Heat Sign Bam Adebayo To Maximum-Salary Extension
NOVEMBER 28, 3:18pm: Adebayo has officially signed the contract, according to a team press release.
NOVEMBER 24, 2:39pm: The Heat and Adebayo have agreed to terms on the extension, reports ESPN’s Zach Lowe (Twitter link). It’s straight five-year deal, with no player or team option, according to Anthony Chiang of The Miami Herald (Twitter link).
Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link) confirms that Adebayo’s new maximum-salary extension will have Rose Rule language and could start at up to 30% of the 2021/22 cap rather than 25%, as detailed below.
NOVEMBER 24, 12:29pm: The Heat are moving forward with a contract extension for fourth-year big man Bam Adebayo, according to Ira Winderman of The South Florida Sun Sentinel (Twitter link). Tim Reynolds of The Associated Press confirms (via Twitter) that the club is in the process of extending Adebayo’s deal.
Adebayo was one of two dozen players eligible for a rookie scale extension entering the offseason. Coming off a breakout year, he looked like one of the most deserving candidates for a new deal, along with Jayson Tatum, Donovan Mitchell, and De’Aaron Fox, all of whom have agreed to maximum-salary extensions in recent days.
However, the Heat’s salary cap situation complicated the team’s decision. Miami has been focused on preserving as much cap room as possible for the 2021 offseason, and a new deal for Adebayo will increase his cap charge from a hold worth about $15MM to a new salary worth at least $28MM (f he gets the max), eliminating the possibility of a max-salary slot for a free agent.
The fact that the Heat are now moving forward on an extension for Adebayo could mean a number of things. Maybe Adebayo wasn’t waiting a year for his new contract; maybe the Heat remain confident that if a star like Giannis Antetokounmpo is available and wants to play in Miami next year, they’ll be able to figure it out even without the necessary cap room, like they did for Jimmy Butler in 2019; or maybe the Heat believe Antetokounmpo is becoming more likely to sign a super-max extension with the Bucks and remain in Milwaukee.
According to Barry Jackson of The Miami Herald (Twitter link), someone who knows Giannis well told him that the reigning MVP would be impressed by the Heat extending Adebayo early rather than making him wait until next year. Still, if Antetokounmpo is moving closer to accepting a deal with the Bucks, Adebayo’s agent Alex Saratsis would certainly know about it — he also represents Giannis.
Whatever the thinking, it’s good news for Adebayo, who was a full-time starter for the Heat in the first time in 2019/20 and responded with an All-Star performance, averaging 15.9 PPG, 10.2 RPG, and 5.1 APG in 72 games (33.6 MPG).
He also helped anchor Miami’s defense, blocking 1.3 shots per game and averaging 1.1 steals as well. His play was crucial in helping the Heat reach the NBA Finals, though his ability to contribute in that series against the Lakers was compromised by a neck injury.
The Heat are expected to give Adebayo a five-year maximum-salary contract that will match the ones signed by those other young stars from his draft class, as Winderman reports. That would put the 23-year-old on track to earn at least $163MM and as much as $195.6MM over the life of the deal, based on current cap projections. The new contract will begin in 2021/22, once his rookie deal expires.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Wizards Sign Cassius Winston To Two-Way Contract
12:42pm: It’s a one-year contract, according to The Athletic’s Fred Katz (Twitter link).
7:31 am: The Wizards have signed former Michigan State point guard Cassius Winston to his first NBA contract, inking him to a two-way deal, according to the league’s official transactions log.
Winston, who spent a full four-year college career with the Spartans, is coming off a 2019/20 season in which he averaged 18.6 PPG, 5.9 APG, and 2.5 RPG with a shooting line of .448/.432/.852 in 30 games (32.7 MPG).
The No. 53 overall pick in the 2020 draft, Winston was technically selected by Oklahoma City, but was sent to Washington in a draft-night trade.
Winston will join guard Garrison Mathews to fill the Wizards’ two-way contract slots, as our tracker shows.
Jazz Trade Rayjon Tucker, 2027 Second-Round Pick To Cavs
NOV. 28: The Cavaliers have waived Tucker, per Kelsey Russo of The Athletic (Twitter link). As a result, they’ll only carry his $340K partial guarantee on their cap.
NOV. 27: The Jazz are trading wing Rayjon Tucker to the Cavaliers along with a future second-round pick, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (Twitter link), who reports that Utah is receiving cash in return.
Bobby Marks of ESPN adds (via Twitter) that the Cavaliers will get the Jazz’s 2027 second-rounder in the swap. The Cavs have issued a press release confirming the deal, making it official.
