Offseason In Review: Denver Nuggets
Hoops Rumors is in the process of looking back at each team’s offseason, from the end of the playoffs in June right up until opening night. Trades, free agent signings, draft picks, contract extensions, option decisions, camp invitees, and more will be covered, as we examine the moves each franchise made over the last several months.
Signings
- J.J. Hickson: Three years, $16.15MM. Signed via mid-level exception.
- Timofey Mozgov: Three years, $14MM. Signed via Bird rights. Third year is team option.
- Nate Robinson: Two years, $4.12MM. Signed via bi-annual exception. Second year is player option.
Trades
- Acquired the No. 46 pick in 2013 from the Jazz in exchange for the No. 27 pick in 2013 and cash.
- Acquired Darrell Arthur and the No. 55 pick in 2013 from the Grizzlies in exchange for Kosta Koufos.
- Acquired Randy Foye from the Jazz and a 2018 second-round pick from the Warriors in exchange for Andre Iguodala (signed-and-traded to Warriors) and a 2018 second-round pick (to Jazz). Foye was signed-and-traded for three years, $9.14MM.
Draft Picks
- Erick Green (Round 2, 46th overall). Playing overseas.
- Joffrey Lauvergne (Round 2, 55th overall). Playing overseas.
Camp Invitees
- Reginald Becton
- Kyle Fogg
- Damion James
Departing Players
Rookie Contract Option Decisions
- Kenneth Faried (4th year, $2.25MM): Exercised
- Evan Fournier (3rd year, $1.48MM): Exercised
- Jordan Hamilton (4th year, $2.11MM): Declined
All was right in Denver after the first game of the playoffs last season. The Nuggets were coming off a regular season in which they’d won 57 times, the most since their ABA days, and they’d added another win in the opener of their first-round series against the underdog Warriors. In a few weeks, George Karl would be named Coach of the Year and GM Masai Ujiri would clutch the Executive of the Year trophy. Yet by the time the league announced those awards, Denver’s fortune had turned. The Nuggets only managed one more win in that series, and they suddenly had to deal with their ninth first-round elimination in 10 years.
More tough breaks followed. Ujiri departed for the Raptors, and Pete D’Alessandro, Ujiri’s top aide in Denver, became the new Kings GM. Other Nuggets executives fled as well, but the changes weren’t limited to the front office. The team parted ways with Karl, who had guided the team to three of its four best regular seasons since the merger but was responsible for seven of the first-round flame-outs. The shocking decision was tempered only by a wild offseason of coaching changes in which Lionel Hollins and Vinny Del Negro, who’d both won 56 regular season games in 2012/13, also lost their jobs. Still, Nuggets president Josh Kroenke reeled in capable replacements before the draft, hiring well-regarded Pelicans exec Tim Connelly as the new GM and Brian Shaw, a fast-rising assistant on the Pacers bench, as the new coach.
There was upheaval galore in Denver, but perhaps the most significant figure to leave was Andre Iguodala, who rejected Connelly’s four-year, $52MM offer and even more money from the Kings to sign with Golden State on a four-year, $48MM pact. The Nuggets, Jazz and Warriors turned it into a three-way sign-and-trade that facilitated Denver’s acquisition of Randy Foye, but the arrangement had more to do with Golden State and Utah than it did with the Nuggets. Foye can provide some of the outside shooting that Denver sorely lacked in 2012/13, and while Iguodala hardly looked like the Gold Medal winner he is last season, Foye doesn’t figure to come close to Iggy’s impact. It’s somewhat surprising that Connelly didn’t add a fifth year to Iguodala’s offer, a sweetener no other team could match. Still, the nine-year vet was clearly willing to take less to play with a team that has more star power and, as this spring’s results suggested, a better chance to advance deep into the playoffs. The loss to Golden State clearly continues to cast a shadow on the Nuggets.
Connelly affected plenty of other changes, swinging a draft-night trade with the Grizzlies that sent Kosta Koufos to Memphis in return for Darrell Arthur. The intentions of the deal were clear. Nuggets brass wanted to give JaVale McGee more playing time after he came off the bench behind Koufos while Karl was coach. There’d otherwise be little motivation for the Nuggets to give up a starter for Arthur, who hadn’t started as many as 10 games in a season since his rookie year in 2008/09. That’s especially true since Koufos is cheaper and has a partially guaranteed 2014/15 season, while Arthur has a player option for next year. The desire to maximize their four-year, $44MM investment in McGee surely fuels their interest in seeing him play, and with McGee out indefinitely with a stress fracture in his leg, Denver may have overplayed its hand with a trade it could regret.
