Lefteris Bochoridis, Martin Peterka To Enter Draft
A pair of longshot European prospects are heading to the NBA draft. Greek shooting guard Lefteris Bochoridis has officially declared for the draft, as his agents at Lotsos & Associates tweet, while a source tells Eurobasket.com that Czech power forward Martin Peterka will declare, too. Neither Jonathan Givony of DraftExpress nor Chad Ford of ESPN.com list either of them in their top 100 prospects, but Bochoridis is No. 19 among international prospects born in 1994, according to Givony, who has Peterka at No. 44 among those born in 1995.
The 6’5″ Bochoridis has averaged 5.2 points in 19.4 minutes per game for Aris BC in Greece this season, and his three-point shooting has been anemic, as he’s hit just 23.5% on 2.1 attempts per contest. Peterka has put up 9.1 PPG in 20.8 MPG to go along with 5.0 rebounds per game this year for BK JIP Pardubice in the Czech Republic. Peterka has stretched the floor at 6’8″, nailing 41.0% of his three-pointers.
College was a consideration for Peterka, but he’s ultimately decided to turn pro. He won’t be able to play NCAA ball after officially declaring for the draft at this point, but he and Bochoridis could still withdraw from the draft anytime between now and June 16th. Bochoridis won’t be automatically draft-eligible until 2016, and Peterka can wait until 2017.
Steve Mills Again In Running For Top Union Job
Knicks GM Steve Mills is once more a strong candidate to become the next executive director of the National Basketball Players Association, reports Frank Isola of the New York Daily News. Many around the league had considered it a foregone conclusion that Mills would head the players union last summer, but that changed when the Knicks pulled off a September surprise and hired Mills to run their front office.
Mills lost his title of team president to Phil Jackson when the Knicks brought aboard the Zen Master last month, and Howard Beck of Bleacher Report wrote earlier this week that it was likely that Mills would cut loose or reassigned from his role as GM. Still, Jackson said Wednesday that hiring someone new for the front office is “not a priority.”
The union recently formed a search committee, headed by Sacramento mayor Kevin Johnson, to come up with a replacement for Billy Hunter, who was ousted in February 2013. Screen Actors Guild executive director David White and attorney Michele Roberts appeared to be the finalists for the position as of this past February, but the committee is to come up with a new list of three to five finalists by early June.
Failed Drug Test Pushes Mitch McGary Into Draft
Michigan sophomore Mitch McGary will enter this year’s NBA draft, he tells Dan Wetzel of Yahoo! Sports, rather than face a one-year NCAA suspension for failing a drug test that showed he took marijuana. McGary had been thinking about declaring for the draft anyway, but the looming suspension “pushed it overboard,” he said, and it’s prompted him to turn pro in spite of back surgery that limited him to just eight games this season.
McGary was in line to become a lottery pick had he declared for the draft after his inspired NCAA tournament play as a freshman, but he’ll do well to sneak into the back end of the first round this year. He’s the 32nd-ranked prospect onJonathan Givony’s DraftExpress list and No. 41 with Chad Ford of ESPN.com. It’s unclear how much the failed drug test will affect McGary’s stock, but surely it won’t help his cause. There’s also disparity over which position he’s best suited for, as Givony lists him as a center, while Ford has him as a power forward.
Energy, athleticism and rebounding are the calling cards of the 6’10” McGary, but he leaves much to be desired on the offensive end, as Zach Links of Hoops Rumors examined in his Prospect Profile on the 21-year-old. He averaged just 9.5 points this year and 7.5 as a freshman. He came to prominence helping Michigan to the NCAA title game in 2013, scoring a career-high 25 points against top-seeded Kansas in the Sweet 16. He also pulled down 14 rebounds in that game, and he averaged 11.6 rebounds per 36 minutes over his college career.
