- Former Hornets lottery pick Frank Kaminsky is entering a vital season for his financial future, writes Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer in a mailbag column. Kaminsky will be a restricted free agent next summer if he can’t work out an extension with Charlotte before the start of the upcoming season. The Hornets gave deals to Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and Cody Zeller before they could test the free agent waters, but Bonnell isn’t convinced that Kaminsky has the same value.
- If the Hornets are looking to unload players at next year’s trade deadline, Jeremy Lamb will be a prime candidate to go, Bonnell writes in the same piece. Lamb has an expiring contract and Charlotte has a lot of wing players on its roster.
JULY 27: The Hornets have officially signed Chealey, the team announced today in a press release.
JULY 26: The Hornets have agreed to a deal with undrafted guard Joe Chealey, Michael Scotto of The Athletic tweets.
The terms of Chealey’s deal weren’t specified, but it figures to be a training camp contract with little to no guaranteed money. The Hornets have an open spot on their 15-man roster but both of their two-way contract slots are filled. Center Mangok Mathiang, and shooting guard J.P. Macura hold the two-way slots.
Chealey played for the Hornets’ Summer League team.
The 6’4” Chealey, 22, played all four college seasons at the College of Charleston. He averaged 18.0 PPG, 4.6 RPG and 3.6 APG as a senior and led them to the NCAA Tournament. He scored 32 points in an overtime win in the Colonial Athletic Association championship against Northeastern but was held to two points by Auburn in the NCAAs.
The Hornets have signed undrafted rookies Jaylen Barford and Zach Smith to their training camp roster, the team announced today in a press release. The club also confirmed the previously-reported signing of another undrafted free agent, Isaiah Wilkins.
Barford, a 6’3″ guard out of Arkansas, was the No. 95 prospect on Jonathan Givony’s 2018 big board at ESPN.com. In his final college season, Barford averaged 17.9 PPG, 3.9 RPG, and 2.5 APG with a .470/.431/.721 shooting line for the Razorbacks, earning First Team All-SEC honors.
A 6’8″ forward, Smith played his college ball at Texas Tech, averaging 12.1 PPG and 7.2 RPG in his junior year before being slowed by injuries in his senior season. He played in the Las Vegas Summer League for the Hawks, averaging 5.5 PPG and 4.3 RPG in four games.
Wilkins, meanwhile, had modest averages of 6.0 PPG, 6.2 RPG, and 1.6 APG during his senior year at Virginia. However, the 6’8″ forward filled up the stat sheet with 1.4 BPG and 1.2 SPG, and was named the ACC Defensive Player of the Year. Wilkins is the stepson of NBA legend Dominique Wilkins.
While terms of the three deals aren’t known, I’d anticipate minimum salary contracts with little to no guaranteed money. It’s possible that the contracts include an Exhibit 10 clause, in which case Barford, Smith, and Wilkins would be candidates to eventually end up with the Greensboro Swarm, the Hornets’ G League affiliate.
- Hornets rookie Devonte’ Graham apparently won’t need surgery on his injured right knee, according to Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer. A cartilage issue was discovered in the knee earlier this month, but specialists believe it will heal on its own. A team spokesman said Graham will resume basketball activity on a “conservative schedule.” He is expected to be ready for the start of training camp in September.
As we detailed at length back in March, the NBA’s new Collective Bargaining Agreement made some changes to the trade rules related to non-guaranteed contracts.
Under the NBA’s old CBA, which was in effect through the 2016/17 season, a player’s full salary (not including unlikely incentives) was used for trade purposes, whether or not it was guaranteed. If a player had a $10MM salary with a partial guarantee of $1MM, his outgoing salary in a trade was the same as it would have been for a player who had a fully guaranteed $10MM contract.
[RELATED: Hoops Rumors Glossary: Traded Player Exception]
That’s no longer the case under the league’s new CBA, however. While contracts signed under the old agreement still operate by the old rules, contracts signed after July 1, 2017 are subject to the rules of the current CBA. And under the current CBA, only the guaranteed portion of a player’s contract counts for outgoing salary purposes in a trade, limiting the appeal of non-guaranteed salaries as trade chips.
In the example above, the player with a $10MM salary and a $1MM guarantee would now only count for $1MM for outgoing salary purposes in a trade, but the team acquiring him would still have to consider him a $10MM player.
These new rules have perhaps put a damper on the trade market for players on non-guaranteed contracts this offseason, but there have still been a handful of moves involving those players. Here’s a breakdown of this month’s trades that have featured a non-guaranteed salary, and how the new rules impacted each deal:
Bulls acquire Julyan Stone ($1,656,092 non-guaranteed salary) from Hornets in three-team trade
The Hornets also sent Timofey Mozgov to the Magic for Bismack Biyombo in this deal, and Mozgov’s salary was large enough to match Biyombo’s. As such, it didn’t matter from Charlotte’s perspective that Stone counted as $0 for outgoing salary purposes.
