Latest On Kings Coaching Search
Kings GM Pete D’Alessandro, advisor to the chairman Chris Mullin, DeMarcus Cousins and rumored coaching candidate Mark Jackson visited in private for more than an hour and a half late Tuesday, USA Today’s Sam Amick reports. D’Alessandro downplayed any significance to the affair, insisting that “it was not a meeting,” instead calling it a reunion of old friends and reiterating that Tyrone Corbin is the team’s head coach, as the GM said to Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). Jackson was in Sacramento to broadcast Tuesday’s Kings-Thunder game for ESPN. D’Alessandro, Mullin and Jackson have longstanding connections to each other, but Cousins doesn’t share much history with the group, and he had expressed a desire to meet with Jackson prior to the visit, Amick writes.
The connection between Mullin, another apparent Kings coaching target who’s reportedly reluctant to take over head coaching duties at midseason, and Jackson dates back to their high school days, and they were teammates in college and the NBA, Amick notes. D’Alessandro was a video coordinator at St. John’s after Mullin had left but while Jackson was still there, and the three always meet when they have the chance, according to Amick. Jackson also has ties to owner Vivek Ranadive, who owned a minority stake in the Warriors while Jackson was coaching at Golden State.
Ranadive said D’Alessandro and Mullin had given full-throated support to Corbin when they suggested that Michael Malone be let go, though the owner left the door open for another change at any time as he spoke with Sean Cunningham of News10 in Sacramento (video link; hat tip to Spears).
“I sat down with Pete D’Alessandro and Chris Mullin when they recommended that we make this change at this time,” Ranadive said. “I asked them, ‘What are all the options?’ and “Who should we consider?’ and while we’re always looking at options, they were very emphatic that Tyrone Corbin had earned the right to be the head coach of the Sacramento Kings at this time, and that we all needed to get behind him and support him. So we’re going to put all the wood behind the Ty Corbin arrow, and we’re going to support him to our fullest.”
Ranadive also made a tangential reference to Ray Allen in his chat with Cunningham, saying that, “Just because you win 16 games in a row, it doesn’t mean that you don’t try to get Ray Allen on your team to make your team even better.” However, that appears to be a reference to the Warriors, who had their 16-game winning streak snapped Tuesday and have recently been identified as a suitor for the free agent shooting guard, and not an indication that Sacramento is making any sort of push to sign Allen.
Mullin Not Planning To Coach Kings This Year
6:00pm: The Kings have contacted Vinny Del Negro about their head coaching vacancy, Chris Mannix of SI.com reports (Twitter link). If Sacramento is indeed still searching for candidates to take the reigns of the team it would conflict with the earlier report that Corbin would likely finish out the season as head coach. Del Negro’s last stint as a head coach was during the 2012/13 season with the Clippers. His career coaching record is 210-184.
1:44pm: Corbin would have to “fall on his face” not to survive the season as coach, Amick tweets, adding that Karl is not in the team’s plans. Mullin will take a more active role in practices, planning and other duties as he works to enhance Sacramento’s offense, but he has no plans to coach the team, Amick also reports (Twitter link).
1:30pm: Mullin won’t coach the Kings this season, sources tell Chris Broussard of ESPN.com (Twitter link). If he does become Kings coach, he would start at the beginning of 2015/16, Broussard adds. Corbin will likely remain in the position for the balance of this season.
11:12pm: Mullin has expressed interest in coaching someday, but the Kings are concerned that it will be difficult to convince him to jump into coaching in the middle of the season, reports Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter links). Karl, too, said it would be difficult to come in midseason when he spoke Monday to Tom Byrne on SiriusXM Radio, as Jason Jones of The Sacramento Bee transcribes.
9:01am: The notion of Chris Mullin taking over as Kings coach continues to grow on owner Vivek Ranadive, leaving one-time front-runner George Karl as a secondary candidate at this point, writes Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. Mullin, who serves the Kings in a consultant’s role as advisor to the chairman, is far from sold on the idea of coaching, but he’d have the backing of ownership and GM Pete D’Alessandro if he chose to move to the bench, Wojnarowski hears. D’Alessandro and assistant GM Mike Bratz like Karl, but D’Alessandro would be on board with Mullin, sources tell Wojnarowski.
Some in the Kings organization consider Mark Jackson a compelling candidate, too, according to USA Today’s Sam Amick. It’s unclear if the Kings have reached out to Jackson, but they haven’t reached out to Karl, Amick hears, adding that Sacramento doesn’t appear interested in doing so at this point.
