Chris Silva Signs Third 10-Day Deal With Heat

JANUARY 21: Silva has officially signed a third 10-day hardship contract with the Heat, the team announced today in a press release.

JANUARY 20: Chris Silva‘s second 10-day hardship contract with the Heat expired overnight, but the expectation is that he’ll sign a third 10-day deal, according to reports from Ira Winderman of The South Florida Sun Sentinel and Anthony Chiang of The Miami Herald (Twitter links).

Silva, 25, appeared in seven games with the Heat during his first 20 days with the team, averaging 3.4 PPG and 3.7 RPG in 9.0 minutes per contest. The 6’8″ forward was on a 10-day deal with Minnesota earlier in the season.

Since guard Tyler Herro entered the NBA’s health and safety protocols on Wednesday, Miami remains eligible for a hardship exception. The league permits teams to add one replacement player for each player in the protocols, with the replacement’s 10-day hardship contract not counting against team salary for cap or tax purposes.

The Heat don’t play today, so they’ll likely re-sign Silva on Friday prior to their game in Atlanta. Based on the reporting from Winderman and Chiang, it sounds like the only way the two sides won’t complete another deal is if Herro tests out of the protocols quickly, making the team ineligible for a hardship addition.

Miami does technically have an open spot on its 15-man roster and could re-sign Silva to a standard 10-day contract, but such a deal would count against the team’s cap and tax. The Heat don’t have much breathing room below the luxury tax line, so they’ve kept their 15th roster spot open for the entire season to date. They’ll likely continue to do so until they can safely promote two-way player Caleb Martin to the 15-man roster without going into tax territory.