- The Mavericks are going to great lengths to try to keep Kristaps Porzingis healthy and productive and Tim Cato of The Athletic details what the franchise is doing to make that happen. Porzingis hasn’t played more than 66 games over the last four seasons; he’s appeared in 18 of the Mavericks’ 32 games this season.
- The Mavericks were interested in Nikola Vucevic when the Magic center hit the free agent market in 2019 but he was out of their price range, Brad Townsend of the Dallas Morning News tweets. Vucevic re-signed with Orlando that summer for four years and $100MM.
The Designated Veteran Extension, as we explain our glossary entry on the subject, is a relatively new addition to the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement. It allows players with 7-9 years of experience, who would normally qualify for a maximum starting salary of 30% of the cap, to qualify for a “super-max” contract that starts at 35% of the cap, a level normally reserved players with 10+ years of experience.
A player who has seven or eight years of NBA service with one or two years left on his contract becomes eligible for a Designated Veteran Extension if he meets the required performance criteria and hasn’t been traded since his first four years in the league. A Designated Veteran contract can also be signed by a player who is technically a free agent if he has eight or nine years of service and meets the required criteria.
The performance criteria is as follows (only one of the following must be true):
- The player was named to an All-NBA team and/or was named the NBA Defensive Player of the Year in the most recent season, or in two of the last three seasons.
- The player was named the NBA MVP in any of the three most recent seasons.
Technically, players like Gary Harris and Evan Fournier meet the criteria related to years of service with one team and could theoretically become eligible to sign a super-max extension this year, but they’re obviously not viable candidates to make an All-NBA team in 2021.
There are, however, a few players who are more realistic candidates to qualify for a super-max veteran contract based on their All-NBA candidacy. Let’s dive in and examine a few of those cases…
Joel Embiid (Sixers)
When Embiid first signed his five-year, maximum-salary contract with the Sixers back in 2017, he had appeared in just 31 games over the course of his first three NBA seasons, making the investment a risky one. The deal included some injury protection for Philadelphia, giving the team the ability to waive Embiid without fully guaranteeing the salaries in later years of the deal if one of the injuries he experienced early in his career became a recurring issue.
The idea of the Sixers waiving Embiid seems absurd now. While the former third overall pick hasn’t exactly been an iron man since the start of the 2017/18 season, there are no longer any concerns about his career being derailed by health issues before it could really get off the ground.
Embiid will have seven years of NBA service under his belt at the end of the 2020/21 campaign and if he earns a spot on an All-NBA team, he’d have done so twice in the last three years, having made the Second Team in 2019.
For now, he looks like an awfully safe All-NBA bet — his 30.0 PPG, 11.3 RPG, .519/.415/.858 shooting line, and solid defense have made him a legit MVP candidate. Health is always the wild card for Embiid, but as long as he stays on the court for most of the second half, an All-NBA spot should be a lock. That would make the big man eligible to sign a super-max extension with the Sixers this offseason.
Embiid remains under contract through 2023, with a $31.6MM salary in ’21/22 and a $33.6MM figure for ’22/23. A super-max extension would tack on four years to those two seasons and would start at 35% of the ’23/24 cap.
It’s too early to know exactly where the cap will end up in 2023/24, but if we use a conservative estimate and assume it will rise by 3% annually in each of the next three summers, that would result in a four-year total of up to $187MM on a new Embiid deal that runs through 2027. It will be fascinating to see how eager the 76ers would be to put that extension – which would cover Embiid’s age-29 to age-32 seasons – on the table.
Nikola Jokic (Nuggets)
Like Embiid, Jokic has played like an MVP candidate and is a lock for an All-NBA spot, barring an injury or another unexpected development. Jokic, who was the All-NBA Second Team center in 2020, is making a case for a First Team spot this season, averaging 26.7 PPG, 10.9 RPG, and 8.5 APG on .564/.421/.879 shooting through 33 games for the Nuggets.
