Free Agent Stock Watch: Shawn Marion
The snail’s pace of negotiations for Eric Bledsoe and Greg Monroe are somewhat explainable, given that both are restricted free agents. It’s a little harder to believe that unrestricted free agent Shawn Marion still remains unsigned. He started 76 games for the Mavs last season and all seven contests during the team’s first-round challenge of the eventual-champion Spurs. The 36-year-old is nearing the end of his career, but he still appears to have a lot left to give.
The Heat had been expected to make a push for Marion when free agency began, apparently viewing him as the sort of player whose addition could help convince LeBron James to stick around. Of course, LeBron ended up elsewhere, and Miami committed its available cash to Luol Deng, Josh McRoberts, Danny Granger and its own free agents, leaving only the minimum salary left to chase anyone else. The Mavs can’t offer Marion more than the minimum, either, having renounced their Bird Rights on the versatile forward, exhausted their cap space, and spent the room exception on Jameer Nelson.
The Dan Fegan client probably would have signed by now if he had been willing to accept the minimum salary, and it appears he continues to hold out for more. That’s in spite of a growing number of teams limited to paying only the minimum. There were 11 such clubs when I ran them down this past Friday, and the Lakers have since joined that group. Similarly, Marion probably would have signed by now if teams with the $5.305MM mid-level exception or better thought he was worthy of that sort of cash, so it seems there’s a disconnect at play. Marion doesn’t appear too worried, recently telling Eddie Sefko of the Dallas Morning News that, “It’s only July, man. We got two more months. We’ll just wait and see how it works out.”
Yet teams rarely dole out more than the minimum salary once September rolls around, and if they do, it’s not much more than that. So while there’s no need for Marion to sign now if he intends to play in the NBA next season, there’s urgency if he wants to play on a salary befitting his production.
Marion remains valuable, but there’s no doubt that he’s slowing down. The Mavs outscored opponents by 7.8 points per 100 possessions whenever Marion sat this past season, but they only broke even when he was on the floor, according to NBA.com. He put up a career-worst 13.7 PER this past season, a rather steep decline from his 18.0 mark in 2012/13. His 10.4 points per game in 2013/14 were his fewest since his rookie season, though that was a product of his shot attempts per contest nearing a career low as he played on a Mavs team that could draw its offense from an array of other capable sources.
More encouraging was his three-point stroke, as he nearly doubled his attempts from that distance over the previous season and improved his accuracy to 35.8%, his best mark in 11 years. That percentage is just about average in today’s NBA, but it nonetheless represents growing proficiency in a sought-after skill that’s extended many careers. It’s more difficult to gauge just how strong a defender Marion remains, but suffice it to say that the Mavs entrusted him with holding together their defense in a lineup largely devoid of stoppers.
The Bulls and the Rockets are the teams other than the Heat and the Mavs to have been linked to Marion this month. Chicago, like Dallas and Miami, has only the minimum to offer, but Houston would be an intriguing suitor if its efforts intensify. The Rockets have most of their non-taxpayer’s mid-level exception to spend, as well as their $2.077MM biannual exception. It would surely please Rockets GM Daryl Morey to poach the Mavs’ starting small forward after Dallas had done the same to Morey’s team with a near-max offer sheet to Chandler Parsons. It’s worth wondering if Fegan, who represents Marion as well as Parsons, harbors ill feelings toward Morey and company, given the acrimony surrounding Parsons’ cross-Texas move. Still, that probably wouldn’t forestall a deal in the end, especially since the Rockets employ star Fegan client Dwight Howard.
There are other seemingly attractive teams with either the cap space or the exceptions to give Marion a fair deal, including the Spurs, Hawks and Nuggets. Still, none have appeared to show interest. It’s conceivable that the market for Marion will soften once the fates of Bledsoe and Monroe are resolved. He’ll have opportunities, and it would be surprising if he doesn’t field multiple offers for better than the minimum. The questions are whether those offers will be for substantially more, just how long the deals would run, and just which teams will come to his doorstep. It seems as though Marion has ideals in mind for each, and, as he indicated, he doesn’t feel the need to compromise now, regardless of whether he’d ultimately be better served by doing so.
