Broussard’s Latest: Carmelo, Rondo, Love
Most of the executives to whom ESPN Insider’s Chris Broussard has spoken believe the Bulls will make a run at Carmelo Anthony this summer. Some are “completely convinced” Chicago will go after him, Broussard writes. A rival GM thinks the team’s confidence in Nikola Mirotic‘s ability will play heavily into the team’s decision regarding Anthony. A report in recent days indicated the Bulls are among the front runners for last year’s scoring champ. Broussard has plenty more in latest piece, and we’ll round it up here:
- Rajon Rondo quickly ended extension talks with the Celtics, and the discussions didn’t even get to the numbers stage, according to Broussard, who says the point guard wants to keep his options open as he seeks a payday and a winning situation. Rondo has expressed his commitment to Boston, but the Knicks, who remain interested in trading for him, view him as the perfect complement to Anthony.
- A GM tells Broussard that it’s “a 100% certainty” that Kevin Love will sign with the Lakers after next season. Most executives who’ve spoken to the ESPN.com scribe also believe the former UCLA star is headed for the purple-and-gold.
- The Lakers might be willing to overpay Eric Bledsoe to bring him aboard via restricted free agency this summer, a source tells Broussard. Suns owner Robert Sarver has indicated he’s willing to match any offer for the point guard, so it’d be a surprise if Bledsoe wound up back in L.A.
- If the Celtics, who are looking to clear cap room, can find takers for Gerald Wallace, Jeff Green and Avery Bradley, “they’re gone,” Broussard says. It’s not a surprise that GM Danny Ainge would be quick to unload Wallace, but his apparent enthusiasm for moving Green and Bradley is noteworthy.
- The Raptors had engaged in trade talk with other clubs about DeMar DeRozan and Kyle Lowry before their run to the top of the Atlantic Division, but Toronto is no longer looking to move DeRozan, barring an substantial offer. Broussard hears the Raptors are not high enough on Lowry to offer him a sizable contract when he hits free agency this summer, but an opposing GM thinks Toronto will hang on to Lowry through the trade deadline because of fears about alienating the fan base.
- The Pacers will only trade Danny Granger if another team “blows them away” with an offer, Broussard writes.
- Broussard detects a strong sense around the league that the Pistons are eager to trade Josh Smith.
- The Sixers would be willing to take back a little bit of salary to acquire draft picks for their veterans, according to Broussard. I assume he’s referring to long-term salary commitments rather than players on expiring deals.
- The strong play of the Grizzlies has quieted chatter surrounding Zach Randolph, Broussard reports.
- The Heat are interested in Andrew Bynum, but they’re unwilling to pay him more than the minumum salary, an executive tells Broussard. Bynum is reportedly holding out for more than that.
- GMs who spoke to Broussard identified the following players as candidates to be traded before the deadline: Andre Miller, Jameer Nelson, Emeka Okafor, Kenneth Faried, Shawn Marion, Dion Waiters, Jarrett Jack, Francisco Garcia and Arron Afflalo.
Northwest Rumors: Miller, Nuggets, Blazers
During last night’s game against the Pacers, the Nuggets honored Carl Scheer, the man who owned the club during their ABA days and helped position them for the big move to the NBA. “We were the outlaws to the NBA guys,” Scheer told Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer. “We had small markets and no real television contract. We had to find ways to entertain people.” Scheer, the creator of the slam-dunk contest, was part of a group that also dreamed up red-white-and-blue basketballs and the three-point line. More on the Nuggets and other notes out of the Northwest..
- One league official tells Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN (on Twitter) that Nuggets guard Andre Miller will be a member of the Timberwolves or Kings before the February trade deadline. Recently, our own Chuck Myron examined the veteran guard as a trade candidate.
- The best move the Nuggets can make is to not make one, argues Christopher Dempsey of the Denver Post. Moving the disgruntled Miller, however, is a different story.
