Transactions Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Hornets To Waive-And-Stretch Nicolas Batum

November 21st, 2020 at 1:25pm CST by Luke Adams

The Hornets will waive and stretch the final year of Nicolas Batum‘s contract in order to create the cap room necessary to sign Gordon Hayward, reports Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer.

Batum, who will turn 32 next month, is entering the final season of the five-year, $120MM contract he signed back in 2016. His cap hit for 2020/21 is approximately $27.13MM, but the Hornets can stretch that amount across three seasons at $9.04MM annually, opening up more than $18MM in cap room for 2020/21.

That newly-opened amount will be more than enough to complete the Hayward signing, as Charlotte entered the day with about $19MM in space. The team should have some room left over for an additional move or two, though it will now have to deal with $9MM+ in dead money on the cap for 2021/22 and ’22/23 as well.

Batum was excised from the Hornets’ rotation this past season, appearing in just 22 games (23.0 MPG) and playing poorly in his limited time, with 3.6 PPG, 4.5 RPG, and 3.0 APG on .346/.286/.900 shooting.

Although he’s coming off a down year and has long been viewed as an unfavorable asset as a result of his oversized contract, Batum might be an interesting minimum-salary target in free agency once he clears waivers.

Heat Sign Avery Bradley To Two-Year Deal

November 21st, 2020 at 12:44pm CST by Luke Adams

NOVEMBER 23: The Heat have officially announced their deal with Bradley, issuing a press release to confirming the signing.

“This is a great signing that can help us right away,” team president Pat Riley said in a statement. “Being able to add a two-time All-NBA Defensive Team selection who is also a great shooter and fits perfectly with our current philosophy as a multi-positional player. Avery will be a great addition to fortifying our backcourt.”

As we relayed in a separate story, Boston and Charlotte were among the other teams that expressed interest in Bradley before he agreed to sign with Miami.

NOVEMBER 21: The Heat and free agent guard Avery Bradley have agreed to a two-year, $11.6MM deal, agent Charles Briscoe tells Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).

The contract will include a team option for the second year, sources tell ESPN’s Bobby Marks (Twitter link). The Heat took a similar route with their new deals for Goran Dragic and Meyers Leonard as they prioritize preserving cap room for 2021.

The Heat will use a portion of their mid-level exception to sign Bradley. The Heat have also agreed to a one-year, $3.6MM contract with Maurice Harkless and Miami could preserve its bi-annual exception by splitting up the MLE between Bradley and Harkless, as John Hollinger of The Athletic tweets.

Bradley was considered a fallback option for the team in case it couldn’t re-sign Jae Crowder, Ira Winderman of the South Florida Sun Sentinel tweets. While Crowder was a priority for the Heat, he wasn’t comfortable with only a one-year guarantee, says Barry Jackson of The Miami Herald (Twitter link). As a result, he’ll head to Phoenix on a three-year deal while the Heat replace him with Bradley.

As Charania explains (via Twitter), Bradley – who was recruited by Heat president Pat Riley and star swingman Jimmy Butler – was sold on the Heat’s culture and made the decision to leave Los Angeles after spending the 2019/20 season with the Lakers.

Bradley, who will turn 30 next Thursday, appeared in 49 games for the Lakers in 2019/20, starting 44 of them. He averaged 8.6 PPG and 2.3 RPG with a solid 3PT% (.364) and strong perimeter defense, but opted out of the restart and wasn’t part of the club’s championship run.

The Warriors were among the other teams that had interest in signing Bradley, tweets Monte Poole of NBC Sports Bay Area.

Dana Gauruder contributed to this story. Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Hornets, Gordon Hayward Agree To Four-Year Deal

November 21st, 2020 at 12:31pm CST by Luke Adams

The Hornets are signing Gordon Hayward, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski, who reports (via Twitter) that the forward’s new deal will be worth $120MM over four years. It’s fully guaranteed, tweets David Aldridge of The Athletic.

Hayward turned down a $34.2MM player option with the Celtics earlier in the week, which was a signal that he and agent Mark Bartelstein were confident that one or more lucrative multiyear offers would be waiting for him on the open market.