Unlike Embiid, however, Jokic will only have six years of NBA experience at the end of the 2020/21 season. That means that even though he can technically gain super-max eligibility by earning an All-NBA nod for the second straight season, Jokic wouldn’t officially be able to sign a new extension with Denver until 2022, once he has his seven years of service.
This is the same situation Giannis Antetokounmpo found himself in last year — he gained super-max eligibility following the 2018/19 season based on his multiple All-NBA spots and his MVP award, but wasn’t able to actually sign that super-max contract until the 2020 offseason, once he had seven years of service. The Bucks, of course, planned all along to offer him the super-max as soon as they could, and it’s probably safe to assume the Nuggets will do the same for Jokic.
Jokic’s current contract is virtually identical to Embiid’s, with matching $31.6MM and $33.6MM cap hits for the next two seasons after ’20/21. Because Jokic wouldn’t be able to sign a super-max until 2022 though, he could get a five-year extension at that point — if we once again assume annual 3% cap increases, that deal could be worth up to an eye-popping $242MM.
Zach LaVine (Bulls)
While Embiid and Jokic have clear paths to All-NBA spots in 2021, LaVine is a longer shot to get there. The Bulls guard is having the best year of his career and currently ranks sixth in the NBA with 28.7 points per game, but he’s not a strong defender and Chicago’s place in the standings is unlikely to do him any favors with All-NBA voters.
Stephen Curry, Damian Lillard, Luka Doncic, and James Harden look like the top contenders to fill the guard spots on the first two teams, which means LaVine would be competing with stars like Bradley Beal, Kyrie Irving, Devin Booker, Donovan Mitchell, Ben Simmons, and Jaylen Brown, among others, for a Third Team spot.
LaVine’s current deal pays him well below the max, at just $19.5MM annually, so earning an All-NBA spot would make him eligible for a massive raise. If we once again count on annual 3% salary cap increases, a super-max extension for LaVine would could be worth up to $235MM over five years, starting in 2022/23.
Even if he beats the odds and earns an All-NBA spot, LaVine seems unlikely to receive that sort of offer from the Bulls, who traded Jimmy Butler to Minnesota when his super-max eligibility loomed a few years ago. But the super-max wrinkle would further complicate LaVine’s contract situation, which should be very interesting to monitor even if he falls short of an All-NBA team.
Because he’s earning just $19.5MM next season, LaVine would typically only be eligible for a four-year, $104.8MM veteran extension — the Bulls would almost certainly put that offer on the table, but LaVine would probably pass, since he’d be eligible for a far higher salary as a free agent in 2022.
It’s worth considering, however, that Chicago projects to have a significant chunk of cap room available during the 2021 offseason, giving the team the option of renegotiating the final year of LaVine’s contract to give him a raise and a more lucrative extension. That may be the most likely outcome for the first-time All-Star, who is a super-max long shot but is still likely to command more than the $26MM annual salary the Bulls can offer without a renegotiation.
Luka Doncic (Mavericks)
To be clear, Doncic will not be eligible for a starting salary worth 35% of the salary cap on his next contract. But the Mavericks star is being mentioned here because he’ll likely become eligible for a lesser form of the “super-max” contract.
When a former first-round pick is entering the fourth and final year of his rookie contract, he’s eligible to sign a rookie scale extension that starts at 25% of the cap. But if that player has met the super-max performance criteria listed at the top of this story (based on MVP, DPOY, or All-NBA honors), his rookie scale extension can instead start at 30% of the cap.
Most of the time, a player who signs a rookie scale extension that can start at 30% of the cap does so conditionally — for instance, Jayson Tatum was on the 2019/20 All-NBA Third Team, then signed a rookie scale extension prior to the ’20/21 season. Because his extension will go into effect next season, Tatum still has to earn an All-NBA spot again this season to meet the super-max criteria (an All-NBA spot in the most recent season, or in two of the past three seasons) and to qualify for that 30% starting salary.
