Bucks Opt In With Antetokounmpo, Henson
The Bucks have exercised their options to keep Giannis Antetokounmpo and John Henson on their respective rookie scale contracts for 2015/16, the team announced. Antetokounmpo will make nearly $2MM that year, the third season of his deal, while Henson is due about $2.9MM for what will be year No. 4 in his pact, as our Rookie Scale Team Option Tracker shows.
Neither move is surprising, and that’s especially so for Antetokounmpo, as I suggested in August. The phenom from Greece entered the NBA with many question marks surrounding his game after the Bucks took him 15th overall, but he dazzled with his athleticism even though his numbers, with 6.8 points in 24.6 minutes per game, weren’t nearly as eye-popping. Henson is part of a crowded frontcourt in Milwaukee and found his name in trade rumors this past year, but he’s been efficient when he’s hit the floor, having racked up a career 18.0 PER.
The decisions give the Bucks close to $47MM in guaranteed money on the books for 2015/16, though that doesn’t take into account a $4.25MM early termination option for Jared Dudley. Milwaukee would also reportedly like to reach an extension with Brandon Knight before the October 31st deadline to do so, and if they come to terms, there won’t be much room beneath a projected $66.5MM salary cap for next summer.
Bucks Waive Elijah Millsap, Chris Wright
The Bucks have waived Elijah Millsap and Chris Wright, the team announced. Both were on non-guaranteed deals. The move had been expected for Wright after coach Jason Kidd told reporters last week that the 26-year-old small forward was headed to play in Europe.
Panathinaikos of Greece had interest in Wright but reportedly decided against signing him, so it’s unclear just where he’ll end up. He was with Milwaukee last season on a pair of 10-day contracts before he signed a deal that carried through the rest of 2013/14 and included a non-guaranteed salary for this coming season. Millsap joined Milwaukee this fall for his first taste of NBA preseason action since he was in camp with the Thunder in 2010. The 27-year-old swingman shared his thoughts with Zach Links of Hoops Rumors last month as he readied for his shot with the Bucks.
The cuts leave the Bucks with 16 players, one more than they can have come opening night. Micheal Eric and Kendall Marshall remain as the team’s only non-guaranteed contracts, and with 14 fully guaranteed deals on the books, Marshall will almost certainly be the team’s choice for the final regular season spot.
Eastern Notes: Allen, Stevens, Celtics, Magic
Here’s tonight’s look at the latest from the Eastern Conference, where we’ve rounded up a bit from each division out east:
- Jason Kidd indicated that the team had sincere interest in bringing free agent Ray Allen to the Bucks, writes Charles F. Gardner of the Journal Sentinel. “We did contact Ray,” Kidd admitted. “He’s weighing his options to see where he wants to go. But we did have interest.” Allen started his career in Milwaukee before getting traded for Gary Payton during his seventh season as a Buck.
- Brad Stevens is making a conscious effort to more closely align the playbooks of the Celtics and their the D-League affiliate, the Maine Red Claws, as the second-year coach explains to ESPNBoston.com’s Chris Forsberg. “We’re trying to make [the playbook synergy] even more of a priority this year,” Stevens said. “I didn’t do a great job of that as I was balancing everything [last season]. [Red Claws coach Morrison Scott] has been here now for, really, the better part of [two months]. He’s been able to learn what we’re doing and they’ll play very similar to us.”
- The Magic‘s decision to trade away a pair of first-rounders just to move up two spots in June’s draft looked questionable at the time, but early returns from Elfrid Payton, the player Orlando selected with that pick, are making GM Rob Hennigan look brilliant, opines Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel.
Chris Crouse contributed to this post.