- General Manager Neil Olshey deserves a great deal of credit for the job he has done with the Trail Blazers, tweets Alex Kennedy of Basketball Insiders.
Western Notes: Lakers, Love, Shaw, Lee
The Star Tribune transcribed TNT analyst Charles Barkley’s recent input on Inside the NBA regarding when Kobe Bryant should return from his injury. “It’s not going to matter, [the Lakers] are going to stink with him or without him, it really doesn’t make a difference. They are not a good team, they are not going to be a good team. If he is thinking about the future and he wants to win another championship, they should try to get a great draft pick. He should get healthy for the rest of the season. I think he will make a big mistake coming back.”
Some other notes around the Western Conference.
- With the Lakers losing 15 of their last 18 games, it came as a bit of a surprise to ESPN’s Dave McMenamin when Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak expressed “unbridled optimism” regarding his current roster. Kupchak thinks it is possible for the Lakers to be fun to watch if “they play hard and compete” but McMenamin disagrees and details why there is “no joy in Laker land these days”. McMenamin thinks it is time the Lakers realize their limitations and make personnel changes instead of sending their players out to continue to promise change in play soon.
- Another team being urged to realize their limitations is the Timberwolves. Jim Souhan of the Star Tribune takes a critical look at what Kevin Love has brought to Minnesota. Love has achieved much individually while on the Wolves, but Souhan points out the team has never won more than 31 games since Love has arrived. Love isn’t all to blame, according to Souhan. Front office moves, aside from trading for Love on draft night, have been less than stellar. However, Souhan wonders when the Wolves front office will decide if Love is a player Minnesota can win with, as a team. They already know they can’t win without him, but Love needs to prove “he can carry a flawed team” soon.
- If it weren’t for Pacers coach Frank Vogel returning a favor, the Nuggets may not have Brian Shaw as current head coach. According to Aaron Lopez of Nuggets.com, after changes to the 76ers coaching staff, Vogel was without a job and Shaw encouraged the Lakers to hire Vogel as a scout. Six years later, Vogel intercepted Shaw en route to interview for an analyst job and convinced Shaw he was more coach than analyst. Shaw never completed his trip to interview with ESPN, and after two seasons in Indiana was hired by the Nuggets as their head coach.
- Rockets head coach Kevin McHale told Jenny Creech of the Houston Chronicle he is happy with how recently traded guard Courtney Lee is fitting in with the Grizzlies. Lee has averaged 15.3 PPG in the nine games he has played for Memphis since being sent there from the Celtics in a three team deal earlier this month. McHale praised Lee as one of his favorite players who will play better as his role becomes more defined. According to McHale, Lee “will fit in nice” with the role Memphis has placed him in since arriving. Lee played one season under McHale on the Rockets.
Trade Candidate: Andre Miller
It’s been more than two weeks since Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports tweeted that many around the league believed the Nuggets were trying to trade Andre Miller within the next 48 hours. Talk surrounding the 37-year-old point guard has cooled considerably since then, even though he still hasn’t appeared in a game since his confrontation with coach Brian Shaw during a game on January 2nd. The news that Danilo Gallinari will miss the season no doubt deals a fatal blow to whatever hope of contention the Nuggets may have clung to, meaning there’s less reason to keep an wily-but-aging backup around.
The notion that the Nuggets might trade Miller predates his clash with Shaw, as evidenced by chatter from this past summer. Earlier this season, teams around the league were expecting the Nuggets to unload Miller before the deadline. Miller’s value has no doubt taken a hit during the season, the least productive of his 15-year career. His minutes are at unprecedented lows, but his per-36-minute scoring and assist averages are lower than ever, too.
Still, he’s one of the most durable players in the history of the league. This is the first season in which he’s missed more than two games, but all of his absences have come as a result of his rift with Shaw rather than injury. His statistical declines this season could have as much to do with a poor fit in Shaw’s system as they do with any physical breakdown. Surely, all of his skills haven’t eroded so quickly.
