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Atlantic Rumors: Lopez, Knicks, Sixers, Siakam

October 27th, 2016 at 9:28pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Nets center Brook Lopez doesn’t seem to fit into new coach Kenny Atkinson’s motion offense, according to Brian Lewis of the New York Post. Lopez played just 21 minutes, fewer than eight of his teammates, in Brooklyn’s opener on Wednesday against the Celtics. He scored only one basket, an odd sight for a player who averaged 20.6 PPG last season. Lopez is making $21.16MM this season and $22.6MM in the final year of his contract in 2017/18. “It’s a learning process. It’s both of us: It’s him learning a totally new system and us integrating him into a new system,’’ Atkinson told Lewis. “But I have complete confidence that as the season goes on, you’re going to see a better Brook. He’s going to understand it more.”

 In other news around the Atlantic Division:
  • Developing Kristaps Porzingis should be Knicks coach Jeff Hornacek’s top priority this season but it will difficult with two ball-dominant players like Derrick Rose and Carmelo Anthony in the lineup, Chris Mannix of The Vertical opines. Hornacek is intent on improving Porzingis’ post moves in order to punish teams using smaller defenders on him, Mannix notes. But rival coaches are skeptical that Hornacek’s hybrid triangle offense will allow him to take advantage of mismatches, Mannix continues. Those coaches also believe Porzingis is better suited at center but the signing of Joakim Noah limits that possibility, Mannix adds.
  • Hornacek isn’t surprised that Rose struggled to run the offense in the season-opening loss to the Cavaliers, Barbara Barker of Newsday reports. Rose had just one assist in the Knicks’ opening-night loss to the Cavaliers and later expressed frustration over the offensive scheme. Hornacek said it was a product of Rose missing a good portion of the preseason because of his sexual assault civil trial in Los Angeles, Barker continues. “If we expected anything different, we’d be crazy,” Hornacek told Barker and other beat reporters. “He hasn’t seen a lot of this stuff.”
  • Joel Embiid and Jahlil Okafor didn’t play together in the Sixers’ opening-night loss to the Thunder because both were on minutes limits, Keith Pompey of the Philadelphia Inquirer relays. Coach Brett Brown wants to play them together in certain situations but Embiid is being brought along slowly after missing two seasons with foot issues, while Okafor just returned from knee soreness, Pompey adds. “It’s not intelligent to play them together now when you only have X amount of minutes with both of them,” Brown said to Pompey.
  • Rookie Pascal Siakam started ahead of Patrick Patterson at power forward for the Raptors in their opener to keep Patterson in his normal role, according to Doug Smith of the Toronto Star. Siakam grabbed nine rebounds in 22 minutes.
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D-League Notes: Brown, Magette, Patterson

October 27th, 2016 at 7:55pm CST by Dana Gauruder
Forward Anthony Brown has signed a D-League contract and will be eligible for its draft on Sunday, a league source told the D-League Digest (Twitter link). Brown was the final training-camp cut by the Lakers. Los Angeles ate his guaranteed $874,636 contract, opting to keep two more experienced forwards on the bubble, Thomas Robinson and Metta World Peace. Brown, 24, was selected 34th overall in the 2015 draft by the Lakers, and appeared in 29 games during his rookie season, including 11 starts. The Stanford product averaged 4.0 PPG and 2.4 RPG in 20.7 minutes but shot just 31.0% from the field.
In other D-League developments:
  • Point guard Josh Magette has signed an NBADL contract, the D-League Digest tweets. Magette was a late training-camp cut by the Hawks. The Lakers’ D-League affiliate, the D-Fenders, owns his rights. Magette, 26, made three preseason appearances for Atlanta, spanning 17 minutes. He averaged 11.5 points and 9.1 assists in 45 games last season for the D-Fenders, with whom he has played the past two seasons.
  • Shooting guard Lamar Patterson has signed a D-League contract and will be an affiliate player for the Kings’ Reno Bighorns, according to another tweet from the D-League Digest. Patterson appeared in four preseason games for the Kings, averaging 5.8 points, 1.8 rebounds and 1.0 steals per game, before he was waived. He spent much of the 2015/16 season playing in the D-League and the Hawks waived him in July.
  • Yogi Ferrell plans to open the season with the D-League’s Long Island Nets, according to Jeff Rabjohns of Scout.com. The former Indiana University standout was Brooklyn’s final training-camp cut. He appeared in three exhibition games, logging 28 minutes.
  • Forward C.J. Leslie has signed a contract with the Raptors’ D-League affiliate, the Raptors 905, Chris Reichert of The Step Back tweets.
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KeyArena Could Be Renovated To Attract NBA Team

