Al-Farouq Aminu Opts Out
JUNE 25TH: Aminu has officially opted out, as Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders reports (on Twitter).
2:24pm: The Mavs want to re-sign Aminu, as GM Donnie Nelson made clear today, Sneed tweets.
APRIL 29TH, 2:09pm: Mavs forward Al-Farouq Aminu said today that he’ll turn down his minimum-salary player option with the Mavs for next season, according to Earl K. Sneed of Mavs.com (Twitter link). Aminu nonetheless expressed his affection for the city of Dallas and the Mavs, Sneed notes, and he said he’d love to re-sign, according to Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com (on Twitter).
The news is no shock, since 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.
He upped his production in the Mavs’ five-game playoff loss to the Rockets with 11.2 points and 7.2 rebounds in 30.0 minutes per contest, buoyed by uncharacteristic 7 for 11 three-point shooting. Dallas will have Non-Bird rights on the Raymond Brothers client to give him 20% more than the $1,100,602 value of the option, though that isn’t much spending power, meaning the Mavs will likely have to use cap space or the mid-level or biannual exceptions. The Mavs only have about $28MM in commitments for next season, so there’s a strong chance the team opens cap space.
Wolves Tell Karl-Anthony Towns They’ll Draft Him
THURSDAY, 1:03pm: Brian Windhorst of ESPN is reporting that the Wolves have settled on Towns (via RealGM on Twitter).
WEDNESDAY, 2:36pm: It would be stunning if the Wolves don’t pick Towns, a source told Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link).
5:17pm: Towns also denies a promise has been made, as he told Jon Krawczynski of The Associated Press (Twitter link). “If I had a promise I would go start eating ice cream and getting fat,” Towns said. “There is absolutely no promise at all.”
4:38pm: Andy Greder of the St. Paul Pioneer Press hears the report that the Timberwolves have settled on Towns is untrue (Twitter link).
MONDAY, 11:44am: The Timberwolves have told Kentucky big man Karl-Anthony Towns that they’ll take him with the No. 1 overall pick, a source close to Towns tells Adam Zagoria of SNY.tv. The decision came after Towns worked out for the team on Saturday, the source indicates to Zagoria. The news isn’t altogether a shock, since Towns has been atop most draft boards since the NCAA Tournament and Wolves coach/executive Flip Saunders, who’d instead been in favor of drafting Jahlil Okafor, had recently become enamored with Towns, as Mark Heisler of Forbes.com reported earlier this month. It’s nonetheless disappointing for the Lakers, who hold the second pick and prefer Towns to Okafor, as Chris Mannix of SI.com tweeted Sunday.
Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders had been hearing more and more that Saunders, and perhaps owner Glen Taylor, were still fixated on Okafor, as Kyler wrote today in his NBA AM piece, so it’s possible the Wolves are trying to erect a smokescreen one way or another. Regardless, Towns, a Leon Rose client, would give the Timberwolves a talented defender who, while not as polished a post scorer as Okafor is, has the potential to surpass the Duke center in skill on both ends of the floor, as Eddie Scarito of Hoops Rumors wrote in his profile of the 19-year-old Towns. He averaged 10.3 points and 6.7 rebounds in 21.1 minutes per game in his lone season with Kentucky, numbers suppressed by coach John Calipari‘s platoon system.
The No. 1 pick is in line for a first-year salary of $5,703,600, presuming he gets the standard 120% of rookie scale. The full four-year contract in that case would come to $25,720,035, as our table of likely salaries for first-round picks shows. The Timberwolves are likely to carry that amount as an over-the-cap team this season, as Charlie Adams of Hoops Rumors points out in our offseason outlook for the club.
Minnesota has the chance to become the first NBA team with three consecutive No. 1 overall picks on its roster. The Wolves are surely hoping that Towns, if they indeed draft him, will be more like reigning Rookie of the Year Andrew Wiggins than the struggling Anthony Bennett.
Suns Dangling Eric Bledsoe In Trade Talks?
THURSDAY, 10:46am: Some within the Knicks’ organization want Bledsoe, but so far, the Suns are holding off on talks, Broussard tweets.
8:07am: Sources tell Chris Broussard of ESPN.com (on Twitter) that there are no talks happening between the Knicks and Suns regarding Bledsoe and the No. 4 pick.
WEDNESDAY, 9:35am: The Knicks continue to mull the idea of trading for Bledsoe, along with the 13th pick, if D’Angelo Russell isn’t available to the Knicks at the No. 4 spot in Thursday’s draft, as Adam Zagoria of SNY.tv hears (Twitter link). Still, just how enthusiastic the Suns are about the notion is unclear, given the conflicting reports.