Stone’s inclusion in the trade allowed Chicago to acquire an incoming piece without taking on any guaranteed salary. If Stone hadn’t been a part of the deal, the Bulls would have to receive a draft pick or the NBA rights to a draft-and-stash player just to ensure that they were getting something in the deal. Chicago waived Stone shortly after acquiring him.
Thunder acquire Rodney Purvis ($1,378,242 non-guaranteed salary) from Magic
Purvis was swapped for Dakari Johnson in this deal and both players were on two-year minimum salary contracts. That meant that each team could acquire its incoming player using the minimum salary exception without having to worry about matching salaries.
Under the old rules, each club would have created a $1,378,242 traded player exception in the deal — that’s the amount of Purvis’ 2018/19 salary as well as Johnson’s. Under the new rules, however, only the Thunder could create such an exception, since Johnson’s salary was guaranteed. Purvis counted as $0 for Orlando’s outgoing salary purposes, so the Magic were unable to create a TPE as a result of the swap.
Thunder acquire Abdel Nader ($450,000 of $1,378,242 salary guaranteed) from the Celtics in exchange for Rodney Purvis ($1,378,242 non-guaranteed salary)
This is the most interesting deal of the three. Although Nader is technically earning the minimum salary, his deal runs longer than two years, meaning the Thunder couldn’t use the minimum salary exception to acquire him. They also couldn’t match salaries using Purvis, since he counted as a $0 outgoing salary.
So how did the Thunder acquire Nader? Using that traded player exception they’d just created in their deal with the Magic. Because Johnson and Nader had equal $1,378,242 salaries, Oklahoma City used up the entire trade exception just three days after it was created, making it the rare TPE to be used in full.
Meanwhile, the Celtics acquired Purvis using the minimum salary exception, but were only able to create a $450K trade exception for Nader — that’s the amount of his partial guarantee, so that was his outgoing-salary amount from Boston’s perspective.
Note: Richaun Holmes and Isaiah Whitehead, both on non-guaranteed contracts, were also involved in trades this month, but they were signed under the old CBA. As such, their contracts operated under the old rules.
While Dwight Howard joked in his introductory press conference with the Wizards about being “stung” by the Hornets, he admits to Michael Lee of Yahoo Sports that there was some truth behind that remark, since he was confused by Charlotte’s decision to trade him earlier this offseason.
“I didn’t see any signs,” Howard said. “I wouldn’t think after having a really good season a team would be like, ‘OK, let’s trade you.’ That really caught me off-guard. That’s why I said in the press conference, the Hornets stung me.
“I asked [Hornets GM] Mitch [Kupchak] and I asked the coach: ‘What did I do? Was it something in the locker room that I did?'” Howard continued. “And Mitch said, ‘No, it had nothing to do with the locker room. It has nothing to do with you as a person. We just felt like we wanted to go in this direction as a team.’ I asked him, ‘If this is the truth, you need to come out and say this stuff, because people are thinking it’s because I did something in the locker room or acted a certain type of way.’ And I’m like, ‘This is not who I am.'”
As Howard moves from one Southeast team to another, let’s check in on a few other Hornets-related notes…
- Tony Parker‘s two-year deal with the Hornets, which is now official, is non-guaranteed in year two, per ESPN’s Zach Lowe (Twitter link). Sources tell Lowe that the second year – which has a guarantee date of July 4, 2019 – is worth $5.25MM, bringing the overall value of the pact to $10.25MM.
- As Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer relays, Parker said this week that the opportunity to help former Spurs assistant James Borrego succeed in his first head coaching job was part of what drew him to the Hornets this summer. The veteran point guard also hopes to help his friend Nicolas Batum bounce back from a down year. “He’s been a business partner and my little brother,” Parker said. “I hope we can get the best out of him next season.”
- In a mailbag for The Observer, Bonnell explores whether a Kemba Walker/Malik Monk backcourt pairing would work, given their size and their defensive limitations. Bonnell also addresses the Hornets’ starting center job, Miles Bridges‘ potential, and Kupchak’s influence on the team culture in Charlotte.
JULY 23: The Hornets’ deal with Parker is now official, the team confirmed today in a press release.
“We are thrilled to add a player of Tony’s caliber and experience to our roster,” GM Mitch Kupchak said in a statement. “We believe his track record of success and playoff resume will add backcourt depth to our roster and veteran leadership to our group. Parker’s experience with Head Coach James Borrego will be an invaluable asset to us moving forward as well. We are excited to welcome Tony to Charlotte and for him to continue his Hall-of-Fame career with the Hornets.”
