Klay Thompson Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Western Notes: Thompson, Holiday, Jazz

October 11th, 2014 at 10:32pm CST by Cray Allred

Klay Thompson tells J.A. Adande of ESPN.com that he’s more interested in securing an extension with the Warriors now than signing a single year contract next summer to prepare for the 2016/17 free agent market, when the league’s new TV deal will kick in and boost player salaries. “It really is tempting to do all that,” said Thompson, who admitted that seeing Paul George‘s shocking injury with Team USA has affected his outlook. “But I’d rather have the security right now, you know?” Adande gets the sense from both Thompson and the Warriors that a deal will get done before the October 31 deadline. Here’s more from Golden State and the rest of the West:

25-year-old Justin Holiday has faced a tough road to crack an NBA roster, but tells Rusty Simmons of the San Francisco Chronicle that his experience in international and D-League play has been formative. “I don’t need to go out here and do the jobs of Steph [Curry] and Klay. I understand that,” said Holiday, who hopes to earn one of the two open regular season roster spots with the Warriors. “That’s what a team is about: playing together and using each guy’s strengths in order to win… I want to help and lead on defense. You can’t control your jump shot every night, but you can control your effort on defense all the time.”
Warriors coach Steve Kerr spoke highly of Holiday’s ability, telling Simmons, “He’s an unbelievable guy. He’s a great worker, he’s smart and he’s a team guy. Justin belongs in this league.” Kerr has expressed similar non-committal praise for fellow Golden State camp invite Jason Kapono.
Veteran Jazz newcomers Trevor Booker and Dahntay Jones tell Aaron Falk of The Salt Lake Tribune that Utah’s roster is at an advanced stage for a rebuilding team, having witnessed successful rebuilds in their time with the Wizards and Pacers, respectively.
Though the Jazz have waived Dee Bost and Kevin Murphy, they still have interest in adding the pair to their D-League team, Falk notes.

Warriors, Klay Thompson At Odds On Extension

October 9th, 2014 at 11:51am CST by Chuck Myron

11:51am: Thompson is unwilling to accept a discounted extension, as Marcus Thompson of the Bay Area News group hears (Twitter link). It’s not entirely clear whether that means he’s unwilling to drop beneath a $15MM average annual value or if he won’t take any deal for less than the max.

11:12am: The Warriors and Klay Thompson haven’t made progress toward an extension in the past few weeks, and the sides are $2-3MM apart in the average annual value of their proposals, sources tell Monte Poole of CSNBayArea.com. Still, it doesn’t appear as though agent Bill Duffy has lost optimism that the sides will strike agreement, Poole adds.

Thompson wants at least $15MM a year, while Warriors co-owner Joe Lacob isn’t sold on the idea of paying Thompson as much as the approximately $15MM that David Lee will make this season, according to Poole, who indicates that the team is hovering around $13MM in its offers. A July report indicated that Thompson was seeking the max. It won’t be clear until next July just how much Thompson could make in a max extension, since the cap figures won’t be set until then, but such a deal would yield about $85MM over five years based on this year’s max, or $66MM over four seasons. Next year’s maximum salaries will likely rise above those figures, given the projected increase to the salary cap.

The Timberwolves were prepared to give Thompson a max extension if they had acquired him in a trade for Kevin Love, sources tell Poole, but the Warriors steadfastly held Thompson out of those talks. The Warriors have appeared high on Thompson, and GM Bob Myers last month expressed a desire to strike a deal to keep him around, echoing the vow that Lacob made in the spring. Thompson wants to come to an agreement and his teammates do, too, Poole writes.

Lacob has hinted at a willingness to exceed the luxury tax in the past, but he doesn’t want to do so at this point, Poole hears. The Warriors already have about $56MM in commitments for 2015/16, so an extension would bring the team relatively close to the tax threshold for that season, though it’s unknown just where the tax line will be. Still, the league’s $24 billion TV deal figures to soon bring about a sharp rise in the salary cap, and the tax line along with it, so even a max extension for Thompson probably wouldn’t put the Warriors in too much danger of repeatedly becoming a taxpayer in the years ahead.

The Warriors have apparently budgeted for a Thompson extension, though it’s unclear just how much they’ve set aside. It’s uncommon for the team to strike an extension deal ahead of the deadline to do so, notes Marcus Thompson of the Bay Area News Group (Twitter link). So the lack of progress at this point doesn’t necessarily mean that talks won’t gain momentum closer to October 31st, the final day that the sides can put pen to paper on an extension.

