Transactions Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Cavs Bringing Henry Sims To Camp

September 30th, 2013 at 9:04am CST by Luke Adams

The Cavaliers have added one more player to their training camp roster, having reached an agreement with Henry Sims, according to Jason Lloyd of the Akron Beacon-Journal. The signing of Sims will increase Cleveland's preseason roster count to 18 players.

Sims, 23, made his NBA debut last season for New Orleans, appearing briefly in a pair of games for the then-Hornets. The 6'10" center spent most of the year with the Erie BayHawks, earning a spot in the D-League All-Star game, and finishing with averages of 16.4 and 8.7 RPG in 41 contests. We heard multiple times in August that the Cavs were considering extending a camp invite to Sims, who also drew some interest from the Knicks.

There's no guarantee Sims will earn a regular-season roster spot for the Cavs, but he should at least be given a shot. Even if we assume Andrew Bynum (partially guaranteed) and C.J. Miles (non-guaranteed) are locks for the roster, that could still leave two openings up for grabs, for the likes of Sims, Jermaine Taylor, Kenny Kadji, and Elliot Williams.

Kings Bringing Hamady N’Diaye To Camp

September 29th, 2013 at 10:34pm CST by Chuck Myron

Hamady N'Diaye will join the Kings in training camp for the second straight season. He's one of 17 players listed on the team's camp roster, as Jason Jones of the Sacramento Bee passes along. The 7-footer has seen minimal regular season action in the NBA, logging a total of 83 minutes over two seasons for the Wizards.

The Kings waived N'Diaye before the regular season last fall, and he agreed to a deal with Tianjin of China the same day. He averaged 11.0 points and 8.9 rebounds in 31 games with the Chinese club last season, parlaying that into a summer-league stint with the Mavericks this past July.

N'Diaye joins DeQuan Jones as Kings with non-guaranteed contracts. Trent Lockett, another camp hopeful, has a partial guarantee of $35K on his deal.

Grizzlies Sign Byars, Ely, Gaffney

September 29th, 2013 at 9:35pm CST by Chuck Myron

The Grizzlies have officially announced the signings of Derrick Byars, Melvin Ely and Tony Gaffney. It's confirmation of news we heard about Ely and Gaffney earlier this month. Memphis extended a training camp invitation to Byars this week, but it hadn't been clear whether he accepted. The trio of signees brings the Memphis roster to 18.

Byars also drew interest from the Knicks around the same time he worked out for the Grizzlies this month. He was a second-round draft pick of the Blazers in 2007, but Portland traded him to the Sixers on draft night and Philadelphia cut him in training camp that fall. The 6'7" swingman from Vanderbilt has also been to camp with the Thunder, Bulls and Heat over the years, but he only has a pair of games with the Spurs in 2011/12 on his official NBA resume. Last year he split the season between Caciques de Humacao in Puerto Rico and ALBA of Germany.

Byars, Ely and Gaffney are all presumably on non-guaranteed deals with the Grizzlies, as are Josh Akognon and Willie Reed. The team has 13 fully guaranteed contracts, so it's possible that none of the five camp invitees make the opening-night roster, but it seems like the most impressive of the bunch will remain with Memphis into the regular season.

Elliot Williams To Join Cavs For Camp

September 29th, 2013 at 9:05pm CST by Chuck Myron

Elliot Williams has accepted an invitation to join the Cavaliers for training camp, giving him another chance to fulfill the promise that made him a 2010 first-round pick, tweets Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports, who confirms that the deal is non-guaranteed. Williams missed all of 2012/13 for the Trail Blazers after tearing his left Achilles tendon, and he didn't play in his rookie year because of surgeries on both knees.

Portland took Williams 22nd in the 2010 draft, but he wound up only appearing in 24 games with the club, all of them in 2011/12. The shooting guard from Memphis averaged just 3.7 points in 6.2 minutes per game during his time with the Blazers, who declined the fourth-year option on his rookie deal before last season. Williams didn't take part in NBA summer league action this year.

Fellow NBA veteran Jermaine Taylor appears set to take part in Cavs camp as well, so Williams will bring Cleveland's roster to 17 players. Williams is a client of Wasserman Media Group agent Thad Foucher, as the Hoops Rumors Agency Database shows.

Cavs Invite Jermaine Taylor To Camp

September 29th, 2013 at 8:51pm CST by Chuck Myron

The Cavaliers have extended a camp invitation to former Kings and Rockets shooting guard Jermaine Taylor, agent Michael Whitaker tells Jorge Sierra of HoopsHype (Twitter link). It's not entirely clear from the tweet whether Taylor has accepted the invitation, but since the news is coming from Taylor's camp, it seems he'll likely become the 16th player on Cleveland's roster.

The move isn't entirely a surprise, since Taylor's performance for Cleveland's summer league team drew praise from Cavs coach Mike Brown. The 6'4" Taylor averaged 12.8 points in 18.1 minutes per game for the summer Cavs. He also suited up for the Bulls' summer league team this year. Aside from that action, Taylor has been out of the NBA since 2011. He had a whirlwind 2012/13, playing for Lagun Aro Gipuzkoa BC in Spain, Hapoel Tel Aviv in Israel, Shanxi Zhongyu in China and the Maine Red Claws of the D-League.

Assuming Taylor will be with the Cavs on a fully non-guaranteed contract, he'll join Kenny Kadji and C.J. Miles as the only Cavaliers without at least a partial guarantee. Eleven Cavs have fully guaranteed deals, and nearly half of Andrew Bynum's $12.25MM salary is guaranteed as well. That leaves Taylor with a decent shot at making the opening-night roster.

International Notes: Ajinca, Ewing

September 29th, 2013 at 3:38pm CST by Zachary Links

We'll keep track of today's international news here..