Eastern Rumors: Allen, Wizards, Sixers
A person close to Ray Allen told J. Michael of CSNWashington.com that “nothing has changed” for the veteran shooting guard, who has yet to decide whether to retire or join up with one several teams seeking his services. The Cavs remain the front runners for Allen, and GM David Griffin was in contact with Allen’s people a few days ago according to Michael. Here’s more from around the Eastern Conference, including more on the Allen front:
- The CSNWashington.com scribe reveals that the Thunder and Bucks have contacted Allen’s representatives, in addition to previously reported interest from the Cavs, Wizards, Bulls, and Spurs. Michael notes that Milwaukee’s homecoming pitch fell flat.
- Michael doesn’t think a starting role with the Wizards while Bradley Beal recovers from his wrist injury will make Washington any more enticing to Allen. A source also tells Michael that Wizards won’t pursue a “knee-jerk” trade, which jibes with early reporter reactions to news of Beal’s injury.
- While Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer doesn’t expect the Sixers to be a good team in the near future, coach Brett Brown tells Pompey that he sees “daylight” ahead for the club. “I see a big bright light at the end of this,” Brown said. “I see [Dario] Saric around the corner. I see [Joel] Embiid getting healthy. I see more draft picks. I see [Michael] Carter-Williams and Nerlens [Noel] getting older. I see an abundance of money and flexibility to look at free agents.”
- Sam Amick of USA Today (video link) asked 27 GMs around the league whom they would start their team with, if given the choice, and the majority of them selected LeBron James despite cornerstones like Kevin Durant and Anthony Davis having youth on their side.
Bradley Beal Likely Out Six To Eight Weeks
Bradley Beal suffered a broken wrist to his non-shooting hand in last night’s preseason game, and the Wizards announced in a team release that he will undergo surgery for the non-displaced fracture this evening. While a timetable for return hasn’t been set, David Aldridge of NBA.com tweets that the team fears Beal could miss 6-8 weeks, and that a recovery estimate will be established after the surgery is complete within the next two days.
The injury is a blow to Washington’s hopes of contending for a higher playoff seed this season, as it could force them to be without their budding star for 18 games or more. The team is over the salary cap, so it can only sign someone to a minimum salary contract. An additional restraint is the luxury tax line; Washington sits just under $1.4MM short of that number. The team is carrying Damion James and Xavier Silas on non-guaranteed contracts, two wings who could have a better path to earning a regular season spot thanks to the void left by Beal in the lineup.
The Wizards only have 13 of the maximum 15 guaranteed contracts lined up for 2014/15, and they also have room for two more players under the 20-player preseason maximum. Martell Webster is a solid rotation player, but the veteran guard is still recovering from back surgery himself and likely won’t be back, or back to full speed, when the season opens. Behind Webster, Washington is very inexperienced at guard, with unproven wings Glen Rice Jr. and Otto Porter next in line for minutes. Point guard Garrett Temple can man the two-guard spot, but he had his minutes reduced to just 8.2 per contest last year with the Wizards. Veteran wing Rasual Butler is currently with the team on a non-guaranteed deal, but he is at the tail end of his career and only played 7.6 minutes per game last year with the Pacers.
A trade is a possibility, and the team does have two trade exceptions for $1,254,660 and $4,329,089 that could land them a player for more than the minimum without having to match returning salary. Of course, they wouldn’t be able to use much of the exceptions without exceeding the tax line. Zach Lowe of Grantland pegs Jared Dudley and Randy Foye as gettable players for the Wizards to trade for, but expects the team to ride out the injury while adding a player at the minimum (on Twitter). Chris Mannix of SI.com also tweets that he thinks a trade is unlikely.
In his full story, Aldridge suggests that the team will intensify its pursuit of free agent shooting guard Ray Allen, who has yet to signal whether he will retire or return to the court this season. The team would still only be able to offer the minimum salary due to its cap situation, so any increased efforts for Allen would come down to the size of his role, not his contract.
