Nuggets Parting Ways With Assistant GM Tommy Balcetis
The Nuggets won’t be retaining assistant general manager Tommy Balcetis, according to a report from DNVR Sports (Twitter link).
Multiple sources confirmed the news to Bennett Durando of The Denver Post, who notes that Balcetis had been on an expiring contract, which won’t be renewed.
Balcetis has been with the Nuggets since 2013. He was initially hired as the team’s basketball analytics manager and worked his way up the organization from there, earning the title of director of strategy and analytics, then VP of basketball strategy and analytics. In 2020, following Arturas Karnisovas‘ departure from the organization, Calvin Booth was promoted from assistant GM to general manager, with Balcetis promoted into Booth’s old assistant GM role.
Notably, however, it was VP of basketball operations and G League GM Ben Tenzer who was named the Nuggets’ interim general manager in April when the club dismissed Booth, with Balcetis remaining in his assistant GM position at that time.
Although Balcetis has since been mentioned as a potential candidate to become the Nuggets’ permanent head of basketball operations, the fact that the club initially chose Tenzer over him perhaps signaled that this split was coming.
With little indication that the Nuggets have been seriously considering options outside of the organization, Tenzer now looks like the clear favorite to run the team’s basketball operations department going forward, though it’s possible Denver has just done an excellent job keeping a more expansive front office search under wraps. As for Balcetis, I wouldn’t expect it to take long for him to find work with another NBA team.
2025 NBA Offseason Preview: Cleveland Cavaliers
There was widespread skepticism during the 2024 offseason about the Cavaliers' decision to continue moving forward with their four-player core of Donovan Mitchell, Darius Garland, Jarrett Allen, and Evan Mobley after the team struggled to get past the upstart Magic in round one of the playoffs and then was defeated soundly in round two by the eventual champion Celtics.
Garland was coming off an injury-plagued down year, while Allen had been unable to suit up for the Cavs' final eight playoff games due to a rib issue. There was a sense among many league observers that Cleveland would be better off trading one or both players to better balance the roster, given the overlap in skill sets between Garland and Mitchell in the backcourt and Allen and Mobley up front.
But president of basketball operations Koby Altman and his front office decided to double down on the quartet, signing three of them to new contract extensions in 2024 (the fourth, Garland, was already on a long-term deal). Rather than shaking up the roster, the Cavs made their most significant offseason move on the sidelines, where new head coach Kenny Atkinson replaced J.B. Bickerstaff.
The Cavs responded by making Altman look like a genius from day one of the 2024/25 season. They raced out to a 15-0 start and was 56-10 in mid-March before stumbling a little in the season's final weeks, going 8-8 down the stretch. Atkinson's impact was immediately evident, as a Cleveland team that ranked 16th in offensive rating (114.7) in 2023/24 put up the league's No. 1 mark (121.0) in '24/25 without sacrificing anything on defense. The club finished eighth in defensive rating, with Mobley earning Defensive Player of the Year honors.
Although the Cavs essentially didn't make any veteran roster additions ahead of the 2024/25 season, Ty Jerome returned from a season-ending ankle injury and made a greater impact than the team could've hoped for, averaging a career-high 12.5 points per game on .516/.439/.872 shooting and finishing the season as a Sixth Man of the Year finalist. Outside of Jerome and trade-deadline acquisition De'Andre Hunter though, this was essentially the same group that had won 48 games a year earlier.
Atkinson was named Coach of the Year for turning the Cavs into a 64-win team, and after demolishing the Heat in the most one-sided playoff series in NBA history, they appeared poised for a deep postseason run. Instead, they once again fell to the eventual Eastern champs in round two -- this time around, it was the Pacers who eliminated them in five games.
Cleveland was banged up in the second round, with Garland, Mobley, and Hunter each missing at least one game while Mitchell battled calf and ankle problems. But it would be hard to say definitively that they would've beaten the Pacers with better health luck. And even if they believe that to be true, the Cavs will face some difficult roster decisions in the near future, with their team salary poised to soar past the second tax apron in 2025/26.
