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Rockets Notes: House, D’Antoni, Blossomgame, Shabazz

October 27th, 2019 at 10:23am CST by Arthur Hill

Danuel House credits Rockets assistant coach John Lucas for helping him to stay focused when it appeared his NBA dream may not work out, writes Sean Deveney for Forbes. House reached out to Lucas after being waived by the Wizards in March of 2017. A broken wrist had sidelined him for more than two months and he had gotten into just one game – less than a minute of playing time – with his first NBA team.

“Shut your mouth,” said Lucas, who first met House at age 13 at a Houston basketball camp. “Shut your mouth and get ready for your next opportunity.”

That came the following year with the Suns, but House found a more permanent home last season with the Rockets. He spent most of the year as a two-way player, but started 13 NBA games and eventually earned a three-year contract.

“I also told him he would be an NBA player,” Lucas recalled. “You could see he was good enough for that. I just never imagined we’d be together with the same team.”

There’s more from Houston:

  • Mike D’Antoni was among the first coaches to successfully challenge a call, but he doesn’t believe teams should keep their right to challenge if they’re correct, relays Jonathan Feigen of The Houston Chronicle. Under the newly adopted rule, coaches get to use the challenge once per game, whether they’re right or wrong. “Then you could have 20 or 30 challenges a game,” D’Antoni said. “I could see why they don’t do it.”
  • The Rockets’ G League affiliate has traded for Jaron Blossomgame, who was with Houston during the preseason. Blossomgame’s returning player rights were held by the Canton Charge, who agreed to give him up in exchange for Gary Payton II. Blossomgame impressed Rockets coaches during camp, and he was considered as a candidate for one of the team’s two-way slots.
  • The Rockets weren’t able to hold onto Ronshad Shabazz after signing and waiving him last weekend. Shabazz was selected by College Park, the Hawks‘ affiliate, with the 13th pick in Saturday’s G League draft.
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Hawks Claim Tyrone Wallace Off Waivers

October 23rd, 2019 at 4:08pm CST by Arthur Hill

The Hawks submitted a successful waiver claim for former Timberwolves point guard Tyrone Wallace, tweets ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski. Wallace was Minnesota’s final cut on Monday as the Wolves trimmed their roster to the league limit.

Atlanta will inherit his $1.6MM non-guaranteed contract, which comes with a daily cap hit of $8,973, according to Bobby Marks of ESPN (Twitter link). The Hawks are now up to 15 players and will have $3.7MM in remaining cap room as long as Wallace stays on their roster. His contract will become fully guaranteed on January 7, which is the league-wide guarantee date.

Wallace, 25, spent the past two seasons with the Clippers, averaging a 5.5 PPG in 92 combined games. He had a promising rookie season, but fell out of the rotation last year and saw his playing time cut to 10.1 minutes per night. The Wolves claimed him in July after he was waived by L.A.

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NBA Teams With Open Roster Spots To Start Season

October 23rd, 2019 at 9:00am CST by Luke Adams

As of Monday’s roster cutdown deadline, no NBA team is carrying more than 17 players in total — 15 on standard contracts and two on two-way deals. However, not every team is making use of all 17 roster spots available to them.

Currently, a third of the league’s 30 teams have at least one open roster spot, either on their regular roster or in their two-way slots.

For most clubs, that decision is financially motivated — teams like the Magic and Nuggets are getting dangerously close to the tax line and prefer to avoid moving even closer by paying an extra player or two. The Thunder and Trail Blazers are already over the tax and won’t want to push their projected bills higher.

For teams like the Heat and Warriors, the decision not to carry a 15th man is dictated by the hard cap — neither club currently has sufficient room under the hard cap for more than 14 players.

Teams’ reasoning for retaining an open two-way spot is less clear. Those players earn very modest salaries and don’t count against the cap, so finances shouldn’t be a factor. Perhaps the teams with two-way openings are still considering their options before G League training camps begin next week, recognizing that any two-way player they sign now is unlikely to actually play for the NBA team this week.

Listed below, with the help of our roster counts breakdown, are the teams that aren’t carrying full rosters.

Teams with an open 15-man roster spot:

  • Atlanta Hawks
  • Cleveland Cavaliers
  • Denver Nuggets
  • Golden State Warriors
  • Miami Heat
  • Oklahoma City Thunder
  • Orlando Magic
    • Note: The Magic have two open roster spots, giving them two weeks to get to the required minimum of 14 players.
  • Portland Trail Blazers

Teams with an open two-way slot:

  • Brooklyn Nets
  • Phoenix Suns
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Hawks Waive Gabriel, Ogden Jr.

October 19th, 2019 at 2:37pm CST by Dana Gauruder

The Hawks waived forwards Kenny Gabriel and Mark Ogden Jr., according to a team press release.

