The Suns‘ trade of David Roddy for E.J. Liddell is a financially motivated deal, as Roddy wasn’t on track to be on the team’s regular season roster and Liddell likely won’t make the cut either, tweets John Gambadoro of Arizona Sports 98.7.
According to Gambadoro (Twitter link), whether Liddell’s $2.12MM is stretched across three seasons or applied solely to the 2024/25 cap, the expectation is that the forward will be waived at some point after he’s officially acquired by Phoenix. That would open up a spot on the team’s projected 15-man regular season roster.
Having already signed Monte Morris earlier in the offseason, the Suns remain on the lookout for point guard help and have their eye on the top option on the market. Gambadoro (Twitter link) hears there’s a “real chance” that the club could land Tyus Jones, adding that a deal could materialize quickly if the veteran free agent decides he’s willing to accept a minimum-salary contract, which is all Phoenix can offer.
As Gambadoro explains, Jones could get more money from at least a couple other interested teams, but joining the Suns would give him the chance to play a significant rotation role for a club with championship aspirations.
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Jones’ landing spot has been a popular subject of speculation for a couple weeks, as he’s easily the highest-ranked unrestricted free agent on our top-50 list who remains unsigned. The 28-year-old is coming off a season in which he established new career highs in field goal percentage (48.9%), three-point percentage (41.4%), points per game (12.0), and assists per game (7.3) for the Wizards.
Most of the teams with money left to spend and a roster spot available aren’t projected to be contenders, so Jones may have to decide between accepting a more lucrative offer from a likely lottery team or settling for a minimum-salary deal from the Suns or another would-be contender. If he signs for the minimum, I’d expect him to get a second-year player option so that he’d have the ability to try his luck on the open market again in 2025.
Phoenix’s three stars – Kevin Durant, Devin Booker, and Bradley Beal – are all relatively ball-dominant, but none of them are true point guards, so the Suns entered the offseason looking for a veteran capable of organizing the offense. They landed Morris relatively early in free agency, but continued to be linked to other point guards, including Kyle Lowry, who ended up back in Philadelphia. Adding both Jones and Morris on minimum-salary deals would be a big win for the organization if it comes to fruition.
Liddell can actually be stretched across 5 years because he has a team option for 25-26. To go that route would save 1.7M in salary plus 13M in taxes. I imagine the plan would be to leave his roster spot vacant because he only makes 33K more than the minimum.
That is, if they can’t get Tyus.
Don’t believe the team option year would count for stretching purposes.