Former first-round pick Alexis Ajinca came up empty in his search for an enticing NBA offer and will return to play for Strasbourg of France this season, with eyes on a return to the NBA next summer, as Catch-and-Shoot.com reports (translation via Sportando's Enea Trapani).
Patrick Ewing Jr. has decided to continue his career with Greece's Trikala, according to Emiliano Carchia of Sportando. Ewing has plied his craft around the world since finishing his college career at Georgetown, including a brief NBA stop in New Orleans in 2011.
As always, you can keep track of all international player movement using Hoops Rumors' latest tracker.

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

Erik Spoelstra Signs Extension With Heat

September 29th, 2013 at 12:28pm CST by Chuck Myron

12:28pm: Spoelstra has signed the extension, a source tells Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel (Twitter link).

9:00am: The Heat are close to ensuring coach Erik Spoelstra doesn't hit the open market next summer, as they're putting the finishing touches on a multiyear contract extension for the two-time champion bench boss, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports. Officials from several franchises have suggested to Wojnarowski that they would make a run at the Creative Artists Agency client if he were to become a free agent, so it appears the Heat are averting a bidding war.

Spoelstra's deal had been set to expire at the end of the 2013/14, which will be his sixth as head coach of the Heat. He took over a team that went 15-67 in Pat Riley's final season on the bench and, helped by Dwyane Wade's recovery from injury, guided it to a 43-39 record and a playoff berth. The Heat have finished with a record of better than .500 every year since Spoelstra took over as coach for the team he originally joined as video coordinator in 1995.

The extension will likely be announced before the Heat begin training camp this week. It'll be the second major management-related move for the team in the past few days, after Andy Elisburg's promotion to GM yesterday. In addition, Juwan Howard is joining Spoelstra's staff as an assistant coach.

Jazz To Sign Nick Covington

September 28th, 2013 at 10:21pm CST by Spencer Lund

Jody Genessy of the Deseret News tweets that the Jazz formally offered a training camp invitation to Nick Covington, who has accepted. The 6'2" guard turned 28 this summer, and last played for alma mater Weber State in 2005/06.

For the last three years he's played in the NBA's Development league for Iowa, Sioux Falls and last season with Erie. With the Bayhawks in Erie last season, Covington averaged 9.4 points, 2.6 assists and 2.0 rebounds in 26 minutes of action per game.

In 47 games total, 38 of which he started, he actually shot worse from the field (39.5%) than he did from beyond the 3-point arc (39.9%).

Suns Bringing James Nunnally To Camp

September 28th, 2013 at 8:23pm CST by Spencer Lund

The Suns have added shooter James Nunnally to their camp roster, tweets Paul Coro of the Arizona Republic. The UC-Santa Barbara grad shot 63 percent from 3-point range for Miami during summer league.

Coro adds in his Arizona Republic post that new GM Ryan McDonough believed the Suns needed more perimeter shooting even before trading Caron Butler and Jared Dudley this offseason. McDonough explained the decision to Coro:

“We brought him (Nunnally) in a for a two-day workout recently and we were impressed with him on and off the court. It was competitive with other teams interested in signing him and we recruited him. We were able to get him with the opportunity that he will have here.”

The 23-year-old shot 58 percent from the field and averaged a team-high 13.0 PPG during summer league with Miami. He made quite the impression when he was 5-for-6 from long range for a 21-point second half in a losing effort to the Suns in that time.

Nunnally averaged 15.7 PPG from 2009 to 2012 with California-Santa Barbara and averaged 10.3 PPG and shot 41 percent from 3 last season for Bakersfield, the Suns' D-League affiliate. He'll be the 18th addition to the Suns' training camp, which runs Tuesday through Sunday next week. They won't have to cut down to between 13 and 15 players until the night before the regular season.

Andy Elisburg Promoted To Heat GM

September 28th, 2013 at 6:21pm CST by Spencer Lund

The Heat have reshuffled their front office and coaching personnel. On the heel of news announcing the move of Juwan Howard from player to assistant coach, now the Heat are declaring a new general manager to assist team President Pat Riley.

Here is what the Heat said in their press release:

The Miami Heat announced today several front office promotions, including Andy Elisburg to Senior Vice President, Basketball Operations/General Manager, Adam Simon to Assistant General Manager/General Manager Sioux Falls Skyforce, Dan Craig to Assistant Coach/Player Development, Chad Kammerer to Director of NBA Scouting/Advance Scout, Keith Askins to Director of College and Pro Scouting and the hiring of Juwan Howard to Assistant Coach/Player Development.

Elisburg, a Heat original employee of 25 years, will serve as Senior Vice President, Basketball Operations/General Manager. His duties will include assisting CEO Nick Arison and President Pat Riley in the management of all aspects of the Heat's basketball organization including salary cap administration, talent acquisition, league compliance and the day-to-day business of basketball operations.

[…]

Additionally, the HEAT also named Rich Fernando to Executive Assistant to the Coaches, Eric Glass to Video Coordinator and Tim Hardaway to Scout/Community & Corporate Liaison.

Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel, sent a tweet of the promotion earlier today where he noted that Pat Riley will remain the lead personnel executive despite the promotion. Winderman pointed out in his piece for the Sun-Sentinel that Elisburg's promotion makes him the first person to hold the title of Heat general manager since Randy Pfund in September of 2008.

ESPN basketball scribe Brian Windhorst adds in a tweet that Elisburg is known for his salary cap strategies. With the CBA luxury tax strictures already costing the Heat the 3-point shooting of Mike Miller – who was amnestied earlier this summer – Elisburg should be instrumental in keeping the Heat competing for more championships within the strict luxury tax parameters of the CBA.