Brian Cook

And-Ones: BIG3, 10-Day Contracts, Dorsey

The latest batch of retired NBA players to commit to the new BIG3 League has been announced, tweets Brian Mahoney of the Associated Press. Joining the new three-on-three league will be Latrell Sprewell, Isaiah Rider, Earl Boykins, Brian Cook and Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf.

Sprewell, 46, averaged 18.3 points per game over the course of a 13-year career and was most recently spotted sitting courtside at a Knicks game with team owner James Dolan. Rider averaged over 19 points four times over the course of six seasons between 1994 and 2000 and is now 45 years old.

Abdul-Rauf, now 47, is the oldest of the bunch but averaged north of 18.0 points per game three times during a nine-year NBA career. Once known as Chris Jackson prior to converting to Islam in 1993, Abdul-Rauf averaged 29.0 points per game in two NCAA seasons with LSU.

There’s more from around the NBA:

  • Now that the Warriors have officially signed Briante Weber to a second 10-day contract, an uncommon contract mechanism has come in to play. As Danny Leroux of RealGM tweets, Weber’s contract will actually last through Golden State’s February 25th game against the Nets because 10-day contracts formally span the longer of either 10 days or three NBA games. For more about 10-day contracts, consider our glossary feature on the matter.
  • Former NBA player Joey Dorsey has signed a contract to play with Best Balikesir in Turkey, Emiliano Carchia of Sportando reports. The 33-year-old last played for the Rockets during the 2014/15 campaign.
  • Several NBA teams including the Nuggets, Spurs and Jazz are said to be pursuing Serbian free agent Milos Teodosic, writes Djordie Matic of Novosti (via Emiliano Carchia of Sportando). The 29-year-old will be eligible to sign with a club when his current contract with CSKA Moscow expires on July 1.

Pistons Waive Thabeet, Cook, Bostic, Brown

The Pistons have waived Hasheem Thabeet, Brian Cook, Lorenzo Brown and Josh Bostic, the team announced via press release. That means the team has cut ties with all four of the players it had on non-guaranteed contracts, leaving only 16 fully guaranteed deals.

Thabeet was hoping to rehabilitate a foundering career after the Sixers waived him in September, shortly after the Thunder sent him to Philadelphia in a cost-cutting trade. Still, Joel Anthony‘s arrival in the swap the Pistons made Friday with the Celtics gave Detroit another backup center and made Thabeet’s long-shot chances of making it to opening night with the club even worse. Cook was hoping to turn an appearance in Pistons summer league into his first NBA regular season action since 2011/12. Brown wound up in Pistons camp after a failed physical prompted Italy’s Reyer Venezia to call off their deal earlier in the summer, while Bostic is a veteran of the overseas circuit, having spent much of his pro career in international leagues since going undrafted in 2009.

None of the four saw significant playing time in preseason games this month. The Pistons and the agents for Bostic and Brown have discussed an arrangement in which Detroit would keep the D-League rights to the pair, who would sign to play for the team’s new one-to-one affiliate in Grand Rapids. Detroit can keep the D-League rights to as many as four of its preseason cuts.

Pistons Sign Brian Cook For Camp

The Pistons have signed nine-year NBA veteran big man NBA Brian Cook, the team announced via press release. The release also officially announces the signings of Hasheem Thabeet, Lorenzo Brown and Josh Bostic, who’d reportedly reached deals earlier with the team. The Pistons have the capacity to give Cook more than the minimum, but it’s unlikely that Detroit has done so. It’s unclear if there’s any guaranteed money involved, though the Pistons already have fully guaranteed deals with 16 players.

Cook hasn’t played in a regular season game since splitting the 2011/12 season between the Clippers and Wizards, but he did appear with the Pistons summer league team this past July, averaging 9.3 points and 5.0 rebounds in 21.3 minutes per game. He went to training camp with the Wizards in the fall of 2012 and the Jazz last autumn, but he failed to make the opening-night roster both times. The 6’9″ 33-year-old is a career backup in the NBA, never having averaged more than 18.9 MPG in the regular season.