The Hawks and Knicks were said to have interest in Hayward, but Atlanta quickly moved onto other targets – including Danilo Gallinari – and New York wasn’t comfortable with either the years or the money that Hayward ultimately received from Charlotte, per Steve Popper of Newsday (Twitter link).

Hayward was said to prefer joining his hometown Pacers, and Boston and Indiana attempted to work out a sign-and-trade deal within the last couple days. However, the Pacers’ cap situation complicated matters, as Bobby Marks of ESPN notes (via Twitter), and it was always going to be a challenge for the C’s and Pacers to agree on fair compensation.

Just a half-hour before word of Hayward’s agreement with the Hornets broke, Scott Agness of Fieldhouse Files said (via Twitter) that there had been no progress in those sign-and-trade talks.

So Hayward will be headed to the Hornets, who will have to either open up some extra cap room in order to clear the space necessary to complete the signing. They’ll reportedly do so by using the stretch provision on Nicolas Batum.

Although the Hornets were cited on Friday as a potential suitor for Hayward, the deal still comes as a major surprise, especially since president of basketball operations Mitch Kupchak had talked for the better part of the year about Charlotte not planning to make a splash in free agency. Apparently, the team decided to change course on that plan when Hayward became available.

Hayward, 30, still didn’t quite look like his old All-Star self in 2019/20. However, he was a lot closer to that level last season than he was during his first two years in Boston. In 52 games, he averaged 17.5 PPG, 6.7 RPG, and 4.1 APG on .500/.383/.855 shooting.

Hayward’s deal with the Hornets represents a full-circle moment, as the first free agent contract he signed in the NBA, back in 2014, was an offer sheet with Charlotte. The Jazz, of course, matched that offer and the former Butler standout spent the next six years in Utah and Boston, but now he’s finally joining the Hornets.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Raptors Re-Sign Fred VanVleet To Four-Year Deal

November 21st, 2020 at 11:34am CST by Luke Adams

NOVEMBER 24: The Raptors have formally announced their new deal with VanVleet.

“In the last four years, we’ve seen Fred move from leader of Raptors 905, to leader of the Bench Mob to a leader of a championship team. The constant has been his leadership, no matter his role,” team president Masai Ujiri said in a statement. “We look forward to the coming years with Fred as one of the voices and hearts of our team. We bet on Fred.”

NOVEMBER 21: The Raptors have agreed to re-sign Fred VanVleet, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic, who reports (via Twitter) that VanVleet’s new deal will be for four years and will be worth $85MM. It’ll feature a player option in the final season, Charania adds (via Twitter).

The agreement represents a major payday for VanVleet, who went undrafted out of Wichita State in 2016 and spent part of his rookie season playing in the G League. The Raptors point guard emerged in 2017/18 as a part of the team’s regular rotation, earning a two-year, $18MM deal in the summer of 2018.

On that contract, VanVleet continued to take significant strides, playing a key role in the Raptors’ championship run in 2019 and then entering the starting lineup on a full-time basis last season. He established new career highs in PPG (17.6), APG (6.6), RPG (3.8), and several other categories in 54 games for Toronto in 2019/20.

While the Raptors were always viewed as the frontrunners to re-sign VanVleet, he was expected to receive interest from other teams, especially those with the cap room necessary to give him a deal in the range of $20MM annually. The Knicks were said to have some interest and – according to Vincent Goodwill of Yahoo Sports (Twitter link) – Detroit was also in the mix. The Pistons bowed out when the bidding got too rich for their liking, per Goodwill.

The Raptors now have Pascal Siakam and VanVleet locked up for the next four seasons. The team has reportedly been making an effort to keep its 2021 cap sheet relatively clean in the hopes of making a run at a star free agent such as Giannis Antetokounmpo. VanVleet’s new deal will cut into Toronto’s space, but a max slot remains a possibility, depending on what subsequent moves the Raptors make.

