Western Notes: Clips, Jazz, Withey, Buycks, Mavs
Steve Ballmer’s $2 billion bid for the Clippers equals more than 12 times the total revenue projections for the team from 2013/14, but no major pro sports team has ever sold for more than five times of its total revenue, according to Bank of America. Ramona Shelburne and Darren Rovell of ESPN.com have the details, which back up the contention of Clippers CEO Dick Parsons that it would be tough to envision another bidder coming in so high.
- The Jazz received $1.3MM in cash Tuesday as part of their three-for-one trade with the Cavs, reports Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). That’s slightly more than the $1MM that was originally reported.
- Jeff Withey‘s minimum salary became fully guaranteed for this coming season after the Pelicans declined to waive him before the end of Tuesday, the final day they could do so without owing him any money, according to Mark Deeks of ShamSports. Teammate Luke Babbitt also earned a $100K partial guarantee when the Pelicans kept him past Tuesday, which was also the final day his contract had been fully non-guaranteed.
- Dwight Buycks is drawing the eye of the Clippers and Suns, and multiple teams from overseas are interested in him as well, Sportando’s Enea Trapani reports. The Raptors waived Buycks on Saturday, before his contract would have become fully guaranteed.
- The Mavs are nearing a deal with Jameer Nelson, but owner Mark Cuban insisted to Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com that the team isn’t trying to unload Raymond Felton. “We like him and think he will have a great year,” Cuban said.
- Cuban also made an appearance on Sportsradio 1310 The Ticket in Dallas this week, during which he explained that the Mavericks strategically used the ultra-logical approach of the Rockets‘ front office to put together an offer for Chandler Parsons that was unlikely to be matched (link via The Dallas Morning News).
Raptors Release Diante Garrett
The Raptors have requested waivers on Diante Garrett with intention of releasing him from their roster, the team announced via Twitter. Garrett, the 25 year-old point guard out of Iowa State was acquired by the Raptors in the trade that sent Steve Novak and a second-round pick to the Jazz back on July 10th. Toronto had made the trade with the intent to waive Garrett and his non-guaranteed 2014/15 salary of $915,243 after the moratorium on trades and signings was lifted and the Novak deal became official. Garrett’s deal would have become fully guaranteed if he had remained on the roster past January 7th, 2015.
Toronto had also decided to release Dwight Buycks earlier today rather than have his salary of $816,482 become fully guaranteed for the 2014/15 season, which would have occurred if Buycks was still on the roster come July 22nd.
In 71 games for the Jazz last season, Garrett averaged 3.5 PPG, 1.4 RPG, and 1.7 APG while logging 14.8 minutes per game. His slash line was .381/.375/.833.
Raptors Release Dwight Buycks
5:46pm: The Raptors have confirmed that they have placed Buycks on waivers via the team’s Twitter account.
4:01pm: Buycks tells David Pick of Eurobasket.com that he’s Europe bound if he’s eventually waived by Toronto (Twitter link).
10:44am: The Raptors have decided to release Dwight Buycks, reports Shams Charania of RealGM. The team will make the move before July 22nd, when his fully non-guaranteed $816,482 salary would have become fully guaranteed for 2014/15. The move has been expected since Toronto signed James Johnson on Thursday.
Toronto has three experienced point guards on the roster ahead of Buycks in Kyle Lowry, Greivis Vasquez, and Lou Williams. Buycks joins Nando De Colo and Diante Garrett as backcourt players to be moving on from Toronto this summer. Several teams are expected to pursue Buycks as a free agent, the RealGM scribe writes.
The point guard appeared in 24 games with the Raptors last season, his only time spent in the NBA. The Relativity Sports client struggled with his shot as a rookie, turning in a slash line of .313/.294/.889 in 10.4 MPG. Buycks has averaged 15.2 PPG and 2.8 APG in parts of two seasons in the D-League.