The action comes after the Kings formally dismissed Michael Malone on Monday, replacing him, at least for now, with Tyrone Corbin. The Kings front office was weary of Malone’s resistance on several matters, Amick writes. Malone was hesistant to support extensions for DeMarcus Cousins and Rudy Gay and wanted the team to re-sign Isaiah Thomas, according to Amick.
“I don’t know if there was a point in time when you could say, ‘Yeah this isn’t [working],'” D’Alessandro said to Amick. “The respect always was there, but I just think we both knew that the vision for how to play wasn’t the same. … You start to see it evolve, and then you say, ‘Let’s just be honest about it then. Let’s just be honest, and agree to disagree.’ But then something has to happen. That’s the league we’re in.”
NBA Players Who Can’t Be Traded This Season
Most offseason signees became eligible for inclusion in trades Monday, meaning the vast majority of NBA players are subject to a trade between now and the February 19th trade deadline. Only a small fraction of those players will actually end up in deals, in part because teams have no motivation to trade certain players and in part because their teams won’t be able to find suitable exchanges. There are also trade restrictions on several players that don’t necessarily preclude their teams from making a swap but make it more difficult to pull one off.
A handful of players have no-trade clauses written into their contracts, and many more have de facto no-trade clauses because they re-signed with their teams on a one-year deal or a two-year deal that includes an option, or because they signed an offer sheet that their original team matched. Those players are difficult to trade, but it’s not impossible. Kevin Garnett waived his no-trade clause to approve the deal that sent him from the Celtics to the Nets in 2013, and Aaron Brooks gave his OK to a trade that sent him from the Rockets to the Nuggets at last season’s deadline in spite of a de facto no-trade clause. Yet there’s simply no way to work around the restriction on players who sign within three months of the trade deadline or sign certain kinds of veteran extensions within six months of it.
Seven of the 10 players who are off-limits for trades during the 2014/15 regular season signed after November 19th, the point at which the trade deadline was three months away. Teams can’t trade players at any point during the season within three months of having signed them. So, even if the Sixers wanted to include Furkan Aldemir, who signed Monday, in a trade, they couldn’t until after the regular season. The same is true for the Nets and Darius Morris, who signed with Brooklyn last week. If the Nets make the playoffs and Morris is on Brooklyn’s roster for the postseason, the team couldn’t trade him until after it’s eliminated.
The Lakers can’t move Carlos Boozer at any point this season because they claimed him off amnesty waivers. Any time a team claims a player through that process, that team can’t deal him until the following July 1st.
The rule that prevents the Cavs from trading Anderson Varejao and the Kings from dealing Rudy Gay at any point this season rarely comes into play. They’re only the fifth and sixth players, respectively, to have signed veteran extensions under the existing collective bargaining agreement. Both signed extensions that tacked three seasons onto their existing contracts and involve raises of greater than 4.5%, which means those extensions couldn’t have been part of extend-and-trade transactions. Even though the extend-and-trade is largely a vestige of old CBAs, it lives on through Varejao and Gay. That’s because anytime a team signs a player to an extension that doesn’t fit the restrictions called for under an extend-and-trade, the team can’t trade him for six months. Varejao signed his extension in October, and Gay put pen to paper in November, so they can’t be traded until the spring. Tony Parker and Zach Randolph also signed extensions in recent months that would have run afoul of extend-and-trade rules, but the six-month trade restrictions on both will expire before the trade deadline.
Here’s a list of every player who can’t be traded at any point during the regular season this year:
- Jeff Adrien, Timberwolves
- Furkan Aldemir, Sixers
- Carlos Boozer, Lakers
- Patrick Christopher, Jazz
- Dante Cunningham, Pelicans
- Rudy Gay, Kings
- Gal Mekel, Pelicans
- Darius Morris, Nets
- Anderson Varejao, Cavaliers
- Hassan Whiteside, Heat
Larry Coon’s Salary Cap FAQ was used in the creation of this post.
Rockets Renew Push To Use Trade Exception
DECEMBER 16TH: Houston maintains its interest in Corey Brewer, as the team’s coaches are enamored with him, tweets Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN Twin Cities. Still, no deal is imminent, according to Wolfson, as the Rockets’ self-imposed Friday deadline draws near.