VanVleet’s contract will start at $21.25MM in 2020/21 before declining by 8% in year two, according to Michael Grange of Sportsnet.ca, who notes (via Twitter) that the structure will help the Raps preserve as much cap space as possible for next summer.

Interestingly, the terms of VanVleet’s deal reported by Charania match up exactly with the four-year, $85MM contract Malcolm Brogdon received from Indiana a year ago. We’ve been hearing for months that Brogdon’s deal would likely set the market and be a point of comparison for VanVleet. It appears the Raptors and VanVleet’s camp agreed.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Magic Re-Sign Michael Carter-Williams

November 21st, 2020 at 11:32am CST by Luke Adams

NOVEMBER 24, 12:02pm: The Magic have officially announced their new deal with Carter-Williams.

NOVEMBER 21, 11:32am: It’s a two-year deal for Carter-Williams, with no player or team option on the second year, tweets Josh Robbins of The Athletic. It’s believed to be worth in the range of $3MM per year, tweets Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today.

NOVEMBER 21, 8:00am: Free agent point guard Michael Carter-Williams has agreed to a deal to return to the Magic, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (via Twitter). Terms of the contract agreement aren’t yet known.

Initially acquired by Orlando for the stretch run in 2018/19, Carter-Williams re-signed with the club last summer and came off the bench in 45 games during the ’19/20 campaign. He averaged 7.2 PPG, 3.3 RPG, 2.4 APG, and 1.1 SPG in 18.5 minutes per contest.

With veteran guard D.J. Augustin unlikely to return to Orlando, there may be a path to a larger role in 2020/21 for Carter-Williams, a former Rookie of the Year, though that will depend on what other moves the Magic make this offseason.

The Magic have now made deals with two of their own free agents, agreeing to bring back both Carter-Williams and James Ennis. The team is also adding Dwayne Bacon on a two-year deal.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Bucks Sign Bobby Portis

November 21st, 2020 at 11:30am CST by marksuleymanov

NOVEMBER 25: The Bucks have signed Portis, according to the NBA’s official log of transactions.

NOVEMBER 21:: Free agent big man Bobby Portis has reached an agreement to sign with the Bucks, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link). He’ll get a two-year contract with a second-year player option, Charania adds (via Twitter).

The Bucks are signing Portis using their bi-annual exception, tweets ESPN’s Bobby Marks. That will mean a $3.6MM first-year salary with a $3.8MM option for 2021/22.

The Knicks declined an option on Portis earlier this week to make him a free agent. New York reportedly had an interest in re-signing the center but instead, he heads to the Eastern Conference powerhouse Bucks.

Portis, 25, appeared in 66 games (five starts) for the Knicks last season, averaging 10.1 PPG and 5.1 RPG. The Arkansas native spent his first three-and-a-half seasons in the Windy City with the Bulls before he was shipped to the Wizards in February 2019.

With Milwaukee, Portis and his 6’10’, 250-pound frame will get major minutes backing up the big man duo of reigning two-time NBA Most Valuable Player Giannis Antetokounmpo and Brook Lopez.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Wizards Sign Raul Neto To One-Year Deal

November 21st, 2020 at 11:14am CST by Luke Adams

NOVEMBER 22: The Wizards have officially signed Neto, the team announced tonight in a press release.

NOVEMBER 21: The Wizards have agreed to sign free agent point guard Raul Neto to a one-year contract, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link). The deal will be worth the veteran’s minimum, tweets Jeff Zillgitt of USA Today.

Neto, 28, was a backup point guard in Philadelphia last season, averaging 5.1 PPG and 1.8 APG on .455/.386/.830 shooting in 54 games (12.4 MPG) for the 76ers.

In Washington, he’ll help replenish the Wizards’ backcourt depth, with Shabazz Napier, Gary Payton II, and Jerian Grant hitting free agency on Friday.

Assuming the Wizards open the season with John Wall still on the roster, they plan to manage his workload carefully, perhaps resting him in back-to-backs, which should give Neto an opportunity to increase his playing time.

