Central Notes: Rondo, Pistons, Cavaliers
There has been plenty of drama in Chicago this season, much of which has involved Rajon Rondo, but the Bulls have no plan to buy out the point guard tweets K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune.
Rondo was most recently in the news for firing back at Bulls teammates Dwyane Wade and Jimmy Butler in an Instagram post. The post was a response to comments made by Wade and Butler that questioned the integrity of their teammates.
Despite the saga that has unfolded this season, the Bulls have an asset in Rondo that shouldn’t be cast aside. Johnson writes that, not only has Rondo played well and acted professionally, but his contract remains a valuable trade chip as well.
There’s more out of the Central Division:
- The Pistons have struggled since December, but head coach Stan Van Gundy may have pinpointed what’s gone wrong. “I think we’ve got to get better pressure on the ball, be more active with our hands and our communication,” Van Gundy told Keith Langlois of Pistons.com. “We’ve been fighting that all year.” The Pistons have plummeted from 2nd in defensive rating, all the way down to 13th.
- The Cavaliers haven’t been involved in much trade discussion, writes Sean Deveney of the Sporting News, which may imply that they’re waiting until March 1 to make a transaction. That date, of course, falls after the February 23 trade deadline, just as players who get waived after the fact become eligible to sign with a new team. Deveney mentions Rajon Rondo as a possible fit in this type of scenario.
- Distractions continue to mount in Cleveland and head coach Tyronn Lue isn’t pleased with the impact they’ve had on the Cavaliers, writes Joe Vardon of Cleveland.com. “We gotta focus on basketball, getting back to winning,” says Lue. Lately LeBron James has been in the news putting pressure on the team’s front office to acquire a point guard. The tension has risen so much in Cleveland that even the New York media has taken a break from Knicks to watch it play out.
LeBron James, Cavs At Odds Over Team Payroll
Cavaliers general manager David Griffin and superstar forward LeBron James have gone back and forth this month, making public comments about what the team’s roster does and doesn’t need. Most recently, James publicly called for the Cavs to add a “playmaker” to their roster, with Griffin responding by chiding the Finals MVP for his comments.
According to Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com, however, James’ frustration with the Cavaliers’ leadership group goes above Griffin. Windhorst reports that there is tension between James and Cavs ownership about the team’s payroll spending, with sources tell Windhorst that the relationship between LeBron and owner Dan Gilbert has been “strained” due to their different viewpoints on the issue of team salary.
When James was considering a return to Cleveland in 2014, the Cavs’ willingness to spend unconditionally on talent, regardless of the luxury-tax bill, was a major factor, according to Windhorst, who reports that LeBron signed on with the team after Gilbert agreed not to limit his spending. Since then, Cleveland has had a higher bill for team salary and the luxury tax than any other NBA team, but James has grown frustrated with what he perceives to be slowed spending this season, in the wake of the Cavs’ first title.
The Cavaliers allowed rotation players like Matthew Dellavedova and Timofey Mozgov to depart in free agency this past summer, but committed approximately $57MM to a long-term deal for J.R. Smith, not to mention signing James himself to a deal worth nearly $100MM over three years. More recently, the club managed to acquire Kyle Korver in a trade with the Hawks while simultaneously reducing team salary.
James’ recent comments about not wanting the team to become complacent angered Gilbert, since they seemed to imply that the organization was making a conscious choice not to get better, sources tell Windhorst. For his part, Griffin insists that money is no object for the Cavs, if the right deal presents itself.
“We can absolutely increase payroll if it’s the right piece at the right time. I’ve never once been given a mandate of any kind relative to money,” Griffin said. “We’re not going to do something where we go ask for more money unless we believe it makes us appreciably better. … As we have all along, ownership will do what needs to be done.”
