Steve Nash Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Lakers Granted Disabled Player Exception

November 10th, 2014 at 8:15pm CST by Charlie Adams

The NBA has granted the Lakers a disabled player exception in response to the season-ending injury suffered by rookie Julius Randle on opening night, league sources tell Marc Stein of ESPN.com. The exception will be valued at half of Randle’s 2014/15 salary, meaning it will be worth $1,498,680, a figure worth slightly more than the minimum salary for a player with 10 or more years of experience. Los Angeles will have until March 10th to acquire a player whose pricetag fits into that allotment, whether it be through free agency or trade, but Stein hears that the organization isn’t in any rush to bring aboard a new player.

Of course, the Lakers will also be without Steve Nash for the remainder of the year, as we learned prior to opening night, and reports indicated that the club would be filing for a disabled player exception in wake of the 40-year-old’s injury as well. Stein passes along that the club is planning to explore the trade market for Nash’s $9.7MM expiring contract, but it’s unclear whether or not this means the Lakers have chosen to refrain from applying for a disabled player exception in wake of Nash’s injury. Before the NBA grants Los Angeles another disabled player exception for Nash, a league-approved doctor would need to verify the team’s prognosis that the guard will be sidelined for the entirety of the season.

Although Los Angeles’ roster currently stands at the league maximum of 15 players, they could waive the non-guaranteed deals of Wayne Ellington and Ronnie Price to make room for anyone they might sign as a result of their one or possibly two disabled player exceptions. Nick Young has yet to see the hardwood this season as a result of a thumb injury, but he’s set to make a return within a couple of weeks, so the team won’t be able to apply for a hardship provision which would allow them bring in a 16th player.

Lakers Notes: Randle, Bryant, Roster

October 29th, 2014 at 7:59pm CST by Eddie Scarito

The Lakers have already suffered some significant blows to their roster with both Steve Nash and Julius Randle being lost for the season with injuries. Even if the franchise is approved for Disabled Player Exceptions, they will still have two of their maximum 15 roster spots occupied by injured personnel. If Los Angeles loses another player to injury the team could apply for a temporary hardship increase that would allow the franchise to carry up to 16 players, Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders notes (Twitter links). This scenario could help the team maintain its depth in the wake of another player loss, but once one of the injured players was able to return to action, the 15 player max would resume, Pincus notes.

Here’s more from Los Angeles:

The only bright side to the Lakers losing Randle for the season is that the team will be in contention for a top-five lottery pick next summer, J.A. Adande of ESPN.com opines. Los Angeles’ 2015 first-rounder is owed to the Suns but is protected for picks one-through-five, notes Adande.
The Lakers should take a page out of the Sixers’ playbook and try to hit bottom this season, Chad Ford of ESPN.com (Insider subscription required) writes. This includes trying to convince Kobe Bryant to waive his no trade clause and dealing the future Hall-of Famer, Ford opines. Ford lists the Knicks, Nets, Mavs, and Hornets as teams that would potentially be interested in obtaining Bryant.
The loss of Randle will hurt the Lakers much more than losing Nash, Yannis Koutroupis of Basketball Insiders opines. Los Angeles wasn’t expecting much from Nash, and had Jeremy Lin and Ronnie Price on board to make up for any time that Nash would have missed. With Randle, this season was important for his development, and the team was planning to run a large portion of their offense through him, Koutroupis notes.
The Lakers and Bryant have faced criticism for the two year, $48.5MM contract extension he signed back in 2013. Hornets owner and former NBA great Michael Jordan defended Bryant for inking the pact, DeAntae Prince of The Sporting News writes. “Can I criticize him for maximizing his opportunity from a financial standpoint? No,” Jordan said. “Does his decision have an effect on how the team will structure certain things? Maybe.”

Latest On Steve Nash, Lakers

October 24th, 2014 at 8:27pm CST by Eddie Scarito

The basketball world may have seen the last of Steve Nash on the hardwood, as he is set to miss the entire 2014/15 campaign with recurring nerve damage in his back. Nash was most likely going to retire after this season anyway, and now it seems that the Lakers April 8, 2014 loss to the Rockets, when he notched three points and five assists, was the last stat line of a surefire Hall-of-Fame career. Here’s the latest chatter around the league regarding Nash and the Lakers…