Since the NBA's current Collective Bargaining Agreement went into effect, teams have exhibited a reluctance to operate above the second apron for more than a year or two at a time, having been willing to surpass that threshold only if they feel that they're capable of contending for a title.
The Cavs' 64 regular season wins suggest they're legitimate contenders, but their inability to get past the second round of the playoffs casts doubt on that belief. With massive tax penalties and major roster restrictions looming, the front office will have to think long and hard about whether it makes sense to run it back once more with the current group or whether it's time to entertain more significant roster changes.
The Cavaliers' Offseason Plan
Mitchell, who finished fifth in MVP voting this past season, and Mobley, a first-time Defensive Player of the Year in his age-23 season, are clearly the long-term cornerstones the Cavaliers plan to build around. They won't be available via trade this offseason. But the same can't be said about Garland and Allen. A May report indicated that the Cavs appear more open than in the past to listening to inquiries for those two other members of their "core four."
2025 NBA Offseason Preview: Houston Rockets
After getting back to .500 (41-41) in 2023/24 for the first time in four years following a full-scale rebuild, the Rockets were expected to take another step forward in '24/25. After all, six of their top eight players in minutes per game in '23/24 were still on rookie scale contracts, so it seemed safe to assume those players hadn't yet reached their respective ceilings.
Still, there were relatively modest expectations for just how big a step forward Houston would be capable of taking after a pretty quiet offseason that involved no real roster additions besides No. 3 overall pick Reed Sheppard. Oddsmakers set their over/under at 43.5 wins, and when we asked our readers last September to make their predictions, a slight majority took the "under" on that figure.
Given that context, it's hard to call the Rockets '24/25 season anything but a huge success for the franchise. Houston won 52 games, its highest single-season total since the James Harden years, and held the No. 2 seed in a competitive Western Conference for much of the season, including from March 19 onward.
Fourth-year big man Alperen Sengun followed up his breakout '23/24 campaign by earning his first All-Star nod, while second-year wing Amen Thompson displayed star potential as a two-way player, boosting his scoring total to 14.1 points per game on 55.7% shooting and emerging as one of the NBA's best defensive players -- he claimed a spot on the All-NBA first team and finished fifth in Defensive Player of the Year voting, receiving nine first-place votes.
Notably, the Rockets managed to make a significant move up the standings without major breakout seasons from any of their other young players besides Thompson. Jalen Green, Jabari Smith Jr., and Tari Eason all had good years, but their numbers were in the neighborhood of ones they'd posted in previous seasons. Meanwhile, Cam Whitmore's role was inconsistent and Sheppard had a hard time getting off the bench and cracking Houston's crowded rotation.
In other words, there's reason to believe that all of those players have room to continue improving, especially since they're are still so young -- Eason, who turned 24 last month, is the oldest of the bunch. And if some of them still have another level to reach, it stands to reason that the same is true of the Rockets as a whole.
As we enter the 2025 offseason, the big question in Houston is just how much confidence the front office has in the ability of those young players to take the next steps necessary to turn the team into a legitimate contender. Because, despite their second-place finish in the West, the Rockets weren't a legitimate contender in 2024/25 -- they had trouble generating half-court offense in the postseason and were eliminated by the seventh-seeded Warriors in round one.
The Rockets repeatedly insisted ahead of the 2025 trade deadline that they no interest in breaking up their young core to add win-now help. Will that stance change now that general manager Rafael Stone and his group have had another year - and a seven-game playoff series - to assess this roster? If so, what sort of player will they be targeting on the trade market and which young players and/or draft picks would they be willing to give up to get that player?
The Rockets' Offseason Plan
The two superstars most frequently cited as potential trade candidates this summer are Giannis Antetokounmpo and Kevin Durant. The Rockets have been linked to both players. However, Antetokounmpo has yet to actually request a trade and the Bucks aren't planning to exploring dealing him unless that happens. The Durant sweepstakes, on the other hand, appear to be heating up, with Houston among the teams engaged in discussions with the Suns.