Miller doesn’t possess the floor-stretching ability to shoot from long range that many teams require of their perimeter players, as most of his shots come from around the basket. Still, he creates plenty of looks for others with his crafty passing. He somehow managed to finish 18th in the league in total assists last season despite playing only 26.2 minutes per game, and he was 17th in assist percentage.
The 15th year veteran could help a team like the Suns, who are last in the league in assist percentage, according to NBA.com, in spite of the presence of Goran Dragic to pick up the slack while Eric Bledsoe‘s torn meniscus heals. Suns owner Robert Sarver calls his team a work in progress, so perhaps he’d be willing to have GM Ryan McDonough bring Miller aboard to show Bledsoe a few tricks and to help the team make the playoffs this season. The Nuggets might like to acquire Channing Frye to help with their shooting, though adding another big man to Denver’s crowded frontcourt doesn’t seem ideal.
The Kings are fourth worst in assist percentage, which explains their entreaties for Miller. Sacramento is reportedly anxious to move Marcus Thornton, but their package of either Thornton or Jimmer Fredette plus a second-round pick for Miller apparently hasn’t prompted the Nuggets to budge. That could change by the deadline, and Thornton could be an intriguing buy-low candidate for Denver, but it doesn’t look like there’s much traction here.
The Rockets have the sixth-worst assist percentage, and I’m not sure if either Patrick Beverley or Jeremy Lin is a championship-caliber point guard. Houston possesses plenty of long-range shooting that the Nuggets could use, but analytically driven GM Daryl Morey might not want to sacrifice any of the three-point arsenal he so highly values to go after an aging point guard who might not be a significant upgrade. The Knicks have been trying to find a way into Miller talks, but they don’t appear to have the sort of assets the Nuggets are seeking.
Miller, for as much guile, ball movement, and reliability as he can provide, is overpaid this season on a $5MM salary. He makes $4.625MM next year in the final year of his deal, but that’s only partially guaranteed for $2MM as long as he’s waived before July. He seems the sort of player that a contender willing to swallow hard and open its pockets would trade for in hopes of inching closer to a title. He could also be a fill-in for one of those teams if in case of an injury at the point guard position. The Nuggets don’t have much at stake this season, so they can afford to sit back and wait for other teams to come calling. The urgency lies with the teams seeking Miller, and so I wouldn’t be surprised if Denver doesn’t trade him until the deadline, when teams are under pressure to submit their best offers.
Danilo Gallinari To Miss Season
Danilo Gallinari will miss the rest of the season after undergoing surgery on his ACL today, tweets Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. Gallinari didn’t have ACL surgery this past spring, instead having a procedure done to repair his meniscus, according to Wojnarowski (Twitter link). The Nuggets announced in April that he had torn the ACL in his left knee, and he hasn’t played in a game since. The doctor who performed the initial surgery believed Gallinari could strengthen the ACL enough to play on it without the traditional operation, but the knee didn’t respond, as Wojnarowski explains in his full story.
Gallinari said last week that the thought of missing the entire season had crossed his mind, a change from earlier, when he indicated he didn’t consider that a possibility. The Nuggets haven’t been the same without him, compiling a 20-20 record so far compared to last season’s 57-25 mark. The Warriors upset the Nuggets when they were without Gallinari in last year’s playoffs.
The 25-year-old is in the midst of a four-year, $42MM extension that runs through 2015/16 and pays him more than $10.1MM this season. The deadline to apply for a disabled player exception was January 15th, so the capped-out Nuggets can only sign a minimum-salary player to replace him. Today’s announcement strengthens the chance that Denver will look to make changes that favor the future over the present come the trade deadline.
The Nuggets will recoup some of their obligation to Gallinari this season through their insurance policy, which pays 80% of his salary for any games he misses over the latter part of the season. That’ll work out to a savings of about $4.5MM, tweets Chris Dempsey of the Denver Post.
