Elton Brand Announces Retirement
SUNDAY, 9:03am: The Sixers have released Brand, tweets Derek Bodner of PhillyMag.
THURSDAY, 12:14pm: After signing a new contract with the Sixers during the offseason, Elton Brand appeared ready to extend his NBA career at least one more year. However, the former first overall pick changed his course, announcing today that he’ll be retiring from the game (Twitter link via Jessica Camerato of CSNPhilly.com).
“After 17 years of playing the game that I love – and it’s been great to me – I’m officially retiring,” Brand told reporters today.
Brand previously announced his retirement from the NBA back in 2015, but decided to make a comeback with the Sixers during the 2015/16 season. When he made his announcement today, he asserted that his retirement is “for real this time.”
The No. 1 overall pick by the Bulls in the 1999 draft, Brand averaged over 20 points per game in his rookie season, then reached that mark in five more seasons over the course of his career. A two-time All-Star with the Clippers, Brand spent time in Chicago, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Dallas, and Atlanta during his 17-year career, finishing with averages of 15.9 PPG, 8.5 RPG, 2.1 APG, and 1.7 BPG in 1,058 total regular season contests.
Brand’s minimum-salary contract with the Sixers for the 2016/17 season was partially guaranteed for $1MM, and he’ll likely receive that money. Philadelphia remains well below the salary floor, so there’s little reason for the club to quibble over that payout, particularly if the two sides intend to continue their relationship into the next phase of Brand’s career.
As Camerato tweets, Brand said today that he’ll take some time off before deciding on what his next step will be. Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer (Twitter link) had speculated earlier today, prior to Brand’s announcement, that a role in the 76ers’ front office could be in the big man’s future.
With Brand no longer in the mix as a player, the Sixers will have one less decision to make as they cut down their roster to 15 players for the regular season. The team currently has 11 players on guaranteed salaries, with eight (plus Brand) on non-guaranteed or partially guaranteed deals.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Atlantic Notes: Pierce, Rose, Jennings, Sixers
Paul Pierce confirmed last month that 2016/17 will be his final NBA season, writing in a piece for The Players’ Tribune that he intends to retire next year. Pierce’s story for The Players’ Tribune didn’t mention how exactly he plans to go out, but in in a conversation today on SiriusXM NBA Radio, Pierce announced that he’ll retire as a member of the Celtics (Twitter link via Justine Termine of SiriusXM).
That decision comes as no real surprise — Pierce has played for a few different teams in recent years, but spent 15 seasons in Boston, winning a championship with the Celtics and making 10 All-Star appearances as a member of the franchise. He figures to join the team one last time during the 2017 offseason when he signs a one-day ceremonial contract to announce his retirement.
Here’s more from around the Atlantic:
- According to various reporters, including Nancy Dillon of The New York Daily News (Twitter link), the judge in Derrick Rose‘s civil trial denied motions from the defense to dismiss the case or rule it a mistrial. The trial will continue this week, and Knicks head coach Jeff Hornacek said today that Rose won’t rejoin the club until it wraps up, per Marc Berman of The New York Post (Twitter link).
- Carmelo Anthony feels like the Knicks got a “steal” in free agency by landing Brandon Jennings, who still believes he should have been drafted by the franchise seven years ago. Berman has the quotes and the details in a piece for the Post.
- Derek Bodner of PhillyMag.com examines the battle for the Sixers‘ final roster spot, noting that injuries to Nik Stauskas and Brandon Paul have muddied the waters in that competition. Philadelphia technically only has 11 players on fully guaranteed contracts, but Bodner views T.J. McConnell, Jerami Grant, and Elton Brand as near-locks.
Players Who Can Veto Trades
No-trade clauses are rare in the NBA, and they became even rarer this offseason, when several players with those clauses in their contracts either called it a career or signed new deals. Kobe Bryant, Tim Duncan, and Kevin Garnett, who all opted for retirement, had no-trade clauses last season, and so did Dwyane Wade, who doesn’t have the same protection on his new contract with the Bulls.