And-Ones: Expansion, Greenwood, Anigbata, 2020 Draft
While NBA commissioner Adam Silver believes the league will “likely” expand beyond its current 30 teams sooner or later, he said during an appearance on The Dan Patrick Show this week that it’s not obvious to him that it absolutely needs to happen in the short term (Twitter video link).
“The reason I say it’s not obvious is because as a global business where something like two billion people will connect with us on social media, over a billion people over the course of the year will watch some portion of the game, adding another U.S. city, it’s unclear how much growth we’ll get as a result of that,” Silver explained, noting that expanding from 30 teams to 32 would dilute the NBA’s talent pool and result in two new partners splitting up the league’s revenue.
“… Having said that,” Silver continued, “I do believe certain markets can potentially be additive to the NBA, and that’s what we’re going to look at. I think part of it is geographic. It’s a big country. Making sure we’re represented all around the country, and then over time, maybe there’s more we can do in Canada, and Mexico City is a city we’ve talked about before.”
Silver went on to say that the NBA hasn’t met with any groups from specific cities yet, but confirmed that expansion will be a real topic of discussion at the league’s Board of Governors meetings in July.
“I don’t mean to tease people with this,” Silver said. “This is the summer we’re going to look at it seriously.”
We have more from around the basketball world:
- David Greenwood, a former UCLA star who was the No. 2 overall pick in the 1979 draft behind Magic Johnson, has passed away at age 68 after battling cancer, according to Beth Harris of The Associated Press. Greenwood appeared in over 800 regular season games across 12 NBA seasons with the Bulls, Spurs, Pistons, and Nuggets, earning a spot on the All-Rookie first team in 1980 and winning a title with Detroit in 1990. He held career averages of 10.2 points, 7.9 rebounds, and 2.0 assists in 28.4 minutes per game.
- Ahead of Sunday’s draft withdrawal deadline for early entrants, German forward Alec Anigbata has removed his name from consideration, reports Jon Chepkevich of DraftExpress (Twitter link). The 20-year-old has played a minor role for Ratiopharm Ulm in Germany this season and will become automatically draft-eligible in 2026, Chepkevich notes.
- If the 2020 NBA draft were held again knowing what we know now, Anthony Edwards would still be the No. 1 pick, but a pair of Tyreses – Tyrese Haliburton and Tyrese Maxey – would move into the top three after initially being drafted at No. 12 and No. 21, respectively, according to HoopsHype. In HoopsHype’s 2020 re-draft, a series of late first-rounders move into the top 10, with Desmond Bane jumping from No. 30 to No. 5 while Jaden McDaniels (No. 28 to No. 6), Immanuel Quickley (No. 25 to No. 9), and Payton Pritchard (No. 26 to No. 10) also make big leaps.
Western Notes: Spurs, Williamson, Nuggets, Wolves, Clippers
The Spurs are expected to hire Corliss Williamson to be an assistant coach on Mitch Johnson‘s new staff in San Antonio, league sources tell Marc Stein of The Stein Line (Twitter link).
A former star at Arkansas and a Sixth Man of the Year in the NBA, Williamson appeared in over 800 regular season games for four NBA teams from 1995-2007 and won championships at both the NCAA and NBA level. He transitioned into coaching in 2007 after retiring as a player, spending a few years with college programs in his home state of Arkansas before making the leap to the NBA.
Williamson, who has spent the past two years as a member of Chris Finch‘s coaching staff with the Timberwolves, has also had stints as an assistant in Sacramento, Orlando, and Phoenix.
Here are a few more items of interest from around the Western Conference:
- Checking in on where things stand with the Nuggets‘ front office search, Bennett Durando of The Denver Post (subscription required) says the club’s goal is to resolve the situation before the June 25 draft, even though Denver doesn’t control a 2025 pick. Given how little chatter there has been about outside candidates for the job, in-house executives Ben Tenzer (the current interim general manager) and Tommy Balcetis still look like the best bets for the full-time position, Durando writes, though he acknowledges it’s possible the team has just done a very good job of keeping other targets under wraps.
