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Checking In On Open Roster Spots

By | at March 11, 2026 1:21 pm

As our tracker shows, the following teams currently have one spot available on their 15-man standard rosters:

  • Brooklyn Nets
  • Golden State Warriors
  • Houston Rockets
  • Orlando Magic
  • Toronto Raptors

The Nets have an opening after they decided not to re-sign rookie forward Grant Nelson, whose 10-day contract expired on Sunday night. They’re still operating below the salary cap, so there isn’t anything preventing them from signing another player.

The Warriors and Rockets are operating in luxury tax territory, and while they have plenty of room below their hard caps to add a 15th man, they’re probably not all that eager to increase their projected tax bills by bringing in someone who won’t play at all.

The Magic and Raptors are both operating less than $1MM away from the tax line, but each team has enough room to bring in a minimum-salary veteran on a rest-of-season contract without becoming a taxpayer, so if there’s someone out there they like, they don’t necessarily have to wait.

Toronto is expected to hold off at least a few more days though, in order to avoid a scenario in which the team wins a couple playoff series and Immanuel Quickley’s $500K bonus for making the Eastern Conference Finals pushes the Raptors’ salary over the tax line.

The Kings and Jazz are worth mentioning too. Sacramento’s 15th spot is currently held by Killian Hayes, whose second 10-day contract will expire on Saturday night. Utah, meanwhile, has two players — Mo Bamba and Andersson Garcia — signed to 10-day deals through next week.

Finally, there’s one notable team not mentioned in the list above because they technically have three open 15-man roster spots, not just one. That’s the Celtics. Boston is in the midst of executing an intricately timed plan to meet the NBA’s rules related to roster minimums for the rest of the season while narrowly staying out of the tax.

It’s a safe bet that Boston will stick with just 12 players for the maximum allowable 14 days before making a couple roster additions in mid-March. Current two-way player Max Shulga will likely get a promotion at that time for financial reasons (his rookie minimum salary wouldn’t be subject to “tax variance“). If all goes according to plan, the Celtics will be able to sign a 15th man on the last day of the regular season without surpassing the tax threshold.

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Disabled Player Exceptions For 2025/26 Expire On Tuesday

By | at March 9, 2026 6:48 pm

A series of disabled player exceptions granted to teams earlier in the 2025/26 season will expire on Tuesday if they go unused. The annual deadline to use a disabled player exception is March 10.

We go into more detail on who qualifies for disabled player exceptions and how exactly they work in our glossary entry on the subject. But essentially, if a team has a player suffer a season-ending injury prior to January 15, the exception gives that team the opportunity to add an injury replacement by either signing a player to a one-year contract, trading for a player in the final year of his contract, or placing a waiver claim on a player in the final year of his contract.

Here are the teams whose DPEs will expire if they aren’t used on by the end of the day on Tuesday, per Eric Pincus of Sports Business Classroom:

The Mavericks were granted a second disabled player exception worth $1,148,137 for Dante Exum‘s season-ending knee injury, but forfeited it when they dealt Exum to Washington at the trade deadline.

Since the trade deadline has passed and the only player currently on waivers has a major knee injury, there’s essentially just one way left for teams with disabled player exceptions to use them: signing a free agent. However, that seems unlikely, given that there are no free agents on the buyout market who would warrant a contract worth more than the veteran’s minimum.

In other words, these exceptions will, in all likelihood, expire on Tuesday without being used. Assuming that happens, no team will have used a disabled player exception this season.

Disabled player exceptions have never been used with much frequency, but the fact that mid-level and bi-annual exceptions can now be used to acquire players via trade or waiver claim has further reduced their importance. This is the second season the mid-level and bi-annual exceptions could be utilized in that manner.

