Players Who Took NBA’s Largest Pay Cuts
It was clear from the start that Dirk Nowitzki wasn’t leaving the Mavericks this summer, and while that also foretold a discount deal, few would have predicted that he’d agree to the league’s sharpest decline in salary. The future Hall-of-Famer let the Mavs lop nearly $15MM off his take from 2013/14, a reduction larger than last season’s entire salary for Emeka Okafor, who remains unsigned and trails only Nowitzki in terms of pay decrease from last season.
The presence of Nowitzki might keep new teammate Richard Jefferson from feeling too regretful about his minimum-salary deal, one that comes on the heels of a more than $11MM payday last season. Five players in the NBA are set to see their salaries dip by more than $10MM, and Jefferson is next on the list after that group.
The Wizards are the only other team with two players among the top 10 in salary declines from last season to next, as Paul Pierce and Kris Humphries, whose eight-figure salaries went the opposite way in the 2013 Celtics/Nets blockbuster, unite for less in Washington. Like the majority of the players in this top 10, Pierce and Humphries will still make more than the minimum salary this year, so it could be worse for them.
Here’s the complete list, with each player’s pay cut in parentheses, followed by his name, his 2013/14 salary, his 2014/15 salary, and his 2014/15 team, if applicable. All salaries are rounded to the nearest $1K:
- ($14.747MM) Dirk Nowitzki, $22.721MM — $7.974MM: Re-signed with Mavericks
- ($14,488MM) Emeka Okafor, $14.488MM: Unsigned
- ($12.158MM) Pau Gasol, $19.286MM — $7.128MM: Signed with Bulls
- ($11.944MM) Danny Granger, $14.021MM* — $2.077MM: Signed with Heat.
- ($10.028MM) Paul Pierce, $15.333MM — $5.305MM: Signed with Wizards
- ($9.598MM) Richard Jefferson, $11.046MM — $1.448MM: Signed with Mavericks
- ($9MM) Andris Biedrins, $9MM: Unsigned
- ($8.7MM) Ben Gordon, $13.2MM — $4.5MM: Signed with Magic
- ($7.869MM) Shawn Marion: $9.317MM — $1.448MM**: Agreed to sign with the Cavaliers
- ($7.75MM) Kris Humphries, $12MM — $4.25MM: Signed-and-traded to Wizards
* — Granger’s 2013/14 salary as listed here is the combined salary he made between his original deal and the prorated minimum salary he signed with the Clippers after the Sixers waived him following the trade that sent him to Philadelphia. The amount might be slightly less, depending on whether the Sixers agreed to waive set-off rights as part of Granger’s buyout agreement.
** — Some details about Marion’s deal remain unclear, but the Cavs are limited to giving him no more than the minimum salary.
Basketball Insiders was used in the creation of this post.
Hawks Rumors: Monday
The revelation that Hawks owner Bruce Levenson has decided to sell the team because of a racially charged email that he sent is sending ripples throughout the league. We rounded up Sunday evening’s dispatches related to Levenson in this post, and we’ll track the latest developments throughout today right here, with additional updates at the top:
4:46pm update:
- NBPA acting director Ron Klempner issued a statement on the Hawks situation to reporters, including USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt (on Twitter). The statement reads: “We’ve had continuing discussions with the league office about the incidents of disturbing statements attributed to representatives of the Atlanta Hawks’ franchise. We recognize that there is an ongoing investigation regarding the circumstances, and we will continue to monitor these events and take any action we deem appropriate.”
- Meanwhile, Zillgitt hears (link) that the comments read by Ferry on the Deng background report were the extent of his comments on the player’s race.
11:55am update:
- The NBA does not plan to give Ferry additional punishment on top of what the Hawks are already doling out, Vivlamore reports (on Twitter).
11:53am update:
- Ferry made contact with Ron Shade, one of Deng’s agents, to apologize, and he’s reached out to Deng, too, Wojnarowski tweets.
