Bucks forward/center Bobby Portis won’t pick up his player option for the 2021/22 season, agent Mark Bartelstein tells Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN (Twitter link).
If Portis had opted into the final year of his deal, he would’ve earned a $3,804,150 salary. Instead, he’ll become an unrestricted free agent in search of a new contract.
Portis, 26, took a modest offer worth the bi-annual exception in free agency last fall in order to join the Bucks and played a key role in the team’s championship run. The veteran big man averaged 11.4 PPG and 7.1 RPG on .523/.471/.740 shooting in 66 regular season games (20.8 MPG), then contributed 8.8 PPG and 5.0 RPG in 20 postseason contests (18.3 MPG).
Declining his second-year option doesn’t preclude a return to the Bucks for Portis, who emerged as a fan favorite in Milwaukee. However, the club’s ability to offer him a raise will be limited.
The Bucks only hold Portis’ Non-Bird rights, which would allow them to offer a starting salary worth up to about $4.2MM. If they want to dip into their taxpayer mid-level exception, the Bucks could go up to about $5.9MM in year one. Portis will likely receive more lucrative offers on the open market.
Still, the former first-round pick accepted a discount to sign with Milwaukee once and could be open to doing so again if he wants to try to earn a second consecutive title with Giannis Antetokounmpo and company. The Bucks and Portis reportedly have mutual interest in a new deal.
Resign Bobby!
Bobby, Bobby, Bobby!
Can Bobby sign MLE this year, then sign 3 years $50 million contract with Bucks next year?
IMO
Bucks should trade DiVincinzo for a future first due to tax
No way don’t trade divincenzo
I just struggle to understand the logic of fans who think that trading our 4th most important player for TAX purposes is the way to go.
You just have 65,000 people OUTSIDE of the Bradley Center(I said what I said) while winning a Chip because you played GREAT perimeter defense.
So…you have a guy coming back who was our 4th most important player…and we should trade him as he’s improving?
DD is a American version of Manu. He’s not quite the playmaker(ok, not close to the playmaker)…but he’s a great shooter, he’s as good as anyone in the league at getting loose balls, a great rebounding guard, explosive…and he’s got a nice, smooth stroke and I think with the way Giannis is improving and identifying the help defense earlier, he’s going to just get better as he benefits from open looks.
I’m calling it now. DD will put up a 80/50/40 line next year…while putting up a line of 15/7/5 as he sees more minutes.
I’d love to keep Portis…but I don’t know how that works…unless he’s willing to leave ~40 million on the table over the next two years when he’s 26 and 27.
Unless we can pull a Lacob and throw them some money under the table by way of investment opportunities like KD got in GS? Not that I actually believe that, but that’s the accusation.
What wissportdude1102 said.
Also they just won the title. They’re the team most in contention next year by default. Who cares about the tax besides you Silly and HardenWestbrookMVPs?
Nothing to do with the luxury tax. It’s about not having cap space.
Trading DiVicenzo doesn’t get them under the tax line let alone the salary cap.
That makes even less sense.
The Salary cap is 112.
Giannis, Middleton and Jrue make 107.
So they’re over the cap JUST by having those three…and then filling out the rest of the roster.
We have MULTIPLE billionaire owners. We supported this team…now they need to(and to be clear, they have and I have no reason as of now to believe they won’t continue to).
A-No…the Bucks should NOT trade DiVincenzo. I have a hard time believing anyone who watched this team play this year would think we should get RID of one of the best perimeter defenders in the league…when we’ve still got a team that could potentially have Harden and Kyrie next year(and obviously KD).
2nd-No, you cannot re-sign Bobby to a 1 year deal and then pay him 3/50. Not how Bird rights work.
They’d need him for TWO more years before he could re-sign.
He did resign by opting out (did you mean re-sign?). They won’t be able to pay him as much as teams with cap space, unlikely he returns to Milwaukee.
The point of this comment was to point out a grammatical error in another comment on the internet, then regurgitated information from the piece above. Be better.
Resign?— he has 5-10 years left.
link to shop.bucks.com
Smart man the dude had a decent playoffs why play for so little when he can make so much more
Not a fan of Bobby Portis but he lined himself up pretty well for a decent payday. It’ll be interesting to see if Bobby Bug Eyes chooses contention over compensation. It’s one or the other.
Yes
How is this man just 26? Looks like 46. Feels like he’s been in the league a dozen years.
He has been in half a dozen so you are half right.