Atlanta signed Gabriel on Friday and inked Ogden Jr. earlier on Saturday with the intent of making them affiliate players for the College Park Skyhawks, their G League squad.

Gabriel, 30, has spent his professional career playing in a handful of international leagues since going undrafted out of Auburn back in 2012. Most recently, he played for Turkish club Turk Telecom in 2018/19, averaging 9.2 PPG and 5.6 RPG in 43 games.

The 6’9” Ogden has spent the past three seasons overseas with the Georgian team Olimpi (2017-19) and in Luxembourg with Racing Lux (2016-17). Ogden went undrafted after playing his last two college seasons at Dixie State.

Both will be eligible for a bonus worth up to $50K if they spend at least 60 days with the Skyhawks.

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Hawks Sign Mark Ogden Jr.

October 19th, 2019 at 12:05pm CST by marksuleymanov

The Hawks have signed forward Mark Ogden Jr., the team announced in a press release on Saturday.

Ogden has spent the past three seasons overseas, spending time with the Georgian team Olimpa (2017-19) and in Luxembourg with Racing Lux (2016-17). the Spring Valley native spent two years at Grossmont College before he transferred to Dixie State for two seasons. Ogden’s time at Dixie State included Pac West Defensive Player of the Year honors.

Atlanta’s signing of Ogden is geared toward getting his G League rights rather than adding him to the regular-season roster. Ogden will likely suit up for the College Park Skyhawks.

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Hawks Exercise 2020/21 Options On Collins, Young, Huerter

October 19th, 2019 at 11:02am CST by Luke Adams

The Hawks have picked up their fourth-year option on John Collins and their third-year options on Trae Young and Kevin Huerter, officially announcing the moves today in a press release. All three players are now locked up for the 2020/21 season.

[RELATED: Decisions On 2020/21 Rookie Scale Team Options]

Collins, 22, enjoyed a breakout season in 2018/19, averaging 19.5 PPG and 9.8 RPG in 61 games (30.0 MPG) for the Hawks. The former 19th overall pick will have a cap hit of $4,137,302 in 2020/21 and will be a restricted free agent in the summer of 2021 if he doesn’t sign a rookie scale extension during the 2020 offseason.

Young, the runner-up to Luka Doncic in last season’s Rookie of the Year race, had a big second half and finished with averages of 19.1 PPG and 8.1 APG in 81 games (30.9 MPG). He’ll have a $6,571,800 cap charge in ’20/21. The Hawks will have to decide on his $8.33MM option for 2021/22 by October 31 of next year, though it’s a safe bet that option will be exercised.

Huerter, a member of the 2018 draft class like Young, averaged 9.7 PPG with a .385 3PT% as a rookie. The 21-year-old has a relatively modest $2,761,920 cap figure for ’20/21.

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Northwest Notes: Bazemore, Wolves, Nuggets, Ingles

October 18th, 2019 at 3:00pm CST by Luke Adams

After being traded from the Hawks to the Trail Blazers in the offseason, Kent Bazemore has become rejuvenated, writes Jason Quick of The Athletic. As Quick writes, the veteran wing had become frustrated playing in Atlanta last season as the team – which won 60 games during his first year as a Hawk – fully embraced its youth movement.

“The game is changing with the young guys coming in and getting an opportunity right away,” Bazemore said. “It wasn’t like that when I first came in. I’m old school in that respect. All you have to do is be respectful, work your way up. But the league is changing in that respect, and that frustrated me.”

According to Quick, before Bazemore was traded, he provided the Hawks with a list of preferred destinations. The Blazers were number one on that list. Now, his new teammates can see that Bazemore is enjoying the opportunity to get a fresh start in Portland.

“The environment here will light him up,” Rodney Hood said. “And you can already tell with him, coming from Atlanta and not playing competitive basketball, that he wants to taste it again, that he’s hungry, prepared and ready. He was telling me last year he was so frustrated that he got a lot of technicals. But we can all see he’s excited about the season.”

Here’s more from around the Northwest:

  • Before Kyle Lowry signed an extension with Toronto, the Timberwolves looked into his availability, tweets Darren Wolfson of SKOR North. There has been no indication that the Raptors were considering moving their All-Star point guard, so it may have been as simple as an inquiry that went nowhere. Still, as Wolfson points out, it shows that new president of basketball operations Gersson Rosas will kick the tires on every potentially available impact player — even those that don’t necessarily fit Minnesota’s timeline.
  • The battle for the Nuggets‘ starting small forward job appears to be down to Will Barton and Torrey Craig, writes Nick Kosmider of The Athletic. Barton, who was more effective in Denver’s final preseason game on Thursday, has said he’d “prefer to start,” as Mike Singer of The Denver Post relays.
  • Joe Ingles may have emerged this preseason as the de facto backup point guard for the Jazz, says Tony Jones of The Athletic. Dante Exum is still making his way back from knee surgery and Emmanuel Mudiay hasn’t shown the ability to consistently run an NBA offense, so Ingles figures to take on some ball-handling responsibilities for the second unit, Jones explains.
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Hawks Sign Kenny Gabriel

October 18th, 2019 at 1:47pm CST by Luke Adams

After waiving four players earlier today, the Hawks have filled one of the newly-opened spots on their roster by signing free agent forward Kenny Gabriel, the team announced in a press release.