October 27th, 2016 at 6:31pm CST by Dana Gauruder
Seattle’s KeyArena could be developed into a multi-purpose facility that would allow it to house an NBA franchise, thus enhancing the prospects of the league returning to the city, Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times reports.
A city-hall source confirmed to Baker that Los Angeles-based Oak View Group is interested in renovating KeyArena into a facility that could accommodate an NBA or NHL team. Last year, an architectural firm oversaw a KeyArena study that concluded the arena could be remodeled at a cost of $285MM, Baker continues.
One of the partners in the Oak View Group, Tim Leiweke, has a pro sports background after previously serving as CEO of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment.
Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment owns both the Maple Leafs’ NHL and Raptors’ NBA franchises.  The Oak View group has held several meetings regarding a KeyArena upgrade with Seattle officials, a source told Baker.
Seattle’s Mayor’s office is expected to issue a Request for Proposals to renovate the facility by December, according to Baker, and the city is then expected to seek bids on a potential renovation. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver told The Seattle Times during the spring that the league remains open-minded to a KeyArena remodel, Baker adds.
The NBA, of course, has some history of returning to cities that lost franchises, mostly recently in Charlotte, as well as New Orleans. It would come as no shock if Seattle, who lost the Sonics franchise to Oklahoma City, becomes a viable destination for a new or current franchise if the KeyArena renovations are made.
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NBA Vet Chase Budinger Headed To Europe

October 27th, 2016 at 5:13pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Forward Chase Budinger, the final training-camp cut by the Nets, has signed with Baskonia of Spain, international journalist David Pick tweets. The news was also reported by Sportando and Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical. Budinger will join two other former NBA players who previously signed with Baskonia in the Euroleague, center Andrea Bargnani and point guard Shane Larkin.

Budinger signed a non-guaranteed contract with Brooklyn just prior to camp. The 6’7” Budinger, who was originally drafted in 2009 by the Pistons and then immediately shipped to the Rockets, has bounced around the league in recent years. After playing three seasons in Houston, he was a reserve for the Timberwolves for three consecutive campaigns.

He appeared in 49 games with the Pacers last season before he was waived in early March. He was quickly snapped up by the Suns and came off the bench in 17 games for them as the season wound down.

Budinger averaged 7.9 points, 3.0 rebounds in 19.7 minutes over 407 NBA games. A career 35.2% shooter from 3-point range, Budinger shot under 30% from beyond the arc last year for both Indiana and Phoenix, which cooled interest in him on the free-agent market. It’s possible now that Budinger, 28, has played his last NBA game.

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John Wall, Bradley Beal Discuss Relationship

October 27th, 2016 at 3:56pm CST by Luke Adams

When John Wall admitted earlier this year that he and Bradley Beal had “a tendency to dislike each other on the court,” it led to a series of reports and columns suggesting that perhaps the Wizards wouldn’t be able to keep both players for the long term. But with Beal beginning a new five-year contract and Wall not going anywhere anytime soon, the duo is looking forward to a productive future, as Michael Lee of The Vertical writes.

“This is my brother at the end of the day,” Beal said of Wall. “Nothing is going to change. If I didn’t want to be here, if we did beef, I wouldn’t have signed my contract. That’s what it ultimately comes down to.”

Wall agreed with Beal’s assessment of the situation, pointing out that he “wouldn’t have begged him to come back” if he wasn’t optimistic about the long-term outlook in D.C. The Wizards’ point guard also believes his comments about the duo’s on-court growing pains were somewhat misconstrued.

“I think everybody blew it out of proportion for no reason,” Wall said. “I mean, if you look at any two great teammates, and two young, great guys, that’s talented and want to be great, you’re going to have ups and downs. Everything is not going to be perfect.”

Beal’s new five-year contract with Washington is a maximum-salary deal that will pay him nearly $128MM, an enormous sum for a player who has been plagued by injury issues and hasn’t had a true breakout season yet. But Wall is hoping that Wizards fans will be patient with Beal and allow him to continue to improve.

“He had injuries the last couple of years and they’re like, ‘He don’t deserve it.’ Let him get a chance to earn it,” Wall said. “Let him be an All-Star. Let him see if he can be healthy for a whole season and see what he can do. … I want him to be an All-Star, just like I am. It’s no fun when it’s just one guy. If another guy is there, it makes it more fun.”

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Players Who Can’t Be Traded Until January 15

October 27th, 2016 at 2:35pm CST by Luke Adams

The NBA’s in-season trade market typically doesn’t pick up until the winter, since players who signed free agent contracts in the offseason aren’t eligible to be moved until December 15. By that point, with the regular season approaching the two-month mark, teams have a better idea of where they stand, how they want to approach the rest of the season, and which players they might want to trade.