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Checking In On 10-Day Contracts

By | at March 8, 2026 10:08 am

After Mo Bamba‘s 10-day contract with the Jazz expired on Saturday night, there are currently just two active 10-day deals around the NBA, as our tracker shows. Those deals are as follows:

Bamba, the sixth overall pick in the 2018 draft, was technically active six times for Utah but only made two appearances with the Jazz. He averaged 5.0 points, 10.0 rebounds and 1.0 block in 19.0 minutes per contest during road games in Philadelphia and Washington.

Bamba was on his first 10-day deal with the Jazz, who could re-sign him to a second 10-day pact if they so choose. At the expiration of that theoretical second 10-day contract, Utah would have to either let the veteran center go or sign him for the remainder of the season.

Hayes, another former lottery pick, is on his second 10-day agreement with Sacramento after re-signing with the Kings on Thursday. The 24-year-old point guard’s deal runs through this Saturday.

As for Nelson, the former Alabama forward will become a free agent on Sunday night. The seven-footer appeared in four games with the Nets, averaging 4.3 points, 1.5 rebounds, 1.3 assists and 1.3 blocks in 8.8 minutes per contest.

Head coach Jordi Fernandez discussed Nelson’s 10-day contract ending prior to Saturday’s game at Detroit, per Brian Lewis of The New York Post.

“[He’s] a very good basketball player. Everything he does, he does it well,” Fernandez said. “He doesn’t over-dribble or try to do too much. Everything is efficient. His size is great. He’s a multi-positional defender, very good play-maker, fast. All of those things have been very good. It translates to this level. Obviously right now we have one more game and then after that we’ll have to discuss and see what the next move going forward is.”

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Checking In On 10-Days, Pending Deals, Open Roster Spots

By | at March 5, 2026 10:03 am

Two important roster-related dates for the 2025/26 NBA season are now behind us — teams can no longer sign players to two-way contracts and players who are waived by their current clubs from here on out won’t be playoff-eligible for a new team.

That certainly doesn’t mean there won’t be any players signed or waived in the coming weeks, but the NBA’s transaction wire should be a little less busy going forward. That makes it a good time to step back and take stock of where things stand with rosters and contract situations around the league as we enter the home stretch of the season.

10-day contracts

After Killian Hayes‘ 10-day contract with the Kings expired on Wednesday night, there are currently just two active 10-day deals around the NBA, as our tracker shows. Those deals are as follows:

Following a flurry of 10-day signings during and after the All-Star break, no team has finalized a 10-day deal in nearly a week, but I’d expect action to pick up on that front shortly.

A year ago, a total of 23 10-day contracts were signed between March 6 and the end of the season, with a handful of players receiving multiple deals – and, in some cases, rest-of-season commitments – from their respective teams. There are still a number of clubs across the league with open roster spots, and many of those openings figure to be temporarily filled with 10-day signees in the coming days and weeks.

Pending deals

Before we take a look at exactly which teams have roster spots to fill, it’s worth noting that there’s still one reported transaction that hasn’t been officially completed. The Nuggets reached an agreement with point guard Tyus Jones on Monday but have yet to formally announce his new deal.

No corresponding roster move will be needed for Denver, since the team already has an open spot on its 15-man roster, and it shouldn’t be long before Jones officially joins the roster. As Harrison Wind of DNVR Sports tweets, the 29-year-old was at the Nuggets’ practice facility on Wednesday and is expected to be available for the club’s game against the Lakers on Thursday.

[UPDATE: Jones has officially signed with the Nuggets.]

Open roster spots

As our tracker shows, the following teams currently have one spot available on their 15-man standard rosters:

  • Golden State Warriors
  • Houston Rockets
  • Orlando Magic
  • Sacramento Kings
  • Toronto Raptors

The Nuggets technically belong on this list too, but they’ll have a full roster once they officially sign Jones. The Jazz and Nets could also join this group if they don’t re-sign Bamba and Nelson, respectively, after their 10-day contracts expire.