Nonethless, while the list of players with explicit no-trade clauses may be dwindling, there are still several players each year who have the ability to veto trades. A player who re-signs with his previous team on a one-year contract – or a two-year contract with an option clause – is given no-trade protection, and so is a player who signs an offer sheet and has that offer matched by his previous team. Players who accept qualifying offers after their rookie deals expire can also block deals, though no restricted free agents signed their QOs this year.
Taking into account that list of criteria, here are the players who must give their consent if their teams want to trade them during the 2016/17 league year:
No-trade clauses
- Carmelo Anthony (Knicks)
- LeBron James (Cavaliers): Received no-trade clause on his new contract with Cavs.
- Dirk Nowitzki (Mavericks)
Players whose offer sheets were matched
- Allen Crabbe (Trail Blazers)
- Tyler Johnson (Heat)
Players accepting qualifying offers
- None
Players re-signing for one year (or two years including an option)
- Lou Amundson (Knicks) (waived)
- Elton Brand (Sixers) (retired)
- Ian Clark (Warriors)
- Alonzo Gee (Pelicans) (waived)
- Manu Ginobili (Spurs)
- Udonis Haslem (Heat)
- Kris Humphries (Hawks)
- Dahntay Jones (Cavaliers) (waived)
- James Jones (Cavaliers)
- James Michael McAdoo (Warriors)
- Steve Novak (Bucks)
- Marcus Thornton (Wizards)
- Beno Udrih (Pistons)
- Anderson Varejao (Warriors)
- Sasha Vujacic (Knicks)
- Metta World Peace (Lakers)
Information from Basketball Insiders and Yahoo! Sports was used in the creation of this post.
Contract Details: Brand, Rockets, Thunder, Pacers
With training camps underway, teams have now officially finalized the contract agreements with various camp invitees that had been reported over the past several weeks, meaning we have plenty of contract details to round up. As usual, Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders has been busy reporting those details, updating his salary pages for teams around the NBA.
Because we have so many updates to pass along from Pincus, we’ll divide them up by players who received some guaranteed money from their teams, and those who didn’t. All of the links below point to the Basketball Insiders team salary pages, so be sure to click through for additional information.
Here are the latest salary updates from across the league, via Pincus:
Players receiving guaranteed money:
These players aren’t necessarily assured of regular-season roster spots. In fact, many of them likely received guarantees as an incentive to accept a D-League assignment. Still, for some players, larger guarantees should increase their odds of making 15-man rosters.
- Thomas Walkup (Bulls): One year, minimum salary. $69.5K guaranteed.
- Keith Benson (Heat): Two years, minimum salary. $75K guaranteed.
- Henry Sims (Jazz): One year, minimum salary. $75K guaranteed.
- Alex Poythress (Pacers): One year, minimum salary. $35,381 guaranteed.
- Kevin Seraphin (Pacers): Two years, $3.681MM. First year ($1.8MM) guaranteed.
- Julyan Stone (Pacers): One year, minimum salary. $50K guaranteed.
- Gary Payton II (Rockets): Two years, minimum salary. First year ($543,471) guaranteed.
- Isaiah Taylor (Rockets): Two years, minimum salary. $50K guaranteed.
- Kyle Wiltjer (Rockets): Two years, minimum salary. $275K guaranteed.
- Cat Barber (Sixers): One year, minimum salary. $50K guaranteed.
- Elton Brand (Sixers): One year, minimum salary. $1MM guaranteed.
- Derrick Jones (Suns): Three years, minimum salary. $42.5K guaranteed.
- Alex Caruso (Thunder): One year, minimum salary. $50K guaranteed.
- Kaleb Tarczewski (Thunder): One year, minimum salary. $75K guaranteed.
- Chris Wright (Thunder): One year, minimum salary. $100K guaranteed.
Players receiving no guaranteed money:
The following players all signed one-year, minimum salary contracts with no guaranteed money. Many of these deals are “summer contracts,” which won’t count against a team’s cap unless the player earns a spot on the 15-man roster.
