FA Rumors: Muhammad, Farmar, Mbah a Moute, Allen
The Hawks, Nets, Bucks, Knicks and Magic have all expressed interest in swingman Shabazz Muhammad, according to Marc J. Spears of ESPN.com (Twitter links). The Bulls are on that list as well, tweets Alex Kennedy of Hoops Hype. Muhammad became an unrestricted free agent last week when Minnesota pulled his qualifying offer to create enough cap room to sign Taj Gibson. He has been with the Wolves for all four of his NBA seasons and averaged 9.9 points in 78 games last year.
There’s more tonight on the free agent front:
- Jordan Farmar is hoping to return to the NBA and spoke to Lakers coach Luke Walton today about a possible opportunity, Kennedy relays (Twitter link). The 30-year-old point guard played two games for the Kings in November of last season.
- The Raptors have talked about making a play for former Clippers forward Luc Mbah a Moute, reports Michael Grange of Rogers Sportsnet (Twitter link).
- The Clippers and Timberwolves are both considering Tony Allen, according to Tim MacMahon of ESPN.com (Twitter link). Coaches Doc Rivers in L.A. and Tom Thibodeau in Minnesota have connections with Allen from their time with the Celtics.
- Veteran point guard Beno Udrih is talking to several teams in Las Vegas, tweets Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders. Now 35, Udrih believes he can play for several more years. He got into 39 games with the Pistons last season.
- Former Baylor standout Royce O’Neale is considering several NBA offers, according to Kyler (Twitter link). The 24-year-old forward went undrafted in 2015 and has been playing in Lithuania, but he has an NBA opt-out in his contract through July 20th.
Alfonzo McKinnie Gets $100K Guarantee
- Undrafted free agent Alfonzo McKinnie signed a two-year, minimum salary contract with the Raptors that features a $100K guarantee (Twitter link).
Carroll, Joseph Trades Create Flexibility, But Holes Remain
- Moving DeMarre Carroll and Cory Joseph will give the Raptors a little more flexibility to maneuver, but the club still has holes to fill on its roster, including at the power forward spot, writes Sportsnet’s Michael Grange.
Alfonzo McKinnie Agrees To Deal With Raptors
4:50 PM: The signing is official, according to the team’s Twitter feed.
9:30 AM: The Raptors will sign Alfonzo McKinnie to a multi-year contract with a partial guarantee, according to Blake Murphy of Raptors Republic.
A 6’8″ forward out of Green Bay, McKinnie is currently playing for Toronto’s team in the Las Vegas Summer League. He spent all of last season with the Bulls’ G League affiliate, averaging 14.9 points and 9.2 rebounds in 50 games.
Raptors Sign First-Round Pick OG Anunoby
The Raptors have signed OG Anunoby to a rookie scale deal, according to the team’s Twitter feed. The exact terms were not disclosed, but assuming he signed for 120% of the rookie scale, he’ll make slightly more than $9.75MM over the next four seasons.
The small forward suffered a knee injury part way through his sophomore season at Indiana and it certainly impacted his draft spot. He was expected to be a lottery pick coming into the draft process but ended up going No. 23 overall to Toronto.
It’s unlikely that Anunoby is ready to begin the season, though according to an earlier report, he should be able to get on the court at some point before 2018. Toronto’s wing rotation is currently in flux after losing P.J. Tucker in free agency and trading away DeMarre Carroll to the Nets. The Raptors were able to bring in C.J. Miles via a sign-and-trade, but depth arguably still remains the team’s biggest weakness. Anunoby should be able to help with that once he recovers from his injury.
The Missouri native was impressive on the defensive end during his 16 games with the Hoosiers. He had at least one block or steal in every game he played.
C.J. Miles Headed To Toronto In Sign-And-Trade
The Pacers and Raptors have agreed to a sign-and-trade deal that will send free agent C.J. Miles to Toronto, tweets Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.com. Miles will sign a three-year deal with the Raptors worth about $25MM that contains a player option for the final season.