The Warriors and Rockets are operating in luxury tax territory, and while they have plenty of room below their hard caps to add a 15th man, they’re probably not all that eager to increase their projected tax bills by bringing in someone who won’t play at all.

The Magic, Kings, and Raptors are all operating less than $1MM away from the tax line, but each team has enough room to bring in a minimum-salary veteran on a rest-of-season contract without becoming a taxpayer, so if there’s someone out there they like, they don’t necessarily have to wait.

Finally, there’s one notable team not mentioned in the list above because they technically have three open 15-man roster spots, not just one. That’s the Celtics. Boston is in the midst of executing an intricately timed plan to meet the NBA’s rules related to roster minimums for the rest of the season while narrowly staying out of the tax.

After 10-day deals for Dalano Banton and John Tonje expired over the weekend, it’s a safe bet that Boston will stick with just 12 players for the maximum allowable 14 days before making a couple roster additions in mid-March. Current two-way player Max Shulga will likely get a promotion at that time for financial reasons (his rookie minimum salary wouldn’t be subject to “tax variance“). If all goes according to plan, the Celtics will be able to sign a 15th man on the last day of the regular season without surpassing the tax threshold.

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NBA’s Two-Way Signing Deadline Has Now Passed

By | at March 5, 2026 7:28 am

The deadline for NBA teams to sign players to two-way contracts was Wednesday, March 4. Since that deadline has now passed, no two-way deals can be signed between now and the end of the 2025/26 season. Clubs will be permitted to begin signing two-way contracts for the ’26/27 season on July 1 (restricted free agents who receive two-way qualifying offers can technically accept them in June).

Under the NBA’s previous Collective Bargaining Agreement, two-way signings weren’t permitted after January 15. Teams took full advantage of the extended window to complete two-way deals this season, finalizing 34 of them between the February 6 trade deadline and Wednesday’s deadline. During that same period, teams promoted 20 players from two-way contracts to standard deals.

There were six teams – the Nets, Bulls, Rockets, Lakers, Knicks, and Raptors – that didn’t make any moves involving their two-way players between last month’s trade deadline and the two-way signing deadline. The other 24 clubs were active.

As our tracker shows, all 90 two-way slots around the NBA are now filled. However, that doesn’t necessarily mean the 90 players currently on two-way contracts will all finish the season on those deals.

There are still a handful of two-way players who could receive standard contracts before the regular season ends. The Celtics, for instance, are one team to watch, as both Max Shulga and Ron Harper Jr. are candidates to be promoted to the 15-man roster to fill one of the team’s three open spots.

A team can promote one or more of its two-way players to its standard roster at any time between now and the end of the season — that team simply wouldn’t be permitted to sign a new player to fill the empty two-way slot created by the promotion.

Here are all the transactions related to two-way players that have been finalized since the trade deadline, sorted by team and listed in the order they were completed (from earliest to most recent):

Atlanta Hawks

Boston Celtics

Charlotte Hornets

Cleveland Cavaliers

Dallas Mavericks

Denver Nuggets

Detroit Pistons

Golden State Warriors

Indiana Pacers

Los Angeles Clippers

Memphis Grizzlies

Miami Heat

Milwaukee Bucks

Minnesota Timberwolves

New Orleans Pelicans

Oklahoma City Thunder

Orlando Magic

Philadelphia 76ers

Phoenix Suns

Portland Trail Blazers

Sacramento Kings

San Antonio Spurs

Utah Jazz

Washington Wizards

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Sign Up For The FREE Hoops Rumors Newsletter!

By | at March 3, 2026 12:32 pm

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Here’s what you can expect from the newsletter:

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NBA Teams Can’t Sign Players To Two-Way Deals After Wednesday

By | at March 2, 2026 7:52 pm

NBA teams have until the final day of the regular season (April 12) to finalize their 15-man rosters and sign players to standard NBA contracts. However, each team only has until March 4 — this Wednesday — to sign a player to a two-way contract.

