- Nuggets forward Juan Hernangomez could enjoy a bounce-back season, Christopher Dempsey of the Nuggets’ website opines. Hernangomez appeared in just 25 games last season after seeing action in 62 games the previous campaign, in part due to a bout with mononucleosis, Dempsey notes. Hernangomez could play a bigger role off the bench this season because of his long-range shooting and hustle, Dempsey adds.
Former NBA star Mark Price will join the Nuggets’ coaching staff, according to a post by Adrian Wojnarowski on ESPN Now.
Price has held a variety of coaching positions since his playing career ended in 1998. His last job was as a college coach with Charlotte before being let go in December of last year. He has previous NBA experience with the Nuggets, Hawks, Warriors, Magic and Hornets.
One of the league’s most accomplished shooters during his 12-year playing career, Price served as a shooting instructor with the Hornets, which will also be part of his job in Denver.
Earlier today, the Nuggets added Charles Klask to their coaching staff (Twitter link). Klask has been an NBA assistant since 2011 and most recently worked for Stan Van Gundy in Detroit.
The Timberwolves have hosted a handful of free agents for a workout this week, with Marcus Georges-Hunt, Rashad Vaughn, and John Jenkins among the latest players to earn a look from Minnesota, per Jon Krawczynski of The Athletic (Twitter link). Darren Wolfson of ESPN 1500 (Twitter link) also adds Eric Moreland to the list of players auditioned by the Wolves.
Nick Young, Arron Afflalo and Corey Brewer worked out for the Timberwolves too, but according to Jerry Zgoda of the Star Tribune, a number of agents believe the Wolves simply plan to sign Luol Deng, making them reluctant to send their players for a workout with the team. Minnesota reportedly launched its pursuit of Deng this week.
There’s more from the Northwest Division:
- Following his trade from the Celtics this summer, Thunder forward Abdel Nader is looking forward to his new opportunity with the team, relays Nick Gallo of OKCThunder.com. “It’s great,” Nader said. “I met a lot of the younger guys mostly, and even Russ, PG, Raymond (Felton). Everybody has been great. It’s a great group of guys. High character guys. I’m just really excited to be able to start playing with this team and build chemistry on the court as well as off the court.”
- Dennis Schroder, who was also traded to the Thunder this summer, discussed his upcoming season, the difficulties he faced growing up in Germany and the advice he received from Dirk Nowitzki in a separate piece written by Nick Gallo. Schroder will provide depth off the bench behind All-Star point guard Russell Westbrook this season.
- Nuggets forward Paul Millsap is set to start the season injury-free after wrist surgery forced him to miss 44 games last year, as detailed by Chris Dempsey of Nuggets.com. Millsap will be relied upon to anchor Denver’s defense and stretch the club’s offense.
The Sixers are expanding the list of candidates for their vacant GM job and will interview four more prospects next week, tweets Keith Pompey of The Philadelphia Inquirer. Former Sixers player Elton Brand is joined on the list by fellow team executives Marc Eversley, Ned Cohen and Alex Rucker.
Philadelphia began interviews for the opening this week after receiving permission to talk with Larry Harris of the Warriors, Gersson Rosas of the Rockets and Justin Zanik of the Jazz. The organization has been operating without a GM since Bryan Colangelo departed in June amid charges of releasing sensitive information on Twitter. Nuggets GM Arturas Karnisovas was scheduled to interview as well, but decided to decline the opportunity, Pompey adds (Twitter link).
Brand played for five teams in a 17-year NBA career, finishing up with the Sixers in 2016. He is vice president of basketball operations in Philadelphia and serves as GM for the Delaware Blue Coats, the organization’s G League affiliate. Cohen is the Sixers’ assistant GM, Eversley is senior VP of player personnel and Rucker is senior VP of analytics and strategy. All four were promoted to their current positions after Colangelo left.
- Jamal Murray (Nuggets), Brandon Ingram (Lakers), and Jaylen Brown (Celtics) are among the potential breakout players named by Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders in an article on players who could take a third-year leap.
- Nuggets point guard Jamal Murray has proven he can excel on offense, but he still needs to improve at the other end of the court, contends Joel Rush of Forbes. Rush runs the numbers and shows that Murray’s ineffectiveness on defense negates much of what he contributes on offense.
- Nuggets center Nikola Jokic will not play for Serbia in the FIBA World Cup qualifying tournament next month, according to a Sportando report. Serbia will face Greece and Estonia. Jokic signed a five-year contract with Denver this summer.
NBA teams have now completed the brunt of their offseason work, with the draft and free agency practically distant memories. Still, with training camps more than a month away, most clubs around the league have at least one or two outstanding issues they’ve yet to address.
We’re in the midst of looking at all 30 NBA teams, separating them by division and checking in on the key outstanding question that each club still needs to answer before the 2018/19 regular season begins.
After focusing on the Atlantic, Central, and Southeast last week, we’ve moved to the Western Conference this week, starting with the Southwest and Pacific. Today, we’re finishing things off by focusing on the Northwest…
Denver Nuggets
Will the Nuggets sign Trey Lyles to a rookie scale extension?
The trade that sent Lyles to Denver won’t exactly go down as one of the great moves in Nuggets history, considering it cost the team the lottery pick that became Donovan Mitchell in last year’s draft. Still, don’t hold that against Lyles, who enjoyed a breakout year in 2017/18, establishing new career bests in PPG (9.9), RPG (4.8), FG% (.491), and 3PT% (.381) as one of the first players off Denver’s bench.