Atlantic Links: Nets, Lin, Williams, Celtics
Here’s this Saturday’s quick overview of all the latest chatter coming out of the NBA’s Atlantic Division:
- Daniel O’Leary of the New York Daily News thinks the Nets missed a perfect opportunity to strike a deal for the now-LA bound Jeremy Lin. O’Leary suggests it would have been keen of Brooklyn to craft a deal for Lin that would have dumped Deron Williams‘ lengthy and expensive contract in favor of Lin’s expiring pact.
- Lou Williams is excited to get a fresh start with the Raptors after an injury-riddled stint with the Hawks, as he tells Ryan Wolstat of the Toronto Sun. Thanks to an ACL-tear, Williams played in just 99 games for Atlanta over the course of two seasons,
- Chris Forsberg of ESPNBoston.com tracks all of the pieces from last year’s Celtics/Nets trade that send Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett to Brooklyn in exchange for assets. Forsberg opines that although it’s been just one season since the deal, it isn’t too early to declare Boston the winner of the trade.
Cray Allred contributed to this post.
And-Ones: Boozer, Blair, Williams, Mavs
With the Bulls using their amnesty provision on Carlos Boozer on Tuesday, only seven NBA players remain amnesty-eligible as noted in our 2014 Amnesty Primer. But the five teams that haven’t used the provision will have to wait until next summer, as Wednesday marked the deadline for this offseason.
Boozer was snatched up by the Lakers earlier today for a manageable price of $3.25MM, though as ESPN’s Marc Stein reports (via Twitter), the Duke product had strong interest in the Rockets had he gone unclaimed and cleared waivers. Meanwhile, Eric Pincus of the L.A. Times speculates that Boozer’s presence might signal a more complimentary role for rookie Julius Randle unless the playoff-hungry Lakers consider June’s No. 7 pick a small forward (Twitter links are here).
Here’s more from around the league on Thursday night:
- DeJuan Blair‘s starting salary in his new deal with the Wizards is $2MM, Hoops Rumors has learned, so that leaves just $16K on the Eric Maynor trade exception the team reportedly used to absorb him via sign-and-trade from the Wizards. That effectively exhausts the Maynor exception, which expires this coming February 20th, since the remaining $16K wouldn’t be enough to absorb another player.
- Louis Williams left his exit interview with Hawks officials expecting to be traded, as he told Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, who writes in a subscription-only piece. The instinct was correct, as the Hawks shipped Williams to the Raptors late last month, but Williams said he harbors no ill feelings toward the Atlanta brass.
- Multiple reports have linked Mo Williams to Dallas in recent days, but a source tells Tim MacMahon of ESPNDallas.com that the Mavericks are pursuing another free agent whom they would prefer to spend their room exception on.
- The Mavs‘ deal with Devin Harris, which became official earlier tonight, is for four years and $16.55MM, reports Dwain Harris of the Fort Worth Star Telegram (via Twitter). Meanwhile Eddie Sefko of the Dallas Morning News has the yearly breakdown, reporting that Harris will make $3.878MM next season, followed by $4.053MM in 2015/16, $4.228MM in 2016/17 and $4.403MM in what is a partially guaranteed fourth year in 2017/18.
- Metta World Peace would love to play for the Lakers, Clippers or Knicks, as Mark Medina of the Los Angeles Daily News hears, adding that it seems any conversation World Peace may have had about a return to the Lakers wasn’t too serious (Twitter link).
Chuck Myron contributed to this post.
Greivis Vasquez Re-Signs With Raptors
JULY 17TH: Vasquez has officially signed his new deal, the team announced in a press release.
“Greivis’ passion for the Raptors and Toronto is wonderful,” GM Masai Ujiri said in the team’s statement. “He is a versatile player who provides us with energy and depth.”
JULY 9TH: Greivis Vasquez has agreed to a deal with the Raptors, a league source tells Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter links). The point guard will sign the two-year, $13MM contract with Toronto once the league moratorium has passed. The deal includes no options, tweets Sam Amick of USA Today.