- While the Timberwolves will almost certainly be a taxpayer again in 2025/26, the big question they’ll have to answer is where they’ll draw the line, Yossi Gozlan writes in previewing the team’s offseason for The Third Apron (Substack link). Gozlan predicts Minnesota will try to get below the second tax apron either this offseason or at least by the end of 2025/26 to avoid having another future first-round pick frozen. He also explores how the team might handle its free agents and wonders if the Wolves could reduce their 2025/26 team salary by having Julius Randle decline his player option in order to sign a multiyear deal with a lower starting salary.
- Keith Smith of Spotrac looks ahead to what’s on tap for the Clippers this offseason, discussing James Harden‘s contract situation, considering what the team might do with its other free agents, and evaluating whether an extension for Norman Powell makes sense, among other topics. We published our own Clippers offseason preview earlier this week.
Phil Pressey To Coach Celtics’ G League Team
Former NBA guard Phil Pressey will be named the head coach of the Maine Celtics, Boston’s G League affiliate, league sources tell Michael Scotto of HoopsHype (Twitter link).
Pressey, 34, played college ball at Missouri from 2010-13 and then signed with the Celtics after going undrafted. He appeared in 125 regular season games across two seasons for Boston before spending time with the Sixers and Suns in 2015/16. From 2016-22, he competed in the G League and in various leagues in Spain, Turkey, and Germany.
Pressey averaged 3.2 points and 2.9 assists in 13.6 minutes per game across 148 total NBA appearances, with a .341/.254/.630 shooting line.
A year after ending his playing career, Pressey rejoined the Celtics in 2023 as a player enhancement coach under Joe Mazzulla. He has spent the past two seasons in that role.
Pressey will be replacing Tyler Lashbrook, who was Maine’s head coach in 2024/25 after spending the previous season in Boston as a player development coach. It’s unclear whether Lashbrook will be rejoining the Celtics’ NBA staff or leaving the team for a new opportunity, but he did well in Maine this past season, leading the G League squad to a 21-13 regular season record and an appearance in the NBAGL’s Eastern Conference Finals.
Suns Engaged In KD Trade Talks With Rockets, Heat, Wolves
With trade negotiations heating up ahead of the June 25 draft, the Rockets, Heat, and Timberwolves have been the teams most seriously engaged with the Suns in recent days about a potential deal for Kevin Durant, ESPN’s Shams Charania said during an appearance on The Pat McAfee Show on Friday (Twitter video link).
“(The Suns have) had about six to eight teams reach out,” Charania said. “There’s been interest, there’s been some offers, there’s been some negotiations. But really in the last 24 to 48 hours, I’m told, the focus of the Suns’ conversations has been on a few of the teams: the Houston Rockets, the Miami Heat, and the Minnesota Timberwolves. I’m told those are the three teams right now where a lot of the focus for Durant lies.”
When Charania reported earlier this week that the Suns, Durant, and KD’s business partner and manager Rich Kleiman were sifting through potential trade scenarios, he mentioned those three clubs, along with the Knicks and Spurs, as possibilities for the superstar forward.
Since then, multiple reports from beat writers covering the Knicks have indicated New York isn’t pursuing Durant, while a report on Thursday suggested there’s growing skepticism about San Antonio acquiring the former MVP.
That doesn’t mean that Houston, Miami, and Minnesota are the only suitors still in the mix, however.
When John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7 (YouTube link) discussed the situation during a radio appearance on Thursday, he said he’s also keeping an eye on the Spurs, Raptors, and Clippers in addition to the Rockets, Heat, and Timberwolves, adding that there may be a couple other wild-card teams in play too. ESPN’s Tim Bontemps and Brian Windhorst also mentioned the Clippers today as a possible Durant suitor.