11:48am update:
- Ferry met with Hawks coaches and players Sunday and apologized as he told them what he said about Deng, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. A source disclosed Ferry’s statement about Deng to Wojnarowski. “He’s still a young guy overall,” Ferry said of Deng, according to Wojnarowski’s source. “He’s a good guy overall. But he’s not perfect. He’s got some African in him. And I don’t say that in a bad way.”
- The NBA and officials from the Hawks helped convince Levenson to sell the team, Wojnarowski writes, which seems to conflict with Windhorst’s report that Levenson chose to sell the team on his own volition.
11:07am update:
- The Hawks are set to discipline Ferry, but it’s unclear if the NBA will also levy a punishment against the GM, Vivlamore reports. A person involved tells Vivlamore that they had “never heard a comment as offensive” as the one directed at Deng. The person who wrote the report that Ferry read was not with the Hawks organization, as Koonin says to Vivlamore.
9:06am update:
- The NBA isn’t interested in having the Hawks move to Seattle or elsewhere, Mannix hears (Twitter link). The team’s lease at the arena in Atlanta, which runs through 2017/18 as Windhorst pointed out in his story, would also help forestall a move, Mannix says.
8:59am update:
- Luol Deng is the player who was the subject of the background report that contained an offensive and racist remark that Hawks GM Danny Ferry read, sources tell Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter link). That report sparked the investigation that uncovered Levenson’s email.
- Ferry faces discipline, but he will remain GM of the team, as Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com hears.
- Prospective buyers are already inundating Hawks CEO Steve Koonin with calls, as he tells Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I had over seven phone calls directly today from multi-billionaires,” Koonin said. “It blew my mind some of the people who wrote me today.” The league, rather than Levenson, will take the lead in conducting the sale, as Windhorst writes in his piece. It’s unclear how much of a role Koonin, who owns a share of the Hawks and who has been placed in charge of the team in Levenson’s stead, will play in finding a new controlling owner.
- Levenson made the choice to sell on his own, believing that his racially charged email would become public and that it would hurt business if he continued as owner, Windhorst writes. But an executive for another team tells Chris Mannix of SI.com that he believes Levenson is using the affair as an excuse to cash in on skyrocketing franchise values.
- Players and people around the league generally liked Levenson prior to Sunday’s revelation, according to Windhorst. However, Koonin told CNN’s Martin Savidge that he was “morified and angry” about the email, and that when he met with Hawks players Sunday night, “It was like walking into a funeral,” as CNN’s Eliott C. McLaughlin and Holly Yan pass along. “These are young men who wear our city’s name and our logo on their chest,” Koonin said. “They play for a team, and they are supposed to be supported by their ownership. And ownership failed in supporting them.”
Eastern Notes: Hawks, Knicks, Pistons, Stiemsma
The Hawks lost an estimated $23.9MM on their basketball operations last season, a figure partially offset by $11MM in combined proceeds from luxury tax payouts and the league’s revenue-sharing plan, Grantland’s Zach Lowe reports. The Bucks, who went for $550MM this spring, lost an estimated $6.5MM, but revenue sharing lifted them to a profit, Lowe also reveals. Still, the NBA and its television partners are expected to strike a deal that would give the league an average of more than $2 billion a year, up from $930MM in the current agreement, as John Lombardo and John Ourand of the Sports Business Journal report. The NBA is a hot property, but while outgoing owner Bruce Levenson has the controlling stake in the Hawks, he doesn’t have the majority share, Lowe notes. It remains to be seen whether the Hawks sale will reap a figure close to the $2 billion Steve Ballmer paid for the Clippers, the Bucks sale price, or an entirely different number, but as we wait to see, here’s more from the East:
- Knicks owner James Dolan and team president Phil Jackson have agreed to keep the existing front office staff in place for a year, a source tells Marc Berman of the New York Post. The club hasn’t let go of any front office personnel since Jackson’s hiring, and the only addition has been Clarence Gaines Jr., who serves as an adviser to Jackson, Berman points out. Rick Fox said Sunday that he’d be interested in joining the organization, though there’s been no movement toward that end, as Berman chronicles.