In 2015/16, the Cavs paid $107MM in team salary and $54MM in luxury tax. Those numbers are currently at about $127MM+ and $27MM+ for the 2016/17 season, as our Salary Cap Snapshot for the Cavs shows. Signing a player to their roster to fill their open 15th spot would cost the Cavs about $2.50 in luxury tax penalties for every dollar they spend. The team is also close to going $15MM over the luxury tax line ($113.287MM), in which case that penalty would increase to $3.25 per extra dollar spent.
Latest On Cavs, LeBron, David Griffin
Earlier in the week, LeBron James publicly called for the Cavaliers to add a playmaker with intention of applying pressure to the team’s decision-makers. A team source told Dave McMenamin of ESPN.com that GM David Griffin was disappointed in the manner in which James shared his thoughts.
Griffin intends on sticking to the plan he’s had in place for the several months to add a backup point guard or playmaker and he won’t speed up the search for outside help simply because James made a few comments, McMenamin adds. James and Griffin had a one-on-one meeting earlier today to discuss the star’s comments.
After the meeting, Griffin spoke with the local media, as Brian Dulik of the Medina Gazette passes along in a series of Twitter links.
Griffin said that James’ comments were not “appropriate from a teammate perspective,” and added that the comment about the Cavs being complacent is “really misguided.”
“We’re all frustrated, I get the sentiment,” Griffin said. “I think [LeBron and I] needed it [to talk]. I’m happy.”
Cleveland currently has the largest payroll in league history, but the team is open to adding more salary to win another championship. “We can absolutely increase payroll if it’s the right piece at the right time,” Griffin said before adding that the team has enough talent to go back-to-back. “If we were 100 percent healthy, I feel good about our chances in any [playoff] series.”
Coach Tyronn Lue believes the Cavs can repeat with the players currently on the roster. “We have enough on this team to win a championship,” Lue said earlier today.
A team source told McMenamin that there was disbelief within the front office that James would question the team’s commitment, given its historical payroll. However, another source within the front office told the scribe that the timing of the comments was “brilliant,” as the lashing out could be seen as a motivational tactic designed to get the team back on track.
Heat Notes: Waiters, Bosh, Gay
The Heat are open to keeping Dion Waiters long-term and the shooting guard, who holds a player option worth $3MM for next season, feels like he’s finally found a home in the league, Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel writes.
“Everything, the organization, my teammates, my coach, of course [Pat Riley],” he said. “I feel right at home. Like I said before, when I signed, it wasn’t ever about the money. It was about the opportunity and just having a place you could call home, the enjoyment, and having fun. It’s been good. It’s just been consistent love. I’m happy for the opportunity and I’m just happy to be here.”
Here’s more from Miami:
- Chris Bosh hasn’t definitively decided to resume his basketball career, but the idea of playing alongside Dwyane Wade or LeBron James appeals to him, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reports. Jackson hears that Bosh, who suffers from blood clotting, has not been working toward a comeback this season. Bosh reached out to the Players Association last season in an attempt to force the Heat to allow him to play, but he has not reached out to the union for that kind of help this season, a source tells Jackson. Jackson also hears that the big man isn’t responding to some of the union’s calls.
- The Heat remain interested in Rudy Gay as a second-tier free agent should the team not be able to sign a star, Jackson writes in the same piece. Jackson notes that Gay, who ruptured his Achilles earlier this month, “loves the idea” of playing for Miami.
- Udonis Haslem will make $4MM in the final year of his contract, but he wants to sign a new deal with the Heat during the offseason, as he tells Marc J. Spears of The Undefeated. “My body still feels good,” Haslem said. “I plan on being around at least another year after this year.”
- The MRI on Tyler Johnson‘s shoulder came back negative and the Heat are not expected to request a roster exception from the league, Winderman relays in a separate piece. Johnson has missed the team’s last two games because of the sprained shoulder.
LeBron James: Cavs Need To Add Playmaker
Shortly after the Cavaliers acquired Kyle Korver earlier this month, LeBron James told reporters that the team still needed a backup point guard and another big man. General manager David Griffin wasn’t sold on the idea of adding another frontcourt player, but agreed with James that the Cavs could use another playmaker. Now, with Cleveland having lost five of its last seven games, the reigning Finals MVP has repeated his call for roster reinforcements.