DECEMBER 10TH: The Rockets have once more ratcheted up the intensity of their pursuit of a trade as they seek to use a trade exception worth nearly $8.375MM, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. Houston wants to make a move by December 19th, since the Rockets could flip whomever they acquired in a deal that aggregates salary before the leaguewide February 19th trade deadline, Wojnarowski writes. That jibes with last month’s report from Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle, who wrote then that the team was in active talks regarding as many as a dozen players whom GM Daryl Morey and his staff were eyeing. It appeared then that the club wanted to make a move even before this coming Monday, when most offseason signees become eligible to be traded, though there’s been little chatter involving the Rockets since.
A pair of teams thought they had momentum on deals with the Rockets, but that fizzled as it appears Morey has moved on to different discussions, Wojnarowski hears. It didn’t appear as though the Rockets were prioritizing any particular position last month, but this time around the emphasis is on wings and frontcourt players, according to Wojnarowski, somewhat narrowing the field. Feigen suggested that the team was targeting an upgrade to the rotation who could be packaged with other players in return for a star at the deadline. Teams can’t make trades that aggregate the salary of a player they’ve acquired via trade within the last two months, and while there are ways to package players without aggregating their salaries, it’s easier not to have to work around that restriction.
The trade exception is left over from this summer’s unloading of Jeremy Lin to the Lakers. Houston can acquire a player, or players, whose salaries come up to as much as $100K more than the value of the exception. It doesn’t expire until next summer, even though the Rockets are anxious to use it soon. The Rockets were among the teams in pursuit of Corey Brewer last month, and while Brewer rumors have since died down, Tuesday’s suggestion from Timberwolves coach/executive Flip Saunders that his team is switching into a rebuilding mode could kick start that talk, though that’s just my speculation.
Houston’s self-imposed deadline, two months before the actual trade deadline, evokes memories of a similar target date last year when the Rockets were aggressively shopping Omer Asik. Nothing materialized on Asik last December, and Morey waited until July to ship him to New Orleans.
Ronny Turiaf To Miss Rest Of Season
Ronny Turiaf will miss the rest of the season after undergoing surgery on his right hip today, the team announced (Twitter link). Jerry Zgoda of the Star Tribune reported the news minutes earlier. Coach/executive Flip Saunders said that the team would waive Turiaf if an intriguing player became available at some point, Zgoda notes. The 10th-year big man is on a fully guaranteed contract worth $1.5MM this year, and it expires at season’s end.
The Wolves already have 16 players on their roster, thanks to the hardship Minnesota qualified for in part because of Turiaf’s lingering hip ailment, and it’s unlikely the team would be granted another extra roster spot. Minnesota can apply for a Disabled Player Exception, but the team can only do so if Turiaf is still on the roster, and it would only be worth $750K, which wouldn’t give the Wolves much additional financial flexibility. The 16th roster spot is only temporary, as the league awards it 10 days at a time, and when the Wolves return to health, the team will have to trim down to 15 players. Minnesota could at that point elect to cut Turiaf and keep Jeff Adrien, whom it added when the league first granted the hardship exception, but it’s unknown whether that’s what Saunders intends to do.
The 31-year-old Turiaf has only seen the floor for two games this season after playing in just 31 games for Minnesota last season. He started in 10 of those appearances and averaged 4.8 points and a stout 5.6 rebounds in 19.5 minutes per contest, but he’s largely failed to give the team much return on its investment in the two-year, $3MM contract he signed in 2013.
Latest On Pistons, Josh Smith, Jennings, Monroe
TUESDAY, 1:54pm: Smith is the only player the Pistons have talked about trading, and those discussions have merely been preliminary, according to Vince Ellis of the Detroit Free Press.
MONDAY, 9:20pm: Monroe refuted Deveney’s report and said he would never initiate trade talk on his own, writes David Mayo of the MLive Media Group. Van Gundy also brushed aside the idea that the team is actively looking to move Monroe and is asking for a first round pick in return, reports Keith Langlois of Pistons.com (via Twitter). “I don’t know where that stuff comes from,” he said. “We haven’t talked to anybody about trading Greg Monroe. We know there are teams with interest and that’s it.”
2:47pm: A source tells Sean Deveney of The Sporting News that Monroe would approve almost any deal, conflicting with Zillgitt’s report that Monroe is putting the kibosh on trades. The Pistons are seeking a first-rounder in return for Monroe, Deveney hears. Monroe and agent David Falk had sign-and-trade deals in place for Monroe this summer, but the Pistons didn’t want to take back too much salary, according to Deveney.