- Otis Smith confirms that he and Pistons president of basketball operations Stan Van Gundy discussed making Smith the team’s GM, a job that instead went to Jeff Bower, but Smith told Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel that the timing wasn’t right (Twitter links). “I don’t think I’m ready to go back to NBA,” said Smith, the former Magic GM who joined the Pistons as the coach of their D-League team.
- Greg Stiemsma‘s one-year deal for the minimum salary with the Raptors is indeed partially guaranteed, according to Ryan Wolstat of the Toronto Sun (Twitter link).
Suns Interested In Zoran Dragic
The Suns are among a group of three NBA teams with keener interest than others in Spanish-league shooting guard Zoran Dragic, reports Marc Stein of ESPN.com. Dragic would have to sign with an NBA team before the start of the Spanish season and pay a buyout greater than the equivalent of $971K to escape from his contract with Unicaja Malaga, Stein adds.
Such a buyout would exceed the NBA’s $600K Excluded International Player Payment Amount, so the overflow amount would count against the cap for any NBA team that signs Dragic. However, the Suns have plenty of cap flexibility, and it appears that they would still be able to retain cap room even if they re-sign Eric Bledsoe to a max contract, which doesn’t appear likely at this point.
The 25-year-old Dragic “badly wants” to play in the NBA, as Stein wrote last month, and joining Phoenix would mean pairing with his brother, Goran Dragic, whom teams are already eyeing as a potential 2015 free agent should he opt out of his contract next summer. Inking Zoran Dragic would ostensibly help the Suns keep his brother, as Stein points out, though the Rockets, who were reportedly at the head of the pack for Zoran Dragic as of May, are one of the teams considering a run at Goran Dragic a year from now. Orazio Cauchi of Sportando more recently identified the Pacers as another suitor for Zoran Dragic.
Charlie Villanueva Mulls Clippers, Mavs Offers
The Mavericks and the Clippers have made minimum-salary offers to free agent Charlie Villanueva, who’s close to making a decision between the two, a source tells RealGM (Twitter link). The teams are the first to have been directly connected this summer to the 30-year-old former 7th overall pick.
A report in July indicated that Villanueva had worked out for multiple teams, though it’s not clear whether the Mavs or the Clippers were among them. The Excel Sports Management client is coming off an exceedingly player-friendly five-year, $37.7MM contract with the Pistons, but it looks like he’s in line to make much less this time around. His points per game decreased in each of those five seasons in Detroit, and last year, he notched 4.6 points in 9.0 minutes per night across just 20 appearances. He shot a career-low 25.0% from behind the three-point arc in the small sample size, but the 6’11” power forward is a career 34.3% three-point shooter capable of stretching the floor.
Joining the Clippers would appear to give Villanueva a better shot at making the opening-night roster, since they only have 13 guaranteed deals while the Mavs have 15, as our roster counts show. Hedo Turkoglu is reportedly on track to sign with the Clippers, but even if he receives a fully guaranteed contract, there’d still be room enough for the team to give one to Villanueva, too.
Unsigned Former Lottery Picks
Hasheem Thabeet went unclaimed after the Sixers waived him this week, putting the No. 2 pick from 2009 on a free agent market in which he has plenty of company. Lottery picks are supposed to turn into stars, or at least players capable of holding NBA roster spots. Still, there are dozens of lottery picks since 2000 who are out of the NBA, and perhaps more surprising is how many of them had NBA contracts just within the past 12 months.
It’s no shock not to see names like Luke Jackson and Julian Wright on NBA rosters, since that’s been the case for years now. Still others are like Thabeet, who’s consistently remained in the NBA up until now, and are left to scramble for contracts of some kind as the offseason grows short.
