Richard Hamilton Announces Retirement
Three-time All-Star and 14-year NBA veteran Richard Hamilton announced his retirement today on ESPN2’s “His & Hers with Michael Smith and Jemele Hill” show, as Ramona Shelburne of ESPNLosAngeles notes (Twitter link). The 37-year-old last played in the NBA during the 2012/13 season. He’d said this past July that he’d heard from NBA teams a couple of times and was hoping to return to the league to play for a contender, but no deal ever materialized. Hamilton added that the Wolves had shown interest early in 2013/14, and they appeared to be one of several teams interested at that point, but it appears his final NBA appearance will go down as a 35-minute, 15-point performance for the Bulls in a playoff loss to the Heat in 2013.
The seventh overall pick in the 1999 draft out of Connecticut, Hamilton averaged single digits in points as a rookie and in his final season, but he never otherwise did so as an NBA player, peaking with 20.1 points per game with the Pistons in 2005/06, his first All-Star season. The 6’6″ swingman also averaged 20 PPG in the last of his three seasons with the Wizards, his original NBA team. His arrival in Detroit in a trade that sent Jerry Stackhouse to Washington helped turn the Pistons into perennial contenders, and Detroit won the NBA title in Hamilton’s second year with the club.
His tenure with the Pistons ended acrimoniously as he clashed with then-coach John Kuester, and the team let him go shortly following the 2011 lockout. He signed a three-year, $15MM contract with the Bulls soon thereafter, but the Bulls waived him in July of 2013 rather than pay him more than his $1MM partial guarantee, effectively bringing an end to his playing days.
The Leon Rose client walks away with more than $109MM in earnings over the course of his time in the NBA, according to Basketball-Reference. He averaged 17.1 PPG and 3.4 assists per game with 34.6% three-point shooting and a 16.5 PER for his career.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Kings Open To Trading DeMarcus Cousins?
The Kings wouldn’t rule out trading DeMarcus Cousins or anyone else on their roster at the trade deadline, a person with insight into coach George Karl‘s thinking told Bleacher Report’s Howard Beck. Karl, who also worked with Kings GM Pete D’Alessandro when they were with the Nuggets, has a level of control over personnel decisions in Sacramento, that source said to Beck. Karl would love to acquire Ty Lawson or any of the other members of the 2012/13 Nuggets, the last team Karl coached, Beck also hears.
There were conflicting reports about whether the Celtics were pursuing Cousins prior to the deadline, but most of the chatter surrounding the star center had to do with his frustration regarding Sacramento’s coaching situation. Cousins was an advocate of former coach Michael Malone and expressed frustration about the upheaval that saw Tyrone Corbin and now Karl succeed Malone this season. Still, Cousins has indicated that he’s enthusiastic about playing for Karl, one of nine NBA coaches with more than 1,000 career wins. The 24-year-old center is in the first season of a four-year max extension.
Tension surrounds Lawson and the Nuggets, and GM Tim Connelly recently exhorted the 27-year-old point guard to “grow up” after he was late returning from the All-Star break. The Kings were among the teams with apparent interest, but while the Nuggets reportedly received calls from numerous would-be suitors, they were turning them away. The team did engage in exploratory talks with the Celtics, several sources told Grantland’s Zach Lowe, but it appeared as the deadline drew near that Denver hadn’t seriously considered any deal. Lawson makes more than $12.404MM next season and in excess of $13.213MM in 2016/17, the final season of his contract.
No trades can take place before the end of the season, since the deadline has passed. Teams are eligible to trade players as soon as the regular season is over if they’re not in the playoffs, but typically moves don’t happen until June.
Bulls Have Exploratory Talks With Nate Robinson
The Bulls have engaged in exploratory discussions with Nate Robinson, who’s interested in returning to Chicago, reports Shams Charania of RealGM (Twitter link). The team is plotting its course in reaction to Derrick Rose‘s latest injury with some level of hope that Rose will play again this season, Charania adds. Coach Tom Thibodeau cautioned that he likes the team’s roster as constituted and that anyone the Bulls would sign into their open roster spot would be primarily for insurance purposes, as Vincent Goodwill of CSNChicago.com and K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune relay (Twitter links).