2:09pm: The Pistons are looking to move Brandon Jennings and Josh Smith, executives from teams around the league tell Bleacher Report’s Howard Beck. Teams have been calling Detroit about Greg Monroe, but the soon-to-be free agent has made it known that he’s not interested in waiving the de facto no-trade clause he received when he signed his qualifying offer in the summer, USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt tweets. Monroe would lose his Bird rights if he approved a trade, meaning whichever team that acquires him would need ample cap room to re-sign him in the offseason, and that’s dissuading the big man from giving the OK to a move, Zillgitt notes. There are no such restrictions on Jennings or Smith, both of whom are on contracts that cover next season.
Sacramento’s front office targeted Smith this summer over the objections of soon-to-be former coach Michael Malone, though Detroit reportedly had no interest in Sacramento’s proposals, none of which appeared to offer the Pistons much in return. Vincent Ellis of the Detroit Free Press surmised today that the Pistons would probably need to attach a first-round pick to Smith to find a trade partner, making a deal unlikely, though that appeared to be educated speculation. Smith makes $13.5MM this season and each year through 2016/17. His 13.7 points per game this season are his fewest since 2005/06.
Jennings is on a cheaper contract and is only signed through 2015/16. He’ll make $8MM this season and more than $8.344MM next year. He, like Smith, has experienced a dip in scoring production this season, as Jennings is putting up 12.7 PPG, a career low. The Pistons are 5-19 in their first season under coach/executive Stan Van Gundy, who’s pointed to a four-day stretch of off days next week as a time when he’ll assess the direction of the club.
Atlantic Notes: Larkin, Morris, Aldemir
The Atlantic Division is home to the teams with the NBA’s two highest payrolls — the Knicks and the Nets — as well as the Sixers, who have the lowest. All three of them are under .500, and the Knicks, with 21 losses, have suffered just one fewer defeat than Philadelphia has. Here’s more on a trio of teams with different approaches and similar results:
- Shane Larkin wants to re-sign with the Knicks next summer even though they declined their 2015/16 team option on his rookie scale contract, as Larkin tells Dan Feldman of NBCSports.com. “I love it here. I want to be here,” Larkin said. “Obviously, I want to help bring the Knicks back to what they used to be.” The Knicks haven’t dismissed the possibility, but declining the option hamstrings the team, which can’t pay more than the $1,675,320 value of his option if they were to re-sign him, as Feldman points out, examining the risky play of ceding control over young talent in exchange for cap flexibility.
- The non-guaranteed minimum-salary deal that the Nets gave Darius Morris last week covers two seasons, according to Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). The salary for 2015/16 becomes partially guaranteed for $25K if he remains on the roster through July 1st, and there are additional guarantee dates later in the year that further raise that guaranteed amount, as Pincus shows on the Basketball Insiders Nets salary page.
- Furkan Aldemir received a signing bonus of nearly $306K, Pincus reports (Twitter links). His base salary is $2.8MM in the first, third and fourth years of his four-year contract and $2.7MM in year two, Pincus adds. The first two seasons are fully guaranteed, so the cap hits for the signing bonus, which by rule are spread over the guaranteed seasons of the deal, come to $2.96MM for this season and $2.84MM for next, as Pincus also reveals.
- The amount of guaranteed money going to Aldemir signals the gravity of his signing amid an otherwise low-risk strategy for Sixers GM Sam Hinkie, writes John Smallwood of the Philadelphia Daily News. Aldemir’s ability to develop will be a key bellwether for the success of Hinkie’s tenure, Smallwood believes.
Josh McRoberts Likely To Miss Rest Of Season
12:43pm: Erik Spoelstra said today that McRoberts is likely to miss the season, as the Heat coach told reporters, including Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel. The Heat plan to apply for a Disabled Player Exception, though they’re expected to wait until they’re confident that an NBA-designated doctor will agree with their assessment that it’s unlikely that he’ll play again in 2014/15, Winderman writes. If the league’s doctor disagrees, Miami wouldn’t be able to reapply for the exception for another 90 days, and even then, they could only do so if McRoberts either aggravated the injury or suffered a different ailment.