The deal put the onus on Connelly to re-sign restricted free agent center Timofey Mozgov to provide depth. Ujiri had made it clear long before he skipped town that Mozgov was a priority, rebuffing trade interest in the Russian seven-footer last season. The deal seems like a fair market price for an intriguing 7’1″ center, even though he rarely played last season. He’ll be a couple weeks shy of his 30th birthday when the contract is up, but early returns, with Mozgov averaging career highs of 10.3 points and 4.6 boards per game, suggest the team’s decision on Mozgov was more sound than what its done with its other centers.
Denver made its most significant expenditure of the offseason on another player capable of manning the five spot. J.J. Hickson is more of a power forward, but he’s played plenty of center, including his role as the starting pivot for the Blazers last season. Portland GM Neil Olshey said publicly that he wanted an upgrade at the position this summer, irking Hickson, who’d resurrected his career while with the Blazers. He went from signing a one-year, $4MM deal in 2012/13 to a three-year pact with the Nuggets that will pay him more than four times last year’s contract. Hickson averaged 10.4 rebounds last season playing out of position, so his new deal is priced reasonably, though it was odd to see the Nuggets, with Kenneth Faried and Arthur at power forward and McGee and Mozgov at center, spend to acquire another big man. That’s led to rumors that Connelly could trade Faried this season.
The Nuggets didn’t just focus on the frontcourt this summer, acquiring Foye and Nate Robinson to play shooting guard. Robinson is a dangerous scorer, as he proved with a 34-point performance in the first round of the playoffs for the Bulls last season, but he’s also an inconsistent one, as witnessed by a zero-point, 0-for-12 effort during the second round. The 5’9″ Robinson nonetheless outperformed expectations that he would run afoul of defensive guru Tom Thibodeau, proving he was capable enough on defense to at least garner playing time. He’s inexpensive on a deal that pays him a little more than $2MM a year, but that slight raise on the minimum salary cost Denver its biannual exception, a tool it won’t be able to use next summer.
Denver is off to a slow start in 2013/14, which isn’t a major surprise given all of its movement. Once the Nuggets find their rhythm, they still probably won’t approach last season’s win total, especially with the absence of Iguodala and the injured Danilo Gallinari, as well as the potential for yet more significant changes to the roster. Connelly clearly isn’t of the belief that last year’s playoff loss was a fluke, so the Nuggets are a work in progress at this point. It’s hard to see exactly what Connelly’s vision for the franchise is, but Kroenke and company are probably more willing to tolerate regression this year than they were another banner regular season that led to a playoff defeat. Connelly will have time.
Luke Adams contributed to this post.
Southeast Links: Williams, Nelson, Chalmers
The Hawks didn’t get the full return on their mid-level investment in Lou Williams last season, as the sixth man went down in January with a torn ACL. Still, he didn’t take nearly as long to come back as Derrick Rose and others who’ve suffered similar injuries, as Williams is playing in Atlanta’s game tonight against his former team, the Sixers. Here’s more from around the Southeast Division:
- Jameer Nelson has never played for a team other than the Magic, and he tells Ian Thomsen of SI.com that he’d like that to remain true when he calls it a career. He acknowledges that he could be traded this season and understands he’s powerless to stop the Magic if they want to make that happen. Nelson envisions being the one making those decisions as a GM once he retires and can also see himself as a coach.
- In today’s mailbag, a reader asked Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun Sentinel if impending free agent Mario Chalmers could be playing himself out of the Heat‘s price range with his performance this year. Chalmers, who is making $4MM in the final year of his deal, could be a casualty as the Heat are mindful of luxury tax implications. Miami has already exercised its 2014/15 option on the cheaper Norris Cole.
- Martell Webster finds himself in a familiar position as Trevor Ariza is once again sidelined with a leg injury, writes Michael Lee of the Washington Post. Webster stepped into the starting lineup in Ariza’s place last season and went on to post career-best numbers and earn a four-year, $22MM deal from Washington.
Zach Links contributed to this post.