The move will end Vasquez’s restricted free agency following Toronto’s choice to extend a qualifying offer over a week ago. Vasquez was being sought after by the Bucks, but was reportedly close to re-signing with the Raptors before Milwaukee’s efforts could gain steam. Ryan Wolstat of The Toronto Suns speculates that the agreement could have been delayed by a failed attempt on the part of the 27-year-old’s agent, Arn Tellem, to gain a third year on the contract (on Twitter).
Vasquez will return to back up Kyle Lowry, whom Toronto reached a four-year agreement with already. An average salary of $6.5MM is high for a second string guard, but the length of the contract gives the team flexibility and a reliable insurance option should the oft-injured Lowry run into any health trouble. Vasquez excelled as a backup last season, posting a career-high per-36-minute scoring average while maintaining a solid 6.2 assists-per-36-minute rate.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Raptors Sign James Johnson
JULY 17TH: The deal is official, the team announced via press release.
JULY 10TH: 10:10am: The deal is fully guaranteed, according to Shams Charania of RealGM (Twitter link).
8:40am: The Raptors and James Johnson have reached agreement on a two-year deal, reports Doug Smith of the Toronto Star. The value of the contract will be $5MM, according to Smith, though Ryan Wolstat of the Toronto Sun believes it might be for slightly more (Twitter link). The Raptors are using part of their mid-level exception on the Mark Bartelstein client, Wolstat adds in the same tweet.
Johnson revived his NBA career after signing with the Grizzlies in December, proving a useful reserve as he averaged 7.4 points in 18.4 minutes per game. The five-year NBA veteran previously spent parts of two seasons with the Raptors, though that was during the regime of former GM Bryan Colangelo. The 27-year-old spurns the Rockets, who were reportedly set to meet with him earlier this month, as well as the Jazz, who also had interest, as Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports reports. The Grizzlies had apparently been split on whether to bring him back.
The move largely brings a close to Toronto’s major free agent expenditures, as Smith writes, after previous agreements with Kyle Lowry, Patrick Patterson and Greivis Vasquez. The Raptors wouldn’t mind trying to find a trade partner willing to take on Chuck Hayes or Landry Fields if they could net younger versions of those players in return, but the club probably won’t make any trades until the leaguewide free agency rush passes, Smith writes. The move also likely squeezes out Dwight Buycks, who’s on a non-guaranteed contract, and probably ends any chance that the Raptors would sign Andray Blatche or Ed Davis, according to Smith.
And-Ones: Draft, Jackson, J.R. Smith, Blair
The league office proposed a new lottery system for as soon as next season that would more evenly distribute the odds that non-playoff teams would have of ending up with the No. 1 overall pick, Grantland’s Zach Lowe reports. The proposal to the competition committee, which would cut the worst team’s chance from 25% to 11%, was the dominant subject of talk about lottery reform at league meetings this week, but it’s nonetheless one of many the NBA has considered, Lowe cautions. There’s more draft-related fodder among the latest from around the league:
- Chad Ford of ESPN.com unveiled his top 100 top prospects list and mock draft for 2015 in a pair of subscription-only pieces. His top three players are Jahlil Okafor, Emmanuel Mudiay, and Karl Towns, Jr. Mudiay’s recent decision to withdraw from college basketball and play overseas shouldn’t much affect his draft stock, according to Ford.
- Phil Jackson doubts that Jerry Buss, as has been reported, made the final decision to pass Jackson over to hire Mike D’Antoni as Lakers coach in 2012, as the Zen Master writes in an update to his latest book with Hugh Delehanty, as excerpted in the New York Daily News. Jackson also says that he spoke to the Nets, Raptors and Suns about jobs in the wake of Lakers’ choice.
- J.R. Smith appeared on ESPN’s First Take Thursday, telling the hosts that he wouldn’t blame the Knicks if they traded him (transcription via Ian Begley of ESPNNewYork.com). “No. Absolutely not,” Smith said. “The way I was playing, I was playing like a person who didn’t want to be there. Not looking as focused as a person should be in that situation that we were, in the trenches. I wouldn’t blame them at all.”
