And-Ones: Telfair, Georges-Hunt, O’Bryant, Re-Draft
Former high school basketball prodigy and NBA veteran Sebastian Telfair was sentenced on Monday to three and a half years in prison in his New York City gun case, per The Associated Press. Telfair, 34, was convicted earlier this year of carrying a loaded handgun in his pickup truck.
This was not Telfair’s first brush with the law nor his first incident involving a loaded weapon. He and a friend were arrested in 2007 after a traffic stop during which police found a loaded handgun in the vehicle. He pleaded guilty to criminal possession of a weapon and was sentenced to three years’ probation.
While he never lived up to the hype from his prep career, Telfair did have a relatively successful NBA career. He played 564 games over 10 seasons and averaged 7.4 PPG and 3.5 APG.
There’s more NBA-related news to pass along this evening:
- Former Magic and Timberwolves guard Marcus Georges-Hunt, now fully healthy, recently worked out for the Nuggets as he looks to work his way back to the NBA. According to Jon Krawczynski of The Athletic, the fully healthy 25-year-old Georgia Tech product also has several other workouts lined up the rest of the month.
- As first reported by Donatas Urbonas (Twitter link), top EuroLeague free agent and former NBA player Johnny O’Bryant has signed with Lokomotiv Krasnodar (Twitter link) of the Russian VTB United League. O’Bryant, a second-round pick in the 2014 NBA draft, played four seasons in the NBA with the Bucks, Nuggets, and Hornets.
- Sam Vecenie of The Athletic would draft Bucks forward and 2018/19 MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo, Jazz big man Rudy Gobert, and Trail Blazers guard CJ McCollum with the top three picks in a re-draft of the 2013 NBA Draft. None of the three went higher than No. 10 overall six years ago.
Southwest Notes: Doncic, Roby, Ivey, Westbrook
Callie Caplan of SportsDay reports that 2018/19 NBA Rookie of the Year, Mavericks guard Luka Doncic, is working his tail off this summer to become better conditioned as he becomes a focus night in and night out for Mavs’ opponents during the 2019/20 season.
Per Mavericks head coach Rick Carlisle, “it’s just a natural progression that every player needs to have going from Year 1 to Year 2, especially someone like Luka that had such a great first year. People are really going to be coming for him in his second year, and the continued work on body and conditioning and developing his game is going to keep moving him in the direction of becoming a really great player.”
Doncic, who is training in his native Slovenia this summer, has not yet returned to Dallas to join his Mavericks teammates, but Carlisle, assistant coach Jamahl Mosley and teammate Dwight Powell all visited him this offseason and liked what they saw. “I know he’s working his butt off this summer,” Carlisle added. “I know he’s very motivated for this (upcoming) season.”
There’s more news from around the Southwest Division this afternoon:
- Newy Scruggs of NBC5 Dallas-Fort Worth (h/t to SportsDay) suggests that although the $1.5MM first-year salary for rookie Isaiah Roby may seem high, it was not an overpay by the Mavericks because of the lack of guaranteed salary in years three and four. Moreover, at least one source told Scruggs that Roby has Kyle Kuzma-type potential. If so, his contract will be a steal.
- Niele Ivey, the first female assistant coach in Grizzlies history, believes that outside of being a head coach, a move to the NBA was the next step in her professional career, writes David Cobb of The Commercial Appeal. “I was like, ‘you know what? I felt like I’ve worked really hard and I’m at a great point in my career now and — outside of being a head coach — this would be next level for me.'”
- As we noted yesterday, Rockets point guard Russell Westbrook agreed to alter his payout dates when he was traded from Oklahoma City in order to ease the initial/upfront financial burden on Houston ownership.
DeMar DeRozan In Line For Max Extension?
According to Mike Finger of the San Antonio Express-News, the Spurs have not ruled out the possibility of offering four-time NBA All-Star DeMar DeRozan a maximum contract extension, which DeRozan became eligible for on July 14.
Per Finger, despite some outside speculation that DeRozan could be used as trade bait this offseason, the Spurs generally value the 30-year-old shooting guard’s presence in San Antonio and want to keep him around.
DeRozan’s current contract runs through the 2020/21 season, so a maximum contract extension would put DeRozan under contract with the Spurs through the 2023/24 campaign.
As for the value of the potential new contract, DeRozan’s salary for both the 2019/20 and 2020/21 seasons is approximately $27.7MM, so a max extension would see DeRozan earn $33.3MM, $36MM, and $38.6MM per season from the 2021/22 season to the end of the contract.
The total value of the new five-year contract would be $163,332,973, which just exceeds the value of Kristaps Porzingis‘ five-year contract with the Mavericks but falls short of Khris Middleton‘s new five-year contract with the Bucks.
Kelly Olynyk Injured In Exhibition Game
Heat big man Kelly Olynyk slipped on what appeared to be a wet spot on the court during a FIBA exhibition game between Canada and Nigeria earlier this evening and limped to the locker room thereafter as a result (h/t to Josh Lewenberg of The Sports Network).