Northwest Notes: Durant, Westbrook, Williams
Kevin Love has been the hottest name in rumors of late, but Tuesday, another Northwest Division star began to generate some buzz. Kevin Durant spoke openly of the possibility that he’ll sign with his hometown Wizards when he becomes a free agent in 2016. He also chalked up his decision not to negotiate an opt-out clause into his current five-year deal to a mixture of naivete and his love for Oklahoma City, as The Oklahoman’s Darnell Mayberry notes. Durant said it would “definitely be tough” to leave if the Thunder were to win a pair of championships in the two years remaining before he can hit free agency, as USA Today’s Sam Amick observes. With the onus on GM Sam Presti to put his team over the top, there’s more on the Thunder and their stars amid the latest from the Northwest:
- The general assumption is that Russell Westbrook will look to leave the Thunder when he becomes a free agent in 2017, but that’s no certainty, as Durant impressed upon reporters Tuesday, including Amick, who shares the tidbit in the same piece.
- John Wall is already expressing support for the idea of Durant joining the Wizards in two years, calling him “like an older brother” and saying, “It’d be great to have him back home,” as Amick notes.
- Had the Trail Blazers wanted to re-sign Mo Williams this summer, “in all retrospect, they could have,” Williams said in a pair of tweets. The guard has instead agreed to a deal with the Timberwolves.
Maalik Wayns To Play In Lithuania
Former Sixers and Clippers point guard Maalik Wayns has signed to play with Zalgiris Kaunas of Lithuania, the team announced (translation via Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia). The terms aren’t immediately clear, and it’s uncertain whether the deal includes an NBA escape clause.
A preseason knee injury helped Wayns make the Clippers opening-night roster last season, as I explained last week when I looked at a special form of non-guaranteed contracts. The Clippers waived him shortly before his contract would have become guaranteed for the season, and they re-signed him to a 10-day deal, but they terminated that 10-day contract before it ran to term so they could sign Hedo Turkoglu instead. He spent most of the rest of the season in the D-League with the Rockets affiliate.
The Andy Miller client will be making his first foray overseas, having remained stateside for two years after going undrafted out of Villanova. He’s averaged 2.7 points and 1.0 assists in 7.3 minutes per game for his NBA career, which has so far encompassed only 29 appearances.
Mike Scott Mulling Offer From CSKA Moscow
Hawks restricted free agent Mike Scott is thinking about taking a lucrative three-year offer from Russian powerhouse CSKA Moscow even though he’d prefer to remain in the NBA, sources tell Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). The Hawks have been working to re-sign the power forward, as Wojnarowski noted last week when the team reached agreement with Shelvin Mack, its other restricted free agent, but there’s seemingly been little progress toward a deal.
Mack said in May that he wanted to remain with the Hawks, but other NBA teams were reportedly confident as free agency began this month that they could pry him from Atlanta. News has been otherwise quiet on the Aaron Mintz client, as I noted last week in a look at the remaining restricted free agents across the league, and it seems that going overseas is growing more appealing for Scott as NBA interest stagnates.
Scott, 26, grew into a more prominent role for the Hawks this past season after mostly manning the bench as a rookie in 2012/13. The 43rd overall pick from the 2012 draft averaged 9.6 points and 3.6 rebounds in 18.5 minutes per game this year, and his role expanded further in the postseason, when he saw 20.9 MPG.
Kings To Audition Terrence Williams
Former No. 11 overall pick Terrence Williams will meet with the Kings and work out for them Thursday in Sacramento, reports Shams Charania of RealGM (Twitter link). The 27-year-old has been out of the NBA since a 24-game late-season stint with the Celtics in 2012/13.
If the two sides strike a deal, the Kings would likely have to sign Williams either to a non-guaranteed contract or one with a tiny partial guarantee to stay beneath the luxury tax threshold without waiving Quincy Acy, whose contract becomes fully guaranteed next month. Sacramento recently decided against claiming Omri Casspi off waivers to instead reach agreement on a deal that would keep the team under the tax line. Williams would probably force the team to swing a trade to stay out of the tax if he were to make the team out of camp.
The Nets spent a lottery pick on Williams in 2011, but they traded him to Houston midway through his second season, and his NBA travels included a stop with the Kings before his time with Boston. The swingman spent much of this past season with the Lakers affiliate in the D-League, averaging 20.5 points, 6.4 assists and 5.0 rebounds in 35.7 minutes per game. He also had brief stints in the Philippines, Puerto Rico and Turkey during 2013/14.
Grizzlies Hire Ed Stefanski For Front Office
3:19pm: The hiring is official, the team announced via press release.
9:25am: The Grizzlies have identified the front office addition they’ll make to assist GM Chris Wallace, reaching agreement with former Nets and Sixers GM Ed Stefanski to become the executive vice president of player personnel in Memphis, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. The selection is a surprise, since Stefanski wasn’t among the several executives linked to the Grizzlies in the past few months. A report just three days ago indicated the team’s progress toward a hire had stalled.