Gambadoro also mentioned that he believes Durant prefers to end up with one of the Texas teams – San Antonio and Houston – though that sounds more like informed speculation than hard reporting.
Interestingly, both Charania and Gambadoro believe a trade could be consummated well in advance of the draft. Gambadoro said during Thursday’s Burns & Gambo show that he’s predicting a deal will occur at some point next week. Asked on Friday on McAfee’s show about that report, Charania concurred.
“You said a week. I think it could be even sooner than that,” Charania said. “I think there’s some motivation with some teams. Potentially even sooner than seven days. Maybe in the next few days we could get some Kevin Durant trade action.”
As Kurt Helin of NBC Sports points out, commissioner Adam Silver and the league office have typically discouraged teams from making (or at least leaking) mid-June blockbuster trades that would upstage the NBA Finals, so even though there appears to be traction on the Durant front, that’s a factor to consider when projecting a timeline for an agreement.
The NBA Finals could end on Monday at the earliest, with a potential Game 6 scheduled for Thursday (June 19) and Game 7 to be played next Sunday (June 22), if necessary.
Bontemps/Windhorst’s Latest: Durant, Clippers, Knicks, Jerome
Kevin Durant said in February that he was “blindsided” when he learned that the Suns were discussing potential trades involving him without his knowledge, and sources tell ESPN’s Tim Bontemps and Brian Windhorst that there was some disagreement within the organization about how those talks were handled.
According to ESPN’s duo, that situation is one reason why Suns owner Mat Ishbia and new general manager Brian Gregory have spoken repeatedly about a desire for all of the team’s leaders to be in “alignment” going forward. It’s also why Durant and his manager Rich Kleiman are being kept in the loop during this summer’s trade talks.
Still, while the Suns would ideally like to find a deal that Durant is happy with, finding “alignment” with the star forward on that front is ultimately less important for the franchise than maximizing its return in any KD trade, as Bontemps and Windhorst observe. League sources who have spoken to ESPN believe Phoenix may have a hard time finding a package the front office will be satisfied with, though there’s still a sense a deal could get done before or during the draft.
Bontemps and Windhorst identify the Clippers as one potential dark-horse suitor to watch in the Durant sweepstakes, echoing an earlier report from John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7.
Here are a few more highlights from that ESPN report:
- Due in part to a lack of high-end free agents and teams with cap room, one source who spoke to ESPN predicted the draft will be busier than normal in terms of trades and might even be the summer’s “high point of activity.”
- The Knicks were declined permission to speak to five head coaches currently under contract with rival teams, but there’s a belief that those initial denials may not be the end of the team’s pursuit of Mavericks coach Jason Kidd and/or Bulls coach Billy Donovan, per Bontemps and Windhorst. K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Sports Network (Twitter link) has heard similar rumblings, but he says Donovan “isn’t going anywhere” and is “in Chicago to stay.” We wrote more on Thursday about why New York may not be ready to move on from Kidd right away.
- While there’s an expectation around the NBA that it may take the full non-taxpayer mid-level exception ($14.1MM) to sign free agent guard Ty Jerome this summer, the Cavaliers are hopeful that he’ll be willing to re-sign in Cleveland for a little less than that, sources tell ESPN. With starting point guard Darius Garland coming off toe surgery, the Cavs may feel some added pressure to bring back Jerome, but the cost would be high, since the club projects to operate above the second tax apron and will face a substantial luxury tax bill.
- In case you missed it, Bontemps and Windhorst also shared a handful of Bucks-related notes and rumors, which we rounded up in a separate story.
Bucks Rumors: Giannis, Tax, Lopez, Portis, Point Guards
After stating during multiple television appearances this week that a Giannis Antetokounmpo trade appears unlikely to happen in the short term, ESPN’s Brian Windhorst reiterated that point on Friday in a an ESPN.com story co-authored by Tim Bontemps.
At the moment, Windhorst and Bontemps say, the expectation around the NBA is that Antetokounmpo will still be in Milwaukee by the time the 2025/26 season tips off.