“I just hope that we’re not satisfied as an organization,” James said on Monday night to a handful of Cavs’ beat reporters, including Dave McMenamin of ESPN.com. “I just hope we’re not satisfied.”
As McMenamin details, James told reporters that this year’s Cavs aren’t better than last year’s team from a personnel standpoint, having failed to adequately replace a few departing players like Matthew Dellavedova and Timofey Mozgov. James also views Cleveland’s roster as too “top-heavy,” relying on him, Kyrie Irving, and Kevin Love for a huge portion of the club’s production during the regular season.
“It’s great to have bodies (in the regular season),” James said. “Obviously, in the playoffs, you go down to what, eight max? And if somebody gets in foul trouble, you go to nine. You’re not playing back-to-backs. You have two days in between. You’re able to lock in. … When you don’t have bodies, it’s tough. The (expletive) grind of the regular season. We’re a top-heavy team.”
[RELATED: Five ways Cavs could address backup point guard spot]
James acknowledged that the front office was handcuffed to a certain extent by Mo Williams‘ last-minute decision to retire, since Williams had been penciled in as the team’s backup point guard prior to training camp. The 32-year-old also acknowledged that reliable rotation players don’t grow on trees, but stressed that the Cavs “need a (expletive) playmaker.”
“I don’t know what we got to offer (in trades),” James said. “I just know me, personally? I don’t got no time to waste. I’ll be 33 in the winter, and I ain’t got time to waste. That’s what I’m talking about.”
As James hints, the Cavs don’t have a ton of appealing assets to dangle in trade talks. The earlier first-round pick Cleveland can trade is its 2021 selection, and most of the players the club can afford to part with have modest contracts, which could make salary-matching difficult. The Cavs have five traded player exceptions at their disposal, but the largest one is worth about $4.84MM, so any player making more than $5MM or so would be out of reach with those TPEs. The team will also have to be wary of adding too much more salary to its books — no NBA club has a higher payroll ($127MM+) or a more substantial projected tax bill ($27MM+) than Cleveland.
[RELATED: Salary Cap Snapshot: Cleveland Cavaliers]
Nonetheless, the Cavs figure to continue scouring the market for potential difference-makers. Mitch Lawrence of Forbes suggests that Jameer Nelson, Rajon Rondo, and Deron Williams are among the team’s possible targets, and while some of those options are probably less realistic than others, it wouldn’t be a surprise to see Cleveland make a move before next month’s trade deadline.
And-Ones: All-Star Snubs, BIG3, Team USA
The starters for this year’s NBA All-Star Game were announced this week and, as always, people were quick to disagree with the players selected. Unique this year is the fact that fans don’t shoulder all of the blame. This year the fans accounted for just 50% of the vote, while the media accounted for 25% and players accounted for 25%.
There were plenty of hot takes about what should have happened, but none more memorable than Clippers head coach Doc Rivers‘ regarding the snub of Russell Westbrook. To ESPN’s Jeff Goodman, Rivers said: “Fake news. I am just shocked that fans don’t see the same things we see.”
Also among Westbrook supporters were Sam Amick of USA Today and Kevin Garnett.
“This might be the league’s all-time history snub right here,” Garnett said on his TV show Area 21. “Seriously. He has to be on the team, bruh.”
Another guard left out of the starting lineup was Kyle Lowry and Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today made a case for him over either Kyrie Irving or DeMar DeRozan.
Lang Whitaker of NBA.com discussed the official list of starters.
There are more general headlines from around the league:
- Count Ricky Davis and Al Harrington among the retired players expected to sign on with the BIG3, tweets Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical.
- With the trade deadline a month away, Keith Smith of RealGM explored the most tradeable contracts in the NBA. Draymond Green, for example, looks to be a bargain given the under-market deal he signed in 2015.