MONDAY, 1:26pm: Josh McRoberts has a lateral meniscus tear in his right knee which will force him to undergo surgery that could be season-ending, the Heat announced (Twitter links). McRoberts missed the start of the season after undergoing offseason toe surgery and has struggled to recover, averaging just 17.4 minutes per game and missing seven regular season contests after signing a four-year, $22.652MM contract in the offseason. The Heat would be eligible to apply for a Disabled Player Exception worth nearly $2.653MM if McRoberts is indeed deemed most likely to miss the season, though Miami would have to waive a player to make use of it, since the team has a full 15-man roster.
There’s a strong chance that Miami is also without Chris Bosh for a while, since it’s possible that he’ll miss a few weeks because of a strained calf, reports Joseph Goodman of the Miami Herald. The Heat have struggled to replace LeBron James after bursting out of the gates to a 3-0 start this season, and Miami sits seventh in the Eastern Conference at 11-13 after a blowout loss Sunday at home to the Bulls.
McRoberts enjoyed a career year last season with Charlotte, where he averaged 30.3 minutes per game and established himself as a premier passing big man, racking up 4.3 assists against just 1.1 turnovers per contest. The Heat gave him a deal equivalent to the non-taxpayer’s mid-level exception with hopes he’d do the same in Miami, and McRoberts passed up a comparable offer that the Hornets made after the Heat had already put their offer on the table. His absence from Charlotte appears to be one of many problems ailing the Hornets, who’ve gone just 6-17 without him this season.
Western Rumors: Turiaf, Clippers, Gasol, Lopez
Wolves coach/executive Flip Saunders told reporters today that it’s likely he’ll try to find a way to use Ronny Turiaf‘s roster spot to help the team in the short term, tweets Jerry Zgoda of the Star Tribune. Turiaf had surgery today on his right hip, and it’s unclear when he’ll be able to return. His contract, which calls for him to make a guaranteed $1.5MM this year, is up at season’s end, as Zgoda notes. Minnesota is already carrying 16 players through a hardship exception granted in part because of Turiaf’s injury, so his extended absence wouldn’t give the team any more ammunition to apply for a 17th roster spot, which it would be unlikely to receive, anyway. There’s more injury-related news amid the latest rumblings from around the Western Conference:
- Clippers coach/executive Doc Rivers acknowledged a report that the team is interested in Jermaine O’Neal, telling gathered media, including Ben Bolch of the Los Angeles Times, that he’s casting a wide net (Twitter link). “Hey, count me in for everybody,” Rivers said. “… We’re looking at everything.”
- Jordan Farmar isn’t enamored with his limited role under Rivers, who’s giving him just 15.0 minutes per night, observes Arash Markazi of ESPNLosAngeles.com. Farmar’s deal with the Clippers includes a player option worth more than $2.17MM for next season.
- Marc Gasol isn’t tiring of hearing his name in rumors as he nears free agency in the summer ahead, but he once more made it clear that he’s quite pleased to be in Memphis, notes Chris Mannix of SI.com (Twitter link). The Raptors are the latest team reportedly gearing up for a run at the Grizzlies big man.
- Robin Lopez is expected to miss the next four weeks after suffering a broken right hand in Monday’s win for the Blazers against the Spurs, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. The Blazers have 15 fully guaranteed contracts, so they have little flexibility to find a replacement.
Arnett Moultrie To Play For Chinese Team
Former Sixers power forward Arnett Moultrie is joining the Jiangsu Nangang Dragons, reports Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). Spears indicates that Moultrie has already signed a contract with the club, though the terms of the deal are unclear. The Dragons already have Toney Douglas and Chris Singleton on their team, and the Chinese Basketball Association doesn’t permit its clubs to have more than two healthy American players, though Singleton has missed the last two games.
The Sixers sent Moultrie, the 27th overall pick in the 2012 draft, to the Knicks in October’s Travis Outlaw trade, and New York waived Moultrie the same day. The now 24-year-old Moultrie had played both of his NBA seasons with Philadelphia, averaging 3.6 points and 3.1 rebounds in 12.4 minutes per game, but he grew upset when the team was slow to activate him following an injury last season, and the NBA later suspended him for a drug-related violation. The events left doubt during the offseason about his future with the Sixers, so it wasn’t surprising when the trade happened.
Moultrie’s salary of more than $1.136MM for this season was guaranteed under the terms of his rookie scale contract, and the Knicks remain on the hook for it. Still, it’s possible that New York will be able to recoup a small portion of it through set-off rights, depending on how much Moultrie makes on his deal with the Dragons.