How Omer Asik’s Backloaded Deal Affects Trades
The Rockets have reportedly engaged other teams in trade talks about Omer Asik, and even though a trade doesn’t appear to be imminent, his name figures to surface quite often in rumors this season. The pairing of Asik and Dwight Howard together on the court hasn’t been successful so far, and relegating Asik to playing backup to a superstar who’ll likely average around 36 minutes a game seems a waste when the Rockets have needs at other positions.
Asik is on Houston’s books for $8,374,646 this year and next — not at all an inflated amount for a top-shelf interior defender. The problem is that his actual salaries are quite different from his cap hits, thanks to the terms of the Gilbert Arenas Provision which the Rockets used to snatch him from the Bulls in 2012. Houston backloaded Asik’s contract to dissuade Chicago from matching the offer for the restricted free agent. The Arenas rule allowed the Rockets to spread the cap hit for the steep third-season raise in Asik’s deal over all three years of the contract. If the Bulls matched, Chicago would have had to carry cap hits that reflected each season’s actual payout. Asik is pocketing just $5.225MM this season, but he gets $14,898,938 in 2014/15.
Next season’s actual salary will likely put Asik among the top 25 highest-paid players in the league, even though his cap hit will be significantly less, regardless of whether he’s playing for the Rockets or another NBA team. Some owners might welcome the chance to acquire a player with a reasonable salary cap hit even though the actual payout is much more expensive, but, as Grantland’s Zach Lowe has written, many are wary taking on the balloon payment for either Asik or Jeremy Lin, who has a contract with precisely the same terms.
Asik doesn’t have the resume of a top-25 player, but he nonetheless had a drastic effect on Houston’s defense last season. The Rockets gave up 107.0 points per 100 possessions when he was on the bench in 2012/13, but just 101.3 when he was playing, per NBA.com. His actual pay next season will be exactly the amount of money former All-Star Roy Hibbert will earn with the Pacers in 2014/15. Hibbert’s superior block totals from last year indicate that he’s better at basket protection, and he averaged more points per game. Still, Asik took far fewer shots and was much more accurate, and he outrebounded Hibbert by 3.4 boards per game in similar minutes. Asik might not be a top-25 player in the NBA, but his statistical record holds it own against that of a player the small-market Pacers were willing to pay at an elite level.
The 27-year-old from Turkey might be worth a salary at or near the one he’ll see next season, but he won’t be quite the bargain his cap hit for 2014/15 would suggest. Teams will consider any trade for Asik knowing he’s due for a nearly 300% raise. Acquiring him and his $5.225MM salary this year would help ease that burden, but it still works out to an average annual value of around $10MM for whatever team is willing to trade for him, much more than his cap hit will be in either season. It will be interesting to see if a team with financial muscle but limited cap flexibility takes advantage of his reduced cap number, or if a low-revenue team swallows hard and prepares for a nearly $15MM payout next year.
Rockets Have Sought Omer Asik Trade
5:38pm: Wojnarowski clarifies that the Rockets have discussed possible Asik trades with teams over the past few months, but those talks aren’t necessarily active (Twitter link).
5:17pm: The Rockets have asked for an “impact player” in return for Omer Asik in trade talks with multiple teams, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. That’s in spite of a report last night indicating that Houston had denied Asik’s trade request.
Teams have deemed GM Daryl Morey‘s asking price too high so far, Wojnarowski writes. The GM would prefer to acquire a frontline player who can help the team compete for a championship this year, but if he can’t find someone like that for Asik, he’d like to get a largely unprotected 2014 first-round pick. The Rockets were in talks with the Wizards before they traded for Marcin Gortat last month, but Morey was unwilling to take back Emeka Okafor, as the Suns did.
Morey and Andy Miller, the agent for Asik, have been regularly discussing how the Rockets can offload the 7-footer, as Wojnarowski reports. Asik’s camp this week reiterated the trade request they originally made back in July, when the Rockets were closing in on signing Dwight Howard. A rumor around that time suggested the Rockets might trade Asik for Pelicans power forward Ryan Anderson, but New Orleans never showed much interest, and Wojnarowski hears the Rockets have been unwilling to get the Pelicans to reconsider.
Just as Woj’s report surfaced, the Pelicans announced center Greg Stiemsma will be out six to eight weeks with a left knee injury that he suffered Tuesday. Perhaps his absence will prompt GM Dell Demps to listen more closely to what Morey has to offer, though that’s just my speculation. It’s unlikely that any deal will take place before December 15th, when players who signed this past offseason may be included in deals, Wojnarowski points out.