Players Eligible To Be Traded As Of Today
It’s been an active season for trades in the NBA. We’re still more than a month away from the deadline and we’ve already seen five swaps, including today’s three-teamer between the Warriors, Celtics and Heat. The door to the action opens just a little bit wider today, as seven more players become eligible to be included in trades. It’s not quite a landmark sort of occasion like December 15th, when most free agents signed in the offseason, along with a few others, become fair game for trades, but the arrival of January 15th nonetheless represents one fewer obstacle to player movement.
Players who received a raise of better than 20% this summer when they re-signed via Bird or Early Bird rights with a team that was over the cap weren’t eligible to be traded until today, as long as they were making more than the minimum salary last season. That narrow distinction applies to the following players:
- Tony Allen, Grizzlies
- Chase Budinger, Timberwolves
- Timofey Mozgov, Nuggets
- J.R. Smith, Knicks
- Tiago Splitter, Spurs
- Nikola Pekovic, Timberwolves
- Brandan Wright, Mavericks
The Wolves are the only team with two players on that list, but J.R. Smith seems far and away the most likely trade candidate, and he’s uncertain about his future in New York, as we passed along this morning. It doesn’t seem as though there’s much of a market for him, but if a team wants to engage in talks with the Knicks about the reigning Sixth Man of the Year, collective bargaining agreement rules won’t forestall a move any longer.
ShamSports, RealGM, and Larry Coon’s Salary Cap FAQ were used in the creation of this post.
Nuggets Rumors: Miller, Gallinari, Draft
Denver is perhaps the NBA’s streakiest team, having won seven in a row at one point and five in a row at another, with an eight-game losing skid in between. So far, it’s all more or less evened out, as Denver has a 19-18 record. Monday’s loss to the Jazz snapped their five-game win streak, perhaps signaling another string of defeats is on its way. Here’s the latest from the Rocky Mountains:
- The Nuggets have no interest in acquiring J.R. Smith, be it in a trade for Andre Miller or otherwise, as Chris Mannix of SI.com reported earlier this morning, and it doesn’t look like there will be a Miller trade involving the Mavericks, either. In reference to the veteran point guard, Mavericks president of basketball operations Donnie Nelson told the BaD Radio program on 1310 The Ticket in Dallas that he’s satisfied with his backcourt and won’t be “looking to mess around with that” (transcription via the Dallas Morning News). Nelson also said the notion of Andrew Bynum joining the Mavs is “a long to long-long-long shot.”
- Danilo Gallinari says the thought of missing the entire season has crossed his mind, but it’s still possible that he’ll return this year from his torn left ACL, as he tells Massimo Lopes Pegna of La Gazzetta dello Sport (translation via Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia). That’s a change from his comments two months ago, when it appeared likely that he would come back at some point in 2013/14.
- Gallinari also told Pegna that the Nuggets are scouting Italian draft prospect Alessandro Gentile, who could be a second-round pick (translation via Carchia). The swingman is No. 69 in the DraftExpress prospect rankings, but No. 127 at ESPN.com.
Latest On J.R. Smith
J.R. Smith is eligible to be traded starting today, and while it doesn’t appear as though any deal is imminent, all is not well between last year’s Sixth Man of the Year and the Knicks. Smith didn’t appear in last night’s game against the Bobcats, even though he says Mike Woodson hadn’t told him he would be benched, observes Marc Berman of the New York Post. Smith didn’t directly answer a reporter’s postgame question of whether he wants to be traded, but he nonetheless hinted at discontent with his situation in New York.
“I’ll figure out what I can do better to help this team and go from there,’’ Smith said, as Berman notes. “If I can’t help the team, no point in me being here.’’
A reporter also asked Smith whether he would try to talk to Woodson about the benching, but Smith replied that, “The communication from my end is over,” Newsday’s Al Iannazzone tweets. The latest discord seems to have started with Smith repeatedly trying to untie opponents’ shoelaces earlier this month, but Smith says it’s “ridiculous” that such pranks have led to so much trouble, according to Berman.