If you’re a regular Hoops Rumors reader, you’ve likely noticed a significant uptick in two-way activity over the past few weeks, and particularly over the past few days. If you weren’t already aware, now you know why — teams are finalizing their two-way spots for the remainder of the 2025/26 season, with an eye on the future.

There’s overlap between a team’s 15-man roster and its three available two-way spots. For example, 21 players who were on two-way contracts have had their deals converted to standard contracts in ’25/26. The majority of those players received multiyear standard deals, though that’s not always the case.

In an ideal scenario, a team would complete all its conversions before Wednesday so it can back-fill any vacant two-way slots prior to the deadline. That said, two-way contracts can be converted to standard deals until April 12.

As we explain in our glossary entry, a player with fewer than four years of NBA experience can sign a two-way contract with a team. Because a player is credited with a year of service on the last day of a league year (ie. June 30), a player with three years of experience is eligible to sign a two-way contract at any time during his fourth NBA season. Certain players who have four years of experience and have missed an entire season due to injury can still be eligible for a one-year two-way contract as well.

A player who opens a season on a two-way contract can be active for a maximum of 50 games. However, that figure is prorated once the season begins — players who finalize their deals on Monday or Tuesday are eligible to be active for a maximum of 12 games, while players who complete two-way contracts on Wednesday can be active for up to 11.

Players who have spent all of 2025/26 on two-way contracts will earn $636,435 in 2025/26, half of the rookie minimum. But just like the active-game limit, that figure is prorated for those who sign in-season deals. For example, a player who finalizes his two-way contract on Wednesday will earn $146,307.

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Players Waived After Sunday Won’t Be Playoff-Eligible

By | at February 27, 2026 8:02 am

In order to retain his postseason eligibility for a new NBA team, a player must be waived on or before March 1. That means that any player who remains on an NBA roster after Sunday won’t be eligible to suit up in the playoffs for a new team, though there’s at least one key exception to that general rule.

A player who is currently on a 10-day contract – or a current free agent who signs one after March 1 – will retain his playoff eligibility going forward. For instance, once Killian Hayes‘ 10-day deal with Sacramento expires next Wednesday night, he’d still be able to join a new team and play in the postseason for that club, since he’s not being placed on waivers after March 1.

That rule applies even if a player has his 10-day contract terminated early, since that player becomes a free agent immediately without being required to pass through waivers.

Here’s the list of players on 10-day contracts that run through at least March 1 who will retain their playoff eligibility when their current deals expire:

  • Rayan Rupert, Grizzlies (runs through 3/3)
  • Killian Hayes, Kings (runs through 3/4)
  • Mo Bamba, Jazz (runs through 3/7)

Since it’s often a point of confusion, it’s worth clarifying that a player doesn’t have to sign with a new team by March 1 to be playoff-eligible — he simply can’t be placed on waivers after 11:59 pm Eastern time on Sunday.

Eric Gordon, for example, was waived by Memphis earlier this month. As long as he signs with a new team by the final day of the regular season (April 12), Gordon can play in the postseason (including play-in games).

The buyout market in 2026 hasn’t exactly been flooded with big names, but Jevon Carter, Cam Thomas, Jeremy Sochan, and Haywood Highsmith are among the veterans of note who have found new NBA teams after being waived in February. Kyle Anderson will join them once he clears waivers this weekend, having reached a deal with Minnesota.

All of those players – and those who have been waived but haven’t yet signed with new teams, such as Gordon, Lonzo Ball, and Chris Boucher – would be playoff-eligible for their new clubs. So would anyone waived on or before Sunday, with veteran forward Khris Middleton among the candidates to hit the waiver wire in the coming days. But anyone on a standard or two-way contract who is waived after Sunday won’t be appearing in the postseason this spring.

We’ll be keeping a close eye on the NBA’s transaction wire over the next few days to see who else might land on waivers before that deadline passes.

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Community Shootaround: Who Will Come Out Of The East?