However, the ESPN duo stresses that’s just where things stand as of today. It doesn’t necessarily mean the situation won’t change at some point this offseason, since there’s no indication Antetokounmpo has definitively told the Bucks that he’s staying. It remains possible he could request a change of scenery later in the summer if he decides he’s not thrilled with the team’s direction.
For now though, the Bucks aren’t listening to trade inquiries on Antetokounmpo and aren’t expected to make any deal involving the two-time MVP in the short term.
Here’s more on the Bucks from Windhorst and Bontemps:
- In meetings since the Bucks’ season ended, general manager Jon Horst and head coach Doc Rivers have presented plans to keep the core of the roster intact around Antetokounmpo, per ESPN. Milwaukee went 10-4 without Damian Lillard in March and April and is optimistic about its ability to contend for a top-six playoff spot until he’s ready to return, which the club hopes will happen before the end of the 2025/26 season, as Windhorst and Bontemps explain.
- Personnel around the NBA are curious about the Bucks’ appetite to be a taxpayer in ’25/26 after paying substantial penalties in recent years, according to Windhorst and Bontemps, who hear from sources that the team is indeed prepared to operate above the tax line again. It would be difficult for the Bucks to retain free agent big men Brook Lopez and Bobby Portis without surpassing that threshold, ESPN’s duo notes.
- While Milwaukee may be a taxpayer again next season, rival teams think the Bucks will look to operate below the first tax apron, giving them access to at least part of the non-taxpayer mid-level exception. The team may need that MLE to sign a free agent point guard to step in for Lillard. According to Windhorst and Bontemps, Dennis Schröder, Tyus Jones, and Malcolm Brogdon are a few names to watch.
Nuggets’ Russell Westbrook To Opt Out Of Contract
Nuggets point guard Russell Westbrook won’t exercise his $3.47MM player option for the 2025/26 season, league sources tell Marc Stein of The Stein Line (Twitter link).
Declining that option will put Westbrook on track to become an unrestricted free agent this summer. He would have the opportunity at that time to either re-sign with Denver or join a new team.
Westbrook, 36, played a significant role for the Nuggets after signing with the team as a free agent during the 2024 offseason. He averaged 13.3 points, 6.1 assists, 4.9 rebounds, and 1.4 steals in 27.9 minutes per game across 75 appearances (36 starts) during the regular season, with a .449/.323/.661 shooting line. He also contributed 11.7 PPG, 2.6 APG, and 3.7 RPG in 13 playoff contests (24.1 MPG).
A former MVP and a nine-time All-Star, Westbrook is a polarizing player for a future Hall of Famer. He was lauded by coaches and teammates in Denver this past season for his energy, competitiveness, and leadership, and remains an excellent play-maker and an elite rebounder at his position. However, he’s also an inefficient scorer whose high-energy style often results in out-of-control plays and a high turnover rate.
Despite his flaws, Westbrook has been a great value on minimum-salary contracts in recent years after earning the maximum for much of his playing career. Since being bought out by the Jazz in 2023, he has opted for situations with the Clippers and Nuggets where he can play a major role on a team with championship aspirations. If money were more of a priority, Westbrook could likely have done better than the veteran’s minimum on the open market over the last couple seasons.
His decision to decline his option doesn’t come as a major surprise, since his $3,468,960 option was based on a 5% raise on this past season’s minimum salary. With the salary cap expected to rise by 10%, Westbrook’s new minimum projects to be $3,634,153, so even if he wants to remain with the Nuggets, opting out to sign a new contract makes sense.
It’s also worth noting that if Westbrook signs a one-year minimum-salary deal with Denver or another team, his cap hit for 2025/26 would be just $2,296,274. If he signs another one-plus-one contract that includes a second-year option, his cap charge would be equivalent to his actual salary, whether or not he earns the minimum.
Westbrook is currently recovering from a procedure to repair multiple ligament tears in his right hand.