Nash’s contract may still hold value for the Lakers as a trade chip, J.A. Adande of ESPN.com writes. Los Angeles could look to deal Nash’s expiring $9.7MM contract, but if they do so they will most likely have to take back a player with more than one season remaining on his deal, something the team might be reluctant to do as they look ahead to clearing as much cap room as possible heading into the summer of 2016, Adande notes.
Despite missing most of last season with injury woes, Nash still enjoyed the time he was able to make it onto the court, Bruce Arthur of The Star writes.
It was reported earlier that Los Angeles intends to apply for a disabled player exception for Nash, but that isn’t their only financial option regarding the player and his contract. Eric Pincus of The Los Angeles Times (subscription required) runs down five different possibilities, including trading him; Nash retiring; simply keeping him on the roster for the season; or a possible buyout of his contract.
The Lakers are deferring to Nash as to whether or not he will stay around the team to rehab, recover at home, or simply retire, Mark Medina of The Los Angeles Daily News reports.
Former Raptors and Suns GM Bryan Colangelo reflected on his decision to draft Nash back in 1996, writes Sean Fitz-Gerald of The National Post. Colangelo said, “At the 15th position in the first round, a lot of people said, ‘who’s this kid from Santa Clara who doesn’t really look or feel like an NBA player?’ Nobody knew that he was going to go on to have a storied career like he has, and be considered one of the greats who’s played the position of point guard. But lo and behold, this guy is so dedicated to his craft and dedicated to the physical fitness side of it and being prepared and being ready, he just has done some incredible things. I just feel fortunate to play a small part in what is such a storied career.”

Lakers To Apply For Disabled Player Exception

October 24th, 2014 at 4:50pm CST by Eddie Scarito

The Lakers intend to apply to the league office for a disabled player exception for injured guard Steve Nash, Bill Oram of The Orange County Register reports (Twitter link). If granted, the exception would be worth nearly $4.851MM, or half of his $9.701MM salary for this season.

It was announced yesterday that Nash would miss the entire 2014/15 season due to recurring nerve damage in his back. The Lakers could waive Nash and apply for a salary exclusion if it is determined that he suffered a career-ending injury. The catch is that they would have to wait to apply for that until the one-year anniversary of his last game played, which was on April 8th of last season. The issue with going this route is that it would only give the league a little less than a week before the regular season ended to grant the exclusion. If it was granted it would erase Nash’s salary from the team’s cap, but Los Angeles would still be on the hook for his salary.

It’s unclear if the Lakers intend to use the exception, if granted, to sign a player immediately, or rather to keep it in reserve for a move later on in the season. There aren’t many free agents of consequence who come available midseason. The DPE could also be utilized for salary-matching purposes in a trade, and that route would likely net the team a better player, though the Lakers don’t have much in the way of tradeable assets they would be willing to part with. Plus, they’d only be able to acquire a player who’s on an expiring contract and whose salary is no more than $100K greater than the value of the exception.

Steve Nash To Miss Entire Season

October 23rd, 2014 at 7:21pm CST by Chuck Myron

7:21pm: The Lakers have confirmed that Nash will miss the season, the team announced. He still hasn’t decided whether he’ll retire in the wake of the news, USA Today’s Sam Amick tweets.

6:58pm: Nerve issues will keep Steve Nash from playing this season, reports Kevin Ding of Bleacher Report. Sources tell Ding that the Lakers are expected to rule the 40-year-old point guard out for all of 2014/15 because of recurring nerve damage in his back. Mike Bresnahan of the Los Angeles Times confirms that Nash will not play this year (Twitter link). The Lakers can apply for a Disabled Player Exception worth nearly $4.851MM, or half of his $9.701MM salary for this season, but they can’t take Nash’s contract, which expires at season’s end, off the books.

If the Lakers waive Nash, they could apply for a salary exclusion if he’s deemed to have suffered a career-ending injury. However, they’d have to wait to apply for that on the one-year anniversary of his last game, which took place on April 8th last season. That would give the NBA only about a week before the end of the regular season to grant the exclusion, which would wipe Nash’s salary from the team’s cap figure, though the Lakers would still have to pay the former MVP his salary. Still, that’s unlikely to change the equation much for the Lakers, as few, if any, free agents of impact are available at that point in the season, and it wouldn’t affect the team’s cap room for next summer, since Nash’s contract expires at season’s end one way or another.

The league has an insurance policy that covers teams for a portion of the salary for around 150 players in case they are injured, but the insurance company may choose as many as 14 players to exempt from that policy each year. It’s not clear whether Nash is one of those exempt players, but if the insurance covered Nash when he first signed his deal in 2012, at which point he was still fully healthy, he’d still be covered now. The insurance nonetheless has no bearing on Nash’s cap figure.