Doncic, on the other hand, has a chance to pull off a rare feat. Because he was named to the All-NBA First Team in just his second season, he’ll become eligible for a 30% starting salary if he earns All-NBA honors again this year, in his third season. It wouldn’t matter whether or not he’s an All-NBA player again in 2022, because he would have already met the necessary benchmark — two All-NBA berths in three years.
Assuming Doncic earns an All-NBA spot this season, which looks like a safe bet, he’d be eligible to sign a five-year rookie scale extension worth a projected $201.5MM, which would begin during the 2022/23 season.
Like Tatum, Donovan Mitchell, Bam Adebayo, and De’Aaron Fox all signed rookie scale extensions in 2020 that will increase in value if they meet certain performance criteria, so they’re worth keeping an eye on this season too.
Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
- The Mavericks‘ 2018 draft class has never looked better, Callie Caplan of the Dallas Morning News writes. Luka Doncic (pick No. 3) and Jalen Brunson (No. 33) have gradually improved since entering the league almost three years ago. “He’s a great player,” Doncic said of Brunson. “It’s easy to have chemistry like that.”
- Kristaps Porzingis has been cleared to return for the Mavericks tonight, tweets Callie Caplan of The Dallas Morning News. “I don’t see him going into the high 30s or anything like that, but we have not talked about any specific minutes limits,” coach Rick Carlisle said of Porzingis, who missed the past three games with back tightness. “Everything’s very positive at this moment.”
Seth Curry played a key role in the Sixers‘ win over the Mavericks on Thursday, scoring 15 points on 6-of-9 shooting and recording a plus-17 rating in his 29 minutes. Asked after the game if playing against the team that traded him away in the fall provided any extra motivation, Curry responded with a smile.
Curry’s ability to knock down 3-pointers has been crucial this season for the Sixers, who weren’t getting that same floor spacing from Josh Richardson. Curry has made a career-best 46.8% of his attempts from beyond the arc this season, while Richardson has a career-worst .301 3PT% for the Mavericks.
Mavericks big man Kristaps Porzingis (back) hasn’t played since February 14, but sounds likely to return on Saturday vs. Brooklyn after going through a full practice on Friday, writes Brad Townsend of The Dallas Morning News.
Porzingis also addressed the trade rumors that surfaced this week, telling reporters he’s not sure what’s happening “behind the scenes,” and that it’s out of his control. Team owner Mark Cuban and other members of the Mavs organization adamantly denied discussing Porzingis with any other teams.
“I shouldn’t be too worried about it,” Porzingis said. “It can only distract me at the end of the day. I try to focus on being in the moment, being here day to day and putting in the work with my teammates and getting better as a basketball player.”
As Porzingis readies for his return to court, here are a few injury- and protocol-related updates on other players:
- After missing four games due to the NBA’s health and safety protocols, Lakers guard Dennis Schröder has been cleared to return and is back in the starting lineup on Friday night, tweets Jovan Buha of The Athletic.
- Hornets guard Devonte’ Graham is out for a fourth consecutive game tonight due to a sore left knee, according to Rick Bonnell of The Charlotte Observer (Twitter link). Head coach James Borrego acknowledged earlier in the week that Graham may not be able to return prior to the All-Star break.
- The back spasms that have kept Bulls forward Otto Porter Jr. on the shelf for the last 12 games will keep him sidelined through the All-Star break, head coach Billy Donovan said on Friday, per Rob Schaefer of NBC Sports Chicago. The team also isn’t expecting Lauri Markkanen (shoulder) back until sometime after the break.
Veteran guard Austin Rivers was excited to join the Knicks as a free agent back in November, but his first year in New York hasn’t played out as he envisioned so far. After getting a late start to the season due to a groin injury, Rivers has now fallen out of the rotation entirely following the acquisition of Derrick Rose.