Andres Nocioni Mulls NBA Comeback
Exactly one year ago, Andres Nocioni’s agent said his client turned down an offer from an NBA team. The Spanish league forward received interest from several teams this past summer, according to K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune, and now, the 34-year-old tells Johnson that he’s warming to the idea of returning stateside to play.
“Europe is a great, great place to play basketball,” Nocioni said. “I came back here because I sat on the bench a lot in Philly and that was frustrating for me because all my life I have played. But my situation has changed a little bit. I don’t need to play as many minutes. I’m too old. So maybe I go to the NBA and try to enjoy a good organization and try to help young guys and the team to win games. I think about playing more like a veteran helping with fewer minutes and more experience. But I have no decision now. I’m not thinking long-term.”
Nocioni signed a one-year extension with Spain’s Laboral Kuxta Baskonia last June. He’s averaged 14.3 points and 5.4 rebounds in 25.8 minutes per game this season, his best numbers since leaving the NBA. He played just 56 minutes total in 11 games for the Sixers during his final NBA season in 2011/12, and Philadelphia waived him that March.
He was much more productive in his four and a half seasons with the Bulls, a time he recalls fondly to Johnson. He scored a career-high 14.1 points per game during 2006/07, his third year with Chicago, and otherwise put up a statistical line eerily similar to the one he’s compiled in Spain this year. He was also a 37.3% three-point shooter in the NBA, demonstrating an ability to stretch the floor.
Coaching Rumors: Jazz, D’Antoni, Boylen
Executives, coaches and other league insiders struggle to come up with names of intriguing coaching candidates after last year’s record volume of new hires, but Kevin Arnovitz of ESPN.com was able to pry the identities of a few well-regarded potential hires. Some of them have been in rumors in recent weeks, but University of Virginia head coach Tony Bennett, Bulls assistant Ed Pinckney, and Blazers assistant David Vanterpool are the names we haven’t heard. Potential head coaches with ties to the Spurs were already popular, and they’ve grown even more so this year, Arnovitz hears. Here’s more from the coaching rumor mill:
- The Jazz plan to interview more than 20 candidates fitting virtually every description, team president Randy Rigby said Wednesday on The Zone Sports Network radio, notes Jody Genessy of the Deseret News. Though a few candidates have reportedly emerged, Rigby insists the club hasn’t identified any potential targets. He also said the decision will be a group effort and won’t lie solely with GM Dennis Lindsey.
- Mike D’Antoni won’t be coaching Marshall University next season, but his brother Dan D’Antoni will be, the school announced. Dan D’Antoni is leaving his job as a Lakers assistant coach to take the new gig.
- The Pacers weren’t pleased when former assistant coach and current Jazz head coaching candidate Jim Boylen left last year to become a Spurs assistant, tweets Scott Agness of Pacers.com. “He did us dirty,” one Pacers player told Agness.
- Knicks president Phil Jackson said Wednesday that his coaching search could extend into July, but he adds that it’s not because he’s waiting around to see which, if any, coaches working in the playoffs become available, notes Ian Begley of ESPNNewYork.com (on Twitter).
- Nets GM Billy King said on NBA TV that he, and not coach Jason Kidd, made the decision to reassign assistant coach Lawrence Frank earlier this season, fellow ESPNNewYork.com scribe Mike Mazzeo observes.
Warriors Plan To Keep Klay Thompson
Warriors co-owner Joe Lacob acknowledged before the trade deadline that the team had received inquiries about Klay Thompson, and while he said then that the team wasn’t anxious to move him, he was even more forthcoming today in expressing his desire to keep the shooting guard. Thompson is eligible for a rookie scale extension this summer that would keep him from restricted free agency next year, and Lacob promised on 95.7 The Game that the team would get a deal done, as Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group tweets.
“We are going to re-sign Klay Thompson,” Lacob said. “I will say that unequivocally.”