By | at February 25, 2026 11:00 am

The Pistons have held the No. 1 seed in the Eastern Conference since early November and have maintained a firm grip on that spot. At 42-14, Detroit has a 4.5-game lead on its next-closest competitor in the conference and has a 10-2 record against the other Eastern teams currently in playoff (ie. top-six) position.

However, there are still questions about the Pistons’ ability to win three consecutive playoff series and represent the Eastern Conference in the 2026 NBA Finals. A relative lack of postseason experience is one potential concern. Detroit’s first-round exit last spring represented the team’s first playoff appearance since 2019 and the only taste of the postseason that young stars like Cade Cunningham and Jalen Duren have gotten so far.

A lack of offensive firepower is another possible red flag for the Pistons. The team leans heavily on Cunningham for scoring and shot creation and lacks reliable play-makers and knock-down shooters alongside him. Detroit ranks 28th in the NBA in three-point makes per game (11.1).

Monday’s loss to San Antonio exposed those flaws and cast a spotlight on Trajan Langdon‘s decision not to be more aggressive at this month’s trade deadline, notes Omari Sankofa II of The Detroit Free Press (subscription required). The Pistons’ only real pre-deadline acquisition was wing Kevin Huerter, who has struggled with his outside shot this season and fallen out of the team’s rotation in the past three games.

If not the Pistons, who else could come out of the East this spring? Well, the Celtics hold the No. 2 seed despite being without Jayson Tatum all season as the All-NBA forward recovers from an Achilles tear. With Jaylen Brown taking on the primary role, Boston has built the best offense in the conference without its usual leading scorer, writes Esfandiar Baraheni of The Athletic, posting a 120.0 offensive rating that exceeds the team’s mark from 2024/25.

Still, there’s no guarantee Tatum will be able to return to action before the end of this season, and the Celtics would miss him more in big postseason moments than they do in a typical regular season game. And even if Tatum does make it back in the coming weeks, is it realistic to expect him to be back to his old self in time for the playoffs after such a lengthy layoff and challenging rehab process?

The Knicks, who have the NBA’s third-best offensive rating, hold the No. 3 spot in the East at 37-22 and are coming off a conference finals appearance in 2025. New York is a good team, but under new head coach Mike Brown, the club has also looked “like a world beater one quarter and a bottom-feeder the next,” according to James L. Edwards III of The Athletic, who suggests we may not know for sure until the playoffs how good the Knicks really are.

Interestingly, none of those three teams are currently the betting favorites to win the East, according to most sportsbooks. That honor belongs to the Cavaliers, who have looked resurgent in recent weeks after a shaky start to the season and have pulled into a tie with the Knicks at 37-22. The Cavs, winners of 13 of their past 15 games, have “renewed confidence” following the deadline acquisition of James Harden, head coach Kenny Atkinson said following his team’s victory over New York on Tuesday (story via Jamal Collier of ESPN).

“We understand we’re a better team,” Atkinson said. “That spirit, that confidence for some strange reason, it makes you play harder, compete harder, compete harder defensively. I felt like we were kind of missing that edge, that belief. I feel like we’re regaining that. A lot of it has to do with who we added in the trade.”

The Cavaliers were widely viewed as a favorite to win the East in the fall after winning 64 regular season games in 2024/25 and being derailed by injuries in the playoffs. Enthusiasm about their ceiling waned as they hovered around .500 through Christmas, but it has been building again as of late. For what it’s worth, the Cavs are also the only one of the East’s projected playoff teams that doesn’t have a losing record against the Pistons so far in ’25/26 — the teams have split their two matchups.

The Raptors, Sixers, Magic, Heat, Hawks, and Hornets are all lurking in the Eastern Conference playoff picture as potential threats.