Greg Monroe stands out among those on this list, but his continued presence on the market has more to do with the fact that he’s a restricted free agent than any on-court shortcomings. All the other names below are unrestricted free agents, so teams are free to scoop them up if they see fit. That simply hasn’t been the case for Greg Oden, Andrew Bynum, Charlie Villanueva, and others.
The list would grow further if we took it back a few more years, and it would include 1999 No. 1 overall pick Elton Brand, who’s still unsigned after spending last season with the Hawks. Still, Brand, like all the other lottery picks from the 20th century, is nearing retirement, so his continued free agency isn’t earth-shattering.
Here are the lottery picks since 2000 who remain free agents after having been on regular season or preseason NBA rosters within the past 12 months:
- Greg Oden, No. 1, 2007
- Kwame Brown, No. 1, 2001
- Hasheem Thabeet, No. 2, 2009
- Michael Beasley, No. 2, 2008
- Emeka Okafor, No. 2, 2004
- Greg Monroe, No. 7, 2011
- Charlie Villanueva, No. 7, 2005
- Joe Alexander, No. 8, 2008
- DeSagana Diop, No. 8, 2001
- Patrick O’Bryant, No. 9, 2006
- Andrew Bynum, No. 10, 2005
- Andris Biedrins, No. 11, 2004
- Melvin Ely, No. 12, 2002
- Earl Clark, No. 14, 2009
- Ronnie Brewer, No. 14, 2006
Five more veterans from the 2013/14 campaign have struck deals to play overseas:
- Jan Vesely, No. 6, 2011 — signed to play in Turkey
- Josh Childress, No. 6, 2004 — signed to play in Australia
- Ike Diogu, No. 9, 2005 — signed to play in China
- Anthony Randolph, No 14, 2008 — signed to play in Russia
- Hilton Armstrong, No. 12, 2006 — agreed to play in Turkey
Shane Battier, the No. 6 pick from 2001, started 56 regular season games for the Heat this past season, but he retired after the Finals in June.
Latest On Rajon Rondo
3:01pm: A multitude of executives from teams around the league tell Bleacher Report’s Ric Bucher that the Celtics have made Rondo available to them. Teams have been reluctant to give up either promising young players, high draft picks, or both in return for Rondo out of concern about his temperament, his health, and his lack of experience leading a team without stars around him, Bucher writes. An Eastern Conference GM also cites Ainge’s demands as reason why no trade has materialized. People around the league believe that Ainge would have been more willing to commit to Rondo if he’d drafted Joel Embiid, Bucher adds.
FRIDAY, 12:31pm: Celtics team president Rich Gotham dismissed the idea that Rondo is bucking for a trade, as Gotham said in comments to reporters, including Gary Washburn of The Boston Globe (Twitter links). “If he’s made that demand it hasn’t been directed to the Celtics,” Gotham said. “I’ve not heard [about wanting out]. Rajon’s been working out all summer. He’s been here. This is his home.”
TUESDAY, 12:14pm: Sean Deveney of The Sporting News largely seconds Blakely’s report, having heard denials from both Rondo’s camp and the Celtics that the point guard has made a trade request. Rondo intends to play out the final season of his contract as a member of the Celtics and the C’s plan on starting the year with him on the roster, Deveney writes.
MONDAY, 4:04pm: People close to Rajon Rondo indicate to A. Sherrod Blakely of CSNNE.com that he never told the Celtics he wanted out, countering this weekend’s dispatch. Multiple sources from around the league tell Blakely that Rondo wants to begin the season in Boston and see how the situation develops from there, and people within the Celtics organization echo that sentiment, according to Blakely. The most likely scenario involves Rondo remaining with the Celtics at least at the beginning of the season, though the C’s are open to dealing Rondo for the right return, Blakely hears.
A rival GM suggested to the CSNNE.com scribe that the presence of Marcus Smart gives the Celtics greater leverage against Rondo if the All-Star were to demand a trade, given Smart’s upside. Blakely reiterates an earlier report that indicated that teams around the league are anxious to see Rondo at full health, dampening the market for a trade at present.