Robinson, who started 23 regular season games and eight playoff contests for an injured Rose in 2012/13, has been a free agent since shortly after negotiating his release from the Celtics in a buyout deal last month, soon after Boston acquired him from Denver via trade. The Clippers and Cavs appeared to have interest in him soon after he came available, but the Clips made him a secondary priority and the Cavs reportedly decided not to pursue him after making a preliminary inquiry. There were conflicting reports regarding interest from the Wizards and Heat.
It’s the second straight year that Rose has turned up with a torn meniscus in his right knee, but there’s growing belief that it’s not as serious this time around, Johnson tweets. Johnson wrote earlier this week that Rose was told after his injury last year that it was possible another tear would occur and that the typical treatment for a second tear would entail a shorter rehab of three to six weeks, but Johnson’s latest story has that timetable at three to eight weeks. The postseason is seven weeks away.
The Bulls would be limited to handing out the minimum salary to Robinson, an Aaron Goodwin client. As long as he remains a free agent, he’d be eligible to take part in the playoffs for Chicago even if he signed on the final day of the regular season.
Ronnie Price To Miss Rest Of Season?
THURSDAY, 8:18am: Scott cast further doubt on the notion that Price would return, saying there’d probably be no need to bring him back for the handful of games that would remain on the schedule if he meets the front end of his recovery timetable, Turner notes in a full story.
WEDNESDAY, 1:41pm: Price will miss six to eight weeks, the team announced, as Mike Trudell of Lakers.com tweets. The regular season ends in seven weeks. Regardless, the Lakers will still be eligible to apply for an extra roster spot once Price misses three games.
TUESDAY, 3:03pm: Ronnie Price will miss the rest of the season after surgery to repair a bone spur in his right elbow, Lakers coach Byron Scott told reporters, including Broderick Turner of the Los Angeles Times (Twitter link). The surgery will take place Wednesday, the team announced (on Twitter). He’s the fourth player on the Lakers roster expected to miss the balance of 2014/15, joining Kobe Bryant, Steve Nash and Julius Randle. That means the Lakers, with a full 15-man roster, will be eligible to apply for a 16th roster spot via hardship once Price sits out the next three games.
The 31-year-old Price made the Lakers regular season roster on a non-guaranteed invitation to training camp and wound up starting 20 games, more than he’d started in any single season during his previous nine years in the NBA. The newfound playing time has allowed him to average career highs nearly across the board, and he’s been more efficient than usual during that time, posting a 10.2 PER, his first double-digit mark in that category since 2009/10. The injury won’t help the Mike Higgins client as he heads back into restricted free agency, but this season has done much more help than harm to his value.
The deadline to apply for a disabled player exception was more than a month ago, but the Lakers already have two of them, one worth $4,850,500 for Nash and the other worth $1,498,680 for Randle. Still, GM Mitch Kupchak and company haven’t shown an inclination to use those exceptions, which expire March 10th. The Lakers might not even bother with apply for the extra roster spot, given that they’d only have two days to sign someone into that slot if the league were to grant it, and since there’d be little consequence to simply waiving Price, whose salary became fully guaranteed earlier this season. The team let the chance to add a 16th player expire earlier this season.
Pistons Sign John Lucas III For Rest Of Season
2:27pm: The deal is official, the team announced via press release.
FEBRUARY 25TH, 12:01pm: Detroit is indeed signing Lucas for the rest of the season, according to Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter link). His second 10-day deal expired after Tuesday night’s game. He’ll represent the 14th Piston signed through season’s end now that the team has claimed Shawne Williams off waivers.
FEBRUARY 20TH: The Pistons are highly likely to sign John Lucas III for the rest of the season after the expiration of his current 10-day contract, his second with the team this season, coach/executive Stan Van Gundy told reporters today, including Keith Langlois of Pistons.com (Twitter link). His 10-day deal, which actually runs for 13 days because it bridges the All-Star break, as I explained, is up after Tuesday.