Draft Rumors: 2015, Parker, Wiggins, Exum
A pair of players widely considered to be among the five best draft picks for 2015 made their college choices today, with Jahlil Okafor headed to Duke and Cliff Alexander bound for Kansas. Longtime recruiting analyst Tom Konchalski told Adam Zagoria of SNY.tv that if Okafor picked Duke, it might influence top 2014 prospect Jabari Parker to stay an extra year in school so he can play with his AAU teammate. That would be quite a surprise, but there’s plenty of time left before Parker and other potential 2014 early entrants have to decide whether to declare for the draft, so a lot can happen. Here’s the latest on the 2014 class:
- Tuesday’s talent showcase at the Champions Classic was quite a spectacle, but it didn’t help at least one GM draw any conclusions, according to USA Today’s Sam Amick. “To be honest, I think (Tuesday) night muddied the waters even more,” the unnamed GM said.
- Another GM gave Amick his top five prospects: Andrew Wiggins, Parker, Dante Exum, Aaron Gordon and Julius Randle. That’s the same top five that a GM listed for Zagoria, though it’s unclear whether those are different GMs or the same one.
- Gery Woelfel of the Racine Journal Times compares the 2014 draft class to the one that came 20 years before it, opining that Wiggins, Parker and Randle are analogous to Glenn Robinson, Jason Kidd and Grant Hill, the top three picks from 1994 (Twitter link).
Atlantic Rumors: Shumpert, Faried, Williams
Talks between the Knicks and Nuggets on a potential Iman Shumpert/Kenneth Faried swap “were never alive,” a source tells Marc Berman of the New York Post, who terms the conversations New York is having with other teams about Shumpert as merely preliminary. The Nuggets would have wanted a first-round pick from the Knicks, but the earliest first-rounder New York can convey is for 2018, Berman notes. Here’s more on Shumpert, the Knicks and their Atlantic Division rivals:
- The Knicks‘ ample depth at shooting guard and the team’s concern over how Shumpert would react to being benched are among the reasons the Knicks appear willing to trade the 23-year-old, as Ian Begley of ESPNNewYork.com details.
- A family matter has forced former Celtics swingman Terrence Williams to leave Turk Telekom Ankara after he played just two games with the Turkish team, agent Obrad Fimic tweets (hat tip to Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia).
- Jason Terry says the Nets are in “desperation” mode after a loss to the Kings last night dropped them to 2-5, observes Sam Amick of USA Today.
- The Spurs regarded James Anderson as a scorer when they drafted him 24th overall in 2010, former San Antonio assistant and current Sixers head coach Brett Brown says. Anderson’s career-high 36 points last night highlight why Brown thinks the Sixers picked up Anderson at the just the right time in the swingman’s career, as Sam Donnellon of the Philadelphia Daily News examines.
Cavs, Kings Pursuing Trades
The Cavaliers and Kings are actively seeking trades in response to subpar performances so far this season, a source tells HoopsWorld’s Alex Kennedy (Twitter links). It’s not clear whether they’re close to any deals or if they’re working on a trade with each other, but they appear to be two of the most aggressive clubs on the market.
The Cavs are reportedly under a mandate from owner Dan Gilbert to make the playoffs, but they’re just 3-6 to start the season, and offseason signee Andrew Bynum is doubtful he can return to full health. They have eight contracts fully guaranteed beyond this season, but that total doesn’t include the deals for Bynum and frequently mentioned trade candidate Anderson Varejao, giving Cleveland some flexibility. The Cavs also have three extra first-round picks set to come their way the next two years, so they have valuable assets to burn.
The Kings owe one of those picks to Cleveland thanks to a previous trade. Sacramento has all its other first-rounders, but is short on second-round picks to deal. The new regime in Sacramento is anxious to put a quality product on the floor as it continues to campaign for a new arena, as Grantland’s Zach Lowe has written, and there has been trade chatter surrounding DeMarcus Cousins and Jimmer Fredette. Nine Kings players have fully guaranteed salaries for 2014/15, but John Salmons is the only one among the team’s seven most highly paid players who doesn’t. The Kings are 2-5 after upsetting the Nets last night in Sacramento.