It’s a pivotal juncture for the point guard, who’s played just 30 games since tearing his ACL in early 2013 but faces unrestricted free agency in a year. Trade rumors have swirled around him ever since last year’s Paul Pierce/Kevin Garnett blockbuster, but president of basketball operations Danny Ainge has continually denied that he’s looking to trade the last remaining mainstay from his 2008 championship team.
Free Agent Stock Watch: Earl Clark
Cleveland’s ill-fated addition of Andrew Bynum last summer and the return of LeBron James this year have overshadowed another significant miss from last season’s free agent haul for the Cavs. Earl Clark signed with the team a year ago for two years and $8.5MM, and while only the first season’s salary of $4.25MM was guaranteed, GM David Griffin wasted little time in divesting the team of the deal that former GM Chris Grant had signed with the combo forward. Griffin made the best of the Clark contract, shipping it to the Sixers as part of the deadline deal that netted Spencer Hawes, a major contributor for Cleveland in the season’s second half. The Sixers promptly waived Clark and after a pair of 10-day contracts with the Knicks, the 14th overall pick spent the rest of the season out of the league.
It quickly became apparent that the Cavs misjudged Clark last summer, but it nonetheless seems like a similar market overreaction that the 26-year-old has remained without a contract for so long. The Lakers gave him consistent playing time during a 22-game stretch in the 2012/13 season, when Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol were injured, and Clark showed why the Suns made him a lottery pick in 2009. He averaged 11.6 points and 9.2 rebounds in those 22 games, and the career 33.1% three-point shooter lifted his accuracy to 37.8% during that hot streak. That performance over a small sample size helped him earn his contract with Cleveland, even though he tailed off in his final days with the Lakers once Gasol and Howard returned. Still, a regression to the mean might not be the only explanation for why Clark didn’t pan out with the Cavs.
The former Louisville standout took a total of 15 three-point shots over his first three seasons in the league, but with the Lakers, he turned the three-pointer into a significant part of his game, as 104 of his 386 field goal attempts came from behind the arc. Still, he shot more often from three feet and in than any other range on the court that season, according to his Basketball-Reference profile. In Cleveland, three-pointers constituted nearly half his shot attempts, and he took just 16.3 percent of his shots as a Cav from three feet and in. He made threes at a 34.5% clip for the Cavs, but overall, he was inefficient, posting a woeful 8.6 PER in wine-and-gold, down from the 12.4 PER he recorded over his full season with the Lakers. The three-pointer that once served as the missing piece of his game became far too much a part of it.
The Spurs certainly seem wise enough to diagnose the problem, and they were reportedly set to work out the Kevin Bradbury client this week. Clark said earlier this summer that he had fielded interest from a few teams, but otherwise it’s been quite a reversal from last year, when Clark and the Cavs struck agreement during the first week of free agency. He’s proven effective in the right system, and perhaps the key is finding an up-tempo approach that gives Clark chances to go to the basket in transition, like the Mike D’Antoni-led Lakers attack he thrived in, and doesn’t leave him too many opportunities to stand around behind the arc. Clark struggled playing for the defensive-minded Mike Brown in Cleveland and failed to find his way with the Magic when they were focused on pounding the ball inside to Howard. There is irony in that he merely passed through Philadelphia, where the Sixers were the league’s fastest-paced team last season, and never suited up. Still, the Sixers easily could have kept him if they wanted him, so he seems unlikely to end up with Philadelphia again. The Rockets and the Suns loom as other teams that run go-go offenses and possess fewer than 15 guaranteed contracts, though neither Houston nor Phoenix has been linked to Clark this summer.