The 32-year-old has played efficiently for the Pistons, averaging 4.8 points, 4.2 assists and 0.5 turnovers in 12.8 minutes per game spread over six appearances. The Pistons exchanged point guards Thursday, acquiring Reggie Jackson in a trade that sent out D.J. Augustin, so the team’s deadline moves don’t figure to affect Lucas’ spot on the depth chart.
Detroit is carrying the league-minimum 13 players, including Lucas and Brandon Jennings, who’s out for the season. The Pistons reportedly have an agreement to sign Quincy Miller to a 10-day contract to bolster their depth.
Northwest Notes: Garnett, Barton, Nelson
Kevin Garnett called the Timberwolves the only team for which he would have waived his no-trade clause this year, as Jerry Zgoda of the Star Tribune writes amid his story on Garnett’s welcome-home press conference Tuesday. The 20th-year veteran also indicated his belief that he can overcome any hard feelings toward Wolves owner Glen Taylor that stem from Garnett’s parting with the franchise in 2007.
“You know what, throughout time, I’ve understood that you have to forgive and forget,” Garnett said. “I obviously won’t forget certain things, but it’s time to move on. … Glen and I always had an understanding. I wouldn’t have come back if the relationship was to the point where it’s not reachable. I’m looking forward to this opportunity and I’m embracing this change.”
Taylor was absent from the press conference, but it was a simple scheduling conflict, according to Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN Twin Cities (Twitter link). Here’s more on a few Northwest Division players who recently relocated:
- Will Barton relishes his increased minutes since the deadline trade that sent him from Portland to Denver, and Brian Shaw is impressed with the shooting guard who reminds the Nuggets coach of Corey Brewer, as Christopher Dempsey of The Denver Post relays. Barton is poised for restricted free agency this summer.
- Jameer Nelson likes being in Denver and playing for a Nuggets team that he believes wants him around after he was part of two trades in less than a month, as he tells Jessica Camerato of Basketball Insiders. Several teams had reportedly hoped that he and Denver would do a buyout deal, but Denver would apparently like to keep him not just for this season but for next year, too. Nelson has a player option worth nearly $2.855MM.
- Arron Afflalo‘s relationship with Trail Blazers GM Neil Olshey predates last week’s trade that sent Afflalo to Portland, and the shooting guard already had ties to some of his new Blazer teammates, too, as fellow Basketball Insiders scribe Alex Kennedy points out. Afflalo also has a player option for next season, worth $7.75MM.
Southwest Notes: Rondo, Stoudemire, Smith
The tension between Rajon Rondo and Mavs coach Rick Carlisle that bubbled to the surface with a profanity-laced shouting match and Rondo’s subsequent benching during Tuesday’s game predates that confrontation, team sources tell Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com. The soon-to-be free agent and the coach have been at loggerheads over play-calling for a while, MacMahon hears, but owner Mark Cuban doesn’t seem worried, the ESPNDallas.com scribe notes. It’s far from the first time Rondo has clashed with a coach, as Jeff Goodman of ESPN.com points out (on Twitter). While we wait to see if his latest confrontation has any implication on this summer’s free agent market, there’s more on the Mavs amid the latest from the Southwest Division:
- Mavs athletic trainer Casey Smith’s strong reputation was one of the keys to Amar’e Stoudemire‘s decision to sign with Dallas, as MacMahon writes in a separate piece examining the team’s success with players on minimum-salary contracts. Cuban cites the club’s medical staff along with its style of play and its success in the win-loss column for the team’s ability to attract veterans at a discount. “You start looking at the roster and what they’ve accumulated,” Richard Jefferson said. “I’m in year 14 [of my career] now. I want to win. If that means I have to take less money for a year or two to help a team win, then so be it.”
- Josh Smith considered joining the Clippers before signing with the Rockets, as he told reporters today, including Dan Woike of the Orange County Register (Twitter link). The Clippers reportedly reached out to Smith’s representatives shortly after his release from the Pistons in December. He’ll be a free agent again in the summer.
- Former Mavs and Pelicans point guard Gal Mekel wishes he’d entered the D-League when he was searching for an NBA deal after the Pelicans let him go earlier this season, tweets David Pick of Eurobasket.com. Mekel wound up signing this week with Russia’s Nizhny Novgorod.