While most players around the NBA will be trade-eligible at that point, not all of them will be. The NBA’s rules for recently-signed players dictate that those players can be dealt as of December 15 or three months after they signed, whichever comes later. So a player like Metta World Peace, who signed with the Lakers on September 23, wouldn’t be eligible to be traded until December 23.

Finally, there’s a separate group of players that won’t become trade-eligible until January 15, and those are the guys we’ll focus on in this post. These players all meet a specific set of criteria: Not only did they re-sign with their previous team this offseason, but they got a raise of at least 20%, their salary is worth more than the minimum, and their team was over the cap, using Bird or Early Bird rights to sign them.

Here’s the list of players who cannot be traded until January 15, 2017.

Note: Players marked with an asterisk also have the ability to veto trades during the 2016/17 league year.

Information from Basketball Insiders was used in the creation of this post.

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Community Shootaround: NBA Expansion

October 27th, 2016 at 1:15pm CST by Luke Adams

As the NBA and NBPA work toward reaching a deal on a new Collective Bargaining Agreement, the topic of expansion has become a popular one. The new CBA isn’t expected to necessarily open up the door for cities to apply for an expansion franchise, but with the league’s revenue stream at an all-time high and an intriguing arena proposal on the table in Seattle, there have been whispers that the NBA may be willing to consider the possibility of adding a team or two.

Seattle, with Chris Hansen‘s investment group still leading the charge on an arena project, is the city mentioned most frequently when expansion or relocation is discussed, but it’s not the only metropolis out there with possible NBA appeal. A recent report identified Louisville, Pittsburgh, Omaha, Las Vegas, Vancouver, and Mexico City as cities that could become viable candidates if investors and city leaders were to pursue a franchise.

Whether or not the league’s 30 current team owners would be willing to split their share of the league’s earnings with another franchise or two remains to be seen, but for the sake of today’s discussion, let’s say most team owners are on board.

Assuming that’s the case, how do you feel about the possibility of expansion? Should the NBA add more teams, or would the league risk diluting its player pool too significantly? If the NBA were to move forward with expansion, would it make sense to add multiple teams, or just one at a time? Is Seattle the only logical candidate for a 31st team, or would another city deserve a long look?

Weigh in below in the comments section to share your opinions on the topic. We look forward to hearing your thoughts.

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And-Ones: Stephens, Seattle, Childress, NBPA

October 27th, 2016 at 11:43am CST by Luke Adams

Former University of Memphis standout D.J. Stephens has been arrested and charged with domestic aggravated assault, writes Yolanda Jones of The Memphis Commercial Appeal. Stephens, who was in camp with the Grizzlies this month before being waived last weekend, is accused of attacking his child’s mother. The alleged incident reduces Stephens’ chances of getting another shot with an NBA team, but if he does sign with a club at some point, he could be facing a suspension, depending on the outcome of the case.

Let’s round up a few more odds and ends from around the NBA…

  • One NBA team owner tells Sam Amico of AmicoHoops.net that getting a franchise back in Seattle is “a big priority” for the league. A new arena proposal from Chris Hansen‘s investment group has created renewed optimism about getting the NBA back to the city, though it doesn’t sound as if the league has gone too far down the road on planning potential expansion or relocation. “I don’t think it’s been thought out that far along yet,” a source tells Amico.
  • A Wednesday report from Chris Reichert of The Step Back suggested that former Hawks forward Josh Childress, who last played in the NBA during the 2013/14 season, had signed a D-League contract. However, Reichert has since removed his tweet, and Childress’ agent – Daniel Moldovan of Entersport – denied the report (Twitter link).
  • Jon Wertheim of SI.com spoke to NBPA executive director Michele Roberts about the optimism surrounding the Collective Bargaining Agreement negotiations, and what she and the players’ union hope to get out of a new deal.
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Southeast Notes: Batum, Magic, Schroder, Heat

October 27th, 2016 at 10:23am CST by Luke Adams

Nicolas Batum drew interest this summer from several potential suitors, such as Dallas and New York, but he never seriously considered any team besides the Hornets, as Shams Charania of The Vertical details. “There were options with other teams and different scenarios,” Batum said. “But I tried to look at what suited me best, and look at this franchise long term. Having Kemba [Walker] under contract, having [Michael Kidd-Gilchrist] under contract, having Frank [Kaminsky] under contract, having Coach [Steve] Clifford under contract, we have the same core.”