In any case, the prospect of Nash returning to the court for 2015/16 or beyond seems remote, so there’s a strong chance his career is at an end. The 15th overall pick in the 1996 draft didn’t show his true potential until a trade sent him to the Mavs after his second NBA season. He blossomed into an All-Star alongside Dirk Nowitzki, and when Nash left as a free agent in 2004 for Phoenix, where he teamed with coach Mike D’Antoni, he reached new levels, winning back-to-back MVP awards his first two seasons with the Suns. He remained productive for many years, averaging 10.7 assists during the 2011/12 season, when he turned 38, prompting the Lakers to sign-and-trade for him in the summer of 2012. He joined Dwight Howard, Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol to form a star-studded Lakers team that was a chic pick to win the championship, which would have been a first for Nash, but the team fell well short of expectations and lost in the first round of the playoffs.

A broken leg that Nash suffered in just his second regular season game with the Lakers helped limit him to 50 games in 2012/13 and touched off the nerve trouble that was largely responsible for him appearing in just 15 games last season. He never lived up to his contract, worth more than $27.9MM over three years, and he admitted this spring that he wasn’t going to retire because he wanted to collect his salary for this season. Still, Lakers GM Mitch Kupchak has said he doesn’t regret doing the deal.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

And-Ones: Kobe, Lottery, Bosh, Hawks

October 20th, 2014 at 4:03pm CST by Chuck Myron

Henry Abbott of ESPN The Magazine hears from agents and team sources who say Kobe Bryant‘s rough-edged personality is driving free agents away from the Lakers. The Buss family receives more income from the team’s local TV deal if ratings are better, and that helped persuade the team to sign Bryant to his lucrative two-year extension 12 months ago and to eschew an aggressive rebuilding project, Abbott hears. Bryant’s popularity with powerful front-row celebrities also played a role, and co-owner Jim Buss is just “waiting for [Bryant] to leave,” a source tells Abbott, fearful of engaging in a public spat with the superstar. Steve Nash nearly decided against approving his sign-and-trade to the Lakers and Paul George signed his extension with the Pacers in part because of Bryant, sources tell Abbott. Chris Bosh was one of the Lakers’ missed free agent targets this summer, and there’s more on him amid the latest from around the league:

The Thunder will join the Sixers in voting against the changes to the lottery, tweets Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports, but Wojnarowski seconds Lowe’s report (below) that the measure still has enough support to pass.

Earlier updates:

Bosh spoke of a desire to be paid at his full market rate as he explained his decision to turn down a four-year max deal from the Rockets for five years at the max from the Heat to Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel. “It’s always business,” Bosh said. “Nothing is ever personal. I think 100% of those dudes would have taken the deal I took.”
Another NBA team has joined the Sixers in opposition to the league’s lottery reform proposal as the Board of Governors meet today, but the measure is still expected to receive approval, Grantland’s Zach Lowe reports (Twitter links).
Players union secretary-treasurer James Jones is an opponent of shortening games and believes, as teammate LeBron James does, that players would instead like to see fewer games on the schedule, as Jones tells Chris Haynes of the Northeast Ohio Media Group.
Former Hawks All-Star Dikembe Mutombo has met with a group of investors about joining their effort to buy the team, reports Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Western Notes: Nash, Burke, Parsons

October 12th, 2014 at 8:56pm CST by Zachary Links

With Thunder star Kevin Durant out, we’re about to be treated to the full Russell Westbrook experience, writes Ken Berger of CBSSports.com. OKC managed to get by without Westbrook at the start of the 2013/14 season – they were 22-8 over the first three and a half months – but it remains to be seen how they’ll do sans KD. More out of the West..

Steve Nash was widely criticized for his admission earlier this year that he wouldn’t retire because he wanted the money left on his contract, but the Lakers guard isn’t interested in making a phony apology, writes Bill Oram of The Orange County Register. “It was an inflammatory statement in a way,” Nash said. “But I was being extremely truthful. That’s an important part of the business and we are businessmen. I’m not going to just give that money away.”
The early returns are promising on Jazz point guard Trey Burke, writes Tony Jones of The Salt Lake Tribune. Burke won’t turn 22 until next month, but he’s showing the poise of a much older point guard.
Mavs coach Rick Carlisle apologized to Chandler Parsons for publicly criticizing the team’s prized free-agent addition’s weight and conditioning after Friday night’s preseason game. “I have apologized to him and the entire team for this error in judgment. Not only is Chandler Parsons one of our best players, he is also one of our hardest working players and the kind of high character person we strive to bring to our city and franchise,” Carlisle wrote in a statement, according to Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com.