Financial Impact Of Deadline Trades: Central
Last week’s trade deadline was a dizzying affair, with 39 players and 17 teams involved in adozen trades, including a trio of three-team transactions. The day had wide-ranging effects on the salary structures of those 17 teams, and we’ll examine the aftermath for each of them in this multipart series.
Today we’ll look at the Central Division, where a pair of teams made fairly significant moves. The salary figures listed here denote this season’s salaries, though we’ll also discuss salary for future seasons.
Detroit Pistons
In: ($9,912,234)
- Tayshaun Prince ($7,707,865)
- Reggie Jackson ($2,204,369)
Out: ($10,340,000)
- Jonas Jerebko ($4,500,000)
- D.J. Augustin ($3,000,000)
- Luigi Datome ($1,750,000)
- Kyle Singler ($1,090,000)
The Pistons pulled the rare trifecta of lowering their payroll for this season and clearing $3MM from their books for next season while adding a player who’s more well-regarded than any they gave up. Detroit accomplished much of this in its side of the three-team swap with the Thunder and Jazz, relinquishing D.J. Augustin and his $3MM guaranteed salary for next season along with Kyle Singler‘s expiring contract for soon-to-be restricted free agent Reggie Jackson. Of course, the team will have to pay to keep Jackson this summer. However, the way president of basketball operations Stan Van Gundy and GM Jeff Bower structured the trade left the team with only about $27.9MM in commitments for this summer’s efforts to re-sign Jackson and Greg Monroe.
It also allowed the Pistons to create a trade exception worth the equivalent of Singler’s $1,090,000 salary, since the salaries for Jackson and Augustin are a close match. It also appears as though the Pistons could have created a smaller exception worth $795,631 for the difference between Augustin’s and Jackson’s salaries. Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders shows the Singler exception but no Augustin exception on his Pistons salary page, so it’s possible Detroit wound up without that one. Still, such an asset, which comes to less than the two-year veteran’s minimum salary, would be unlikely to come into play.
Jackson goes to a team willing to give him the starting point guard job he’s coveted, at least until Brandon Jennings comes back healthy next season, and that role carries a side benefit for Jackson, too. The trade makes it highly likely that he’ll trigger the starter criteria to lift the value of his qualifying offer from nearly $3.223MM to almost $4.434MM. He was reportedly willing to sign that qualifying offer while he was a member of the Thunder, but it nonetheless appears as though it won’t come to that for him in Detroit, which just watched Monroe ink his qualifying offer last year.
Detroit’s other trade was a shuffling of expiring deals, with Tayshaun Prince coming in and Jonas Jerebko and Luigi Datome going out. Any long-lasting financial effect depends on whether the Pistons want to bring Prince back for next season, which his outsized cap hold would complicate.
Milwaukee Bucks
In: ($5,060,640)
- Michael Carter-Williams ($2,300,040)
- Tyler Ennis ($1,590,720)
- Miles Plumlee ($1,169,880)
Out: ($4,469,160)
- Brandon Knight ($3,553,917)
- Kendall Marshall ($915,243)
The Bucks take a collaborative approach to player personnel, with coach Jason Kidd having as much say as GM John Hammond, but it seems clear that they both understand the value of the rookie scale contract. Yes, Milwaukee gave up a productive player on one of those bargain deals, but they gained three other promising young players, and unlike Brandon Knight, all three new Bucks have at least one season left after this one on their contracts. Knight is headed for restricted free agency this summer, and Grantland’s Zach Lowe estimated in December that he’d wind up with a deal that gives him $10-12MM per year. Michael Carter-Williams, Miles Plumlee and Tyler Ennis combine to make $6,170,694 next season. Carter-Williams is under contract through 2016/17, and Ennis, a rookie, can’t elect free agency until 2018, meaning there’s long-term cost-certainty at discount prices.
The flip side is that all three represent guaranteed salary on the books while Knight’s restricted free agency would have given the Bucks flexibility if they wanted to pivot in another direction. Yet that’s offset by the team’s buyout with Larry Sanders. It looks like they reduced his salary to $9MM this season and will owe him only $4.4MM next season and each year through 2017/18, according to Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). That’s instead of the yearly $11MM payout he was to receive. Sanders gave up enough in the buyout deal that it appears as though the team eschewed the stretch provision, which would have allowed Milwaukee to take seven years instead of three to pay off his contract.