- A report at NBA.com implies that LeBron James could play for Team USA in the 2020 Olympics. The fact that Gregg Popovich will lead the program has had a significant impact. “It factors a lot,” James said. “I’ve said that before. He’s just a great mastermind of the game of basketball.”
Westbrook Tops Snub List Among All-Star Starters
Triple-double machine Russell Westbrook, the league’s leading scorer, will not be among the Western Conference starters for next month’s All-Star Game in New Orleans. The league’s Twitter feed unveiled the starters for each conference, and the Thunder superstar lost out in the balloting to Stephen Curry and James Harden (Twitter links).
As ESPN.com’s Rachel Nichols points out, the fan voting counts for 50%, while the players’ votes weigh in at 25%, as does the media vote under the revised system. According to NBC’s Kurt Helin, Westbrook missed out because the fans had him third among Western Conference guards behind Curry and Harden.
Kawhi Leonard, Anthony Davis and Kevin Durant will comprise the starting frontcourt for the West.
Giannis Antetokounmpo, Jimmy Butler and LeBron James were selected as the frontcourt starters for the Eastern Conference. DeMar DeRozan and Kyrie Irving were chosen as the starting backcourt.
It’s a breakthrough for Antetokounmpo, who will be making his first All-Star appearance. Arguably the biggest snub on the Eastern Conference side was Celtics point man Isaiah Thomas, the fourth-leading scorer in the league and the conference’s top scorer.
Do you think Westbrook should have garnered a starting spot ahead of Curry or Harden? Besides Westbrook, which other player has the biggest beef about failing to land a starting spot in the league’s annual showcase event? Take to the comments section to share your thoughts.
David Griffin Talks Cavs, Roster Moves
When the Cavs decide to sign or trade for a player, LeBron James is often credited with the orchestration of the roster move. GM David Griffin isn’t upset by the notion that a player is doing his job, though he does believe it’s unfair for outsiders to paint James as someone who is constantly pushing the buttons behind the scenes, as he tells Michael Lee of The Vertical.
“I take offense to it on [James’] behalf at times,” Griffin said. “He doesn’t like that image. I don’t think he wants that image. He wants to lead his troops. He wants to be a player. He wants to lead the guys from within. He never tried to do any more than that. I think for him, it’s almost an unfair characterization of him, that he’s some kind of overlord. That’s not at all what he does.”
James has publicly lobbied for the organization to add a veteran point guard with his most recent request coming after the team traded for Kyle Korver. Griffin knows the team can get better, despite sitting atop the Eastern Conference.
“We like our group. We think we’ve got a group that belongs together, that fits together,” Griffin told Lee. “But if we can improve and continue to further the cause, then we will. We’ve got that same small window to capitalize in and we’re going to do what we need to, when we can.”
Griffin is well-versed in mid-season moves. Within months of taking the GM position, he traded for Spencer Hawes in hopes of competing for the eighth seed in the conference. During the 2014/15 season, he made a bold move in acquiring J.R. Smith along with Iman Shumpert. Last year, he made an even bolder move by firing David Blatt, a coach who had taken the team to the NBA Finals in the previous season.
“Our ownership has something they fell back on as a saying: ‘Nothing clarifies like clarity.’ We know what we’re about. Our only goal is to win championships. Sometimes, when that’s true, decisions make themselves,” Griffin said of the decision to fire Blatt. “It was not an overly difficult decision to make the move we made; it was just difficult to execute. We had a conversation like, ‘Nobody ever does this.’ And my response was, ‘You don’t know how many teams should have and where they’d be had they done it. I know no one has done it, but I can tell you somebody should have.”
The decision turned out to be the right call, as the Cavs won the championship under new coach Tyronn Lue. This year, the team is looking to go back-to-back and Griffin understands the unique situation he’s in, as he tells Lee in the same piece.
“I’ve said this several times since, but you’re basically charged with the legacy of Babe Ruth, and it’s our responsibility to allow that legacy to grow and evolve,” Griffin told Lee. “So it’s almost like a sacred trust that the kid gives you. He’s so good, in his own right, by himself, that he sort of mandates you have to be a title contender just by his presence alone … and if you don’t capitalize on the years he has left, then shame on us.”