Tucker, 23, appeared in 20 games as a rookie for Utah last season, averaging 3.1 PPG and 1.0 RPG in a very limited role (8.1 MPG). His $1.52MM salary for the 2020/21 campaign will become guaranteed if the Cavs keep him under contract through November 29, but for now it’s just partially guaranteed for $340K, per Marks.
The Jazz will open up a spot on their projected regular season roster and clear a little money from their salary cap. Meanwhile, if the Cavs don’t intend to hang onto Tucker, they’re essentially just buying a future second-round pick for $340K (his partial guarantee), plus whatever amount of money they sent to Utah in the deal.
Raptors Sign Malachi Flynn To Rookie Contract
The Raptors have officially signed first-round pick Malachi Flynn to his rookie contract, according to the NBA’s transactions log.
Flynn, who transferred to San Diego State after starting his college career at Washington State, had a breakout season in 2019/20 a junior. The 6’1″ point guard averaged 17.6 PPG, 5.1 APG, 4.5 RPG, and 1.8 SPG with a .441/.373/.857 shooting line in 32 games (33.4 MPG) for the Aztecs. He was named the Mountain West Player and Defensive Player of the Year.
On draft night on November 18, Flynn was the 29th player off the board, going to Toronto with the second-last pick of the first round. As a Raptors rookie, he’ll get to learn from All-Star point guard Kyle Lowry and the newly re-signed Fred VanVleet.
Assuming he signs for the full 120% of the rookie scale amount – as nearly every player does – Flynn will earn $1.95MM in 2020/21. If he plays out his full four-year rookie deal, its total value will exceed $10MM. The full breakdown on those numbers can be found right here.
Wright To Pistons, Ariza To Thunder, Johnson To Mavs In Three-Team Trade
NOVEMBER 27: The Thunder, Mavericks, and Pistons have officially finalized their three-team trade, according to press releases from the teams. As detailed below, Ariza and Jackson are headed to Oklahoma City, Johnson is going to Dallas, and Wright moves to Detroit.
The Thunder also acquired a 2023 second-round pick (the more favorable of Dallas’ and Miami’s picks) and the Mavs’ 2026 second-rounder in the deal.
NOVEMBER 21: The Thunder, Mavericks, and Pistons have agreed to a three-team trade, according to reports from ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (Twitter links) and Marc Stein of The New York Times (Twitter links).
The move will send James Johnson from Oklahoma City to Dallas and Delon Wright from Dallas to Detroit. The Thunder will receive Trevor Ariza (from the Pistons), Justin Jackson (from the Mavericks), and – unsurprisingly – some form of draft compensation.
From the Mavericks’ perspective, the deal will allow them to open up a roster spot and add some veteran toughness, according to Tim MacMahon of ESPN, who tweets that Dallas intends to keep Johnson on its roster. Moving Wright, who had two years left on his contract, and taking back Johnson’s expiring $16MM deal also allows the Mavs to create some added cap flexibility for the summer of 2021.
The Pistons will reduce team salary for 2020/21 and will reunite Wright with his former coach in Toronto, Dwane Casey. Having signed a three-year deal in Dallas in 2019, Wright had a decent year off the bench, averaging 6.9 PPG, 3.8 RPG, and 3.3 APG in 73 games (21.5 MPG). But he became expendable when the club acquired Josh Richardson earlier this week.
As for the Thunder, I’d be surprised if they have big plans for Ariza or Jackson — they simply saw another opportunity to pick up an extra draft pick to add to Sam Presti‘s constantly-growing collection.
Ariza, who is still technically a member of the Blazers, has now been part of trade agreements that will send him to Houston, Detroit, and Oklahoma City within the last few days. Those deals will all be completed after the transaction moratorium lifts on Sunday.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Raptors To Bring Oshae Brissett To Camp
Free agent forward Oshae Brissett has yet to sign a new deal yet, but the Raptors intend to bring him to training camp next week, according to Blake Murphy of The Athletic (Twitter link).
Brissett was on a two-way contract with Toronto in 2019/20 and the team issued him a qualifying offer at season’s end, making him a restricted free agent. As Murphy explains, it’s not clear whether Brissett will accept that QO (putting him on another two-way deal) or work out a new standard contract with the club, but the expectation is that he’ll be sticking around.
As a rookie in 2019/20, Brissett appeared in 19 games for the Raptors, playing mostly garbage-time minutes. The former Syracuse standout averaged 1.9 PPG and 1.4 RPG in 7.1 minutes per contest. In 30 G League games for the Raptors 905, he bumped those numbers to 14.9 PPG and 6.6 RPG in 27.8 MPG.
With Brissett back in the mix, the Raptors – who will also reportedly add Henry Ellenson, Yuta Watanabe, and Alize Johnson to their training camp roster – project to have a full 20-man squad.