So, the team entered the deadline with roughly $46.6MM in commitments for next season and emerged from this weekend, when Sanders’ buyout became official, with about $46.4MM in money on the books for 2015/16, essentially a wash. The Bucks, who appear poised to do more than just sneak into the playoffs this spring, have a chance to be a significant player this summer, with near-max money to burn against a projected $68MM cap.
The team felt a twinge of pain in parting with Kendall Marshall, a move it was reluctant to make, since that cost Milwaukee the Early Bird rights to a 23-year-old former lottery pick who’s only a year removed from having averaged 8.8 assists per game. However, his value presumably took a hit in January when a torn ACL knocked him out for the season, and so long as another team doesn’t sign him to a multiyear deal before the Bucks become eligible to sign him again in July, Milwaukee can just use its cap space if it wants to bring him back.
The Bucks don’t receive any trade exceptions since they’re still under this season’s cap. The team’s amnesty payout to Drew Gooden of more than $6.687MM, which counts toward the minimum team salary, helps ensure Milwaukee will exceed the $56.759MM threshold.
The Basketball Insiders salary pages were used in the creation of this post.
Larry Sanders Casts Doubt On Return To NBA
Larry Sanders revealed in a self-authored piece on The Players’ Tribune that he recently checked himself into a hospital where he took part in a program for anxiety, depression and mood disorders, and he used “if” and not “when” in reference to a return to basketball. The former Bucks center is a free agent after clearing waivers Monday from a buyout deal with Milwaukee.
“I love basketball, and if I get to a point where I feel I’m capable of playing basketball again, I will,” Sanders wrote. “I’ve had to make the difficult decision to follow my intuition, and allow myself the space and time to explore my true purpose in life.”
In January, Sanders denied a report from Gery Woelfel of The Journal Times that he was thinking about retirement amid an absence that began following his last appearance in a game on December 23rd. The center indicated in the video portion of his Players’ Tribune piece that the Bucks organization wasn’t the impetus behind his desire to depart. The 26-year-old reportedly has no intention to sign with an NBA team this season, though the Mavericks and Clippers were among the teams with at least some level of interest in signing him.
The center signed a four-year, $44MM rookie scale extension with the Bucks in 2013, but it didn’t kick in until this season. He forfeited all but $22,064,705 of it in the buyout deal, as Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders tweets. Sanders downplayed the importance of money in his essay and suggested in the video that he has numerous priorities other than basketball.
“I’m a person, I’m a father, I’m an artist, I’m a writer, I’m a painter, I’m a musician, and sometimes I play basketball,” Sanders said.
Once a standout defender, Sanders has encountered a multitude of problems since he signed the extension. He broke his hand in a nightclub fight early last season, and the league has twice given him drug-related suspensions. The latest stretched over 12 games and cost him $1.2MM.
Fallout From Derrick Rose’s Latest Injury
Derrick Rose has a torn meniscus in his right knee for the second season in a row, and while there’s no indication yet of how much time he’ll miss, Chicago’s title hopes seemingly hang in the balance. Here’s the latest on the Bulls as they wait to hear the fate of their point guard:
- The Bulls are likely to sign another guard into their open roster spot, writes K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune. Free agent and former Bull Nate Robinson would like to rejoin the team, as USA Today’s Sam Amick hears (Twitter link), but it’s unclear if Chicago reciprocates that interest.
- Rose was informed upon having season-ending surgery to repair his torn meniscus in 2013 that another tear was a possibility but typical treatment would entail a shorter rehab period of three to six weeks, a source said to Johnson for the same story. Still, it’s too soon to tell whether the injury will be season-ending, two sources close to Rose told Chris Mannix of SI.com.
- The point guard is “the definition of untradeable,” but with a pivotal summer ahead, it might be time for the Bulls to reconsider how they regard the former MVP, Mannix opines in the same piece. Rose is due more than $20.093MM next season and in excess of $21.323MM in 2016/17, the last year of his deal.