Today’s moves bring the Pistons to 20 players, the preseason maximum. Cook, Thabeet, Brown and Bostic have little shot of making the regular season roster, but coach/executive Stan Van Gundy can retain the D-League rights to some of them for the team’s new one-to-one affiliate in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Odds & Ends: Cavs, Jackson, Gordon, Ennis

The Cavs have won four straight since firing former GM Chris Grant. One of interim GM David Griffin‘s priorities was to improve the rumored chaos in the Cleveland locker room according to Sam Amico of FOX Sports Ohio (via Twitter). Amico says that Griffin told both Kyrie Irving and Dion Waiters they would not be traded, and urged the team to have fun and avoid stress (Twitter link), which could explain some of the team’s sudden positivity. Here are the rest of the notes from around the league:

  • Mark Jackson took some critical comments made earlier by Warriors owner Joe Lacob in stride, per Tim Kawakami of Bay Area News Group. Jackson said he “understands” why the owner is disappointed with the team’s performance, adding, with a laugh: “I stopped reading [Lacob’s comments]. I was getting depressed.”
  • Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders said he wouldn’t be surprised if Ben Gordon wound up on the Suns before the upcoming trade deadline, in response to a tweeted question he received (Twitter link). This would fall in line with the Suns’ reported preference of landing a perimeter player.
  • Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim doesn’t think consensus top-10 draft prospect Tyler Ennis will enter the draft this summer, per Seth Davis of SI.com. “I think he knows and his father knows that he’s a really good college player. He has to become a better shooter and get stronger to go to the next level,” said Boeheim. “He’d go in the first round, but look at the number of first-round picks who are already out of the league in the last two years. It’s a huge number.” (hat tip to Adam Zagoria of SNY.tv)
  • Representatives from the Bulls attended a Eurobasket game to get a look at Nolan Smith, per David Pick of Eurobasket.com. The 25-year-old point guard spent two years with the Blazers, and was expected to join the Celtics for training camp this summer before heading overseas. Smith has averaged 9.9 minutes per game in his NBA career, and declined in nearly every statistical category last year.
  • Free agent Brian Cook is attempting to make an NBA return, according to a source for Shams Charania of RealGM.com (via Twitter). The 33-year-old has nine years of NBA experience, but he hasn’t played in the NBA since splitting time with the Clippers and Wizards in the 2011/12 season.

Jazz Waive Cook, McGuire, Holiday, Hudson, Machado

The Jazz announced that they have cut Brian Cook, Dominic McGuire, Justin Holiday, Lester Hudson and Scott Machado.  Utah’s roster is now down to 15, including the injured Brandon Rush and Marvin Williams.

Today’s news means that Mike Harris and Jamaal Tinsley have both made the cut for the Jazz. Tinsley’s signing, necessitated when rookie point guard Trey Burke broke his hand earlier this month, likely cost one of today’s camp cuts a spot on the team. All five were on fully non-guaranteed deals, so the Jazz aren’t on the hook for their salaries.

Everyone the Jazz brought to camp has NBA experience, and that includes Harris, who’ll begin his fourth NBA season on opening night. The power forward has played sparingly, totaling just 34 games across stints with the Rockets and Wizards, but coach Tyrone Corbin values the mobility of his 6’6″, 235-pound frame, as Jody Genessy of the Deseret News points out (on Twitter).

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

Odds & Ends: Jazz, Odom, Howard, Nelson, Brooks

With seven preseason games on the schedule for Tuesday night, let’s take a look at some odds and ends from around the NBA:

  • Aaron Falk of the Salt Lake Tribune spoke to Jazz coach Tyrone Corbin and some of the team’s camp invitees — including Justin Holiday, Scott Machado and Brian Cookabout the roster cuts the team will have to make within the next couple of weeks to get down to 15 players.
  • We haven’t heard too much about Lamar Odom since the strange reports about his off-the-court issues surfaced in August. Ramona Shelburne of ESPN LA tweets that the Lakers reached out to Odom recently, but that the contact was strictly for personal reasons.
  • With the Magic in town to face the Rockets on Wednesday, Dwight Howard spoke to Orlando-area reporters, including Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel, about what has been a whirlwind of a two years for the Houston center.  While Howard expressed regret about how things ended in Orlando, he implied that the situation in Los Angeles was different, and that Houston simply represented the best place for him to be.
  • Meanwhile in post-Dwight Orlando, 31-year-old Jameer Nelson is happy to play the role of elder statesman on a young and improving Magic team, writes Jeff Caplan of NBA.com. Caplan writes that Nelson, a veteran in the second year of a three-year deal, is aware that he will probably be shopped this winter unless the Magic surprise everyone and contend.
  • We heard earlier tonight from Stefan Bondy of the New York Daily News that MarShon Brooks had expressed a desire to be traded from the Nets before he was part of the blockbuster with the Celtics. Bondy provides several quotes from Brooks, now in Boston, in his complete story: “I wasn’t really sure with [Jason Kidd becoming coach]. I didn’t know what to expect. Last year obviously we knew what was going on, it was so rocky, I didn’t know if I was playing. There just wasn’t any structure to any of my minutes.. So it was kind of hard for me to perform under those circumstances and obviously I didn’t want to be in that situation next year.”

