Ernie Grunfeld Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Eastern Notes: Grunfeld, Harris, Plumlee, Marks

April 14th, 2016 at 10:13pm CST by Arthur Hill

Wizards GM Ernie Grunfeld was disappointed by the failure to make the playoffs but insists his team has a strong foundation for the future, according to Jorge Castillo of The Washington Post. Washington fired coach Randy Wittman shortly after the 41-41 season came to a close. “The players tell you what to do, and I thought we were very inconsistent this year,” Grunfeld said. “That’s probably the only consistent thing about us: We went up and down. And there was no sense of urgency. I don’t think we played with the type of energy on a nightly basis that you need to achieve the kind of goals that we had. We had high expectations internally and externally.” Grunfeld will lead the search for the Wizards’ next coach and says he has already heard from agents for several interested applicants.

There’s more tonight from the Eastern Conference:

The trade that brought Tobias Harris to the Pistons emerged right before the deadline, according to Rod Beard of The Detroit News. “His name wasn’t even out there for us until two days before we did the deal,” said coach/executive Stan Van Gundy. “We were really surprised.” Harris averaged 16.6 points and 6.2 rebounds per game after arriving from Orlando, helping Detroit secure its first playoff spot since 2009 and the first of Harris’ career.
Center Miles Plumlee is looking forward to next year after the late-season surge that made him a key part of the Bucks‘ rotation, writes Charles F. Gardner of The Journal Sentinel. “I’m just really thankful for the opportunity to get out there and play,” Plumlee said. “I love the game. I love the team here. I think we’re building something really special and I hope to continue to be a part of it.” Plumlee completed his four-year rookie scale contract and will enter restricted free agency this summer.
Sean Marks started fining players for showing up late after taking over as Nets GM, tweets Brian Lewis of The New York Post. Several players confirmed to Lewis that frequent lateness was a problem with the team.

Wizards Notes: Grunfeld, Dudley, Wittman

April 14th, 2016 at 4:52pm CST by Chuck Myron

Wizards president Ernie Grunfeld will head the team’s search for a new coach in the wake of Randy Wittman‘s dismissal today, as Grunfeld told reporters, a remark that appears to remove lingering doubt about the executive’s future with the team, observes J. Michael of CSN Mid-Atlantic. Earlier reports conflicted about Grunfeld’s job security, though he’s under contract through next season.

See more from Washington, where the Wizards reportedly have strong interest in Scott Brooks and others, as we passed along in our Wittman story.

Wizards players concluded that they couldn’t rely on the team’s coaches when they held a players-only meeting in January that veteran Jared Dudley organized, and Dudley criticized the coaching staff’s lack of adjustments in March, Michael notes, suggesting Wittman changed Dudley’s role in retaliation.
John Wall wants to see the Wizards re-sign soon-to-be free agents Dudley, Alan Anderson and Garrett Temple, Michael writes in a separate piece. Anderson is enthusiastic about a new deal with the team, and while Dudley is open to returning as long as Wittman isn’t around, he’s looking for the security of a long-term contract, according to Michael, who speculates Dudley is unlikely to be back.
The partial guarantee on Wittman’s salary for next season is $500K, sources tell Jorge Castillo of The Washington Post (Twitter link), so the Wizards are still responsible for paying that much to the fired coach.
Wittman issued a statement in which he said he believes the team is headed in the right direction as he thanked the organization for the opportunity to coach, as Castillo relays via Twitter.

Latest On Wizards, Randy Wittman

April 13th, 2016 at 4:45pm CST by Chuck Myron

4:45pm: Multiple Wizards players tell J. Michael of CSN Mid-Atlantic they expect the team will fire Wittman.

12:47pm: The belief is widespread in NBA coaching circles that the Wizards are poised to fire Wittman, reports Marc Stein of ESPN.com (Twitter link).

9:52am: It’s unlikely the Wizards will keep Randy Wittman for next season, the last on his contract, league sources tell Jorge Castillo of The Washington Post, who adds that Wizards players believe that Wittman senses the team won’t retain him. That jibes with the general sentiment of late, with Michael Scotto of SheridanHoops reporting last week that Wittman isn’t expected to keep his job and Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com expressing that same belief in a recent appearance on WTEM-AM’s “The Tony Kornheiser Show” (audio link, scroll to 10:45; transcription via James Herbert of CBSSports.com).