Olynyk was dribbling the ball up the floor, quickly slipped and crashed to the court directly on his right knee, and came up hobbled before making his way to the locker room. He did not return to the game.
Devin Heroux of CBC News reported after the game that Canada head coach Nick Nurse confirmed Olynyk will undergo x-rays tomorrow to assess the injury, which Nurse believes occurred to his right knee.
As Anthony Chiang of the Miami Herald notes, the 28-year-old is entering the third season of a four-year, $50MM deal he signed with the Heat back in 2017. He will make a guaranteed $13.1MM for the 2019/20 season.
Southeast Notes: Haslem, Kulboka, Simpson, Simon
Heat veteran forward Udonis Haslem, who re-signed with Miami for a 17th season just yesterday, will not commit to this being his final season, tweets Ira Winderman of The Sun-Sentinel.
Winderman adds in a separate tweet that Haslem will not treat the 2019/20 season as a farewell tour, but given Haslem’s primary status as a reserve for the Heat, it’s probably too presumptive to conclude from that alone that this won’t be his last season.
Finally, Winderman opines that unless someone like former Heat player Yante Maten ends up flourishing for another team in the near future, the signing of Haslem as a veteran locker room presence is well worth using up the last roster spot.
There’s more news out of the Southeast Division tonight:
- Hornets draft-and-stash prospect Arnoldas Kulboka, a 21-year-old Lithuanian swingman who was drafted No. 55 overall in the 2018 NBA Draft, has officially signed his contract with RETAbet Bilbao Basket of Liga ACB, reports Donatas Urbonas (Twitter link).
- Per Chase Hughes of NBC Sports Washington, Wizards point guard John Wall believes that teammate Bradley Beal will sign the three-year, $112MM contract extension being offered by Washington despite the financial reasons for not doing so, as we’ve detailed.
- The Wizards have officially announced the hiring of Mark Simpson as the team’s new vice president of player performance. Simpson has spent the last three seasons as director of performance for the Clippers, where he oversaw the team’s player load management strategies.
- Undrafted St. John’s rookie guard Justin Simon recently underwent a workout with the Heat, but left without a contract, reports Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald.
Angel Delgado To Play In China
Per Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium, the 2019 NBA G League Rookie of the Year, big man Angel Delgado, has signed a one-year, $4.3MM deal with the Beijing Royal Fighters of the Chinese Basketball Association.
Delgado, 24, was on a two-way deal with the Clippers last season while also playing for the Agua Caliente Clippers of Ontario. He only appeared in two NBA games as a rookie, scoring three total points in 15 minutes, but he was named All-NBAGL First Team in addition to ROTY after averaging 18.5 PPG, 14.8 RPG, and 2.8 APG.
The former Seton Hall big man was eligible for restricted free agency this summer, but the Clippers chose not to extend him a qualifying offer.
As we noted two weeks ago, the Clippers opted to retain Johnathan Motley on a two-way deal in addition to rookie Amir Coffey, but given the value of Delgado’s contract in China, it’s unclear whether Delgado was ever interested in a reunion anyway.
Durant Doesn’t Blame Warriors, Never Considered Knicks
Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports sat down with Nets forward Kevin Durant earlier this week to discuss several notable topics, including how the 30-year-old star perceives the opinion of some that the Warriors mishandled Durant’s return from a Grade 2 right calf strain. His response?
“Hell, no. How can you blame [the Warriors]? Hell, no. I heard the Warriors pressured me into getting back. Nobody never said a word to me during rehab as I was coming back. It was only me and [director of sports medicine and performance] Rick [Celebrini] working out every day. Right when the series started, I targeted Game 5. Hell, nah. It just happened. It’s basketball. S— happens. Nobody was responsible for it. It was just the game. We just need to move on from that s— because I’m going to be back playing.”
Durant also spoke about his choice to sign with Brooklyn, saying that the decision was not made until the morning of June 30, as he didn’t want to “disrespect the game” by putting his focus on the future during the season. Interestingly, he also said that he only considered the Warriors and the Nets as potential destinations.
Of course, speculation ran rampant throughout the entire 2018/19 season that the Knicks were a strong, if not primary contender to land both Durant and Kyrie Irving this summer. In response, Durant said “If I was leaving the Warriors, it was always going to be for the Nets. They got the pieces and a creative front office. I just like what they were building.”
There’s more from Durant’s interview with Haynes, which is worth a read in its entirety:
- Speaking on how some Toronto fans cheered and applauded his injury before several Raptors players signaled the crowd to stop, Durant smirked and said, perhaps with a suggestion of karma, “It will probably be the last time they will be in the Finals.”
- Durant had a difficult time watching the remainder of Game 5 from his hotel room, even turning the channel at one point before flipping back later to cheer on his teammates.
- Durant would not confirm that he will miss the entire 2019/20 season, leaving open the possibility that he could return before season’s end.
