Clippers, Doc Rivers To Talk Extension
Doc Rivers and the Clippers are expected to begin negotiation soon toward an extension, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. Rivers and new Clippers owner Steve Ballmer, who formally assumed control of the team today, have been anxious to forge a long-term working relationship, Wojnarowski writes.
Rivers, who serves in a dual capacity as coach and executive, has two seasons left on the three-year, $21MM pact he signed when the Clippers and Celtics worked out a deal that let him out of his contract with Boston. The 52-year-old had assumed control of Clippers player personnel when he joined the team last summer, but this June the club changed his title from Senior VP of basketball operations to president of basketball operations.
The notion of extension talks is an about-face from rumors that cast Rivers’ future with the team in doubt. Rivers publicly shepherded the team through the early days of the Sterling saga this spring, but weeks passed before he would definitely say that he had no plans to leave. Yet the specter of Rivers’ potential departure resurfaced last month during the probate trial to determine whether Shelly Sterling had the authority to agree to strike a deal to sell the team to Ballmer. Clippers CEO Dick Parsons testified that Rivers had told him he didn’t think he would remain with the team if Donald Sterling continued to own it.
Eastern Notes: Monroe, Harrington, George, C’s
The idea that Greg Monroe would take a max offer from the Pistons isn’t necessarily true, as Pistons coach/executive Stan Van Gundy said last month, according to Vincent Goodwill (Twitter link). A resolution to Monroe’s restricted free agency still seems a ways off, as we passed along earlier today. Here’s more from the Eastern Conference:
- Al Harrington hopes to sign with the Wizards after he returns from China, as he tells J. Michael of CSNWashington.com. He’ll make much more on his deal with China’s Fujian Sturgeons than he would have on an NBA minimum-salary contract, the forward also said in his conversation with Michael. The Wizards were unwilling to commit to re-signing Harrington before he inked the Chinese deal, Michael hears, though Washington was open to having him return as an assistant coach. Other NBA teams were interested in him as a player, Harrington said, but none of them were title contenders.
- Pacers executive Larry Bird isn’t ruling out a return to action for Paul George at some point this season, even though the team is “sort of expecting him [to be] out all year,” as Bird said today to reporters, including Michael Pointer of the Indianapolis Star (Twitter link). We rounded up more of Bird’s remarks right here.
- Celtics draft-and-stash prospect Colton Iverson has signed with Laboral Kuxta of Spain, the team announced (translation via Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia). David Pick of Eurobasket.com first reported the agreement (on Twitter). It’s a one-year deal for the 53rd overall pick from 2013, his agent tells Ben Rohrbach of WEEI.com (Twitter link).
- Celtics summer leaguer Dairis Bertans received invitations to training camp from NBA teams, but he’ll continue to play in Spain instead, tweets Shams Charania of RealGM.
- Ray Allen has expressed a wish in past years that he could wait until September to decide whether to play the following season, so his unwillingness to commit to a team for 2014/15 is no surprise, as Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel writes in his mailbag column.
Steve Ballmer Formally Becomes Clippers Owner
The sale of the Clippers to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has formally taken place and the NBA’s Board of Governors has already given its official approval of the transfer, the league announced (hat tip to Dan Woike of the Orange County Register on Twitter). The news appears to bring an end to a saga that began when recordings of racially charged remarks from longtime Clippers owner Donald Sterling surfaced shortly after the playoffs began, though Sterling still has lawsuits pending against the NBA and commissioner Adam Silver. Ballmer is buying the team for a record price of $2 billion.
“I am humbled and honored to be the new owner of the Los Angeles Clippers,” Ballmer said in a statement that the Clippers released on their website. “Clipper fans are so amazing. They have remained fiercely loyal to our franchise through some extraordinary times. I will be hard core in giving the team, our great coach, staff and players the support they need to do their best work on the court. And we will do whatever necessary to provide our fans and their families with the best game-night experience in the NBA.”
Attorneys for Sterling had anticipated that a California judge could at any time issue a final order that affirmed that Sterling’s wife, Shelly, had the authority to strike a deal with Ballmer to sell the team, as she did in May. The judge had ruled in his preliminary decision that the sale could go through even if Donald Sterling were to appeal.