And-Ones: D-League, Bucks, Cuban, Faried
NBA teams can retain the D-League rights to as many as four of the players they cut at the end of the preseason, up from the previous limit of three, Hoops Rumors has learned. Still, if a team keeps the D-League rights to fewer than four such players, it can claim the D-League rights of someone it waives during the regular season, another new wrinkle that Gino Pilato of D-League Digest reported last month. Such decisions are among the many that teams will have to make around the end of the month, when they face rookie scale extension and option deadlines and must set their regular season rosters. Here’s more from around the NBA as those key dates approach.
- The Bucks have hired Deluxe Entertainment Services Group executive Peter Feigin as team president, the club announced. It appears as though he’ll handle business affairs for the Bucks while GM John Hammond will continue to run the team’s basketball operations.
- Mavs owner Mark Cuban downplayed the financial impact the league’s new TV deal will have on teams, but he suggested that the majority of owners won’t attempt to “cry poor” when they negotiate the next collective bargaining agreement with players. Jeff Caplan of NBA.com has the details, including Cuban’s prediction that most players won’t seek one-year deals this summer in an effort to time their free agencies with an influx of TV money in the summer of 2016.
- Kenneth Faried must continue his development and become a star to make his four-year, $50MM extension worthwhile for the Nuggets, argues Mark Kiszla of The Denver Post, who’s loath to bet against the power forward after a year of rapid growth.
Eastern Notes: Nets, Allen, Cavs, Muscala, Wright
Nets GM Billy King took questions from reporters today, including Tim Bontemps of the New York Post. While King originally refused to comment on the Guggenheim ownership talks, he would eventually say Mikhail Prokhorov “isn’t selling” and described the current ownership’s commitment to winning as “unwavering” (Twitter links here). This further confirms the majority of reports over the last week that Prokhorov intends to remain the majority owner.
Let’s take a look at what else is coming out of the Eastern Conference on Tuesday night:
- Jim Tanner, the agent for free agent Ray Allen, shot down any speculation that his client has or is about to sign with the Cavaliers. After speaking with Allen today, Tanner, through the Twitter account of Tandem Sports and Entertainment, indicated that Allen has yet to decide whether or not he will play this season (Twitter links here). Allen was linked to several teams this summer, but as of last month Cleveland still believed they will land the veteran sniper.
- Speaking of the Cavaliers, the team isn’t panicked about their need for rim-protection, writes Grantland’s Zach Lowe, who suggests the Cavs aren’t going to rush to remedy the situation via trade. Instead, they’re more likely to target a wing defender whose salary would fit into their nearly $5.3MM Keith Bogans trade exception, according to Lowe.
- The Hawks are high on the development of Mike Muscala, writes Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Atlanta has 14 guaranteed contracts on the books for the upcoming season and Vivlamore’s report is just the latest evidence that they will award the final spot to Muscala, whose contract is partially guaranteed.
- Greek’s Panathinaikos took a pass on Chris Wright, who’s decided to leave the Bucks, and the small forward rejected a $200K offer from Besiktas in Turkey, Sportando’s Orazio Cauchi reports. That seemingly leaves Wright in a limbo of sorts, but the Bucks have yet to formally place his non-guaranteed contract on waivers.
Chuck Myron contributed to this post.
Bucks To Release Chris Wright
Small forward Chris Wright has left the Bucks to accept an offer to play overseas instead, coach Jason Kidd told reporters, including Matt Velazquez of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (Twitter links). Kidd said it was Wright’s choice to leave, so it appears the team will accommodate his request and release him. The coach said he didn’t know which team Wright would join, but Gery Woelfel of The Journal Times indicates (via Twitter) that Wright is headed to Greece, the home of Panathinaikos, a team that’s reportedly been in pursuit of the 26-year-old in recent days.
Milwaukee followed up a pair of 10-day contracts with Wright last season and inked him to a deal that extended into 2014/15 with a non-guaranteed minimum salary. The former Dayton Flyer appeared in eight games last season, his second in the NBA after a stint with the Warriors in 2011/12, and he averaged 6.0 points and 2.5 rebounds in 15.8 minutes per contest for the Bucks. Still, it looked like he had little shot of remaining with the team, since Milwaukee has 14 fully guaranteed contracts plus a non-guaranteed deal with Kendall Marshall, who’s likely to be part of the team’s rotation this year.