Memphis had reportedly been looking for someone to serve as a “GM-in-waiting” of sorts who would train under Wallace until he was ready to assume Wallace’s duties as the team’s top basketball executive. Stefanski, already having served as GM for two NBA franchises, probably wouldn’t need much training if the team envisions him as its future front office leader, but he’ll at least start off beneath Wallace on the organizational chart, as Wojnarowski indicates. Grizzlies owner Robert Pera said recently that he might promote Wallace to president of basketball operations.
Pacers vice president of basketball operations Peter Dinwiddie and former Raptors and Knicks GM Glen Grunwald were the leading candidates that Wojnarowski identified two weeks ago. Chris Makris, the GM of the Grizzlies’ D-League affiliate, also appeared to be in the mix, at least to a degree. Memphis reportedly interviewed Dinwiddie, Grunwald, Nets assistant GM Bobby Marks, and Knicks director of pro personnel Mark Hughes. The team made Thunder assistant GM Michael Winger an early target before he turned them down. Knicks director of player personnel Mark Warkentien was also an apparent candidate.
Stefanski most recently worked under Bryan Colangelo in the Raptors front office from 2011-13. Stefanski helped build two NBA Finals teams while serving as Nets director of scouting from 1999 until his appointment as the team’s GM in 2004.
Longest-Tenured NBA Head Coaches
Byron Scott is the NBA’s newest coach after the Lakers officially announced his hiring Monday evening, and while that distinction will no doubt carry into the season, it won’t last too much longer. Michael Malone of the Kings was the NBA’s latest coaching hire when Luke Adams of Hoops Rumors last checked in on the league’s longest-tenured coaches on June 4th of last year, and now Malone has been around longer than nearly half of his peers.
There have been 14 additions to this list since last time. That doesn’t include three entire coaching tenures that have come and gone: Jason Kidd with the Nets, Maurice Cheeks with the Pistons, and John Loyer, who served in an interim capacity after he replaced Cheeks in February. Kidd is on this list, but in his new capacity as coach of the Bucks. Lionel Hollins, Kidd’s successor in Brooklyn, and Scott are already behind Kidd, even though Kidd has officially been with the Bucks for less than a month. Larry Drew, whom Kidd replaced in Milwaukee, had only been on the job a few days when Luke compiled last year’s list.
The No. 1 spot remains unchanged, and on-court results demonstrate the virtue of patience. Gregg Popovich, who signed an extension earlier this summer after winning his fifth NBA title, remains the dean of NBA head coaches. Right behind him is Erik Spoelstra, the coach he’s faced in the last two NBA Finals. The top three spots are occupied by the last three coaches to win championships, and Nos. 1-4 are the only coaches to take part in the Finals since 2011.
- Gregg Popovich, Spurs: December 1996
- Erik Spoelstra, Heat: April 2008
- Rick Carlisle, Mavericks: May 2008
- Scott Brooks, Thunder: November 2008 (interim; permanent since April 2009)
- Monty Williams, Pelicans: June 2010
- Tom Thibodeau, Bulls: June 2010
- Frank Vogel, Pacers: January 2011 (interim; permanent since July 2011)
- Kevin McHale, Rockets: June 2011
- Dwane Casey, Raptors: June 2011
- Randy Wittman, Wizards: January 2012 (interim; permanent since June 2012)
- Jacque Vaughn, Magic: July 2012
- Terry Stotts, Trail Blazers: August 2012
- Jeff Hornacek, Suns: May 2013
- Mike Budenholzer, Hawks: May 2013
- Steve Clifford, Bobcats: May 2013
- Michael Malone, Kings: June 2013
- Dave Joerger, Grizzlies: June 2013
- Brian Shaw, Nuggets: June 2013
- Doc Rivers, Clippers: June 2013
- Brad Stevens, Celtics: July 2013
- Brett Brown, Sixers: August 2013
- Stan Van Gundy, Pistons: May 2014
- Steve Kerr, Warriors: May 2014
- Flip Saunders, Timberwolves: June 2014
- Quin Snyder, Jazz: June 2014
- Derek Fisher, Knicks: June 2014
- David Blatt, Cavs: June 2014
- Jason Kidd, Bucks: July 2014
- Lionel Hollins, Nets: July 2014
- Byron Scott, Lakers: July 2014
Mavs Sign Ivan Johnson
The Mavericks have signed free agent power forward Ivan Johnson, the team announced via press release. Johnson, 30, was out of the NBA this past season after making his mark in two years with the Hawks, but he hooked on with the Mavs’ summer league team this year, and there had reportedly been mutual optimism that the sides would get a deal done for training camp, if not more. Dallas GM Donnie Nelson said earlier this month that the organization regarded him as “more than just a summer league guy.”