The Spurs didn’t play at a particularly speedy tempo last season, finishing 12th in possessions per 48 minutes, according to NBA.com. GM R.C. Buford and his staff are reportedly working out a handful of others, so Clark still has much to overcome. Yet mere interest from the Spurs stands to drive up Clark’s value, given the respect around the league for San Antonio’s continued ability to turn lightly regarded players into key contributors. It wouldn’t be surprising to see other teams jump into the mix soon as long as the Spurs don’t reach a deal with him. There aren’t many available former lottery picks who stand 6’10” and are less than two years removed from having played effectively in the NBA. Clark probably won’t validate his draft position, but he can provide depth of the sort that helped the Lakers sneak into the playoffs in 2013. Clark would no doubt like to see guaranteed money if he were to sign, but should he open himself to accepting a non-guaranteed camp invitation, it seems he’d still be in strong position to stick on the roster all season.
Pacific Notes: Bledsoe, Warriors, Lakers, Brown
The lack of communication between Eric Bledsoe and the Suns persists, as Chris Haynes of the Plain Dealer hears it’s stretched for nearly six months (Twitter link). Suns owner Robert Sarver said in August that he hadn’t heard from Bledsoe in four months, but whatever the precise length of the silence, it doesn’t appear as though the sides are any closer to settling their differences and agreeing upon a long-term deal. The impasse leaves Bledsoe poised to sign the qualifying offer before it expires October 1st, according to Haynes, though he and the Suns have reportedly both been pursuing sign-and-trade possibilities. Just what happens with Bledsoe will help shape the Western Conference playoff race, and there’s more news from other Pacific Division clubs, as we detail:
- The Warriors are believed to be engaged in talks about an extension with Jerry West, as Tim Kawakami of the Bay Area News Group writes amid his report on GM Bob Myers, who already agreed to an extension. The Hall-of-Famer serves as director of scouting and administration for the team, and he’s played a key role in front office decision-making. West’s existing deal is set to expire next summer, as Kawakami notes.
- Lakers executives Jim Buss and Mitch Kupchak gauged whether Byron Scott‘s was willing to endure a long-term rebuilding process before hiring him as coach, as Scott tells Bill Oram of the Orange County Register, and it appears Scott will have a long leash. “I said, ‘Yeah as long as I know we’re going in the right direction and as long as I know that I’ve got the support of you guys and that we’re all in this together,’” Scott said.
- Lorenzo Brown is back on the free agent market after Italy’s Reyer Venezia voided the contract he signed with the club in July because he failed his physical, the team announced (translation via Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia). Brown appeared in 26 games for the Sixers last season and spent summer league this year with the Clippers.
Several NBA Teams Eye Julyan Stone
Free agent Julyan Stone has workouts scheduled with the Lakers, Cavs, Clippers and Heat, and the Kings are in the mix for the point guard as well, reports Shams Charania of RealGM. The Lakers audition will be his second with the team, Charania notes via Twitter. Stone had been set to work out for the Spurs, and he did so this week, while two Chinese teams have floated lucrative offers for the 25-year-old, as Charania details.
The market seems to have quickly accelerated for the Giovanni Funiciello client who’s been without a deal for nearly two months after the Raptors let him go in July, shortly before his minimum-salary contract was to have become fully guaranteed. It appeared at the time that there was a decent chance the Raptors would sign him back on a new deal, as Charania reported then, but Toronto doesn’t appear to be in the hunt at this point.
Each of the four clubs that Charania links to Stone in his most recent report appear to have the roster flexibility necessary to provide a clear path to the opening night roster. The Heat have only 11 fully guaranteed deals, and the Cavs do as well, although Shawn Marion will presumably have a full guarantee on his contract once he signs, and one of Cleveland’s partially guaranteed contracts belongs to Anderson Varejao. The Kings have 12 fully guaranteed deals, but they’ve agreed to trade Jason Terry, who has one of them, to the Rockets, likely for non-guaranteed salary in return. The Clippers and Lakers have 13 full guarantees apiece. The Spurs have 14 full guarantees and three partial guarantees, but they can offer more money than any of the other clubs, since they still have their $5.305MM non-taxpayer’s mid-level exception available. The Kings have their $2.077MM biannual exception, while Stone’s remaining suitors are limited to the minimum salary.