert to the Lakers, as Jake Fischer of SI Now tweets. It had been unclear whether the Lakers would have enough cap room to accommodate Hibbert’s salary of more than $15.5MM, so it was possible that L.A. would have to send players to Indiana as part of the deal, or ship players elsewhere. The Lakers were reportedly exploring trades that wound send out Robert Sacre, Ryan Kelly and Nick Young.
Other teams will benefit from the higher cap, and the higher tax line means less of a burden for the Bulls, Heat, Nets, Cavs, Warriors, and Thunder, all of whom are already in tax territory or are expected to get there. That’s especially so for Brooklyn and Miami, as both would pay repeat-offender tax penalties if they finished the regular season above that $84.74MM threshold. Teams that trigger a hard cap this year will have greater flexibility, since they can spend up to $88.74MM, $4MM above the tax line.
The league also tabulated final payrolls for each team from last season, revealing that players collectively made less than the 50.39% of basketball-related income that the collective bargaining agreement holds that they’re entitled to. Thus, the league will pay out the $57,298,826 shortfall to the union, which will distribute that amongst the players, as Zillgitt relays (Twitter link). Also, both the Magic and Nuggets fell shy of the $56.759MM minimum team salary. Orlando was $1.92MM short, so the players who finished the season on the Magic’s roster will split a $1.92MM payment from the team, salary cap expert Larry Coon tweets. Those on the Nuggets roster will share $773K, Coon adds. This year’s salary floor, locked in at 90% of the cap, will be $63MM, the NBA announced.
Today’s news doesn’t affect the amounts for exceptions, like the mid-level and biannual, and player minimum salaries, as the league and the players set them in stone when they negotiated the collective bargaining agreement in 2011. Thus, those figures have progressively less relative value as the cap rises from year to year.
This year’s cap increase, unlike those projected for years to come, isn’t a direct result of the league’s $24 billion TV deal, which doesn’t kick in until next July. Instead, it appears to be a function of higher than expected revenue during the 2014/15 season. The Warriors collected record gate receipts on their run to the Finals, as Grantland’s Zach Lowe reported, and it would seem likely that the NBA saw unforeseen money from other avenues, too.
2015 Free Agency Observations
DeAndre Jordan‘s indecision has seemingly hijacked NBA free agent movement today, but it’s just the latest development in a fascinating eight days. The July Moratorium ends tonight, but player movement will continue, and Thursday will be a hectic day as teams formally sort out trades and signings. While we wait for that, here are a few noteworthy trends as told by our free agent tracker:
- Teams and players are showing far more willingness to do five-year deals. So far, 12 such deals have been agreed to, almost twice as many as in the summers of 2013 and 2014 combined. That’s perhaps in part because teams want to lock in salaries now, before the cap shoots up as it’s expected to in the next couple of years, and because a fair number of players are willing to take the long-term outlay of money instead of betting on themselves with a short-term deal.
- On the flip side, teams and players are doing much more lucrative one-year deals than in years past. None is as lucrative as Dwyane Wade‘s $20MM agreement with the Heat, though Rajon Rondo‘s $10MM deal with the Kings is still larger than any one-year pact a player has signed over the past three summers. Reports indicate that Jason Smith has a $4.3MM, or perhaps $4.5MM, deal with the Magic and Alan Anderson has a $4MM deal with the Wizards, and those, too, are of higher value than any of the one-year contracts signed in the summer of 2014.
- Guards may be of unprecedented value in the NBA, but that hasn’t manifested in this summer’s deals. Teams have only committed $50MM or more to five guards, including Jimmy Butler and Wesley Matthews, who also play small forward. Thirteen forwards and centers have received such deals.
- All told, teams have so far doled out $2.176 billion over a combined 213 years by our accounting, which doesn’t take into effect draft picks and deals with draft-and-stash prospects. That eclipses the $1.565 billion over 437 years that teams paid out for the entire 2014 offseason, the $1.462 billion that went out over 482 years in 2013, and the $1.546 billion over 461 years from 2012. Most of the salaries for this summer are estimates, since the July Moratorium prevents the majority of deals from becoming official.
— Note: This data still counts Jordan’s deal with the Mavs.
Southwest Rumors: Villanueva, Gasol, Conley
The Southwest Division free agent bounty might take a hit if DeAndre Jordan indeed reverses course on his decision to sign with the Mavericks, as the Clippers are trying to convince him to do, but he’s not the only free agent the Mavs and Clippers have fought over. There’s more on that amid the latest from around the Southwest:
- Clippers coach/executive Doc Rivers put in a recruiting call to Charlie Villanueva, who also spoke with Wizards GM Ernie Grunfeld, as Villanueva reveals on his own website (hat tip to TNT’s David Aldridge). The forward also indicates that the Kings were in the mix, too, but Villanueva made it clear that he’s pleased to have agreed to a deal with the Mavs.