It’ll have to be a minimum-salary arrangement of some kind for Johnson, since the capped-out Mavs are out of exceptions. It’s not immediately clear whether the deal includes any guaranteed salary, or how long it runs.
The Jeremiah Haylett client had reportedly worked out for the Nets, Blazers and Spurs this summer, and he did the same for multiple teams late last season when he returned from having played in China. Johnson chose a more lucrative deal with Zhejiang Chouzhou last year when NBA teams were offering only the minimum, as he told Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com recently, but it appears he’s willing to take the minimum to come back to the NBA this time around.
Johnson went undrafted out of Cal State San Bernardino in 2008, and it wasn’t until 2011 that he found himself in an NBA preseason training camp. He took full advantage of the opportunity with the Hawks and became a part of the team’s rotation, averaging 6.5 points and 3.9 rebounds in 15.8 minutes per game. The rough-and-tumble inside player was a dominant force in China, where he put up 26.0 PPG and 9.9 RPG in 32.8 MPG this past season.
Western Notes: Clippers, Henry, Grizzlies
Attorneys for Donald Sterling plan to ask an appellate court for permission to appeal Monday’s probate court decision, even though the ruling doesn’t allow Sterling to seek a court order stopping the sale of the Clippers as he appeals, according to Brian Melley of The Associated Press. Dan Woike of the Orange County Register details three ways that Sterling can still prevent wife Shelly Sterling from completing the $2 billion sale of the Clippers to former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. Monday’s ruling left Donald Sterling unbowed, as his attorney Bobby Samini said to reporters, including Woike.
“His reaction was very calm,” Samini said. “He didn’t see this as the final battleground. This is one stage of a long war. This is one battle. We had hoped for a different result, but this is not the end.”
There’s more on the Sterling saga amid the latest from around the Western Conference:
- Judge Michael Levanas accepted the contention of Shelly Sterling’s lawyers that it was unlikely that anyone would match Ballmer’s $2 billion bid for the Clippers, as Melley notes in his piece. “Ballmer paid an amazing price that cannot be explained by the market,” Levanas said.
- Xavier Henry‘s one-year contract with the Lakers isn’t a minimum-salary arrangement, as first believed, and is instead worth the $1.082MM leftover portion of the team’s room exception, reports Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). The other part of the room exception went to Ryan Kelly.
- Joe Abadi, a lawyer for Grizzlies owner Robert Pera, conducted the team’s interviews with candidates for the front office job that Ed Stefanski will fill, sources tell Marc Stein of ESPN.com. Abadi has taken on a larger role in the organization while Pera has marginalized minority owners Stephen Kaplan and Daniel E. Straus, as Stein details.
Grizzlies Sign Chris Wallace To Extension
12:30pm: It’s a three-year deal with a team option on the final season, according to Marc Stein of ESPN.com. It appears as though the terms kick in for this coming season, though that’s not entirely clear.
11:16am: The Grizzlies have signed Chris Wallace to a multiyear extension and dropped the interim tag from his GM job, the team announced via press release. The team had applied the interim tag to Wallace’s GM title earlier this offseason when it parted ways with former CEO Jason Levien, although it represented a return to power for Wallace, who had retained the title of GM even during virtual exile from the organization.
“We are very pleased to announce Chris Wallace as our general manager,” owner Robert Pera said in the team’s statement. “Chris has been at the forefront and a stable presence throughout some of the Grizzlies’ greatest successes. His strong bonds and experience, not only within the organization and NBA but also within the Memphis and Mid-South communities, make him the ideal fit to lead our basketball operations. We believe Chris’ skills and expertise to be vital in our continued success of our franchise.”
A report late Monday indicated that Memphis had reached agreement with Ed Stefanski to serve as the team’s executive vice president of player personnel, a role that would make him an assistant to Wallace. The extension seems to confirm that Wallace will remain in charge of the team’s front office, even though the Grizzlies had apparently been seeking a “GM-in-waiting” to eventually take over for him.
Wallace first became the GM of the Grizzlies in 2007, but even though he didn’t lose his job when Levien came aboard with the sale of the team to Pera in 2012, Wallace went nearly a year without stepping foot in Grizzlies offices. Pera nonetheless emerged as an apparent fan of Wallace’s, saying shortly after Levien’s departure that he wanted to retain Wallace in some form or fashion even if he wouldn’t return to his role as head of the club’s basketball department. More recently, Pera said that he might promote Wallace to president of basketball operations, but it appears as though that job will remain vacant and Wallace will head the front office with his familiar job title of GM.