Pacific Rumors: Morrises, Liggins, Gay, Kobe

September 30th, 2014 at 12:39pm CST by Chuck Myron

Marcus Morris says he thinks Markieff Morris should have received a greater share of the four-year, $52MM combined total of the extensions that agent Leon Rose negotiated for the twins, as he told reporters, including Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic. Markieff said it would be OK if he and his brother ended up on different teams, but he added that there was no reason for them to walk away from what the Suns had to offer.

“It’s a dream come true,” Markieff said. “We feel like we’re home together. When they offer us great money to stay together, why not take it instead of going through free agency? We’re both going to have great seasons. … The game is more fun together. It means more. We’re definitely past that point of not being able to play apart, but another four years definitely won’t hurt anything.”

Here’s more from around the Pacific:

DeAndre Liggins doesn’t appear on the training camp roster the Clippers released today, so it looks like he won’t be joining the team after all. There were conflicting reports about whether he had a deal to do so.
Rudy Gay said he briefly began extension talks with the Kings over the summer, but he put them on hold when he joined Team USA, notes Jason Jones of The Sacramento Bee. Still, Gay’s not opposed to having his agents at Octagon Sports resume talks, Jones adds.
Kobe Bryant isn’t ruling out the idea of playing beyond his contract, which ends in the summer of 2016, shortly before his 38th birthday, observes Marc J. Spears of Yahoo! Sports. “Whether I do or not, we’ll have to see that two years from now,” Bryant said. “I don’t know, but I could [play longer]. Physically, I don’t see an end to the tunnel.”
Confidence in the continued development of the team’s young players made the Warriors hesitate to trade for Kevin Love, as GM Bob Myers told NBA TV, while Klay Thompson, in his NBA TV appearance, expressed appreciation for Steve Kerr‘s role in forestalling a swap. Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group provides a transcription. “If it is the truth, it’s awesome,” Thompson said of Kerr’s opposition to a move. “I appreciate Steve for that. It just makes me want to play even harder for him if he really did believe that, so it gives me a new sense of confidence, really.”

Warriors Want To Extend Klay Thompson

September 23rd, 2014 at 8:00pm CST by Alex Lee

Warriors general manager Bob Myers indicated on Tuesday that the team wants to sign Klay Thompson to a long-term extension, reports Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group. Thompson, of course, was famously dangled in trade offers for Kevin Love during the offseason before the Warriors opted against moving him. Myers had the following to say about Thompson and his backcourt mate Stephen Curry:

“We value [Thompson] in the highest way, and we want to keep him on this team for a long time. I think most people believe it to be the best, one of the best backcourts in the NBA, and I don’t think that that’s a minority opinion. I think it’s a majority opinion. That’s part of the team you don’t worry about too much, right? I mean, that part is good, which is hard to find… The two guard in the NBA is a depleted position, so we feel like if we can move forward with those two guys we’re in pretty good shape.”

Thompson is reportedly seeking a max contract and the Warriors have until October 31 to agree on an extension of his rookie-scale contract that would prevent him from hitting restricted free agency next summer. There was an August report that suggested the 24-year-old shooting guard was disgruntled after all the trade rumors, but last week Sam Amick of USA Today spoke to Thompson who pledged his loyalty to his current team.

Unfortunately for the Warriors, Amick also reported that Thompson’s agent Bill Duffy values his client as the best two-guard in the NBA, though the USA Today scribe added that the team believes they have budgeted appropriately enough to keep Thompson. More details surrounding negotiations between the Warriors and their star shooting guard are sure to unfold as we near the start of the 2014/15 regular season.

And-Ones: Thompson, Moore, Oden

September 16th, 2014 at 6:32pm CST by Eddie Scarito

Klay Thompson was one of many Warriors players who expressed support for Mark Jackson in the days leading up to Golden State’s firing of its former coach, but the extension-eligible Thompson tells USA Today’s Sam Amick that he’s optimistic about working with Steve Kerr. “It was tough seeing Coach [Jackson] go, but at the end of the day the front office did what they felt would be best for us to win,” Thompson said. “They’ve made great moves in the past, so no reason not to trust them on this move. I’ve talked to Steve and he seems really good, like a guy who is really going to open it up for us. I’m excited to work with him.”

Here’s more from around the league:

The salary in the second season of E’Twaun Moore‘s deal with the Bulls will become guaranteed if he remains on the roster beyond a certain date in July 2015, writes Shams Charania of RealGM.
Executives with two NBA teams were optimistic that Greg Oden could still prove a useful NBA player after seeing him with the Heat last year, as they told Michael Wallace of ESPN.com. Still, his chances of finding work in the NBA anytime soon are in serious doubt as he faces a felony domestic violence charge stemming from an incident last month, as another exec tells Wallace.
The Celtics have hired Scott Morrison, the longtime coach at Lakeland University in Canada, to coach their D-League affiliate, the team announced.