TUESDAY, 11:53am: Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders heard from sources close to Bledsoe and the Knicks who laughed off the idea of trade talks (Twitter link).
MONDAY, 2:15pm: The Suns have discussed Eric Bledsoe trade scenarios with other teams, including the Knicks, and are likely to continue to do so after the draft if they haven’t dealt him by then, according to sources who spoke with Sean Deveney of The Sporting News. The No. 4 overall pick was also a subject of talks with New York, Deveney notes, adding on Twitter that the team has shopped Bledsoe to the Knicks and just about every team higher up on the lottery. It’s not clear whether he means higher than the Knicks or higher than themselves, as Phoenix is set to pick 13th.
Bledsoe is one season into a five-year, $70MM deal. That Phoenix would be willing, or even eager, to trade Bledsoe is somewhat surprising and represents an apparent shift in thinking from last summer. That’s when the team re-signed Bledsoe and signed-and-traded for Isaiah Thomas, banking that they and Goran Dragic would work in a backcourt that featured three highly skilled point guards. The Suns traded Thomas and Dragic at the deadline, as well as 2014 first-round pick Tyler Ennis, who’s also a point guard. The deadline moves did bring in Brandon Knight, who’s poised to become a restricted free agent next week.
Knicks team president Phil Jackson has indicated a willingness to trade the No. 4 pick, though Bledsoe would appear to be the most significant target yet to emerge. Still, it’s unclear what other assets, if any, New York would have to relinquish to acquire the Rich Paul client.
Bledsoe’s scoring output regressed slightly on the same 12.9 shots per game he saw last season. He put up 17.0 points in 2014/15 after notching 17.7 PPG in fewer minutes during 2013/14. Still, the 25-year-old bettered his assists, with 6.1 per game this year, and rebounds, with 5.2, again showing his versatility. Suns president of basketball operations Lon Babby is moving into a reduced role with the club, though that shouldn’t have had too much of an effect on the team’s philosophy with GM Ryan McDonough still entrenched.
Hawks, Wizards Swapping Picks
10:22pm: The deal is official, the Wizards and Hawks announced. The second-rounders going to Atlanta are for 2016 and 2019, according to the Wizards.
8:24pm: The Wizards have a deal to acquire the rights to 15th pick Kelly Oubre from the Hawks, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (on Twitter), with the 19th pick going to Atlanta. Two future second-round picks will go to the Hawks, too, Wojnarowski adds (Twitter link).
Oubre was a highly touted prospect coming out of high school who endured a tough season at Kansas, averaging fewer than 10 points per game. Still, Washington is banking on the upside that Eddie Scarito of Hoops Rumors examined in a Prospect Profile. He’ll represent a cap hold of $1,600,200 on Washington’s books.
Atlanta is reportedly flipping the rights to the 19th pick, Jerian Grant, into Tim Hardaway Jr. in a deal with the Knicks.
Nets Dangle Mason Plumlee, Seek Higher Pick
JUNE 25TH, 9:38am: The Nets are still trying to use Plumlee to get into the lottery, sources tell Jeff Goodman of ESPN.com (on Twitter).
JUNE 23RD, 8:55pm: Brooklyn is unlikely to part with Plumlee unless it can secure a 2015 lottery pick in return, league sources have informed Stein (via Twitter).
6:57pm: The Nets continue to explore trade possibilities involving Plumlee in advance of the draft, Marc Stein of ESPN.com tweets.
JUNE 15TH, 3:37pm: The Nets are trying to trade Mason Plumlee to further their goal of landing a higher draft pick than the ones they have at 29th and 41st overall, tweets Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News, responding to a NetsDaily tweet that posed the question of whether the Nets should trade Plumlee. Brooklyn’s desire to keep Plumlee derailed a proposal that would have sent Deron Williams to Sacramento this past season, as multiple reports made clear, but circumstances have changed for the 25-year-old big man, as Bondy detailed in May.
Some executives from teams around the league figured that Brooklyn would come to this point after the trade-deadline acquisition of Thaddeus Young and the resurgence of center Brook Lopez reduced Plumlee’s role, as Marc Stein and Mike Mazzeo reported a few weeks ago. Opposing teams had begun to inquire about Plumlee’s availability, as Stein added at the time. Lopez and Young aren’t necessarily locks to return, with Lopez possessing a player option and Young an early termination option, though Nets GM Billy King has made it clear that retaining both is a priority.