Here’s more from out of the Southeast division:

  • The Magic expect to choose the location for their new D-League affiliate within the next month or so, CEO Alex Martins tells Josh Robbins of The Orlando Sentinel. Orlando hopes to have a D-League affiliate ready to begin play in 2017/18, and the team has narrowed the potential location down to two Florida-based candidates: Kissimmee (Silver Spurs Arena) and Lakeland (Lakeland Center).
  • Bobby Marks of The Vertical has the details on Dennis Schroder‘s new deal with the Hawks, who will carry a $15.5MM annual cap hit for the point guard for four years, from 2017/18 through 2020/21. According to Marks (via Twitter), the extension features $2MM per year in unlikely incentives, so the total value could max out at $70MM.
  • Ira Winderman of The South Florida Sun Sentinel isn’t sure there’s room in the Heat‘s rotation for Derrick Williams, who joined the team on a one-year, $4.6MM deal in July.
  • The Hornets‘ first game of the season showed that new center Roy Hibbert, who signed a one-year deal with the team this summer, can impact games in a way that no Charlotte player could last season, writes Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer.
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NBA Teams With 15 Fully Guaranteed Salaries

October 27th, 2016 at 8:59am CST by Luke Adams

With R.J. Hunter poised to officially join the Bulls, the only NBA team with an open roster spot will be adding a 15th man, meaning every one of the league’s 30 clubs will be at the regular-season roster limit. However, that doesn’t mean those teams are locked into those 15 players for the season.

As we saw in the days leading up to opening night, plenty of teams were willing to cut ties with players on fully guaranteed salaries, with the increased cap giving clubs a little extra flexibility to eat salary. Still, generally speaking, teams will be less inclined to waive a player if his 2016/17 salary is already fully guaranteed, preferring to cut a non-guaranteed salary if they need to make an addition.

So, with the season underway, it’s worth taking a look at which teams have 15 fully guaranteed salaries on their roster and which teams are carrying a non-guaranteed contract or two. Those non-guaranteed deals will perhaps give those clubs a little extra flexibility up until January 10, at which point everyone still on an NBA roster has his salary become fully guaranteed.

Here are the teams with 15 fully guaranteed salaries on their roster:

  1. Boston Celtics
  2. Brooklyn Nets
  3. Detroit Pistons
  4. Indiana Pacers
  5. Los Angeles Clippers
  6. Milwaukee Bucks

Meanwhile, the following teams are carrying 14 fully guaranteed salaries, with just one player on a non-guaranteed or partially guaranteed deal:

  1. Atlanta Hawks: Mike Muscala (partial)
  2. Dallas Mavericks: Dorian Finney-Smith (partial)
  3. Denver Nuggets: Jarnell Stokes (partial)
  4. Golden State Warriors: JaVale McGee (partial)
  5. Miami Heat: Rodney McGruder (partial)
  6. Minnesota Timberwolves: John Lucas III
  7. New Orleans Pelicans: Lance Stephenson (partial)
  8. New York Knicks: Ron Baker (partial)
  9. Oklahoma City Thunder: Semaj Christon (partial)
  10. Phoenix Suns: Derrick Jones (partial)
  11. Portland Trail Blazers: Tim Quarterman (partial)
  12. Sacramento Kings: Ty Lawson
  13. Toronto Raptors: Fred VanVleet (partial)
  14. Utah Jazz: Jeff Withey

That leaves nine teams dedicating multiple roster spots to players on non-guaranteed or partially guaranteed salaries early in the season. That doesn’t necessarily mean these teams are more likely to make back-of-the-roster moves over the next couple months, but it gives them a little more financial flexibility to do so. Here are those nine teams:

  1. Charlotte Hornets: Treveon Graham (partial), Aaron Harrison
  2. Cleveland Cavaliers: DeAndre Liggins (partial), Jordan McRae
  3. Houston Rockets: Kyle Wiltjer (partial), Bobby Brown
  4. Los Angeles Lakers: Thomas Robinson, Metta World Peace
  5. Memphis Grizzlies: Vince Carter (partial), JaMychal Green (partial), Troy Williams (partial)
  6. Orlando Magic: Arinze Onuaku, Damjan Rudez
  7. Philadelphia 76ers: Robert Covington (partial), Jerami Grant, T.J. McConnell, Hollis Thompson
  8. San Antonio Spurs: Bryn Forbes (partial), Nicolas Laprovittola
  9. Washington Wizards: Danuel House (partial), Sheldon McClellan (partial), Daniel Ochefu (partial)

The 30th team? Those aforementioned Bulls, who had been carrying 13 guaranteed salaries, as well as Cristiano Felicio‘s non-guarantee deal. Depending on whether or not R.J. Hunter‘s new contract is guaranteed, Chicago will either fall into the second or third group above.

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