Conversely, the Wizards are expected to retain team president Ernie Grunfeld, Castillo writes. Previous reports have conflicted on that matter.

Wittman’s contract calls for him to make more than $3MM per year, Castillo notes, though only an unknown portion of that is guaranteed for next season. Several people around the league wondered as the season began about the possibility that the Wizards would let Wittman’s fate hang in the balance until July so that free agent target Kevin Durant could weigh in on the decision, as The Vertical’s Chris Mannix reported for SI.com in November. That was before a disappointing season that’s appeared to dampen the chances of Durant choosing to play in his native Washington, D.C.

The season has taken a toll on the relationship between Wittman and his players, as J. Michael of CSN Mid-Atlantic recently wrote, and it’s the combination of that and the team’s subpar performance that have sparked the belief amongst the players that Wittman thinks he’s about to lose his job, according to Castillo. Wittman took the team to the second round of the playoffs the past two years, the first time that’s happened for the franchise since back-to-back trips to the Finals in 1978 and 1979, but Washington has been eliminated from contention for a postseason berth with a 40-41 record this season.

Does Wittman deserve to take the fall for the struggles of the Wizards? Leave a comment to share your thoughts.

Reports Conflict On Ernie Grunfeld’s Job Security

April 8th, 2016 at 12:49pm CST by Chuck Myron

Conflicting reports have emerged about the job security of Wizards president Ernie Grunfeld, as two people with knowledge of the situation told J. Michael of CSN Mid-Atlantic recently that his position is safe while league sources told Michael Scotto of SheridanHoops that Grunfeld is no lock to return. The 60-year-old executive is under contract through next season, as Jorge Castillo of The Washington Post revealed this week, but people around the league have for the past few months brought up Danny Ferry‘s name as a possible replacement, according to Scotto. Thunder assistant GM Troy Weaver has also drawn mention as a potential candidate, Scotto writes.

Coach Randy Wittman‘s salary for next season is only partially guaranteed, and Scotto writes that he’s “not expected” to return. However, it doesn’t appear as though the team has made any final decision.

The Wizards are on the brink of elimination from playoff contention, three and a half games back of the eighth-place Pistons with four to play. They’re also in line to relinquish their first-round pick to the Suns as part of the Markieff Morris trade. Washington has long planned to recruit Kevin Durant, a D.C. native, in the summer ahead, but the team’s losing season has dimmed its hopes of a homecoming for the former MVP, as Scotto notes. The uncertainty surrounding the future of several soon-to-be free agents on the Wizards is one of several contributing factors to the team’s slippage this year, Castillo posits.

Ferry’s name has emerged frequently in recent months following the buyout deal that ended his tenure as GM of the Hawks, as he’s reportedly been a candidate for GM vacancies with the Nets and Sixers, in spite of the controversy regarding the racially charged remarks he read from a scouting report in 2014. Weaver has been with the Thunder since the 2008/09 season, helping build Oklahoma City into a perennial title contender.

Grunfeld is one of the NBA’s longest tenured executives, having run the Wizards front office since the 2003/04 season. Every player on the team was acquired under his watch.

Southeast Notes: Grunfeld, Johnson, Howard

April 5th, 2016 at 12:59pm CST by Chuck Myron

It’s been a down year for the Wizards, but team president Ernie Grunfeld doesn’t appear to be going anywhere, since he’s under contract for next season, league sources revealed to Jorge Castillo of The Washington Post. The terms of Grunfeld’s pact hadn’t been clear, and it remains unknown when Grunfeld and owner Ted Leonsis included this season in the arrangement. The pressure remains on coach Randy Wittman, who’s also under contract for next season but with only a partial guarantee on his salary, and Wittman’s relationship with the team’s players has reportedly deteriorated.