Contract Details: Rockets, Tatum, Ibaka, Craig, Patterson
Sterling Brown‘s new deal with the Rockets is a one-year, minimum-salary contract that is fully guaranteed, according to Keith Smith of Yahoo Sports (Twitter link). That makes it one of the simpler, more straightforward deals Houston has finalized this week.
Newly-signed forwards Bruno Caboclo and Jae’Sean Tate, on the other hand, got multiyear contracts, but they both only have $50K guarantees for now, per ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link). Caboclo will have his 2020/21 salary fully guaranteed if he’s on the opening night roster, while Tate will get a $500K partial guarantee if he survives to the regular season opener, Marks writes.
While Caboclo has a two-year, minimum-salary deal, Tate’s three-year contract required the Rockets to dip into their mid-level exception and is worth more than the minimum in year one. As Smith details (via Twitter), Tate’s first-year salary will be $1,445,697 – typically the minimum for a player with one year of NBA experience – instead of the standard rookie minimum of $898,310.
Here are a few more new contract details:
- Celtics forward Jayson Tatum got a 15% trade kicker on his new five-year, maximum-salary extension with Boston, while big man Serge Ibaka received a 15% trade kicker on his two-year contract with the Clippers, according to Keith Smith (Twitter links).
- Torrey Craig‘s one-year deal with the Bucks is a guaranteed contract worth the veteran’s minimum, tweets Smith. That doesn’t come as a surprise, as Milwaukee had no exception money left besides the minimum for Craig.
- Rather than re-signing him to a minimum-salary contract, the Clippers re-signed Patrick Patterson using his Non-Bird rights, giving him 20% more than the minimum, according to Bobby Marks (Twitter link). That means a one-year, $3.08MM contract for the veteran forward.
NBA Announces 2020 Preseason Schedule
The NBA has officially released the full schedule for its 2020 preseason, which will tip off on Friday, December 11. The preseason slate features 49 total games and runs through Saturday, December 19.
As the league explains in its press release, every team will play at least one home game and one road game. There are some clubs playing as many as four games, while others just play two or three.
The full schedule, which begins with a five-game slate that include a Lakers/Clippers matchup, can be found right here.
The NBA indicated in its announcement that the schedule for the first half of the 2020/21 regular season (December 22 through March 4) will be released “in the coming days.” The schedule for the second half (March 11 to May 16) will be announced during the latter portion of the first-half schedule, according to the league.
Spurs Sign Second-Rounder Tre Jones To Three-Year Deal
6:05pm: The Spurs have officially announced the signing in a press release.
3:18pm: The Spurs have signed former Duke guard Tre Jones to a three-year contract, agent Kevin Bradbury tells ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (Twitter link). Terms of the deal aren’t known, but Jones figures to get at least one fully guaranteed season, if not more.
[RELATED: 2020 NBA Draft Pick Signings]
As a sophomore in 2019/20, Jones averaged 16.2 PPG, 6.4 APG and 1.8 SPG in 29 games for the Blue Devils. He was named ACC Player of the Year and declared for the 2020 draft in the spring. San Antonio used the No. 41 pick last Wednesday to select him.
With Jones under contract, San Antonio now have 15 players on traditional contracts, notes ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link). While the Spurs are over the tax line, they can slip below if they waive Tyler Zeller‘s non-guaranteed contract, Marks adds.
The Spurs will use a small portion of their mid-level exception to sign Jones.
Magic Announce Five Free Agent Signings
The Magic have officially announced five free agent signings ahead of the start of training camps next week. Here are the five newly-added players to Orlando’s roster:
- Devin Cannady, G
- Robert Franks, F
- Jordan Bone, G — two-way contract (previously reported)
- Karim Mane, G — two-way contract (previously reported)
- Jon Teske, C (previously reported)
Bone and Mane project to fill the Magic’s two-way contract slots to start the season — you can read more about them and Teske in our previous stories on their contract agreements.
Cannady, who went undrafted out of Princeton in 2019, signed with Brooklyn last October, but was only on the roster for three days, allowing the Nets to claim his G League rights. He spent his rookie season with the Long Islands Nets, averaging 14.5 PPG, 4.0 RPG, and 2.6 APG in 39 NBAGL games (30.9 MPG).
As for Franks, he also went undrafted last year – out of Washington State – and spent the season in the G League. The 23-year-old power forward started the 2019/20 campaign on a two-way contract with the Hornets, but never got into an NBA game and was waived in January. He put up 17.3 PPG and 6.5 RPG in 36 G League contests for the Greensboro Swarm and Stockton Kings.
Cannady, Franks, and Teske likely won’t make Orlando’s regular season roster, but appear poised to spending training camp with the club.