- Jabari Brown and Jaleel Roberts (Bucks)
- Markel Brown, Dahntay Jones, Cory Jefferson, Eric Moreland, John Holland, and Jonathan Holmes (Cavaliers)
- Dorell Wright (Clippers)
- Chris Crawford (Grizzlies)
- Ryan Kelly, Will Bynum, and Richard Solomon (Hawks)
- Perry Ellis (Hornets)
- Eric Dawson (Jazz)
- Julian Jacobs and Travis Wear (Lakers)
- Quinn Cook (Pelicans)
- Joel Anthony and Nicolas Laprovittola (Spurs)
- Gracin Bakumanya, Derek Cooke, and Shaquille Harrison (Suns)
- Rasual Butler (Timberwolves)
Elton Brand Likely To Make Sixers’ Roster?
Elton Brand signed a one-year contract with the Sixers earlier this month, but that deal is non-guaranteed and Brand is part of a crowded frontcourt in Philadelphia. Still, the former first overall pick is a good bet to make the Sixers’ 15-man roster, according to Jake Fischer of Liberty Ballers, who tweets that the club appears poised to hang on to Brand beyond training camp.
Brand, 37, signed with the Sixers last January and appeared in 17 games for the team the rest of the way, averaging 4.1 PPG, 3.7 RPG, and 1.1 APG in 13.2 minutes per contest. When Brand first joined the team, he wrote a piece for The Cauldron suggesting that he believed his “experience and wisdom” could help Jahlil Okafor and other young players on Philadelphia’s roster. Presumably, he aims to fill that veteran leadership role once again, particularly with Carl Landry no longer in the mix.
However, Brand’s ongoing veteran presence on the Sixers’ roster might cost the team one of its young prospects. With only 11 guaranteed salaries on its books, Philadelphia won’t face any financial ramifications for keeping Brand, but it will leave just three open roster spots for the club’s other eight non-guaranteed players. That group includes Robert Covington, Hollis Thompson, Jerami Grant, T.J. McConnell, James Webb, Brandon Paul, Shawn Long, and Cat Barber.
If the Sixers decide to keep Brand and want to retain more than three of those non-guaranteed players, it may spell trouble for someone like Nik Stauskas. The former King has a guaranteed salary worth nearly $3MM for 2016/17, but wasn’t great during his first year in Philadelphia — it’s not clear if he’s part of the club’s long-term plans.
Sixers Sign Elton Brand To One-Year Deal
2:48pm: Brand’s one-year deal is non-guaranteed, according to Jessica Camerato of CSN Philly (via Twitter).
2:29pm: Former first overall pick Elton Brand isn’t ready to call it a career quite yet. According to Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical, Brand will return to Philadelphia for the 2016/17 season, having signed a one-year contract with the Sixers. The team has since confirmed the signing in a press release.
Financial terms of the deal aren’t yet known. Philadelphia has no shortage of cap room, so the club could have lured Brand out of potential retirement by offering more than the minimum after he expressed back in April that he didn’t expect to keep playing. Still, a minimum-salary contract appears likely.
[RELATED: Salary Cap Snapshot: Philadelphia 76ers]
Brand, 37, signed with the Sixers last January and appeared in 17 games for the team the rest of the way, averaging 4.1 PPG, 3.7 RPG, and 1.1 APG in 13.2 minutes per contest. When Brand first joined the team, he wrote a piece for The Cauldron suggesting that he believed his “experience and wisdom” could help Jahlil Okafor and other young players on Philadelphia’s roster. Presumably, he’s returning to fill that veteran leadership role once again.
Although the Sixers have a crowded frontcourt, Brand figures to ostensibly take Carl Landry‘s place on the roster. Landry was expected to the veteran presence for a group of frontcourt players that includes Okafor, Joel Embiid, Nerlens Noel, Ben Simmons, and Dario Saric. However, Landry wanted the opportunity to earn more playing time, so Philadelphia granted him his release. In Brand, the Sixers have an experienced big man who won’t expect or demand significant minutes.