See more from Washington amid items from the Southeast Division:

Two soon-to-be free agents on the Wizards have dropped their agents to instead hire Mark Bartelstein of Priority Sports, as SportsBusiness Journal reports in a subscription-only piece. Ramon Sessions left Allegiant Athletic Agency’s Jared Karnes to team up with Bartelstein while Garrett Temple parted with John Hamilton of Performance Sports Management.
Heat buyout market signee Joe Johnson isn’t giving the team quite as much return on its investment of late after a hot start, though coach Erik Spoelstra, among others, isn’t overly concerned, as Manny Navarro of the Miami Herald chronicles. Johnson will hit free agency again this summer after his short-term deal with Miami is over. “Joe’s a vet, an experienced guy,” said fellow soon-to-be free agent Luol Deng. “We’re not worried about the vet guys. He’ll be fine.”
Dwight Howard reportedly has interest in returning to the Magic, but the team would be unwise to give him the maximum salary of around $30MM that he and new agent Perry Rogers will no doubt request, opines Brian Schmitz of the Orlando Sentinel. Schmitz believes the Magic should stop at around $20MM and thinks the team would prefer to sign a free agent with less baggage.

Nets Interested In Tommy Sheppard For GM Job

February 4th, 2016 at 7:58am CST by Chuck Myron

The Nets have requested permission to interview Wizards senior VP of basketball operations Tommy Sheppard for their GM vacancy, a source said to Brian Lewis of the New York Post. He joins Bryan Colangelo, Arturas Karnisovas and Gersson Rosas as contenders for the position, Lewis notes, having reported earlier this week that Danny Ferry was no longer a viable candidate. John Calipari is a long shot candidate, but remains a possibility because of his strong support from CEO Brett Yormark, according to Lewis.

Brooklyn already reportedly received permission to speak with Karnisovas and Rosas. Washington denied a June 2014 request from the Grizzlies to interview Sheppard, as Chris Vernon of 92.9 FM ESPN in Memphis reported at the time, so it’s no lock that the Nets will have the chance to pursue him. Sheppard has been with the Wizards for 12 years and assumed his current position under GM Ernie Grunfeld shortly before the 2013/14 season.

The Nets reportedly want to hire a GM before the trade deadline, which is two weeks from today. Assistant GM Frank Zanin has been running the front office since the team removed Billy King from the GM job nearly a month ago.

Wizards Plan Extension For Bradley Beal In 2015

October 13th, 2014 at 11:31am CST by Chuck Myron

Bradley Beal won’t be eligible for an extension to his rookie scale contract until July, but the Wizards are already planning to come to terms with him next offseason, and his latest injury hasn’t given the team pause, sources tell J. Michael of CSNWashington.com. Beal is likely out six to eight weeks with a broken wrist, but it remains a fait accompli that the team will pick up his approximately $5.695MM rookie scale team option for 2015/16 by the deadline at the end of the month, Michael writes.

Beal played in only 56 games as a rookie thanks to a leg injury and was on a minutes limit last year because of another injury to the same leg, as Michael notes, but his history of ailments apparently isn’t a concern to GM Ernie Grunfeld and his staff. A quick extension for Beal would follow the team’s path with backcourt mate John Wall, to whom the team committed a five-year maximum-salary deal in 2013 despite the fact that to that point he’d missed at least 13 games in two of his three seasons in the NBA. The extension made Wall the team’s Designated Player, meaning the Wizards can grant an extension of no more than four years to Beal as long as Wall remains on the roster.

It’s conceivable that Beal will be worth the maximum salary, as Michael opines, but it remains unknown whether the team wants to jump into a max deal with the Mark Bartelstein client just as it did with Wall. The maximum salary is tied to the salary cap, and it’s unclear just how high the salary cap will spike for the summer of 2016, when an extension for Beal would kick in. The league’s new $24 billion TV deal also takes effect that summer, but while some projections have the cap surging as high as $80MM, it’s not yet known if the league will phase in more gradual increases, and if so, how the league would structure those incremental rises. Waiting until Beal hits restricted free agency in the summer of 2016 would give both sides the ability to see where the max and the cap are situated before committing to a deal. The Wizards have only about $29MM on the books for 2016/17, but locking themselves into a max extension for Beal might make it difficult for the team to chase free agent target Kevin Durant in the summer of 2016.