The Board of Governors interviewed Ballmer on July 15th, and voted unanimously last week to approve him as owner, according to Ramona Shelburne of ESPNLosAngeles.com (All Twitter links). That gave Ballmer the opportunity to close on the sale whenever he became comfortable with the legal situation surrounding it, Shelburne writes. Ballmer had asked for a written order from a judge affirming Shelly Sterling’s right to sell as part of his original purchase agreement with her, and Ballmer has received that order, Shelburne also tweets. The judge has yet to issue a final order in the case, but Ballmer is apparently satisfied with the written order he has in hand, Shelburne adds (on Twitter).
Donald Sterling’s battle to hang on to ownership of the team cast doubt on the willingness of Doc Rivers to continue as coach and president of basketball operations, but Rivers, in the team’s statement, expressed his commitment to the club in the wake of today’s news
“This is an amazing new day in Clippers history,” Rivers said. “I couldn’t be more excited to work together with Steve as we continue to build a first-class, championship organization. I am already inspired by Steve’s passion for the game, his love of competition and desire to win the right way and I know our players and fans are going to be inspired as well.”
Clippers players Chris Paul and Matt Barnes as late as last month were publicly discussing the notion that they would boycott until Donald Sterling was removed as owner. Still, Silver won widespread praise for the lifetime ban and $2.5MM fine he imposed on the embattled owner in April. That maneuver nonetheless didn’t wrest control of the team from Donald Sterling, who originally purchased the franchise in 1981.
Shelly Sterling reportedly negotiated the right to retain up to 10% of the team that would be controlled by a charitable foundation on which she would serve as chair as part of her deal with Ballmer, but it’s not clear whether she exercised that right.
Pacers Rumors: Marion, Sloan, Tax, George
The Heat lost LeBron James, but it’s the team Miami beat in the last two Eastern Conference finals that seems in line to tumble farther down the standings this year. The Pacers garnered the most votes when I asked Hoops Rumors readers last week to identify which team had endured the worst offseason so far. More than two months remain before opening night, so while Indiana probably won’t find anyone who can deliver the production of Lance Stephenson and the injured Paul George, there’s time left to tinker. Here’s the latest:
- Pacers president of basketball operations Larry Bird left Monday’s meeting with Shawn Marion with the sense that even though the forward remains undecided, he wants to play for a contender, as Bird said Tuesday to reporters, including Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com (Twitter link). That confirms what fellow ESPN scribe Marc Stein had been hearing and explains why the Cavs continue to be the apparent front-runners for the 36-year-old. Marion has a positive working relationship with Cavs GM David Griffin dating back to their days together with the Suns organization, as Stein also writes in his piece.
- Indiana intends to keep Donald Sloan past Friday, when his non-guaranteed minimum salary will become fully guaranteed, Bird also said today, as Stein notes (on Twitter).
- Bird reiterated that the Pacers remain steadfast against crossing the $76.829MM luxury tax line, tweets Michael Pointer of the Indianapolis Star. “We’ll never go over the [luxury] tax,” Bird said. “My owner [Herb Simon] has told me he won’t do that.” Indiana’s team salary is $74,810,552, according to Mark Deeks of ShamSports, leaving them $2,018,448 shy of the tax line. The Pacers are applying for a $5.305MM disabled player exception in the wake of the George injury, as Bird confirmed today, Pointer tweets, but they’d have to rid themselves of other salaries in order to use the full amount. Luis Scola and Shayne Whittington are on partially guaranteed contracts, though guaranteeing Sloan’s deal limits Indiana’s flexibility.
- Doctors believe that George will eventually make a full recovery, Bird and coach Frank Vogel said, according to Michael Marot of The Associated Press.
Latest On Greg Monroe, Eric Bledsoe
Greg Monroe is “definitely” willing to take his nearly $5.48MM qualifying offer from the Pistons should it come to that, a source tells Vincent Goodwill of The Detroit News. He’s pursued sign-and-trade opportunities rather than offer sheets from other teams, the source also says to Goodwill. A sign-and-trade that would be amenable to all parties would dismiss the possibility that the Pistons would match a deal he inks with another team, and signing the qualifying offer would take Monroe to unrestricted free agency next summer.
