DECEMBER 1ST, 2:50pm: Galatasaray has agreed to let go of Aldemir, Raznatovic tweets (hat tip to Sportando’s Orazio Cauchi), adding that his client is set to come stateside as early as Tuesday. Raznatovic also makes reference to a signed document, presumably referring to the FIBA letter of clearance.
NOVEMBER 30TH, 3:00pm: Despite his Turkish club’s insistence on keeping him, Aldemir remains committed to the NBA and will travel to Philadelphia within the next week, a source tells Shams Charania of RealGM (via Twitter).
NOVEMBER 28TH, 7:52am: A source told Bob Cooney of the Philadelphia Daily News that the sides are perhaps weeks away from reaching any sort of agreement. That’s an odd development, considering all of the details that have been reported so far. Perhaps the source was referring to the time at which an official signing might take place, but that’s just my speculation. In any case, Cooney’s latest report jibes with the lack of clarity that Brown pointed to earlier this week.
TUESDAY, 8:09am: There is a team option on the deal in addition to the non-guaranteed salary involved, according to John Gonzalez of CSNPhilly.com. The deal is pending FIBA clearance, and while it’s expected to become official within the next few days, there’s a decent chance it takes as long as a week, Gonzalez writes. In any case, the NBA has filed a request for a FIBA letter of clearance, Raznatovic tweets (hat tip to Mark Porcaro of Secret Rival). The letter of clearance is a standard document that must be obtained whenever a player moves from a league in one country to another.
MONDAY, 6:14pm: Sixers coach Brett Brown cautioned that the team’s situation with Aldemir isn’t as clear-cut as the reports have made it seem, tweets Bob Cooney of the Philadelphia Daily News.
4:16pm: The final two seasons of the deal are non-guaranteed, according to Tom Moore of Calkins Media (on Twitter).
1:26pm: The Sixers and draft-and-stash prospect Furkan Aldemir have agreed to a four-year deal that features two guaranteed seasons, reports Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports (Twitter link). Wojnarowski adds that the final two seasons are team options, but since only one year may be an option season, it sounds like it’ll be non-guaranteed for at least year three. It’s possible that year four is both a team option and non-guaranteed. Misko Raznatovic, the agent for the 6’9″ power forward, told Cem Pelister of CNNTurk.com that his client had terminated his contract with Turkey’s Galatasaray and the 6’9″ power forward wrote on his Facebook page that he had opted to explore a future in the NBA, as we noted earlier. The Sixers, who obtained the NBA rights to Aldemir in the 2013 Royce White trade with the Rockets, must unload one of their 15 players before their deal with Aldemir can become official.
Aldemir does his best work on the boards, as evidenced by his 9.1 rebounds in 22.7 minutes per game in 11 contests so far this season for Galatasaray, which was reportedly behind on payments in the three-year, $5.3MM deal that Aldemir had signed in the offseason. The 23-year-old has played exclusively overseas since entering the draft in 2012, when the Clippers made him the 53rd overall pick before sending him to the Rockets the next day.
The deal marks one of the first attempts that Philadelphia has made to cash in on its store of overseas talent that includes the rights to No. 12 overall pick Dario Saric and two other 2014 draftees. The Sixers have plenty of cap room to have lavished Aldemir with more than the minimum salary, but it seems unlikely that it took a significant chunk of money to lure him, particularly given Philly’s willingness to guarantee the first two seasons of the deal. The Sixers have been carrying only eight players known to have fully guaranteed salary for this season, one in which they’ve lost their first 13 games in the midst of a radical rebuilding project.