1:12pm: Denver has waived Dorsey, the team announced via press release. He’s giving up $200K of his salary in the buyout, according to Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter links), who also indicates that the Nuggets waived their set-off rights as part of the arrangement. That means the Nuggets will have to pay Dorsey $815,241 if he clears waivers, regardless of the money he makes playing elsewhere the rest of this season.
10:49am: The Nuggets and Joey Dorsey have agreed to a buyout deal that will facilitate his departure for Turkey’s Galatasaray, reports Christopher Dempsey of The Denver Post (Twitter link). Dorsey, whom Denver will waive as part of the arrangement, has already signed a deal worth more than $650K with Galatasaray, as international journalist David Pick reported earlier this morning. The Nuggets had been set to pay him a guaranteed salary of more than $1.015MM for this season. It’s unclear how much of that Dorsey has agreed to forfeit.
Another NBA team could claim Dorsey off waivers and foil his plan to go overseas once the Nuggets release him, but that’s an unlikely outcome, since his salary is fully guaranteed. Dorsey, whom the Nuggets acquired from the Rockets in the Ty Lawson trade, averaged a career-high 12.4 minutes per game and made 17 starts, also a career best, for Houston last season, though injuries to Dwight Howard and others helped him to his place in the rotation. The Rockets were reportedly ready to trade him in December to free up a roster spot for Josh Smith, but Houston found no takers and released Tarik Black instead, a move that paved the way for Dorsey’s starts, all of which came after Smith replaced Black. The 31-year-old Dorsey was out of the mix by the playoffs, when he saw just 13 total postseason minutes.
Denver will have 14 fully guaranteed contracts once it formally sheds Dorsey. Erick Green has a $100K partial guarantee on his minimum salary, and conflicting reports shroud the future of Kostas Papanikolaou and his non-guaranteed salary of nearly $4.798MM. The Nuggets are limited to paying no more than the minimum salary to outside free agents after using the room exception to re-sign Darrell Arthur.
Dorsey is one of those players who is better off overseas. He can make similar money and actually get to display his skills instead of rotting on someone’s bench. Plus he gets a nice going-away present from the Nuggets.