Jazz Announce Three Camp Signings

The Jazz have officially announced the signings of Brian Cook, Justin Holiday and Dwayne Jones. Agreements involving all three had been reported this month. The team has 19 players under contract, though that doesn't include Nick Covington's deal, which we heard about this weekend.

Cook, Holiday and Jones all have NBA experience, though Cook has by far the most among the three, and he ranks in the top 10 among all of this year's NBA camp invitees in games played. Holiday is the only one of the trio to have appeared in a game last season, as he saw action in nine contests for the Sixers, alongside younger brother Jrue Holiday.

The Jazz have only 12 fully guaranteed contracts and Ian Clark's partially guaranteed deal, but with a full contingent of players for camp, none of the players on non-guaranteed deals seem like safe bets for the opening-night roster.

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Brian Cook Agrees To Camp Deal With Jazz

Veteran big man Brian Cook will join the Jazz for training camp, tweets Jody Genessy of the Deseret News. He'll be the 19th player on Utah's preseason roster as he seeks to play a 10th NBA season.

The Wizards waived Cook at the end of training camp last year, and he spent the season with the Piratas de Quebradillas in Puerto Rico, as our International Player Movement Tracker shows. The Puerto Rican deal had an NBA out, but Cook didn't exercise it before he became a free agent this summer. He switched agents in August, hiring Herb Rudoy of Interperformances.

Cook's last official NBA action came in 2011/12, when he split 32 games between the Wizards and Clippers, totaling just 81 points and 276 minutes. He had a more significant role with the Clips in 2010/11, averaging 4.8 points and 2.4 rebounds in 11.2 minutes per game. The former first-round pick has a decent shot at making the Jazz opening night roster, since the team has only 12 fully guaranteed contracts and Ian Clark's partially guaranteed deal.

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Odds & Ends: Faried, Favors, Henry, Cook

A few random notes from around the league:

Knicks Eyeing Another Point Guard

Citing a source close to the team, ESPN New York's Jared Zwerling reports that the Knicks are considering adding a veteran point guard to supplement Raymond Felton, Jason Kidd and Pablo Prigioni.  While injuries have decimated their frontcourt, Zwerling says a lack of free agent options has led the Knicks to consider opting for guard help.

Zwerling indicates that the Knicks are ideally looking for a point guard that has some speed and quickness, in contrast to the wisdom and decision making of the older Kidd and Prigioni.  The source points to Delonte West, Sundiata Gaines and Jannero Pargo as options, with West being the most likely.  While West has some issues – as evidenced by his absence from the NBA this year – the Saint Joseph's product would join a veteran roster in New York.  Meanwhile, all signs point towards Pargo signing a 10-day contract with Charlotte tomorrow.  So unless that deal falls through, the Knicks would have to hope the Bobcats let him walk once his contract expires if they want to pursue him.

Two of those veterans are injured big men Amare Stoudemire and Rasheed Wallace, both out for the remainder of the regular season.  Zwerling says Mike Woodson remains committed to Wallace, probably making James White the odd man out should the team decide it needs a roster spot. 

Should the Knicks decide their need for frontcourt help is too pressing to consider anything else, Zwerling lists Henry Sims, Tony Battie, Josh Boone, Brian Cook, Dan Gadzuric, Troy Murphy, Ben Wallace, Hassan Whiteside and Sean Williams as potential targets.  While Sims provides the most intrigue of the bunch, Zwerling says the Knicks would prefer a veteran.