Trading Smith, who signed a three-year contract for nearly $18MM in the offseason, wouldn’t fetch the Knicks much in return, as there’s apparently no market for the swingman. The Knicks have been trying to find a way to trade for Andre Miller, but the Nuggets have no interest in Smith and wouldn’t entertain the idea of a Miller-for-Smith swap, reports Chris Mannix of SI.com (Twitter link).
Western Notes: Miller, Aldridge, Warriors
Rudy Gay says he is happy to be in Sacramento and in a Q&A on the Kings‘ website, he said being traded along with two teammates he’s close with helped make for an easy transition. When asked what he is bringing to his new team, he responded, “People pretty much know what I can do – bring leadership, scoring and all those things I’ve been doing my whole career.” Here are some more notes from around the Western Conference:
- Andre Miller still hasn’t played for the Nuggets since his public confrontation with coach Brian Shaw, but the rift between the two isn’t as profound as it’s been portrayed to be, Shaw told reporters, including Jody Genessy of the Deseret News. “He’s dealing with what he needs to deal with. I’m focusing on the team and what’s best for the team right now,” Shaw said. “As I’ve said, I’m willing to coach any(body) and everybody who wants to put the team first. I have nothing but respect for him.”
- LaMarcus Aldridge seemed to want out of Portland over the summer, but he’s changed his mind and is thinking about signing an extension because the Trail Blazers have become a more successful team, he tells Chris Haynes of CSNNW.com. “[GM] Neil [Olshey] did a great job of bringing in what we needed,” Aldridge said. “He worked with me throughout the process. I’m happy. We’re winning and we look good. Look, I just want to win.”
- The Warriors D-League affiliate Santa Cruz Warriors have signed Scott Machado, according to Rusty Simmons of The San Fransisco Chronicle (via Twitter), making official what Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports reported was forthcoming earlier today.
- Suns rookie Archie Goodwin shared his thoughts with SNYtv.com’s Adam Zagoria on prospects Willie Cauley-Stein, Andrew Harrison, Aaron Henderson, and Julius Randle, comparing the latter to Josh Smith. Goodwin believes he would have been drafted much higher than 29th last year had his Kentucky Wildcats team made an NCAA tournament run instead of losing in the first round of the NIT tournament.
Chuck Myron contributed to this post.
Bucher’s Latest: Griffin, Anthony, Lowry
A majority of the league believes Blake Griffin and DeAndre Jordan don’t fit together, and Jordan’s improvement has made Griffin the more obvious trade candidate, according to Ric Bucher of Bleacher Report. The consensus is that the Clippers need a big man who can shoot, and even Chris Paul wishes Griffin were more like former teammate David West, sources tell Bucher. A general manager who possesses the sort of power forward who might mesh better with Jordan said to Bucher that the Clippers haven’t contacted his team and added that he hasn’t heard that the Clippers are shopping Griffin at all. The GM thinks owner Donald Sterling would never agree to such a deal, though Bucher hears from a Clippers source confident that Doc Rivers will talk him into it before the trade deadline. Bucher has more on the Clippers and scuttlebutt around the league, as we detail:
- Bucher suggests that if the Clippers were to trade for Carmelo Anthony, there’d be no certainty that they could re-sign him.
- The Warriors decided against trading for Kyle Lowry over concerns about how he’d fit into their locker room. The Raptors have upped their asking price for Lowry in the meantime, and executives around the league aren’t sure whether Lowry, Andre Miller or Kirk Hinrich is the best oversized point guard who might be available.
- Several GMs believe the Bulls will trade Mike Dunleavy for a draft pick, with Chicago setting its sights on a retool for next season. The Rockets are reportedly targeting Dunleavy, and Bucher shares insight from a rival executive on why Houston might be inclined to deal for him.