Rivers, who said he heard rumors even before the season that the Knicks could eventually trade for Rose, referred to his situation as “tough.” But with the team outperforming preseason expectations, he’s focused on staying positive — even if his own future remains unclear as the trade deadline approaches.
“As long as I’m here, I’m here,” Rivers said, per Marc Berman of The New York Post. “I can’t control if I’m traded today, tomorrow or the next day. What I can control is how I am as a player and what I can bring to this team every day. That’s being ready at all times no matter if my name is called or not and to help the young, young guys be ready to play. I’ll just continue to be ready to play here as long as I’m here, for however long.”
Here’s more on the Knicks:
- The Knicks are “analyzing” whether to attempt to trade for Cavaliers center Andre Drummond, a source tells Marc Berman of The New York Post. Drummond’s $28.75MM salary diminishes his value as a trade chip, but the Knicks still have approximately $15MM in cap room and wouldn’t have to match the big man’s full salary. Berman adds that the Cavs’ asking price is believed to be modest, which makes sense, since the club only gave up a second-round pick and expiring contracts for him a year ago.
- Mike Vorkunov of The Athletic explores how the Knicks’ second-half schedule will affect their chase for a playoff spot, noting that weathering the six games at the start of the second half will be crucial, since they could help determine the team’s approach to the trade deadline. That six-game stretch includes games against Brooklyn, Milwaukee, and Philadelphia (twice).
- In a separate story of The Athletic, Vorkunov and Tim Cato revisit the Kristaps Porzingis trade, which the Knicks and Mavericks made in January 2019. According to Cato, Dallas still feels strongly that it won the deal, especially given the way Tim Hardaway Jr. has played over the last two years. However, Vorkunov suggests it hasn’t been a total disaster for New York, given Porzingis’ ongoing injury issues and his up-and-down play, plus the fact that the Knicks could still make good use of the two first-round picks they’re owed.
The Mavericks have put on a full-court press in downplaying reports from Bleacher Report and SNY.tv suggesting that they’d gauged Kristaps Porzingis‘ potential value on the trade market. Team owner Mark Cuban sent messages to beat reporters on Tuesday denying that the team had discussed Porzingis with anyone and expressing displeasure with at least one of the anonymous quotes in the Bleacher Report story.
Additionally, as Brad Townsend of The Dallas Morning News reports, multiple other key members of the organization disputed the idea that Porzingis might be a trade candidate. Townsend says he was told that the “pat answer” president of basketball operations Donnie Nelson gives to teams asking the Mavs about trades is that Luka Doncic and Porzingis are off the table.
According to Townsend, he was also “emphatically” told that the Mavericks haven’t initiated discussions with any franchise about a Porzingis trade, and that when one team did inquire about the big man, “the answer was a quick no.”
When a team swiftly and emphatically denies a report about a rumored trade discussion, it’s sometimes the case that the report got some details wrong, or was altogether false. However, in this instance, multiple reputable reporters had similar stories, and the Mavs’ insistence that they’d never deign to consider a Porzingis trade feels a little over the top, given his injury history, his contract, and his good-but-not-great production.
While I don’t expect the Mavericks to actually trade Porzingis this season or even in the offseason, it’s not unreasonable to assume the team is doing some damage control here and won’t consider the former lottery pick completely off-limits going forward.
Here’s more from around the Western Conference:
- Although the Mavericks have had on-and-off interest in DeMarcus Cousins for years and could use some rebounding help, Dallas isn’t considered a viable landing spot for the veteran center, who is currently on waivers, tweets Brad Townsend of The Dallas Morning News.
- Warriors guard Mychal Mulder had been viewed as a candidate to be released today, before his full-season salary became guaranteed, but Anthony Slater of The Athletic (Twitter link) hears that Mulder isn’t going anywhere for now. The 26-year-old has another non-guaranteed season on his deal, so Golden State will retain some flexibility with him this offseason if he remains on the roster.