Gabriel, 30, has spent his professional career playing in a handful of international leagues since going undrafted out of Auburn back in 2012. Most recently, he played for Turkish club Turk Telecom in 2018/19, averaging 9.2 PPG and 5.6 RPG with a .430/.339/.784 shooting line in 43 games.

While they do have a spot open on their 15-man regular season roster, the Hawks presumably view Gabriel as a potential affiliate player for the College Park Skyhawks, their G League squad.

Assuming Gabriel received an Exhibit 10 contract from Atlanta, he’ll be eligible for a bonus worth up to $50K if he signs a G League contract and spends at least 60 days with the Skyhawks.

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Hawks Waive Four Players

October 18th, 2019 at 9:15am CST by Luke Adams

The Hawks have waived all four of their players on non-guaranteed contracts, the team announced today in a press release. Armoni Brooks, Marcus Derrickson, Tahjere McCall, and Jordan Sibert have been cut by Atlanta.

[RELATED: 2019/20 Non-Guaranteed Contracts By Team]

Brooks and Derrickson signed Exhibit 10 contracts with Atlanta back in August and are now likely to become affiliate players for the College Park Skyhawks, the Hawks’ newly-relocated G League team.

McCall signed with the Hawks in September, while Sibert joined the team earlier this month — they’re also on track to join the Skyhawks, as returning-rights players.

After today’s roster moves, the Hawks are carrying 14 players with guaranteed salaries and two on two-way contracts. The roster is regular-season-ready, though Atlanta still could make additional moves within the next couple days to line up more affiliate players for the Skyhawks.

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2019/20 Over/Unders: Southeast Division

October 16th, 2019 at 10:28am CST by Luke Adams

The 2019/20 NBA regular season will get underway in just six days, which means it’s time to get serious about predictions for the upcoming campaign.

With the help of the lines from a handful of sports betting sites, including Bovada and BetOnline, we’re running through the predicted win totals for each of the NBA’s 30 teams, by division. In a series of team-by-team polls, you’ll get the chance to weigh in on whether you think those forecasts are too optimistic or too pessimistic.

Having already looked at the Atlantic, Northwest, Central, and Pacific, we’re moving onto the Southeast today…

Miami Heat

Trade Rumors app users, click here for Heat poll.

Orlando Magic

Trade Rumors app users, click here for Magic poll.

Atlanta Hawks

Trade Rumors app users, click here for Hawks poll.

Washington Wizards

Trade Rumors app users, click here for Wizards poll.

Charlotte Hornets

Trade Rumors app users, click here for Hornets poll.

Previous voting results:

Atlantic:

  • Philadelphia 76ers (54.5 wins): Over (54.9%)
  • Boston Celtics (49.5 wins): Under (57.0%)
  • Toronto Raptors (46.5 wins): Under (59.1%)
  • Brooklyn Nets (43.5 wins): Over (58.3%)
  • New York Knicks (27.5 wins): Under (54.9%)

Northwest:

  • Denver Nuggets (53.5 wins): Over (51.8%)
  • Utah Jazz (53.5 wins): Under (50.8%)
  • Portland Trail Blazers (46.5 wins): Over (78.7%)
  • Minnesota Timberwolves (35.5 wins): Under (57.5%)
  • Oklahoma City Thunder (32.5 wins): Under (55.1%)

Central:

  • Milwaukee Bucks (57.5 wins): Over (63.5%)
  • Indiana Pacers (46.5 wins): Over (56.6%)
  • Detroit Pistons (37.5 wins): Over (69.8%)
  • Chicago Bulls (33.5 wins): Under (56.2%)
  • Cleveland Cavaliers (24.5 wins): Under (70.0%)

Pacific:

  • Los Angeles Clippers (54.5 wins): Over (53.9%)
  • Los Angeles Lakers (51.5 wins): Over (50.3%)
  • Golden State Warriors (48.5 wins): Over (54.3%)
  • Sacramento Kings (38.5 wins): Over (66.2%)
  • Phoenix Suns (29.5 wins): Under (61.8%)
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