- Durant’s perspective on the entire injury situation is a positive one, saying “Yeah, I still think about that night… that one is definitely always going to be a huge part of my career because it’s the biggest stage and the type of injury I had. But now I look at it as me just going out there playing basketball, and I happened to get hurt. And now I’m just waiting to get back. I know it’s a huge deal to everybody else, but I just try to take it on the chin and keep it moving.”
Thunder Notes: Patterson, Luxury Tax, Bliss, Gibbs
Erik Horne of The Oklahoman opines that Patrick Patterson became expendable after the Thunder acquired Danilo Gallinari from the Clippers, signed veteran free agent Mike Muscala, and drafted Darius Bazley in the first round of the 2019 NBA Draft.
Gallinari is now the likely the starter at power forward, able to stretch the floor alongside big man Steven Adams. Meanwhile, Muscala has arguably been a more productive player the last two seasons and is three years younger. Finally, Bazley, still only 19 years old, will almost certainly merit playing time should the Thunder fall into rebuild mode.
Patterson, who was signed in the summer of 2017, was supposed to be the type of floor spacer the Thunder are now looking for from Gallinari, but he never lived up to his contract. The signing of Carmelo Anthony, which pushed Patterson to a reserve role, didn’t help, nor did undergoing arthroscopic knee surgery in 2017.
That said, Patterson is just a season removed from shooting 38.6 percent from three-point range and 87 percent from the line, so it’s possible he could be a nice piece for the Clippers in the right role.
There’s more to report from Oklahoma City this afternoon:
- According to Bobby Marks of ESPN, the Thunder will stretch Patterson’s cap hit over the next three seasons. With Patterson giving back $3.5MM of his $5,711,200 salary, the yearly cap hits equal $737,067 after taking set-off into account.
- Marks adds (Twitter link) that while the Thunder are now approximately $698K below the luxury tax threshold, they only have 13 guaranteed contracts. As such, they’ll need to go back into the tax in order to sign another player to a standard contract.
- Despite his infamous name, Thunder player development coach Dave Bliss, also a former Knicks’ assistant coach under former Thunder point guard Derek Fisher and Jeff Hornacek, is well on his way to a promising coaching career, writes Horne in a separate piece for The Oklahoman.
- Former Gonzaga and Creighton guard Grant Gibbs has been named head coach of the Thunder’s G League affiliate, the Oklahoma City Blue, the team announced on Friday. Per Executive Vice President and GM Sam Presti, “Grant is someone we identified early in his post-playing career as a potential fit within our organization… He has steadily impressed us with his versatility as a coach. We believe he will do an excellent job with the Blue and is ready to continue his growth within the organization.”
Isaiah Hicks To Play In Russia
One of the Knicks‘ two-way players from last season is headed overseas to continue his playing career, with VTB United League club Avtodor Saratov announcing (via Instagram) that they have signed Isaiah Hicks for the 2019/20 season (h/t to Emiliano Carchia or Sportando).
Hicks, who went undrafted out of North Carolina after helping the Tar Heels win a national championship in 2017, spent both the 2017/18 and 2018/19 seasons as a two-way player for the Knicks. In 64 G League contests with the Westchester Knicks, Hicks averaged 16.0 PPG, 7.7 RPG, and 2.0 APG in 29.7 MPG.
The 25-year-old power forward also saw some game action with the Knicks during his tenure in New York, appearing in 21 NBA games and posting averages of 4.4 PPG and 2.3 RPG in 13.0 minutes per contest.
The Knicks opted not to tender Hicks a two-way qualifying offer earlier this summer, thereby making him an unrestricted free agent. Guard Kadeem Allen remains the Knicks’ only current two-way player, but it was reported back in June that rookie Kris Wilkes will earn the second slot for the 2019/20 season.
Warriors Sign Damion Lee To Two-Way Contract
JULY 30: The Warriors have officially signed Lee to a new two-way contract, per RealGM’s NBA transactions log.
JULY 28: Per a report from Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium, the Warriors and swingman Damion Lee have reached terms on a two-way contract that will see Lee, the brother-in-law of Stephen Curry, return to the Bay Area for the 2019/20 season.
Lee, who played under a two-way contract with Golden State last season also, appeared in 39 games for the Warriors in 2018/19, averaging 4.9 PPG in 11.7 MPG. Anthony Slater of The Athletic first reported that Lee was again a candidate for one of the team’s two-way slots approximately two weeks ago.
The 26-year-old Drexel and Louisville product also played in 15 games (11 starts) for the Hawks during his rookie season in 2017/18, where he averaged an impressive 10.7 PPG in 26.9 minutes per contest, albeit in relatively meaningless action toward the end of the regular season.
The Warriors other two-way slot is occupied by rookie guard Ky Bowman. Forward Julian Washburn held the other spot for awhile, but he was waived after being acquired from the Grizzlies in the trade that sent Andre Igoudala to Memphis to clear cap space.