JULY 6: After spending 17 seasons in San Antonio, Tony Parker will head to Charlotte for the 2018/19 season. The veteran point guard has reached an agreement to sign with the Hornets, reports Shams Charania of Yahoo Sports (via Twitter).
Parker will sign a two-year, $10MM contract with the Hornets, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski (via Twitter). A tweet from Charlotte forward Nicolas Batum first hinted that Parker – Batum’s teammate on the French national team – would join the franchise.
The Hornets had been on the lookout for a backup point guard after struggling to find consistent production behind Kemba Walker in recent years. Parker, 36, will provide a steady presence at that spot, though he’s no longer the impact player he once was. In 2017/18, the longtime Spur lost his starting job to Dejounte Murray and averaged a career-low 7.7 PPG and 3.5 APG in 55 games (21 starts).
As Jabari Young of The San Antonio Express-News tweets, there were about five or six teams interested in Parker, but he chose the Hornets because the team sold him on more playing time and a significant role.
Parker’s departure is the latest development in what has been an unusually dramatic year in San Antonio. The Spurs will now be without a point guard who first joined the franchise back in 2001 and has appeared in more than 1,400 total regular season and postseason games with the team.
According to Wojnarowski (via Twitter), Parker called Spurs head coach Gregg Popovich within the last hour to inform him of his plan to head to Charlotte. Although the Spurs wanted Parker back, the veteran will reunite with former San Antonio assistant James Borrego, who was hired as the Hornets’ head coach this spring.
This is the second time in recent years that a club headed by a former Spurs assistant has made a play for a longtime Spur. The Sixers and Brett Brown were unable to lure Manu Ginobili to Philadelphia in 2016, but Borrego and the Hornets were able to secure Parker’s services this time around.
Parker’s deal figures to be completed using a portion of the Hornets’ mid-level exception, since the team is over the cap. The trade that sent Dwight Howard to Brooklyn helped Charlotte create the flexibility to complete a signing like this one without going into tax territory.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
- Lithuanian forward Arnoldas Kulboka is back with German club Brose Bamberg after being loaned to Orlandina in Italy last season, according to an announcement from the team (hat tip to Sportando). Kulboka was selected by the Hornets with the 55th overall pick in the 2018 draft, so Charlotte will retain his NBA rights and could have the opportunity to bring him stateside in a future season.
Two European teams are hoping to sign former Cavaliers two-way player London Perrantes, according to Nicola Lupo of Sportando. The French club Limoges has expressed interest in Perrantes, who received a two-year offer on Friday from Olimpia Milano in Italy, which plans to loan him to VL Pesaro during his first season.
Cleveland waived the 23-year-old point guard last month after one season with the organization. Perrantes appeared in 14 games for the Cavs and averaged less than five minutes per night. His G League numbers were much better as he posted an 11.9/3.4/7.8 line while starting 35 games for the Canton Charge.
A four-year player at Virginia, Perrantes got the opportunity in Cleveland just before the start of last season. Prior to that, he had been signed and waived by the Spurs.
There’s more overseas news to pass along:
- Former Laker Tyler Ennis‘ decision to sign with Fenerbahce is examined by Kostas Giataganas of Eurohoops. Ennis will join ex-Spur Joffrey Lauvergne on the Turkish club and will follow his brother Dylan, who played in Europe last season. Ennis was waived by the Lakers in June before his $1.7MM contract for next season became guaranteed. He appeared in 54 games for L.A. last year, averaging 4.1 points per night.
- Hassan Martin, who had an impressive performance with the Celtics‘ summer league team, is headed to Germany, Lupo relays in a separate piece. The former Rhode Island forward averaged 10 points and six rebounds per game in Las Vegas. He played in Japan last year.
- Former Hornets G Leaguer Terry Henderson has signed with Scaligera Verona in Italy, also according to Lupo. The one-time North Carolina State guard averaged 11.3 points in 42 games with the Greensboro Swarm last season.
The Hornets have agreed to a training camp deal with Isaiah Wilkins, the stepson of NBA legend Dominique Wilkins, reports Michael Scotto of The Athletic.
Wilkins averaged 6.0 points, 6.2 rebounds, 1.6 assists, 1.4 blocks and 1.2 steals as a senior last season at Virginia before being named the ACC Defensive Player of the Year. He managed to shoot 48.5% from the field but only a disappointing 17.6% from three.
While it’s unlikely that Wilkins ends up on the Hornets’ 15-man regular season roster, he’s probably a good bet to end up playing for the team’s G League affiliate, the Greensboro Swarm.