It’s unclear whether he’s talking about an extension or a new contract next summer, but Lacob’s comment demonstrates the team’s level of commitment to the sharpshooting 24-year-old. The remark also puts pressure on GM Bob Myers, since Thompson’s representatives at BDA Sports Management will know going into negotiations that Myers’ boss wants to come away with a deal.
The Warriors wound up with a bargain with they signed Stephen Curry to a four-year, $44MM extension in 2012 amid concerns about his oft-injured ankles. Curry has remained largely healthy since and blossomed into a superstar. His backcourt mate has made strides, too, as Thompson’s 18.4 points per game and 41.7% three-point shooting this season are both career highs.
Lacob has appeared impatient this season amid rumors of upheaval surrounding the coaching staff. His strong desire to keep Thompson is in sharp juxtaposition to his lack of promises for coach Mark Jackson, who, like Thompson, is set to head into the final season of his contract in 2014/15.
Spencer Dinwiddie Declares For Draft
Colorado junior Spencer Dinwiddie announced in a press conference today that he’s entering the NBA draft. The shooting guard had been leaning heavily toward doing so, but the news is still somewhat surprising, since he tore his left ACL in January and missed the rest of the season. Chad Ford of ESPN.com has him as the 40th-best prospect for this year, while Jonathan Givony of DraftExpress rates him 49th.
Dinwiddie was a potential first-round pick before the injury, and Givony ranked him 22nd going into the season. He scored 14.7 points in 31.1 minutes per contest in 17 games this year and shot 41.3% from behind the arc. It was something of a bounceback from three-point range for the 21-year-old, who made just 33.8% of his treys as a sophomore after nailing 43.8% his freshman year.
He traveled to Houston for a medical evaluation this past weekend before making his decision just three days before the deadline for underclassmen to enter the draft. It’s too late for him to withdraw and keep his NCAA eligibility, but providing he returns to full health, there seems to be a decent chance he’ll become a second-round steal for an NBA team.
10-Day Contract Trends In 2013/14
A total of 41 players signed 10-day contracts this past season, up from 36 last year. It’s a greater volume of 10-day signees than in any season since 2006/07, the first represented in our 10-Day Tracker. There’s plenty of other data that can be gleaned from this year’s slew of 10-day signings, as we detail below:
- There were 16 players who signed one 10-day contract with a team, but didn’t re-sign.
- Almost as many — 14 — signed two 10-day contracts with a team, but didn’t re-sign.
- A dozen players signed two 10-day contracts with a team before re-signing on a deal for at least the rest of the season.
- Five players signed one 10-day contract and followed with a deal covering at least the rest of the season with the same team.
- Shannon Brown, Dewayne Dedmon, Cartier Martin, Darius Morris, James Nunnally and Jarvis Varnado all signed at least one 10-day contract with two teams.
- ASM Sports and Wasserman Media Group were the agencies with the most clients signing 10-day deals. Each represented four signees.
- The Sixers led the NBA with 23 players appearing in a game this season, so it’s no surprise that they signed an NBA-high five players to 10-day contracts. That doesn’t include their deal with Adonis Thomas. The Sixers referred to it as a 10-day contract, but it covered the final 10 days of the regular season, making it analogous to a rest-of-season deal.
- No team signed four players to 10-day contracts, but the Hawks, Celtics, Bulls, Cavaliers, Clippers, Bucks, Thunder, Kings and Spurs signed three each.
- Ten teams — the Raptors, Pacers, Pistons, Trail Blazers, Timberwolves, Nuggets, Jazz, Rockets, Mavericks and Pelicans — didn’t sign anyone to a 10-day contract this season. I noted in March that they were unlikely to do so.
Feel free to play around with the tracker and see if you can identify a few more trends.