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

Latest On Klay Thompson

September 15th, 2014 at 7:33pm CST by Cray Allred

Sam Amick of USA Today interviewed many of the key decision makers in Golden State regarding Klay Thompson‘s extension negotiations, including the shooting guard himself. Thompson’s agent Bill Duffy, who is reportedly seeking the max for the fourth-year sharpshooter, tells Amick that the reason he’s demanding so much for his client in extension talks with the Warriors is that he views Thompson as the best shooting guard in the league.

“I don’t want Kobe Bryant to go crazy, but there’s some uncertainty as to who he is right now [due to injury]” Duffy said. “But I think Klay Thompson right now is the top two-way, two-guard in basketball. I think when you look at his body of work, when you look at what he accomplished guarding point guards on a regular basis [last season], I think it’s pretty clear.”

Warriors owner Joe Lacob declined to get into specifics about Thompson’s potential rookie scale extension, but reiterated the team’s commitment to locking him up long-term. Golden State reportedly budgeted with Thompson’s future in mind, convincing Andrew Bogut to take less in his extension, and Lacob says that the move that first brought Bogut aboard and sent away guard Monta Ellis was made to accommodate Thompson as well.

“We traded an excellent guard freeing up a starting spot for him,” said Lacob. “As is known, despite many requests from other teams over the last few years, we have continued to bet on his continued development. We are very proud that he is a Warrior and also of his major contribution on this year’s USA Basketball team. We are looking forward to a great year for Klay, the Splash Brothers and the Warriors.”

For his part, Thompson tells the USA Today scribe that the trade speculation involving him and Kevin Love earlier in the summer didn’t upset him, and that he has no interest in exploring opportunities elsewhere as a restricted free agent next summer. Thompson believes that the Warriors are capable of competing for a championship.

“I wasn’t really [angry],” Thompson said, countering rumors of his displeasure. “I was more just worried about being traded, just because I’m so comfortable in the Bay. I think that’s natural for anybody [to not want to] just get up and move. I mean it wouldn’t have been the end of the world, but it’s a business, and I’m still playing ball for a living. I was more happy when they showed faith in me that they didn’t want to budge and trade me for a guy [in Love] who’s a multiple all-NBA guy and a proven All-Star. I thought that was really cool that the Warriors believed in my potential…Me and Steph [Curry] have another year together, and we’ve got a proven big man, all-NBA defender [in Bogut]. I really believe we can be a championship team.”

Amick surmises that Golden State’s unwillingness to deal Thompson for Love, along with his strong play in the regular season and for Team USA, has shifted all the leverage to his side of the negotiating table.

Western Notes: Grizzlies, Thompson, Suns

August 23rd, 2014 at 8:59am CST by Eddie Scarito

The Grizzlies allowed a trade exception worth $1,160,040 to expire when they failed to use it by the end of Friday. Memphis had created the exception in the deal that sent Tony Wroten to the Sixers a year ago. It’s the second trade exception that the Grizzlies have let lapse in the past week or so, after their $1,027,424 Donte Greene trade exception expired on the 15th.

Here’s more from out west:

Mychal Thompson discussed the trade rumors this summer regarding his son, Klay Thompson. Thompson was rumored to be a key piece for the Wolves in any deal involving Kevin Love heading the Warriors. The elder Thompson said, “He was put on the table by the owner and the general manager. Jerry West and Steve Kerr pulled him off the deal,” tweets Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group.
The elder Thompson also told Leung (Twitter link), that he thought the Warriors would land Love. “I really thought [Joe] Lacob the owner was just going to veto everybody’s opinion,” Thompson said.
After their surprise success last season, very little has gone right for the Suns this offseason, writes Bob Young of the Arizona Republic. Young chronicles the franchise’s difficulties this summer, including the contract impasse with Eric Bledsoe; the failure to land Love; losing Channing Frye in free agency; and P.J. Tucker‘s arrest.

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

And-Ones: Melo, Thompson, Lee, Lowry

August 21st, 2014 at 10:43pm CST by Alex Lee

Speaking at a charity event on Thursday night at the Barclays Center, Carmelo Anthony indicated he’s that he was close to leaving the Knicks this offseason, writes Ian Begley of ESPN New York. Melo did add that he’s optimistic about the new-look roster built under Phil Jackson‘s direction, though he acknowledged that the Eastern Conference improved this summer.

Here are some other notes from around the league:

Ric Bucher of Bleacher Report cites a source close to Klay Thompson that says the Warriors‘ guard is angry that he was dangled as trade bait for Kevin Love over the summer. In his piece, Bucher examines the idea that Golden State alienated Thompson and David Lee, though he was unable reach Lee or sources close to him.
Looking towards the 2014/15 version of the Raptors, Moke Hamilton of Basketball Insiders likens Kyle Lowry to Rajon Rondo, comparing the the four-year, $48MM deal that Lowry signed with Toronto this summer to the five-year, $55MM deal that Rondo inked in 2009. The common thread, Hamilton writes, is that both lucrative pacts, while based off small samples, were awarded to point guards that had the potential to justify them.