Still, accepting the qualifying offer would be a drastic move. It would represent a steep one-year discount from the eight-figure salaries, perhaps in excess of $13.5MM, that Monroe would receive if he were to ink a long-term deal with the Pistons. The maneuver might backfire should Monroe become injured, but the 24-year-old has missed just one of his last 310 games, as Goodwill points out. Only 17 players have signed qualifying offers since rookie scale contracts came into being in the mid-1990s, and the most high-profile player to have done so was probably Ben Gordon, who took Chicago’s qualifying offer in 2008.
Goodwill’s source disputed the notion that he’s uninterested in returning to the Pistons, saying that the big man likes coach/executive Stan Van Gundy while cautioning that Monroe remains skeptical of Van Gundy’s vision for the team. The state of the relationship between Monroe and Bledsoe doesn’t sound quite as dire as the situation involving the Suns and Eric Bledsoe, as multiple reports have indicated that the point guard is souring on Phoenix.
“Maybe that’s just posturing and negotiating,” Suns owner Sarver said of the reports, in an interview with Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic. “We haven’t heard from the guy in four months, so I couldn’t tell you. I do know that when he played here, he felt good about the organization, his coaching staff and his teammates at the end of the season. We had the same feelings toward him.”
The Suns reportedly extended a four-year, $48MM offer to Bledsoe, who appears to be holding out for the max, which would come to $84,789,500 over five seasons. Agent Rich Paul of Klutch Sports, who represents Bledsoe, is also the rep for Kevin Seraphin, the most recent player to have signed a qualifying offer, having done so last month. Seraphin was nonetheless in a drastically different position, since he couldn’t have commanded much more.
Bledsoe, like Monroe, stands to forfeit a significant amount of his earnings for the coming season if he inks his qualifying offer of nearly $3.727MM. The guard missed significant time with a meniscus tear, so injury is ostensibly a greater concern than it would be for Monroe. The qualifying offer would be a sacrifice for either Bledsoe or Monroe, and while either of them could make up the money over the life of a long-term max deal if he were to wind up with one in unrestricted free agency next summer, that sort of deal is certainly no guarantee.
Josh Childress Signs With Australian Team
Eight-year NBA veteran Josh Childress has inked a deal to play this year with the Sydney Kings of Australia, the team announced. Nikos Varlas of Eurohoops.net reported Monday that Childress was leaning toward taking the deal. It’s not clear what, if any, sort of NBA escape clauses the contract provides for, but it didn’t appear as though the swingman received strong interest from any NBA club following his release from the Pelicans in December.
Childress, 31, appeared in just four games with New Orleans last year, and he played sparingly for the Nets during the previous season. His last significant NBA action came during the 2011/12 campaign, when he logged 14.5 minutes per game in 34 appearances for the Suns, who amnestied him the following the summer. He was once one of the NBA’s premiere sixth men, averaging 13.0 points and 6.2 rebounds in 36.8 minutes per game for the Hawks in 2006/07, his best statistical season.
The Chris Emens client will probably be competing against DeAndre Daniels, this year’s 37th overall pick, who’s close to a deal with Australia’s Perth Wildcats. Childress joins 11 others who played in the NBA last year and have come to agreement with overseas teams since the start of July, as our Free Agent Tracker shows.
Cavs Sign Alex Kirk
2:52pm: It’s a partially guaranteed arrangement that covers more than one season, sources tell Shams Charania of RealGM (Twitter link).
2:30pm: The Cavs have signed Alex Kirk, who went undrafted this summer out of New Mexico, the team announced. The 6’11” Kirk was part of Cleveland’s summer league team last month. The terms of the deal aren’t immediately clear, but it’s not likely to carry much, if any, guaranteed salary. It’s almost certainly for no more than the minimum salary, since that’s all the Cavs can offer.
Kirk is a rim protector, as his 2.7 blocks per game this past season for the Lobos show. The Cavs have been sniffing around for someone who can play that role, reportedly offering a first-round pick for Timofey Mozgov, though Kirk will likely have to beat out a veteran or two to serve in that capacity for significant minutes in wine-and-gold this year.