California Notes: Warriors, Crawford, Nash

September 2nd, 2014 at 7:31pm CST by Cray Allred

The NBA landscape in California has undergone quite the transformation in recent years. In the past, there have been long stretches with the Kings near the top of the division, while the Warriors and Clippers have often scraped the bottom. Currently, Golden State and the formerly hapless Los Angeles franchise have established themselves as perennial playoff teams, while Sacramento underwhelms at the bottom of the division. The Lakers’ decline might turn out to be the most startling development, especially if the purple and gold don’t emerge from their downturn in the next couple seasons. Here’s a rundown of California rumblings this evening:

Rusty Simmons of the San Francisco Chronicle confirms that the contracts of Warriors camp invites James McAdoo and Mitchell Watt are partially guaranteed.
Agent Andy Miller has already signaled Jamal Crawford‘s interest in signing an extension when he becomes eligible next summer, and it sounds like the reigning Sixth Man of the Year will have a friendly face on the other side of the negotiating table. Crawford has a longstanding relationship with Clippers owner Steve Ballmer based on their Seattle connections, as Crawford details to Jeff Caplan of NBA.com. “We’ve done a lot of [charity] events together in Seattle, so I’ve known him before he was actually the owner,” Crawford said. “We were texting throughout the year and emailing each other and staying in contact and continuing to work together with charities around Seattle. It’s exciting. I don’t know how many people have actually known their owner before they actually played for the team they were on. So it’s pretty cool.”
Despite some thought given by the Lakers to use the stretch provision on Steve Nash, the deadline to execute the maneuver came and went without Los Angeles doing so. Eric Pincus of the Los Angeles Times reports that the team was still considering stretching Nash’s deal before its top free agent targets of LeBron James, Carmelo Anthony, and Chris Bosh decided to sign elsewhere, eliminating the team’s need to gain cap flexibility from such a move.

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

Western Notes: Rubio, Nash, Thompson

July 28th, 2014 at 8:47pm CST by Eddie Scarito

The Wolves are willing to give Ricky Rubio an extension similar to the four-year, $44MM extension Stephen Curry signed with the Warriors two years ago, tweets Darren Wolfson of 1500 ESPN Twin Cities. Rubio and agent Dan Fegan are asking for the max over five seasons. We took a look at Rubio and other extension candidates earlier today.

Raptors CEO On Carter, Nash, Title Aspirations

July 8th, 2014 at 2:36pm CST by Chuck Myron

Tim Leiweke, CEO of the Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment group that owns the Raptors, believes the franchise is poised for a “growth spurt” with the unique advantage of having an entire country behind it, as he tells USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt. Leiweke points to the team’s willingness to spend, the acumen of GM Masai Ujiri, and the organization’s commitment to competing for championships as selling points for free agents. He also speaks about the effect that former Raptors star Vince Carter had on Canadian basketball, remarks made all the more interesting by Carter’s status as a free agent and reports indicating that the team is in the mix to sign him. Zillgitt’s entire piece is a must read for Raptors fans, but we’ll share a few particularly relevant snippets here:

On Vince Carter and his influence on back-to-back No. 1 overall picks Anthony Bennett and Andrew Wiggins, both of whom are Canadians:

“That is Vince Carter. I give him an enormous amount of credit. That [Raptors] team and that era is the era that is beginning to produce the Wigginses, the Bennetts. He inspired those kids to play basketball at the highest level. Now we get a chance to do that with our era, but we won’t see the results of that for another 10 years.”

On Steve Nash:

“There are probably few people who admire and like Steve Nash like I do. I had the privilege of getting to know him when he came to the Lakers. I love Steve Nash. I hope whenever his career ends, and I hope it’s not today, I hope a great player like that gets to go out on a high. That said, I definitely would hope there’s day in time where Steve Nash is playing a role here somehow.”

On the team’s Atlantic Division title this season, which it celebrated with the hanging of a banner:

“Personally, I wouldn’t have done the banner. They didn’t ask me, but if they did I would’ve told them that doesn’t mean anything. I don’t go in the locker room and congratulate the guys because we haven’t done anything yet. Our guys know that. It’s not that I don’t love our guys and I won’t fight for them. But we haven’t done anything yet. I don’t understand why everyone’s happy. We have work to do here. For me, are we on the right path? Yes. Do we have a chance to do something great? Yes. Talk to me when we do it. I’m not happy. Masai’s not happy.”