The 76ers, who had been carrying the maximum allowable 20 players, opened up two roster spots when they cut Landry and Tibor Pleiss, but have since filled those openings by signing Brand and Cat Barber. Not counting Barber and Brand, since the exact details of their deals haven’t yet been reported, Philadelphia has 11 guaranteed salaries on its books, plus seven non-guaranteed or partially-guaranteed contracts.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Eastern Rumors: Bulls, Celtics, Pistons, Sixers
Bulls GM Gar Forman wouldn’t rule out the idea of trading Jimmy Butler when asked Wednesday night, notes K.C. Johnson of The Chicago Tribune (Twitter link). Both Forman and Executive VP of Basketball Operations John Paxson made it clear no one on the roster is truly off-limits for a trade, Johnson writes, and changes are coming to coach Fred Hoiberg‘s coaching staff, sources tell Johnson. Still, Hoiberg will be sticking around, Paxson confirmed, according to Johnson, and owner Jerry Reinsdorf issued a statement backing Forman and Paxson. Paxson confirmed the Bulls would like to re-sign Joakim Noah, Johnson also notes.
See more from Chicago amid news from the Eastern Conference:
- The Celtics refused to give up Jae Crowder in trade talks with the Bulls before the deadline, scuttling any realistic possibility of a trade, league sources tell Vincent Goodwill of CSN Chicago. Jimmy Butler‘s name reportedly was the center of those discussions, though Goodwill hears they spoke with teams about Derrick Rose and confirms earlier reports that they had Pau Gasol trade talks, too.
- The Bulls were on board with a trade that would have involved Pau Gasol, Tony Snell and Kirk Hinrich going out and Kosta Koufos and Ben McLemore coming in from the Kings, but Sacramento withdrew from those talks when the Sixers, who were to be included as a third team, insisted the Kings relinquish a second-round pick, Goodwill hears. Sacramento was also reluctant to give into the Bulls’ desire to reduce the top-10 protection on the 2016 first-rounder the Kings owe them, according to Goodwill.
- The Cavaliers made it a priority to sign a perimeter defender like Dahntay Jones as insurance for Iman Shumpert instead of a point guard to offset the injury to Mo Williams because they envision LeBron James running the point in a pinch, accoriding to Dave McMenamin of ESPN.com. The Cavs inked Jones earlier today as Williams reportedly headed to New York for further examination on his sore left knee.
- Coach Brett Brown said the replacement of GM Sam Hinkie with new president of basketball operations Bryan Colangelo won’t result in a change to the team’s playing style, and he called for the front office to focus on strong defenders and veteran big men as they seek offseason upgrades, observes Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer. Brown also spoke highly of Elton Brand, Pompey notes. Brand is heading back into free agency and isn’t sure he’ll keep playing.
Atlantic Notes: Colangelo, Brand, Ujiri, DeRozan
The hiring of Bryan Colangelo and resignation of Sam Hinkie doesn’t signal “a departure from a process,” Colangelo insisted Sunday as the Sixers introduced him as their new president of basketball operations, as Christopher A. Vito for The Delaware County Daily Times observes. Colangelo nonetheless expects a “summer of change” for the roster, suggesting that with as many as four draft picks this year, all in the first round, the Sixers will consider parlaying some of that youth into more experienced talent. “You can only have so many developing players on your roster at a time, so there may be some decision to defer some of those to a future date, or may be a decision to package some of those things to acquire players that make sense and fit our strategy,” Colangelo said. “… It’s about putting a basketball team together. We’re really changing our focus toward winning. It’s part of a shift in culture, a mindset. I think [coach] Brett [Brown] is excited about shifting that. … There’s going to be a much-greater likelihood that we win basketball games.”
See more from Philadelphia amid news from the Atlantic Division:
- Elton Brand, whose signing earlier this season was one of the team’s first moves away from developing players, thinks he’ll retire at season’s end, Vito notes (Twitter link). Brand, 37, also thought he’d retire this past summer before the Sixers came calling.
- GM Masai Ujiri‘s contract with the Raptors is believed to be worth $15MM, according to Sportsnet’s Michael Grange, so it appears the executive is seeing an average of $3MM annually on the five-year deal. Grange wonders whether the Raptors will explore restructuring the pact, which has two years left on it, now that the Knicks are reportedly eyeing him.