The 22-year-old also averaged 13.3 points and 8.7 rebounds in 32.0 minutes per game in his junior year this past season at New Mexico. Kirk managed only 0.4 blocks per contest over 15.4 MPG across five summer league appearances, but Cleveland is seemingly confident that the larger sample size of his college performance is a better indicator. Kirk joins 15 others who have a contract or an agreement with the Cavs, though only 10 of them are known to have fully guaranteed deals, as our roster counts show.
And-Ones: Sterling, Singleton, Lee, Childress
The idea of limiting international play to those age 23 and under still has its supporters within NBA organizations, but there’s little push for making such a change, reports David Aldridge of TNT, who writes in his latest Morning Tip column for NBA.com. Two owners who’ve watched their players take part in competitions for their national teams on many occasions tell Aldridge that Paul George‘s injury hasn’t changed their opinions.
“I’d rather have them with Coach [Mike Krzyzewski] and a first class staff than in their high school gyms,” one owner said to Aldridge. “If it happened playing pickup he wouldn’t have gotten immediate medical attention. [I] fully support USA Basketball and what it means for the game globally.”
Here’s more from around the NBA:
- A desire to let the legal process play out with charges brought against Donald Sterling in the past was partly behind the league’s unwillingness to oust the Clippers owner during former commissioner David Stern’s tenure, as Stern indicated to Aldridge for the same piece. Stern also suggested that the myriad of other issues the NBA dealt with during his tenure crowded the league’s agenda.
- Free agents Chris Singleton and Malcolm Lee will be working out in front of NBA team officials today, reports Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter links).
- Swingman Josh Childress is considering an offer from the Sydney Kings of Australia, according to Nikos Varlas of Eurohoops.net. Childress played four games this past season for the Pelicans, who released him in December.
- Manu Ginobili continues to debate whether or not to play beyond the coming season, as he told Juan Manuel Trenado and Xavier Prieto Astigarraga La Nacion (translation via J.J. Gomez of Pounding the Rock; hat tip to Dan McCarney of the San Antonio Express-News). The Spurs kept Ginobili from playing for Argentina this year, but he’s not upset, and said that the Spurs might have been too lenient in letting him play during past summers, as he also expressed in the interview.
- Thunder draft-and-stash prospect Tibor Pleiss has officially signed with Barcelona, as expected, the team announced (translation via (Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia). It’s a two-year deal.
Free Agent Stock Watch: Andray Blatche
It’s worth wondering why Andray Blatche is without an NBA contract in the middle of August. He’s 27 years old, stands 6’11”, and is coming off a season in which he averaged 11.2 points and 5.3 rebounds in 22.2 minutes per game with an 18.8 PER for a Nets team that went to the conference semifinals. He’s an unrestricted free agent, without the encumbrance of restricted free agency that’s holding up deals for Eric Bledsoe and Greg Monroe and without the strong leads on a job that Shawn Marion has. He’s not considering retirement like Ray Allen. There are questions about his character, dating back to his pre-amnesty days with the Wizards and reverberating most recently in a report about the Heat’s longstanding reservations about his maturity and behavior. Another dispatch asserted that Blatche’s midseason absence this past year was a de facto suspension meted out by then-coach Jason Kidd, a punishment that left Nets management impressed with the coach. But such trouble has not kept lesser players out of the league.
There could easily be more than meets the eye to Blatche’s locker room issues, but those reports may also be the extent of it. His continued free agency might stem simply from a demand for more money than the market is bearing. He turned down a player option to stay with the Nets for a salary of nearly $1.438MM, slightly more than the minimum, so he probably envisioned a raise, which wouldn’t be easy to find at this stage of free agency. He’s been linked to a few teams in some form or fashion this summer, dating back to a mid-June report that he and the Pelicans had mutual interest, though a follow-up indicated that Blatche was the only party eyeing such an arrangement. Around the start of July, Blatche had apparently been telling many around the league that he would end up in New Orleans, but there’s been no movement toward that end.
The Raptors were reportedly to have met with Blatche about a week or so into free agency, but Toronto appears to have moved on. There was a report that he would work out along with a few other big men of note for the Clippers, but agent Andy Miller quickly dismissed that as false. Whether or not the Clippers enter the picture legitimately at any point, it seems a reunion with the Nets isn’t forthcoming. Blatche was the only one of the team’s free agents to whom GM Billy King declined to reach out at the start of free agency, a strong signal that there’s little, if any, interest from the club.