Eastern Rumors: Arenas, Stephenson, Bucks
Gilbert Arenas reiterated on SiriusXM NBA Radio today that he’s still holding out hope for an NBA comeback, as USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt tweets, and that echoes Arenas’ comments from December. The Magic are probably rooting for his return to the league, since that could allow them to use set-off rights to recoup a small portion of the millions they still owe him on his amnestied contract. While we wait to see if Agent Zero, still just 32 years old, makes it back to the Association, here’s more from the Eastern Conference:
- Sean Deveney of The Sporting News heard from a GM around the beginning of February who expected Lance Stephenson to receive offers with eight-figure annual salaries, but an executive now tells Deveney that the soon-to-be free agent will probably command only $7-8MM a year.
- Outgoing Bucks owner Herb Kohl borrowed money from the NBA a total of five times in 2009 and 2010 to help keep the team going, reports Rich Kirchen of the Milwaukee Business Journal. Kohl told Kirchen that he’s spent more than $100MM of his own money on the team during his nearly three decades of ownership.
- Casper Ware‘s multiyear contract with the Sixers extends through 2016/17, but the team only inked Adonis Thomas through the end of 2013/14, according to Mark Deeks of ShamSports (Twitter link).
- Eric Dawson, who spent preseason with the Hawks this past fall, is headed to play for Heilongjiang Zhaozhou Feng Shen of China’s second-tier league, according to Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia. Dawson has also spent time in the D-League and Iran this season.
Bird Rights
The Bird exception, named after Larry Bird, is a rule included in the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement that allows teams to go over the salary cap to re-sign their own players. A player who qualifies for the Bird exception, formally referred to as a Qualifying Veteran Free Agent, is said to have “Bird rights.”
The most basic way for a player to earn Bird rights is to play for the same team for at least three seasons, either on a multiyear deal or separate one-year contracts. Still, there are other, more complicated criteria. A player retains his Bird rights in the following scenarios:
- He changes teams via trade, rather than being waived or signing elsewhere as a free agent. For instance, MarShon Brooks is in the third year of his contract. He has been traded three times, from the Nets to the Celtics, the Celtics to the Warriors and the Warriors to the Lakers, but he still has his Bird rights because he hasn’t been waived.
- He finishes a third season with a team after having only played partial seasons with the club for one or both of the first two years (without signing elsewhere in between).
However, a player sees the clock on his Bird rights reset to zero in the following scenarios:
- He changes teams via free agency.
- He is selected in an expansion draft.
- He is waived and is not claimed on waivers.
- His rights are renounced by his team.
If a player has earned Bird rights, he is eligible to sign a maximum-salary contract for up to five years with 7.5% annual raises when he becomes a free agent. The maximum salary will vary depending on how long the player has been in the league, but regardless of the amount, a team can exceed the salary cap to complete the deal.
Although the Bird exception allows teams to exceed the cap, a team cannot necessarily use free cap room to sign free agents and then re-sign its own players via Bird rights. A team with a Bird free agent is assigned a “free agent amount” or cap hold worth either 190% of his previous salary (for a player with a below-average salary) or 150% of his previous salary (for an above-average salary), up to the maximum salary amount. For players coming off rookie scale contracts, the amounts of those cap holds are 250% and 200%, respectively.
The Mavericks, for instance, will have a $6.042MM cap hold for Vince Carter on their 2014/15 books — 190% of his $3.18MM salary this season. Dallas could renounce Carter and clear that $6.042MM in cap space, but the Mavs would lose his Bird rights if they did that. That would force them to use either cap room or a different cap exception to follow through on their plan to re-sign him.
Ultimately, the Bird exception was designed to allow teams to keep their best players. The CBA ensures that teams are always able to re-sign them to contracts up to the maximum salary, assuming the player is interested in returning and his team is willing to go over the cap.
Note: This is a Hoops Rumors Glossary entry. Our glossary posts will explain specific rules relating to trades, free agency, or other aspects of the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement. Larry Coon’s Salary Cap FAQ was used in the creation of this post.
Versions of this post were initially published on April 17th, 2012, and May 2, 2013 by Luke Adams.