Eastern Links: Grunfeld, Kerr, Vasquez, Ariza

May 5th, 2014 at 3:49pm CST by Chuck Myron

Ernie Grunfeld‘s contract with the Wizards was believed to run only through this season, but Mike Wise of The Washington Post reports that it covers next season, too. That Grunfeld is on target to return to the team for 2014/15 is no surprise, given Washington’s revival this year, and perhaps Grunfeld may still have the opportunity to parlay the success into an extension. Still, it looks he won’t be hitting the open market this summer. Here’s more from the Eastern Conference:

Steve Kerr was the only voter to have Tim Hardaway Jr. atop his Rookie of the Year ballot. It’s seemingly further indication that Kerr is on his way to the Knicks, and a source tells Marc Berman of the New York Post that the would-be coach sees re-signing Carmelo Anthony as “vital” to the team’s future, as Berman writes.
Greivis Vasquez is set for restricted free agency this summer, but he apparently has no intention of leaving the Raptors, as he told reporters today, including Cathal Kelly of The Globe and Mail (Twitter link). “I want to be back. I truly want to be back … It will truly be heartbreaking if I’m not back,” Vasquez said.
Trevor Ariza would like to re-sign with the Wizards in free agency this summer and says that returning to the West Coast to be closer to family wouldn’t be his top priority, but the small forward tells Michael Lee of The Washington Post that he’ll go “wherever I’m wanted.”
Elton Brand remains uncertain about retirement, though Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution gets the sense that the 15th-year veteran still thinks he can play (Twitter link).
Fellow Hawks big man Mike Scott, a restricted free agent, probably earned a raise as he established himself as a key part of Atlanta’s rotation this year, and he says he would like to come back to the team, Vivlamore tweets.

Coach/GM Rumors: Jazz, Wizards, Raps, Cavs

November 22nd, 2013 at 4:52pm CST by Luke Adams

It may seem a little early in the season for any NBA teams to make a coaching change, but it’s worth noting that each of the league’s 30 coaches have already survived twice as long this year as Mike Brown did with the Lakers a year ago. While there may not be any coaching or front office shake-ups right around the corner, Ken Berger of CBSSports.com examines situations of potential unrest around the league, offering up a few tidbits along the way. Let’s round them up….

Despite leading the Jazz to a 1-12 start, coach Tyrone Corbin doesn’t appear to be in any danger, since the focus in Utah is on player development rather than wins and losses. Berger adds that there’s also no logical in-house candidate to serve as an interim coach now that former assistant Jeff Hornacek is in Phoenix.
League sources question how much longer Wizards president Ernie Grunfeld “can remain in self-preservation mode,” says Berger.
If the Wizards and Raptors continue losing, Randy Wittman and Dwane Casey could be in a dead heat for the first coach to be replaced. According to Berger, the feeling around the league is that new Toronto president Masai Ujiri would be quick to make a change and start putting his own stamp on the franchise if things go south for Casey and the Raptors.
Cavaliers GM Chris Grant is on “shaky ground,” sources tell Berger. While coach Mike Brown may have pushed for the drafting of Anthony Bennett, Brown just signed a four-year contract with the team, so Grant’s seat is much hotter than his coach’s.
Pelicans GM Dell Demps and Pistons GM Joe Dumars are among the other executives who could be in danger of losing their jobs if their respective teams aren’t in the playoff hunt, writes Berger.

Eastern Notes: Bosh, Wizards, Bucks, George

September 26th, 2013 at 8:52am CST by Luke Adams

With the NBA preseason nearly right around the corner, let's catch up on a few miscellaneous items from around the Eastern Conference….

Chris Bosh tells Shandel Richardson of the South Florida Sun Sentinel that he's better equipped to handle free agency now than he was back in 2010. Bosh will be eligible to opt out of his contract next summer, but the big man suggests that if the Heat win another title next spring, he, LeBron James, or Dwyane Wade probably aren't going anywhere.
Using the Wizards and Bucks as a couple of case studies, Mark Deeks of SBNation.com explains how not to not rebuild in the NBA.
Asked by WUSA's Dave Owens whether GM Ernie Grunfeld is "on the hot seat" heading into this season, Wizards owner Ted Leonsis was noncommital in his reply (link via the Washington Post). "We’re all on the hot seat," Leonsis said. "I’m on the hot seat. If the ratings aren’t good, you’ll be on the hot seat, too. I mean, we live in very accountable businesses, and we’re all accountable."
Paul George's max extension will limit the Pacers' flexibility for the next couple seasons, as Michael Pointer of the Indianapolis Star writes, which doesn't bode well for the odds of Lance Stephenson and Danny Granger remaining in Indiana beyond 2014. Pointer also notes that the fifth year of George's new deal is a player option.
In a piece for HoopsHype, Charley Rosen considers whether or not George is worth a five-year max extension.