- Marc Gasol hinted that Mike Conley assured him he’ll be just as committed to re-signing with the Grizzlies next summer, when he’s a free agent, as Gasol was this year, as Ronald Tillery of The Commercial Appeal writes in a subscription-only piece. Gasol said it never got to a point where he could envision himself playing outside of Memphis. “I was just sitting on it. I wanted to talk to Mike Conley,” Gasol said to Tillery. “Once I knew Mike Conley was on board, that sealed the deal. We both talked about the future. Once I knew he was on board it was a done deal.”
- Some people within the Spurs wondered in retrospect if the team would have been better off giving some of Manu Ginobili‘s minutes to Marco Belinelli, but Ginobili remains valuable to the team and around the league, as Buck Harvey of the San Antonio Express-News chronicles. Someone from another NBA team told Harvey that if he thought Ginobili would ever sign with a franchise other than the Spurs, his team would have pursued him. The veteran swingman has reportedly agreed to re-sign with the Spurs for what appears to be the $2.814MM room exception. Belinelli committed to the Kings.
Atlantic Notes: Saric, Kaun, Jason Smith, Carroll
The Sixers apparently wanted to bring Dario Saric over for 2015/16, and Saric shared that desire, reports David Pick, writing for Basketball Insiders. However, the No. 12 pick in the 2014 draft doesn’t have a way to escape his contract with Turkey’s Anadolu Efes until next year. Saric was circumspect when Pick asked him about the idea of coming stateside and the situation with his overseas team.
“It’s really hard for me to answer that,” Saric said. “I can’t comment. I think I’m ready to compete in the NBA, against the best players, but we built a great team in Efes and I want to help the club win a championship.”
In any case, it would seem that Saric is anxious to sign with the Sixers as soon as he can, rather than wait until 2017, when he wouldn’t be bound by the rookie scale, though that’s just my observation. Here’s more from around the Atlantic Division:
- The most recent talks the Nets have had with the Cavaliers were about Cleveland draft-and-stash center Sasha Kaun, not Joe Johnson, as Chris Mannix of SI.com reports as part of a larger piece. The Nets and Kaun, a 6’11” 30-year-old, have had mutual interest for some time, tweets Mike Mazzeo of ESPNNewYork.com. The Spurs have also reportedly talked to the Cavs about him. The Johnson discussion is reportedly dormant.
- The Knicks offered their $2.814MM room exception to Jason Smith, but he turned it down for more money from the Magic, writes Marc Berman of the New York Post. New York could have offered as much as $3,933,600 via Non-Bird rights, but agent Mark Bartelstein made it clear there are no hard feelings, as Berman relays. “The Knicks made a great attempt to try to keep him,’’ Bartelstein said.
- Soon-to-be Raptors signee DeMarre Carroll authored an homage to the Hawks, his former team, in The Players’ Tribune, giving credit to a handful of figures, especially former Hawks assistant Quin Snyder, who’s now head coach of the Jazz.
- New Raptors D-League one-to-one affiliate Raptors 905 has named Dan Tolzman as its GM and Jesse Mermuys its head coach and assistant GM, the team announced. Both were already employed within the Raptors organization.
Western Rumors: Durant, Cauley-Stein, Lee, Suns
The Mavericks believe they’re legitimate contenders for Kevin Durant next summer, buoyed as they are by their agreements to sign DeAndre Jordan and Wesley Matthews, reports Chris Mannix of SI.com. Of course, they’ll have plenty of competition, as many teams will no doubt line up for a chance at the player atop the 2016 free agent class. The Wizards have reportedly loomed as the top threat to the Thunder for the former MVP. Here’s more from around the Western Conference:
- One lottery team took Willie Cauley-Stein off its board completely over concerns about his surgically repaired left ankle, while another two teams cleared him, but “just barely,” according to Mannix, who writes in the same piece. The Kings drafted Cauley-Stein sixth overall.
- The Warriors didn’t have any option of moving David Lee for no salary in return when they agreed to take on Gerald Wallace from the Celtics, according to Tim Kawakami of the Bay Area News Group. The trade agreement nonetheless shrinks Golden State’s projected outlay from nearly $150MM in combined payroll and tax payments to about $128MM, Kawakami writes.
- Suns coach Jeff Hornacek knows and likes Derrick Favors from his time as a Jazz assistant coach, but Utah is firm in its position to keep the power forward, writes Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic, suggesting that Phoenix is more likely to make a major addition via trade than free agency at this point. Speculation linking the Suns to Ryan Anderson doesn’t seem likely to bear fruit, Coro adds.
- The Thunder met with free agent Keith Appling on Tuesday, a visit that could lead to a training camp invitation, according to Vince Ellis of the Detroit Free Press. The former Michigan State point guard was with the Lakers for preseason this past fall.