King said early last month that he explored trading everyone on the roster at some point last season, and in the same press conference, he said that the team will indeed try to trade up in the draft, as it’s often done in years past. King cautioned that he preferred not to deal away future draft assets to do so, leaving cash and current players as more likely trade bait.
Plumlee, whom the Nets mined with the 22nd overall pick two years ago, has two more years left on his rookie scale contract, which pays him slightly less than $1.416MM next season. That would make him a bargain with the kind of production he displayed in the first half of the season, when he averaged 10.3 points and 7.0 rebounds in 23.4 minutes per game coming off a summer with Team USA. Those numbers dropped to 6.0 PPG, 5.0 RPG and 17.5 MPG in the season’s second half.
Offseason Outlook Series
The draft is today, and free agency begins next week. The height of the NBA offseason is upon us, and Hoops Rumors has been preparing for months. Our Offseason Outlook Series began in April as the first teams were eliminated from the playoffs and ran through Wednesday night, as we pondered how the Kings will proceed as they face an apparent turning point in their relationship with DeMarcus Cousins. All 30 teams are covered below in this recap of the series, so dive in to get ready for the whirlwind of player movement that’s poised to descend upon the league.
Atlantic
Central
Southeast
Southwest
Northwest
Pacific
Brandon Rush Opts In With Warriors
Brandon Rush has picked up his minimum-salary player option with the Warriors, reports Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). The team hasn’t made a public announcement, but it appears as though the move has indeed taken place. The news isn’t surprising, since the seven-year veteran saw sparse playing time this past season for the NBA champs.
Rush signed with Golden State last summer, returning to the team with which the former 13th overall pick scored a career-high 9.8 points per game as a valuable sixth man in 2011/12. A Mark Bartelstein client, he wound up with a two-year, $8MM pact the following summer but tore his ACL in the opening week of the 2012/13 season, and his career hasn’t gotten back on track since. Rush averaged less than a point in 8.2 minutes per game across 33 appearances this past season.
The Warriors already had more than $77.6MM in guaranteed salary for 2015/16, well in excess of a projected $67.1MM cap, so Rush’s option, worth nearly $1.271MM, compounds the team’s financial issues. The tax threshold of $81.6MM looms as the team seeks to re-sign Draymond Green, so it’s no surprise that the Warriors are reportedly looking for takers for David Lee and his nearly $15.494MM salary.
Celtics To Pursue Paul Pierce, Robin Lopez
3:45pm: The Celtics consider a frontcourt tandem of Love and Lopez a “dream scenario,” but it’s not one they expect to happen as of right now, Michael Scotto of SheridanHoops tweets.
1:45pm: The Celtics plan to pursue Paul Pierce and Robin Lopez as complementary players to sell Kevin Love on the idea of signing with Boston, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). The Celtics have about $40MM on the books against a projected $67.1MM cap already, and if they sign Love to a deal starting at an estimated max of $18.96MM, they’d be hard-pressed to find room for both Pierce and Lopez without making salary-clearing trades. They also face a stiff challenge from the Clippers for Pierce, as the Clips seek to offload bench players in deals that could net them trade exceptions to allow them to sign-and-trade for the 37-year-old small forward, but Pierce is “in play” for the C’s if they can get Love, Wojnarowski adds (on Twitter).
Pierce told Steve Bulpett of the Boston Herald in December that he would probably speak with president of basketball operations Danny Ainge and co-owner Wyc Grousbeck about a role with the Celtics for after his playing days. Pierce would like to become a GM someday, according to Gary Washburn of the Boston Globe (on Twitter). It appears that Boston has a different sort of return planned for him if the circumstances are right. Pierce intends to play next season, as Jorge Castillo of The Washington Post reported, and he’s turning down a player option worth nearly $5.544MM on the contract he signed last summer with the Wizards, according to Marc Stein of ESPN.com.
The Clippers will have only the $3.376MM taxpayer’s mid-level to spend on outside free agents if they re-sign DeAndre Jordan for the max. They could aggregate bench players to create a trade exception for larger than that amount, as Wojnarowski suggests, though doing so would require the team to find willing trade partners, and they’d also have to convince the Wizards to go along with the plan if they want to sign-and-trade for Pierce. The Nets reportedly resisted the Clips’ efforts to construct sign-and-trade scenarios involving Pierce last year.
Lopez has said he’d prefer to re-sign with the Blazers, though Portland is in flux. Many executives around the league expect LaMarcus Aldridge, for whom Lopez has been a strong complement, to leave the Blazers, as Marc Stein of ESPN.com wrote today.