The trade cannot be completed until Toronto moves some salary by sending DeMarre Carroll to Brooklyn, Wojnarowski notes (Twitter link). That deal is contingent on the Wizards matching the Nets’ offer sheet to Otto Porter, which they have announced they will do. However, provisions for Porter’s physical could delay the matching process to as late as Wednesday.
The Miles trade will send point guard Cory Joseph to Indiana in return, Wojnarowski adds (Twitter link).
Joseph, who turns 26 next month, played in 80 games for the Raptors last season, averaging 9.3 points and 3.3 assists, mostly as a combo guard off the bench. He will make $7.66MM next season and has a player option worth $8MM for 2018/19. He’ll team with newly-signed Darren Collison as Indiana looks to replace Jeff Teague at the point guard position.
Miles, a 30-year-old swingman, will serve as a replacement for Carroll and provide Toronto with some additional outside shooting. A 12-year veteran, Miles is coming off another productive season — in 76 games, he averaged 10.7 points and 3.0 rebounds, and shot a career-best 41.3% on three-pointers. He will be getting a raise from the $4.58MM he made last season.
The Raptors will be hard-capped at $125.266MM for the 2017/18 league year as a result of acquiring a player in a sign-and-trade deal, and may also have to rely on a pair of youngsters – Delon Wright and Fred VanVleet – as the backup point guards behind Kyle Lowry.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Nets Notes: Carroll, Free Agents, Aldrich, Draft Pick
Brooklyn GM Sean Marks got Raptors president Masai Ujiri to sweeten the deal involving DeMarre Carroll as they talked during Saturday’s games at the Las Vegas Summer League, writes Brian Lewis of The New York Post. Toronto’s original offer involved just Carroll and a first-round pick, but Marks was able to convince Ujiri to send along a second-rounder and take back the $3MM contract of Justin Hamilton.
The deal provides needed cap relief for the Raptors, while giving the Nets a replacement for Otto Porter after the Wizards announced their intention to match Brooklyn’s four-year, $106.5MM offer sheet. The trade may not be finalized before Thursday while the Nets wait for the Wizards to conduct Porter’s physical and report the results to the league.
There’s more today out of Brooklyn:
- With nearly $17MM left in cap space along with a $4.3MM room exception, the Nets will move on to other targets in free agency, Lewis adds. They were believed to be interested in Pistons’ guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, but the Carroll trade prevents them from making a max offer. Caldwell-Pope turned down $80MM over five years from Detroit, but his options may be limited now as fewer teams have cap room to work with. Other possibilities for Brooklyn are C.J. Miles, Dewayne Dedmon, Nikola Mirotic or another restricted free agent in JaMychal Green. Coach Kenny Atkinson sees the value in having an older player around. “I do think [Marks and I] both agree that we don’t want to go in with a totally young roster,” he said. “We do need that veteran support. If it’s the right position where somebody can help us, it’s definitely something [to consider].”
- Saturday’s deal may end the Timberwolves’ hopes of getting the Nets to take on Cole Aldrich’s salary, Lewis notes in the same piece. Minnesota wants to unload Aldrich, who will make $7.3MM in the upcoming season and nearly $6.9MM in 2018/19, to create enough cap room to sign Miles. However, Marks wouldn’t agree to the deal unless the Wolves threw in Oklahoma City’s 2018 first-rounder.
- The second-rounder the Nets will receive in the Carroll deal will probably be the lower of the Magic or Lakers picks, according to a tweet from NetsDaily. Brooklyn already has the rights to the Pacers’ 2018 second-rounder if Indiana misses the playoffs.
Sixers Sign Amir Johnson
JULY 8, 6:57pm: Johnson’s signing is official, the Sixers announced in an email.
JULY 1, 6:25pm: The Sixers and Celtics discussed a sign-and-trade involving Jahlil Okafor for Johnson, but the deal never materialized, Wojnarowski said on ESPN’s televised coverage of free agency.
5:09pm: Amir Johnson will join the Sixers on a one-year, $11MM deal contract, tweets Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN.com.
The 11-year veteran started 77 games for the Celtics this season, averaging 6.5 points and 4.6 rebounds per night. He made $12MM this year in the final season of a two-year contract.