It could be difficult for either team to pull off a trade for at least another month or so. Players who signed new contracts in the offseason won’t become eligible to be included in trades until December 15th, at the earliest.
Sam Young Signs To Play In Australia
Swingman Sam Young has signed a deal that includes an NBA out clause with the Sydney Kings of Australia’s National Basketball League, agent Joel Bell tells Shams Charania of RealGM.com. The 28-year-old can return to the NBA at any point, unless Sydney is in participating in the Australian playoffs, which begin March 28th.
Young has played parts of each of the past four seasons in the NBA, and was a key component of the Pacers’ bench last year, holding his own on defense against LeBron James in the playoffs. He was with the Spurs for training camp but didn’t come close to making the regular season roster, as San Antonio waived him in early October.
Young follows the path of Jonny Flynn, who signed in Australia last season, and Heat second-round draft pick James Ennis, who’s also playing in Australia this year. Keep up with transactions around the globe with the Hoops Rumors International Player Movement Tracker.
Lakers, Clippers Still Considering Lamar Odom
The Lakers and Clippers would again have interest in signing Lamar Odom if he’s able to put his personal troubles behind him, according to Ramona Shelburne and Marc Stein of ESPN.com. The teams remain wary of Odom’s alleged drug use and DUI arrest this summer, and haven’t had recent contact except to inquire about his well-being, but the 34-year-old’s “positive” history with the clubs keeps him in consideration.
Odom has begun training with an eye on returning for the second half of the season, and he must prove he’s in basketball shape as well as in a healthy mental state, Shelburne and Stein write. The 6’10” forward has played all but two seasons of his 14-year career with one L.A. team or the other, and spent last season with the Clippers, who, along with the Lakers, had interest in Odom this summer until his personal problems surfaced.
The Clippers have an open roster spot, and as Shelburne and Stein report, they’re considering several options for filling it. They’re a tax team with about $2.4MM left underneath their hard cap, part of the reason why they began the season without a full complement of 15 players. The Lakers already have 15 guys, but four of them have contracts that contain no more than $100K of guaranteed salary, as our list of non-guaranteed contracts shows. Neither L.A. team would be able to sign Odom for more than the minimum salary.
Odds & Ends: Wizards, Pelicans, Nash
Wizards owner Ted Leonsis has said he expects his club to be a “playoff-caliber team” this year, but today he backtracked from the notion that the Wizards face an ultimatum of making the postseason, observes Joseph White of The Associated Press.
“Playoffs or bust, what does that mean?” Leonsis said in an interview that also touched on his ownership of the NHL’s Capitals. “Shut the team down if we don’t make the playoffs for the Wizards? We would certainly, if we don’t make the playoffs, for both teams we would do our due diligence in a more hypersensitive manner, right? Because we didn’t meet our expectations. But the team’s not going bust. The fan base isn’t going bust. It would just heighten the scrutiny that we have to do.”
The Wizards, with GM Ernie Grunfeld and coach Randy Wittman on expiring contracts, fell to 2-5 with tonight’s loss to the Mavericks. Here’s more from around the NBA:
- Pelicans coach Monty Williams said the team had been considering signing Josh Childress and Louis Amundson for weeks, but he called their additions today “nothing to write home about” and said “we’re just taking a look” at the veterans, notes Dave McMenamin of ESPNLosAngeles.com (Twitter link).
- Lakers coach Mike D’Antoni rolled his eyes at the suggestion that Steve Nash should retire, according to Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Daily News, and Marc Stein of ESPN.com points to Nash’s determination to overcome his injury and continue playing.
- The Knicks plan to send Chris Smith to their D-League affiliate once the season starts next week, as Marc Berman of the New York Post writes within a piece highlighting the Knicks’ woes.
- Kevin Martin‘s shooting has been a boon for the Wolves, and the free agent pickup feels he’s benefited just as much from his pairing with Kevin Love, as Bruce Brothers of the St. Paul Pioneer Press observes. “After playing with Kevin (Durant) and Russell (Westbrook), guys that can score 30 in their sleep, I wouldn’t go to another team without a superstar,” Martin said. “That’s what I have in Kevin Love.”
- RealGM’s Andrew Perna examines the learning curve for Bucks first-round pick Giannis Antetokounmpo, still just 18 years old and adjusting to life outside of his native Greece.