- DeJuan Blair went into Washington’s $2,016,000 trade exception left over from when the team traded Eric Maynor at the deadline, tweets Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders. Previous reports had indicated that the Wizards would absorb Blair into their new $8,579,089 trade exception created through Trevor Ariza‘s sign-and-trade to Houston, but it appears the team will instead preserve that exception. Just how much of the Maynor exception Blair will take up remains to be seen, since the precise amount of Blair first-year salary has yet to be reported.
Cray Allred contributed to this post.
Eastern Notes: Humphries, Meeks, Patterson
Free agent Kris Humphries is still open to returning to the Celtics, writes Ben Rohrbach of WEEI 93.7 FM. Humphries said, “I could definitely see it. My agent handles most of the stuff with free agency. We’ll see what happens. I definitely could see it. I played out last year and didn’t look to jump to a playoff team before the end of the year, so I definitely enjoyed my time there, and we’ll see what happens.”
Here’s the latest from the east:
- Jodie Meeks wants to reward the Pistons on the court this season for making his signing a priority, writes Vincent Goodwill of The Detroit News. Meeks said, “I was their No. 1 priority. He [Stan Van Gundy] liked the way I competed on offense and defense. That’s my motto: Not worry about the bad shooting nights. Just play hard and let the chips fall where they may.”
- Patrick Patterson never had any desire to leave Toronto, which made his decision to re-sign with the Raptors easy, writes Mike Ganter of the Toronto Sun. On remaining in Toronto, Patterson said, “Toronto was always one of my top choices as far as coming back. The fans and organization and the team and the friendships I have with these guys — I didn’t want to leave. I didn’t want to give those up, so there was no real uncertainty or doubt. It was all about coming to the right terms and getting everything situated.”
- The Bucks may announce their new partial owners soon, possibly as soon as tomorrow, reports Gery Woelfel of The Journal Times (Twitter link).
- Van Gundy admits that Greg Monroe‘s contract situation with the Pistons has him a “little nervous,” writes David Mayo of MLive. Van Gundy said, “The nervousness is just the unknown. It’s not knowing, beyond this year, especially, where you’re going. But again, we have plenty of time, if something happened, to adjust for next year and everything else.”
- The Lance Stephenson free agency situation could drag out for awhile, tweets Chris Mannix of SI.com. A league executive told Mannix that the Pacers couldn’t increase their offer much more above what they have already presented Stephenson.
Raptors Re-Sign Patrick Patterson
JULY 12TH: The signing is official, per a team release.
JULY 4TH: The Raptors and Patrick Patterson have reached agreement on a three-year, $18MM deal, reports Jeff Goodman of ESPN.com (Twitter link). Toronto will use Bird Rights to retain the restricted free agent, keeping him away from other suitors before he could sign an offer sheet.
The Suns and Magic were reportedly in pursuit of the power forward. The Raptors apparently feared that some of the above-market deals around the league early in free agency would price them out of the ability to re-sign Patterson and fellow restricted free agent Greivis Vasquez.
The Patterson deal takes care of one part of that equation for the team, but with the club’s trade for Lou Williams shortly before the July moratorium, it’ll be a tight squeeze beneath the projected luxury tax line to sign Vasquez with the hope of adding anyone else. Still, the club appeared to place a priority on Patterson once it secured Kyle Lowry, as worries about the ability of Amir Johnson to stay healthy apparently fueled their desire for a strong backup power forward.
A $6MM average annual value is somewhat high for a bench player, but the capped-out Raptors wouldn’t have had the cap flexibility to shell out quite as much to anyone else had the Sam Goldfeder client ended up elsewhere. Patterson played a critical role in the rotation after coming over from Sacramento in the Rudy Gay trade, averaging 9.1 points and 5.1 rebounds in 23.3 minutes per game with a 16.2 PER for Toronto.