Jon Teske, Magic Agree To Deal

November 21st, 2020 at 10:54am CST by marksuleymanov

The Magic have agreed to a deal with Michigan big man Jon Teske, according to the Medina Gazette. The terms of the contract are unknown but it’s likely to be an Exhibit 10 deal.

Teske, 23, is coming off his senior season with Michigan in which he posted his best numbers to date. The 7’1″, 265-pound Teske averaged 11.6 PPG and 6.7 RPG as a senior. For his collegiate career, the Medina, Ohio, native averaged 6.6 PPG and 4.8 RPG while making over half of his shot attempts (50.1%).

“It’s the best fit for me right now as a player,” Teske said of joining the Magic. “A couple other teams were interested, but for me to showcase my talents and play within my skills, it’s a big advantage going there.”

If Teske’s pact turns out to be an Exhibit 10, it will be a non-guaranteed one-year, minimum salary contract. The deal allows a bonus of up to $50K if he is waived and remains on the franchise’s G League squad for at least 60 days.

Grizzlies Re-Sign De’Anthony Melton To Four-Year Deal

November 21st, 2020 at 10:53am CST by Luke Adams

NOVEMBER 22: The Grizzlies have officially announced their new deal with Melton, confirming the move in a press release.

NOVEMBER 21: The Grizzlies have agreed to re-sign free agent guard De’Anthony Melton to a four-year contract, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic, who reports (via Twitter) that the deal will be worth $35MM. Melton had been a restricted free agent.

The 22-year-old’s modest box-score numbers – 7.6 PPG, 3.7 RPG, and 2.9 APG – understated his impact in Memphis during the 2019/20 season. He was perhaps the Grizzlies’ best perimeter defender and the team had a +5.1 net rating when he played, compared to a -4.0 mark when he was on the bench.

The 46th overall pick in the 2020 draft, Melton earned the minimum salary for the first two years of his NBA career, but will now have a 2020/21 salary comparable to that of Deandre Ayton and Marvin Bagley, the top picks in his draft class, notes Charania (via Twitter). Charania says Melton will earn $9.6MM in year one, suggesting the deal has a declining structure.

The Grizzlies held Early Bird rights on Melton and will be able to re-sign him using those rights, so the deal won’t affect the team’s mid-level exception, which remains available. Melton, meanwhile, will join Ja Morant, Brandon Clarke, and Dillon Brooks as the only Grizzlies players under contract beyond 2022.

Melton had been the 20th overall player on our list of 2020’s top 50 free agents.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Hawks Sign Kris Dunn To Two-Year Deal

November 21st, 2020 at 10:18am CST by Luke Adams

NOV. 28: The Hawks have made the signing official, per a press release.

NOV. 21: The Hawks have reached an agreement to sign free agent guard Kris Dunn, sources tell ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (Twitter link). It’ll be a two-year contract worth $10MM, with a second-year player option, Woj adds.

Based on the terms reported by Wojnarowski, it sounds like Dunn could end up fitting into Atlanta’s room exception ($9.77MM over two years) once the team uses up its cap room. If that’s the plan, the Hawks should still have in the neighborhood of $25MM to spend on other players.

A former fifth overall pick, Dunn hasn’t developed much of an offensive game since entering the league in 2016, having averaged just 7.3 PPG, 3.6 RPG, and 3.4 APG on .444/.259/.741 shooting in 51 games (24.9 MPG) last season for Chicago. The Bulls decided not to make him a restricted free agent, passing on their qualifying offer.

However, Dunn has become one of the NBA’s very best perimeter defenders, leading the league with 2.9 steals per 36 minutes in 2019/20. That makes him an ideal fit in Atlanta’s backcourt, where he could handle tough defensive assignments and allow Trae Young to focus primarily on his offensive game.

Dunn represents the second notable free agent agreement so far for the Hawks, who also struck a three-year deal with Danilo Gallinari. Atlanta is believed to be in the running for Bogdan Bogdanovic and Rajon Rondo too, though it’s not clear if the team’s deal with Dunn will affect either pursuit — there’s definitely some positional overlap with Rondo.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.