Lee’s piece contains several other quotes from Griffin. It’s worth a read for both Cavs fans and fans of the league in general.
Pacific Notes: Curry, Lacob, Mbah a Moute
It’s no secret that, despite the MVPs, Stephen Curry makes less money than some of his Warriors teammates do. The superstar guard is okay with it. “If I’m complaining about $44MM over four years, then I’ve got other issues in my life,” Curry told the Mercury News in a podcast.
Of course Curry is in line for a hefty pay raise as soon as this summer. Per Chris Haynes of ESPN, Curry will be eligible for a five-year extension worth roughly $210MM and you can be sure that the Warriors will present it to him as soon as they’re able too.
Though it would make little basketball sense for Curry to leave an elite level like a contender, the latest CBA makes it harder to justify on a financial level, too. Were Curry to consider options other than the Warriors, he could only receive $140MM over four years.
“Like I’ve said from Day 1, when I was first asked about free agency, this is a perfect place to play. Bay Area fans are amazing, our organization’s amazing, we’ve put together an amazing team that’s competing for championships every year,” Curry said. “There’s really no reason that I can see right now that would draw me elsewhere.”
There’s more out of the Pacific Division:
- The Warriors have seven centers on their roster — eight if you include Draymond Green. Tim Kawakami and Marcus Thompson of the Mercury News spoke with assistant general manager Kirk Lacob about how the club structured the roster coming out of training camp and what might come next.
- Though not as frequently featured on highlight reels as some of his teammates, Luc Mbah a Moute has had a significant impact on the Clippers, writes Jason Jones of the Sacramento Bee. Head coach Doc Rivers agrees, offering some bold praise about the 30-year-old veteran. “He is one of the best defensive players in the league, bar none, but because he’s not a scorer, no one really notices, but that’s his value to a team.”
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Despite their consecutive NBA Finals matchups, LeBron James does not believe the Cavaliers and Warriors have a rivalry. “We’ve had two great Finals appearances the last two years,” James told the media. “But I had the same with San Antonio when I was in Miami. We weren’t rivals. And I think I played those guys more, so I wouldn’t look at it as rivals.”
LeBron James Pushing For Cavs To Add Point Guard
The Cavs agreed to acquire Kyle Korver from the Hawks on Thursday, but LeBron James wants the team to do more, as Jason Lloyd of The Akron Beacon Journal writes. James believes the team isn’t ready for another championship run until it adds another point guard.
“We still got a couple more things we need to do,” James said. “We got to get a point guard. It’s my last time saying it. We need a point guard.”
“I think that’s the next step. You look at our league, most teams have three point guards. We only have two with [Kyrie Irving] and our rook in [Kay Felder]. I think just having that security blanket. Every NFL team has three quarterbacks. Having that security blanket in case of a [situation like Derek Carr’s, Oakland’s QB who broke his leg]. We’ll see what happens, but, we’re happy with our team right now.”
It was reported on Thursday that the team is likely to make another move with an eye on obtaining a veteran point guard. The team’s two biggest needs were arguably a back-up point guard and a scoring wing.
Coach Tyronn Lue likes the acquisition of Korver and believes the 35-year-old will be a good fit on the team. “Especially a guy who can move without the ball the way he moves coming off screens and things like that, there’s no better guy,” Lue said. “You put him on the floor with Channing, RJ, LeBron and the floor will open (up) wide, so now you got to pick your poison when you try to help off Kyrie and LeBron.”
Lue added that the shooting guard will come off the bench, a decision that will leave DeAndre Liggins in the starting line-up. The team likes Liggins in that spot because of his ability to defend opposing point guards.
There’s 47 days to go until the NBA trade deadline. Be sure to check Hoops Rumors frequently for the latest on the Cavs and their quest to add a point guard.