The departure of the Octagon Sports client nonetheless seemingly gives Elijah Millsap and Micheal Eric a boost in their longshot bids to make the opening-night roster, since it eliminates competition. Wright is not to be confused with the former Mavs shooting guard by the same name.
And-Ones: Nets, Williams, Bucks, Durant
The NBA’s new television deal will help with the Guggenheim-Nets talks, Robert Windrem of NetsDaily notes (Twitter link). Brooklyn could reverse its fiscal issues and become profitable with the new influx of money, which would also serve to increase the overall value of the franchise. The Nets reportedly lost $144MM during the 2013/14 season.
Here’s more from around the league:
- Another development to watch for in regard to the new television deal will be Kevin Durant‘s pending free agency in the summer of 2016, Tim Bontemps of The New York Post opines (Twitter link). The salary cap is projected to increase significantly by July 1st, 2016, and it could possibly jump from the $63.065MM this season to $80MM for the 2016/17 campaign. The higher cap will not only potentially net Durant a much bigger windfall, it could also increase the number of teams with enough room under the cap to make a play for the “Slim Reaper.”
- Marvin Williams, one of the newest members of the Hornets, received praise from his new head coach and teammates, Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer writes. Bonnell also explains how Williams’ role has changed from a scorer to a smart role player, and that Williams has “made peace” with who he is at the NBA level.
- Brian Fleurantin of SB Nation previews the Bucks’ upcoming 2014/15 campaign. Jason Kidd managed an aging group in Brooklyn, so it’ll be interesting to see how he does in coaching a significantly younger core in Milwaukee.
- Alex Tyus, an undrafted center out of Florida, had a chance to display his talents during Tel Aviv’s 107-80 exhibition game loss to the Cavs this evening. Tyus logged 13 points, six rebounds, and five blocks for Tel Aviv. “The NBA is all about opportunity and getting a chance. I never got mine because of the NBA lockout and my pursuit of an Israeli passport,” Tyus told David Pick of Eurobasket. The Heat and a few other teams expressed interest in the 6’8″ 26-year-old this summer, and Miami had considered inviting him to training camp, Pick reports.
Chris Crouse contributed to this post.
And-Ones: Sixers, Bender, Ballmer
Sixers managing owner Josh Harris believes the franchise has made remarkable strides in the 17 months since Sam Hinkie was hired as GM, Max Rappaport of NBA.com reports. “I think people see the early returns,” said Harris. “Certainly, we have a lot of cap room, we have two first-round picks next year, we have a slew of seconds, we have a number of players that we have the rights to in Europe, we have possibly two big men between Joel Embiid and Nerlens Noel that will be franchise players for us over a long, long time, and we have the Rookie of the Year.”
Here’s more from around the league:
- 16-year-old Croatian forward Dragan Bender is turning heads over in the Israeli league, writes David Pick of Eurobasket. Pro scouts watching Bender play say his best-case NBA scenario would be to equal Andrei Kirilenko‘s numbers, while the worst-case would place him in Jan Vesely territory. Bender is currently projected by DraftExpress to be selected thirteenth in the 2016 NBA draft.
- Steve Ballmer acknowledged a passing interest in buying the Bucks earlier this year and wonders if the NBA would have allowed him and Chris Hansen to purchase the Kings and move them to Seattle if they had put up more money in a one-on-one with USA Today’s Sam Amick. The new Clippers owner also said that a long-term extension for Doc Rivers “seemed absolutely right to me” based on Rivers’ track record and recommendations from others. Ballmer had more to say to Amick for another piece that we passed along earlier.
- Joel Brigham of Basketball Insiders shares his predictions on which players will have breakout seasons during the 2014/15 campaign. Topping the list are Jonas Valanciunas, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Steven Adams.
Chuck Myron contributed to this post.