- In spit of the Kings‘ eight-game losing streak and Tyrese Haliburton‘s increased production (17.1 PPG and 5.4 APG on .529/.485/.778 shooting in his last 11 games), head coach Luke Walton has no plans to change the starting lineup and insert the rookie guard, writes James Ham of NBC Sports California.
Having disputed a Bleacher Report story that indicated the Mavericks have gauged the trade market to get a sense of Kristaps Porzingis‘ value, team owner Mark Cuban also took exception to a specific part of Jake Fischer’s report.
Fischer cited one Western Conference executive who described Porzingis as looking like a “scarecrow” on defense and who added, “I’m not sure the guy can guard anybody.” That quote didn’t sit well with Cuban, who expressed his displeasure to Brad Townsend of The Dallas Morning News (Twitter link).
“We are not happy that there is a supposed ‘Western Conference exec’ ripping on one of our players,” Cuban said. “There is no trade discussion. I think they just used it as a way to put out there what they think of KP.”
Here’s more from around the West:
- There’s no exact timeline for the return of the five Spurs players who are sidelined due to the health and safety protocols, head coach Gregg Popovich said on Monday night. “Each one is a little bit different,” Popovich said, per Tom Osborn of The San Antonio Express-News (Twitter link). “It depends on the testing they do. So, I think a few more days, the quarantine period ends, but then there are a couple more days of more tests to see how it has affected them.”
- Lakers assistant Lionel Hollins missed Monday’s game for personal reasons and isn’t traveling to Utah for Wednesday’s game either, tweets Dave McMenamin of ESPN.
- The Jazz have recalled Udoka Azubuike from the G League, according to RealGM’s transactions log. The rookie center recently suffered a severe ankle sprain while playing for the Salt Lake City Stars and isn’t expected to be available anytime soon, so it seems he’ll move to the NBA squad while he continues his recovery.
The Mavericks have “quietly gauged” the potential trade market for Kristaps Porzingis as they continue to evaluate whether he can be the team’s second star behind Luka Doncic, league sources tell Jake Fischer of Bleacher Report.
“They’ve kicked the tires on everybody on their roster that’s not named Luka,” a person with knowledge of the situation told Fischer. “You know (president of basketball operations) Donnie (Nelson); they’re always tinkering.”
Mavs owner Mark Cuban disputed the report, telling Tim Cato of The Athletic that his club has “not discussed (Porzingis) with anyone.” However, Ian Begley of SNY.tv backs up Fischer’s reporting, citing sources who say Dallas reached out to the Warriors to gauge their interest in the big man.
As Fischer explains, Porzingis’ ever-growing injury history and his struggles on defense are possible concerns for the Mavericks. Still, it sounds like if Dallas is discussing Porzingis at all, it’s more about the team doing its due diligence or considering hypothetical scenarios than actually looking to move on from the 25-year-old. Cato says it’s “incredibly unlikely” the former No. 4 overall pick will be traded this season or in the summer.
According to Fischer, the Mavericks are believed to be more interested adding a center who can complement Porzingis in the frontcourt, such as perhaps Andre Drummond. Dallas would like a big man with “physicality, rebounding, (and) toughness,” one source tells Bleacher Report.
While it’s not clear if Hawks big man John Collins will be a pre-deadline trade target for the Mavs, league sources believe the team would make a “significant offer” to him if he reaches restricted free agency in the offseason, per Fischer.
Dallas has also explored the trade market for additional shooting and perimeter defense, according to Fischer, who adds that the Mavs appear to have been one of the more active teams in the early stages of trade conversations around the league.
Porzingis’ injury issues and his defensive shortcomings have prevented him taking a major step toward stardom since arriving in Dallas, and he owns the most expensive contract on the Mavs’ books, with three years and $101MM+ left on his deal after this season. However, that contract isn’t interfering with Dallas’ ability to upgrade the roster, as the club still projects to have a significant chunk of cap room available in the summer of 2021.