Grizzlies Acquire Luke Ridnour
2:33pm: The trade is official, the Magic and Grizzlies announced via press releases.
10:21am: The Grizzlies and Magic have agreed to a trade that will send Luke Ridnour to Memphis, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). The Magic will get the rights to 2013 second-round pick Janis Timma, Wojnarowski adds (on Twitter).
The 34-year-old Ridnour was reportedly considering retirement as of March, and he hasn’t publicly said whether or not he intends to play next season. His $2.75MM salary is non-guaranteed, though it becomes fully guaranteed if he remains under contract through July 10th. So, the move doesn’t immediately add to the roughly $47MM the Grizzlies have in guaranteed salary for next season, nor does it reduce the Magic’s nearly $39MM in commitments. Orlando was almost certainly going to waive Ridnour before his salary locked in, tweets Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel.
The Grizzlies have a trade exception worth more than $3MM as a vestige of having sent Quincy Pondexter to the Pelicans in January’s Jeff Green trade, so the Grizzlies could use that to officially acquire Ridnour before July 1st. They could open cap space to make the move if they wait until next month to formalize it, though they’re unlikely to go under the cap unless Marc Gasol bolts, so it would seem the trade exception will go to use. Orlando, which is already under the cap, doesn’t have the chance to create a trade exception of its own for Ridnour.
Memphis is gaining a backup point guard who’s also seen time at the two, so his acquisition would seemingly create competition for Beno Udrih, whose salary of nearly $2.175MM is partially guaranteed for $923K, and Nick Calathes, who’s entering free agency. The Grizzlies can make Calathes a restricted free agent if they tender a qualifying offer $1,147,276 by month’s end, though perhaps today’s news is a signal that they’re prepared to move on from him. It’s also possible that the Grizzlies will try to flip Ridnour in another trade, Wojnarowski suggests.
Timma, a small forward who turns 23 next month, averaged 12.6 points, 5.0 rebounds and 3.5 assists in 28.9 minutes per game this past season for VEF Riga of Latvia. It’s assumed that his contract with that team expires this year, as Mark Porcaro notes in our Draft Rights Held Players database.
League OKs Tony Ressler’s Purchase Of Hawks
Private equity mogul Tony Ressler and his partners have officially assumed control of the Hawks after receiving unanimous Board of Governors approval today, the league announced. Controlling owner Bruce Levenson, who last September announced his decision to sell as he self-reported racially insensitive emails that he had sent in 2012, and the rest of an often-divided consortium of co-owners have relinquished the team in the $730MM deal. The Ressler group is also assuming some $120MM in arena-related debt, raising the total purchase price to $850MM, as several reports made clear in April, when Ressler and his partners secured an agreement to buy the team. USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt reported a few days ago that league approval and the transfer would take place today.
“We are pleased that the NBA’s Board of Governors has approved the purchase of the Atlanta Hawks by principal owner Tony Ressler,” commissioner Adam Silver said. “Tony and his diverse and experienced ownership group will bring tremendous energy and passion to the Hawks and the team and its fans will greatly benefit from their commitment to the Atlanta community.”
Former player Grant Hill, private equity investor Rick Schnall, women’s wear magnate Sara Blakely and her husband, entrepreneur Jesse Itzler, are among those in Ressler’s group. They beat out another bid that reportedly involved baseball legend Hank Aaron as well as former Grizzlies CEO Jason Levien and current Grizzlies minority owner Steve Kaplan. Former Suns and Raptors GM Bryan Colangelo, former player Junior Bridgeman and neuropsychologist Richard Chaifetz also apparently teamed for a run at the Hawks as part of a bid that once included Hill.
The new owners appear poised to work on a deal that would make Mike Budenholzer team president and coach, as well as one that would give assistant GM Wes Wilcox a promotion to GM, as Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports reported last week. Former GM Danny Ferry received a buyout earlier this week that gave him more than he would have received over the remainder of his contract, according to Kevin Arnovitz of ESPN.com. Ferry had been on a leave of absence since September that he began after the revelation that he repeated racially charged comments about Luol Deng that had been written in a scouting report from an outside firm. The departures of Ferry and Levenson allow the team to move on from the scandal that hung in the background amid the team’s 60-win season.
Ressler and the front office face a challenge this summer to retain both Paul Millsap and DeMarre Carroll with only Early Bird rights on them and perhaps not enough cap space to meet their collective market price, as I examined in our Offseason Outlook for the team. Atlanta holds the 15th, 50th and 59th picks in Thursday’s draft.