12:37pm: The moves are official, according to Winderman (Twitter link).
DECEMBER 31, 11:39am: The Heat will sign small forward Derrick Jones to a two-way contract, tweets Shams Charania of The Vertical.
Miami will create an opening by waiving shooting guard Matt Williams, who currently holds one of the team’s two-way deals, according to Ira Winderman of The Sun-Sentinel (Twitter link).
The other two-way contract belongs to point guard Derrick Walton, who is nearing his 45-day NBA limit. The Heat could have chosen to convert Walton’s deal to a standard NBA contract and release center A.J. Hammons, who has spent the entire season in the G League after being acquired in an offseason trade with the Mavericks. Hammons is making more than $1.3MM this season and has nearly $1.45MM guaranteed for 2019/20, and Miami decided it isn’t ready to part with him.
Jones, 20, won a roster spot with the Suns last season, but was waived December 7 when Phoenix converted Mike James‘ contract to a full NBA deal. Jones has been playing for the Suns’ G League team in Northern Arizona since being cut. He appeared in 32 games for Phoenix in 2016/17 and six this season, averaging 4.7 points in about 15 minutes.
Williams has played a total of 11 minutes in three games for the Heat.
Jones has insane bounce. I’d love to see him get some minutes.
Heat desperately needed help at the 3/4 spots, especially with nobody healthy at the 4 right now. These last few games have been really brutal with essentially 1 healthy forward (Josh Richardson), and a bunch of centers playing the 3, 4, and 5