And-Ones: Williams, Curry, Tucker

August 12th, 2014 at 6:51pm CST by Eddie Scarito

Lou Williams believes he fits in better with the Raptors than he did with the Hawks and head coach Mike Budenholzer, writes Alex Kennedy of Basketball Insiders. Williams expanded on his feelings, saying, “I am excited to a part of a young core, I am excited be on a team that wants me, that has a high expectation level for me. My time here in Atlanta, I realized that they were going in a direction that probably didn’t fit my style of play and I probably didn’t fit Coach Bud’s style of play. I’m a guy that needs the ball to be effective and they really didn’t need that from me. They were building a different core of a basketball team. I felt like it worked out for both sides, they got some talented guys in making moves this offseason and I feel great about the fit that I’m in.”

Here’s more from around the league:

The NBA has suspended Suns small forward P.J. Tucker three games without pay for pleading guilty to a DUI charge, the league announced (Twitter link; hat tip to USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt).
Stephen Curry believes the Warriors chose wisely when they declined to part with Klay Thompson in exchange for Kevin Love, as he said Tuesday in an appearance on WFAN Radio in New York. Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group provides a transcription.
Curry was also asked on The Dan Patrick Show if LeBron James‘ decision to return home to Cleveland made him consider returning to his own hometown of Charlotte one day, notes Leung in a separate article. Curry’s response was, “I’ve always had thoughts about playing at home, what it would be like. My dad played there for 10 years, and people around the Greater Charlotte area in North Carolina have done a lot for my family growing up, so you always think about it. Right now I feel like I’ve got three years left on my deal, so this isn’t going to be an issue for me for a while. I love the Bay Area and where we are as a team trying to win a championship, and that’s what it’s all about. Of course everybody dreams about or thinks about what it’s going to be like to play at home. Obviously if that opportunity comes along it’s a different discussion.”

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

Fallout From Kevin Love Trade Agreement

August 7th, 2014 at 1:28pm CST by Chuck Myron

The time between now and August 23rd, when the Kevin Love trade agreement can become an official transaction, makes it possible that the deal could fall apart, but the Cavs and Wolves are under “enormous pressure” to honor the pact, writes Ken Berger of CBSSports.com. A source tells Berger that Wolves coach/executive Flip Saunders would listen if the Warriors decided to offer Klay Thompson, but Golden State has been steadfastly against doing so. The Warriors haven’t spoken with Minnesota for weeks, according to Berger, and Sam Amick of USA Today hears that Golden State doesn’t intend to jump back into the fray (Twitter link). Here are more aftershocks from the Love deal:

Even if the Warriors did offer up Thompson to Minnesota, it wouldn’t cause the Cavs deal to come apart, as the Wolves prefer what Cleveland is set to send them, tweets Jon Krawczynski of The Associated Press.

Earlier updates:

The Wolves gave the Cavs permission more than two weeks ago to negotiate with Love about a long-term future with the Cavs, reports Jerry Zgoda of the Star Tribune. There are conflicting reports about whether Love has committed to signing a max deal with Cleveland next summer.
Minnesota maintains interest in Thaddeus Young, but the Wolves wouldn’t end up sending Anthony Bennett to Philadelphia if such a deal materializes, Zgoda writes in the same piece. Minnesota hopes instead to ship the 2015 first-rounder it’s acquiring from Cleveland in the Love trade to the Sixers for Young, Zgoda writes. The Wolves would also like to shed J.J. Barea and Luc Mbah a Moute in a deal for Young, according to Zgoda, who speculates that Minnesota might include Shabazz Muhammad, too.
Kevin Martin was in plenty of Love rumors, but there’s no indication that the Wolves are looking to trade him or Corey Brewer, Zgoda tweets.
Most around the league believe that the addition of Love will convince Ray Allen to sign with Cleveland at some point before camp, according to Sam Amico of Fox Sports Ohio, and Chris Broussard of ESPN.com tweets that he heard weeks ago that Allen would come aboard if the Cavs traded for Love. Still, Allen has dismissed similar rumors and his criteria for signing with a team appear to exclude the Cavs, as I explained Wednesday.
The Cavs aren’t looking to trade Dion Waiters, who was one of the first within the Cavs organization to whom LeBron James spoke after he made his decision to return from the Heat, Amico writes in his piece.
Cleveland is targeting big men, but the team has faith that Brendan Haywood can contribute, as Amico also notes.