- DeMar DeRozan admitted Sunday to a fondness for playing in Madison Square Garden, but he said he didn’t know whether he would consider the Knicks in free agency this summer, notes Marc Berman of the New York Post. Of course, it’s par for the course that a soon-to-be free agent would praise the Garden, and all indications are DeRozan will re-sign with the Raptors, as Grange points out, given the shooting guard’s consistent praise for Toronto and the organization.
Sixers Rumors: Saric, Brand, Embiid
The Sixers continue to receive signs that Croatian star Dario Saric will be part of their roster next season, according to Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer. Player-development assistant Chris Babcock recently spent eight days with Saric, who is playing for Anadolu Efes in Turkey. The trip left Philadelphia officials confident that Saric is ready to join the NBA. “Obviously, decisions are going to have to be made on his part,” said Sixers coach Brett Brown. “But we like what we see and we believe he likes what he sees.” Philadelphia acquired the rights to the 6’10” power forward in a 2014 draft-day trade with Orlando.
There’s more out of Philadelphia:
- Elton Brand saw his first game action Friday since signing with the Sixers January 4th, writes Derek Bodner of Philadelphia magazine. With injuries to Jahlil Okafor and Nerlens Noel leaving Philadelphia short-handed, Brand played 13 minutes, scoring eight points and collecting four rebounds. “Contrary to reports, I was thinking I was going to play all season when I got here,” said Brand, who will turn 37 next week. “But you see guys like Carl [Landry], Richaun [Holmes], guys working so hard, I didn’t mind not playing.” Okafor and Noel are both listed as day-to-day, so it’s uncertain how much more court time Brand can expect.
- Injured center Joel Embiid has returned from Qatar and participated in Friday’s pre-game workout, Bodner writes in the same piece. Embiid visited Aspetar, a Middle Eastern orthopedic and sports medicine hospital, to help with the rehab process on his surgically repaired right foot. Bodner included a video of Embiid’s pre-game routine with his story.
- Embiid’s long recovery time presents another reason for concern, notes Bob Ford of The Philadelphia Inquirer. The normal recovery period for tarsal navicular surgery is six months, but GM Sam Hinkie has already said Embiid won’t be ready for summer league action, even though it will have been 11 months since the operation.
Atlantic Notes: Rondo, Ainge, Brand
Celtics executive Danny Ainge is expected to be active leading up to this year’s trade deadline and would be willing to deal away significant assets, but only if it would land a “special player,” A. Sherrod Blakely of CSNNE.com relays. “It depends on the player and it depends on his age and it depends on the probability of us re-signing him,” Ainge said during an appearance on 98.5 the Sports Hub’s “Toucher & Rich” show. “But most of the time I would say no, I would not give up [significant assets]. If you’re risking very little, it might be worth the risk. But I would never risk a lot for a small chance unless that player’s one of the top four or five players in the game.” Boston owns the Nets’ first-rounder in this year’s NBA draft, a pick that is likely to be in the top five. The team has reportedly been involved in recent trade talks with the Rockets regarding Dwight Howard and with the Nuggets about Danilo Gallinari.
Here’s more from the Atlantic Division:
- The Knicks are going to attempt to upgrade their point guard position this offseason, but Kings playmaker Rajon Rondo likely won’t be the solution, Ian Begley of ESPN.com writes. At issue for Rondo is New York’s triangle offense, which isn’t a point guard dominated system, Begley notes. When asked if the Knicks were a possibility for him in the future, Rondo, who will be an unrestricted free agent at season’s end, said, “The triangle’s not really a good look for me, I don’t think.”
- Elton Brand wound up with the Sixers because of his value as a leader, something that Hawks coach Mike Budenholzer says the veteran excels at being, writes Chris Vivlamore of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “He is going to bring [leadership to the 76ers] in multitudes of hundreds or thousands,” Budenholzer said. “He’s one of the most incredible leaders I’ve ever been around. And as a person. To have person like that in your locker room every day, in your practice every day, on your bench every day, I think it’s huge value. It was a move that made sense for both of them. For the organization, it’s a really smart move. For Elton, to decide he wanted to get back and help the Sixers organization and help these young players and give back speaks a lot to his character and what kind of guy he is.”