A Philadelphia team that has Joel Embiid and Paul George wouldn’t be an easy out. The same is true of a fully healthy Orlando squad, though we haven’t seen that very often in the past year or two. Charlotte still has a ways to go to even make the playoffs and would be an underdog in a first-round series, but few teams have been hotter in recent weeks — since January 22, only the Cavs (12-2) and Spurs (11-2) have a better record than the Hornets (12-3).

We want to know what you think. Which team do you expect to represent the East in the NBA Finals this season? Is Tatum’s potential return the wild card that could swing your decision or are there other factors you think will ultimately determine how the postseason plays out in the Eastern Conference?

Head to the comment section below to weigh in with your thoughts!

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Rest-Of-Season NBA Dates, Deadlines To Watch

By | at February 24, 2026 9:31 am

With the All-Star break behind us, we’re entering the home stretch of the 2025/26 NBA season. Here are a few noteworthy dates and deadlines to keep an eye on before the playoffs begin in April.

February 28

A team with cap room can renegotiate a player’s current-year salary to give him a raise as part of a contract extension. There are no legitimate candidates for a renegotiation at this point in the season though, with 29 teams operating over the cap and no Nets players renegotiation-eligible.

March 1

  • Last day a player can be waived by one team and remain eligible to appear in the postseason for another team.

As we outline in our glossary entry on buyouts, a player doesn’t need to be signed by March 1 in order to retain his playoff-eligible — he simply can’t be waived after that date. A player who is waived on March 1 and signs with another team on April 8 would be playoff-eligible for his new team, but a player who is waived on March 2 and signs on March 5 wouldn’t be.

This rule doesn’t apply to players on 10-day contracts, since they don’t pass through waivers when their deals expire. A player whose 10-day contract expires on March 3, for instance, could still sign a rest-of-season contract in March or April and be playoff-eligible.

March 4

Under the previous Collective Bargaining Agreement, the deadline to sign a player to a two-way contract was January 15, but it has been pushed back in the current CBA and teams are taking full advantage. In each of the past two years, at least 14 two-way deals were officially finalized during the first four days of March.

Since the February 5 trade deadline, 17 players have signed new two-way contracts. That number figures to continue growing until the end of the day on March 4, with six two-way spots still open around the NBA right now and several teams who don’t currently have openings still likely to make two-way moves.

March 10

The Mavericks have a pair of disabled player exceptions available, with six other teams – including the Pacers ($14.1MM) and Rockets ($12.5MM) – also still holding DPEs. Those exceptions could be used to sign a player to a rest-of-season contract or to claim a player with an expiring contract off waivers.

However, disabled player exceptions are used more frequently at the trade deadline than after it, and most of the teams with DPEs still available are unlikely to be aggressive in bidding for any current free agents. The likeliest scenario is that most or all of these exceptions expire without being used.

April 9

  • Last day to waive a player on an expiring contract or a player with an option for 2026/27 (4:00 pm CT).

Players with at least one year still left on their contracts can be waived during the postseason or offseason, but if a team wants to part ways with a player who has the ability to reach free agency this summer, he must be cut in time to clear waivers before the last day of the regular season.

April 12

  • Last day of the NBA regular season.
  • Last day players can sign contracts for 2025/26.
  • Last day two-way contracts can be converted to standard NBA contracts.
  • Luxury tax penalties calculated based on payroll as of this day.

Several teams around the NBA have at least one open spot on their 15-man rosters. We can probably assume that most – if not all – of those clubs will fill their openings by April 12.

Playoff teams will want to make sure they have as much veteran depth as possible, just to be safe, while lottery teams will look at signing younger players to multiyear deals that include little to no guaranteed money beyond this season in order to get a longer look at them in the summer.

April 13

  • Playoff rosters set (2:00pm CT).

April 14-17

  • NBA play-in tournament.

April 18

  • NBA playoffs begin.

While they wait for the play-in tournament to conclude, the top six teams in each conference will get a few days off between the regular season and the postseason, giving them some time to recharge before the playoffs begin.

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