That might have more to do with the emergence of Mason Plumlee and the expected return to health of Brook Lopez than any shortcoming of Blatche’s. Kidd is gone, having jumped ship to Milwaukee, so any clash between Blatche and his coach is no longer germane. Brooklyn had its greatest success last season playing small ball, so an abundance of big men probably isn’t what the team has in mind.
Blatche’s minutes and production increased slightly this past season over 2012/13, his first in Brooklyn, though his PER and per-minute output went a hair in the other direction. He’s still at an age that suggests he’s entering his prime, if he’s not already there, and he still has a few more years before any precipitous decline should start to set in. He’s not the shot blocker he was in his early 20s, swatting fewer shots per game last season than he did in any season except for when he only saw 6.0 MPG as a rookie. Still, his defensive win shares have exceeded his offensive win shares every season of his career, demonstrating his impact when the other team has the ball. The Nets were slightly better defensively when Blatche was off the court than when he was on it in each of the past two seasons in terms of points allowed per 100 possessions, according to NBA.com, but each year the team’s net rating went up when he played.
The 49th overall pick from 2005 seems to be a plus on the floor, so unless teams have universally decided his off-court reputation is simply too much to bear, which doesn’t seem likely, there are certain to be NBA teams in touch with Miller as the summer wanes. The Lakers joined a list of 11 other teams I recently outlined as being limited to paying the minimum salary for this coming season, but while Blatche’s options for a non-minimum deal are dwindling, they aren’t gone yet.
There’s no urgency for either Blatche or teams to come to an agreement with training camp still about six weeks off, and as the Paul George injury showed, a need could crop up at any time to spur the market for someone who can fill it. The unresolved situations of Bledsoe and — for Blatche in particular — Monroe loom over part of the landscape. So, perhaps a team like the Hawks, who have cap space and have been linked to Monroe, could look to Blatche should the Pistons big man end up elsewhere. It was a little surprising to see his agent so quickly deny the Clippers rumor, so maybe there’s traction with other teams that such news would jeopardize, though that’s just my speculation. In any case, Blatche probably would find a guaranteed minimum-salary deal to sign this week if he wanted to, but he’s probably best advised to continue to wait until the pace of the market quickens and teams are more aggressively filling their rosters for the season ahead.
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One of the most compelling stories of late in the NBA involves Becky Hammon, who will become just the second woman ever to serve as an assistant coach for regular season NBA games when she does so on the Spurs bench this year. Reader TRAPstar hopes for a day when such news is routine:
- Interesting and good for her. However, we make too big a deal of these “groundbreaking achievements” by race and gender. I hope that it opens up a path for all of the smartest minds in basketball (i.e. Lisa Leslie, Sue Bird) to pass their knowledge along as coaches, regardless of gender.
Shawn Marion seems more likely to sign with the Cavs than anyone else, including the Pacers, who’ve also been in pursuit. Still, Kevin Alberda believes that there’s pressure on Indiana to change that.
- Yeah, they need Marion really badly. Can’t possibly run out a SF depth chart of [Chris] Copeland and Solomon Hill and expect to win. Just can’t do it. Assuming Monroe is back, I don’t see any way the Pacers are realistically better than the Pistons. Should be a fight for that eighth seed between those two and maybe the Knicks.
The Cavs reportedly offered a first-round pick to the Nuggets for Timofey Mozgov, and while Cleveland would have to add salary to its proposal make a trade possible, LBCknickerbocker3 thinks Denver will be reluctant to give up the 7’1″ center.
- Mozgov has been steadily improving over the years and has made himself a pretty good player. He would be a nice fit for Cleveland. I don’t see the Nuggets giving him up for a first-rounder though. Timmy is a favorite of Brian Shaw‘s and I know the Nuggets are looking to bounce back this year, which they can do with everyone healthy.
Check out what more readers had to say in previous editions of Hoops Rumors Featured Feedback. We appreciate everyone who adds to the dialogue at Hoops Rumors, and we look forward to seeing more responses like these from you!