There had been rumors that the Celtics were interested in a sign-and-trade with the Sixers involving Johnson, but this appears to be a straight free-agent signing.
The Bulls, Raptors and Rockets also expressed interest in Johnson, and all three teams had meetings with him scheduled for today.
Kyle Lowry Contract Details
- Although Kyle Lowry‘s three-year contract with the Raptors can be worth up to $100MM, the base value is $93MM, with the remaining $7MM coming in the form of unlikely bonuses. Unlikely bonuses don’t count against the cap at this point (Twitter link).
Raptors Re-Sign Kyle Lowry
JULY 7, 11:39am: The Raptors have officially signed Lowry to his new deal, the team announced today in a press release.
“Kyle has been a valuable part of our team’s success the past five years,” Raptors president Masai Ujiri said in a statement. “He has grown as a player and person during his time in Toronto and we are excited that he wants to be here to help us continue building a championship program.”
JULY 2, 4:24pm: Lowry’s new deal with the Raptors will be for three years and $100MM, according to Michael Scotto of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). That’s just a little less than a maximum salary deal for the veteran point guard, and it includes incentives, tweets Sam Amick of USA Today.
4:19pm: The Raptors and Kyle Lowry have agreed to a new deal. Terms of the agreement aren’t yet known, but Lowry has announced in a piece for The Players’ Tribune that he has decided to remain with Toronto.
“I’m coming back to Toronto because my heart is telling me that it’s home — and because staying home, for me and my family, feels like the right thing to do,” Lowry writes. “My heart is telling me that this is the best city in the world, with the best basketball fans in the world. It’s telling me that the Raptors can be a championship-level team, sooner than later. And I’ll be honest (and don’t hate) — it’s telling me that I’ve still never had poutine.”
[RELATED: 2017 NBA Free Agent Tracker]
Lowry, 31, entered this summer as one of the top free agents available at point guard or any position. He’s coming off his third straight All-Star season, having averaged a career-best 22.4 PPG to go along with 7.0 APG, 4.8 RPG, 1.5 SPG, and a shooting line of .464/.412/.819. The Philadelphia native was limited to 60 games due to a broken wrist and missed Toronto’s last two postseason contests due to an ankle injury, but will be 100% for the start of the 2017/18 season.
While it wasn’t a sure thing that Lowry would re-sign with the Raptors this season, many of his other potential suitors addressed their point guard position in other ways within the last week or two. For instance, the Sixers drafted Markelle Fultz, the Nets acquired D’Angelo Russell in a trade, and the Timberwolves committed to sign Jeff Teague.
Those moves – and others – all nudged Lowry back in the direction of Toronto, and his return looked more than ever like a lock when Serge Ibaka reached an agreement with the club earlier today. Lowry and Ibaka share an agent, ASM’s Andy Miller, and it made a lot of sense for the team to re-sign one player if the other returned, since the Raps wouldn’t have any cap room to sign a suitable replacement.
With both Lowry and Ibaka back in the fold, the Raptors project to be well over the luxury tax line, but they’re exploring ways to reduce team salary. The club is said to be discussing a Cory Joseph trade with the Pacers, which would move Joseph’s $7.63MM salary in return for draft-pick compensation. DeMarre Carroll and Jonas Valanciunas are also trade candidates, though it would be virtually impossible to move Carroll without attaching an asset or two to him.
Lowry and Ibaka both agreed to three-year deals, which puts them on track to expire in the summer of 2020. That’s the same offseason that DeMar DeRozan will have the chance to opt out and return to the free agent market as well, so it looks like Toronto aims to contend with its same core for at least the short-term future. The Raps will have the opportunity to potentially reconsider their options by that summer of 2020.
The development of some of the Raptors young players could be key in determining whether or not the club can take the next step and truly challenge for a spot in the NBA Finals. Delon Wright and Fred VanVleet, in particular, could be asked to take on larger roles backing up Lowry if Joseph is dealt. Norman Powell also figures to play more minutes with P.J. Tucker headed to Houston, while Jakob Poeltl and Lucas Nogueira could see more playing time in the frontcourt if Patrick Patterson departs and/or Jonas Valanciunas is traded.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.