Lyles is eligible for a rookie scale extension up until October 15 this year, and while role players generally aren’t strong candidates for early deals of that nature, it’s a possibility worth considering for the Nuggets. Lyles is still just 22 years old, and if the club views him as one of its long-term building blocks, it could make sense to lock him up now before his role and his numbers increase further.
Unless they plan to exercise Paul Millsap‘s $30MM team option next summer, the Nuggets should have cap flexibility going forward, meaning a Lyles extension wouldn’t hamstring them. With Nikola Jokic, Gary Harris, and Will Barton already secured to long-term deals, the Nuggets will have to decide whether they want Lyles to join that group now, or if they’ll take their chances with him in restricted free agency in 2019.
Minnesota Timberwolves
When will the Timberwolves sign Karl-Anthony Towns to a rookie scale extension, and what will it look like?
In the case of the Timberwolves and Towns, the questions isn’t whether or not an extension is coming — it’s a matter of when it will happen, and what it will look like.
Fourth-year players who get offered maximum-salary rookie scale extensions don’t turn them down, and it sounds like an offer of that caliber is on the table for Towns. There’s no rush to finalize it. Last year, Andrew Wiggins didn’t sign his max deal with the Timberwolves until October 11, just days before the regular season got underway.
There may be a little more room for back-and-forth negotiations with Towns than there was with Wiggins, however. While Wiggins signed a standard 25% maximum-salary extension, Towns would be eligible for a starting salary worth up to 30% of the cap if he earns All-NBA honors again next season. His camp and the Wolves may have to spend some time figuring out whether he’ll receive that full 30% if he qualifies, or if there’s a compromise to be reached between 25-30%.
As our early maximum salary projections for 2019/20 show, the total difference between a five-year, 25% max contract and a five-year, 30% max contract figures to exceed $30MM, so the starting point of Towns’ next deal is an important detail for the two sides to work out.
Oklahoma City Thunder
Will the Thunder release Kyle Singler or attempt to trim additional salary?
The Thunder were able to reduce their team salary and their projected luxury tax bill significantly in the three-way trade that (briefly) sent Carmelo Anthony to Atlanta. Still, Oklahoma City’s total team salary remains just shy of $150MM, creating a potential tax bill of $93MM+. In total, the roster projects to cost nearly $243MM.
Team ownership probably wouldn’t mind cutting costs a little more, and Singler is the most logical release candidate. His $4,996,000 expiring salary can be stretched across three seasons if he’s waived by next Friday. In that scenario, assuming the Thunder leave their 15th roster spot open, stretching Singler would reduce the overall cost of the 2018/19 squad by $20MM, taking into account the reduction in team salary and tax.
Although waiving Singler is the most obvious path to trimming salary, it’s possible the Thunder have another move or two up their sleeves. It’s also possible that they’re satisfied with the cost-cutting moves they’ve already made, and are committed to the current roster. Time will tell.
Portland Trail Blazers
Who will the Trail Blazers sign to their two-way contract slots? Will it matter?
Many teams around the NBA used their new two-way contract slots to great effect last season, relying on those two-way players for significant roles and eventually promoting them to a spot on the 15-man roster. That wasn’t really the case in Portland.
C.J. Wilcox and Wade Baldwin signed two-way deals with the Trail Blazers before the season and barely saw any action all season for the NBA club. Wilcox didn’t play a single minute for the Blazers, while Baldwin appeared in just seven games. All but one of Baldwin’s seven appearances came late in the season after he had been signed to a standard NBA contract.
The Blazers are one of just three NBA teams without a G League affiliate of their own, which is one obstacle in the way of maximizing their two-way contracts. If they need an extra body on a given night, it’s not easy to simply transfer a two-way player from their nearby NBAGL squad to the NBA roster. Last year, for example, Baldwin spent most of his time in the G League with the Texas Legends, whose arena is over 2,000 miles away from the Moda Center in Portland.
Despite the impracticality of shuttling their two-way players back and forth between the NBA and the G League, the Blazers still figure to fill those slots at some point. When they do, it will be interesting to see if they once again favor players with some NBA experience, like Wilcox and Baldwin, rather than developmental prospects that they won’t actually have the opportunity to develop due to their lack of NBAGL affiliate.
Utah Jazz
Do the Jazz need to do… anything before the regular season begins?
It’s fitting that the last of the 30 teams we’ve examined in this series is the one that seemingly has no burning questions to answer before the regular season begins.
The Jazz have their 15-man roster for the regular season virtually set, with Royce O’Neale joining 14 players on guaranteed contracts. They’ve filled their two-way contract slots. They don’t have any extension candidates. They’re not in any trouble from a cap perspective. Their coaching staff and front office is stable. Even their forthcoming rookie scale option decisions for 2019/20 look like simple ones. The Jazz do have one spot on their 20-man offseason roster they could fill, but that’s not exactly a pressing issue.
While there may be some rotation battles to watch during training camp, Utah’s primary focus this fall will be staying healthy — after all, it was Rudy Gobert‘s injury issues that played a significant part in the team’s slow start (19-28) last season. Having finished the regular season on a 29-6 run and won a playoff series, the Jazz will be looking to carry that momentum into the 2018/19 season as they push for a top-three seed in a tough Western Conference.
Photos courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
For the 10th time in 12 years, John Schuhmann of NBA.com got the opportunity to ask the NBA’s incoming crop of rookies a series of questions related to their fellow draftees.
Historically, the NBA rookies haven’t been particularly clairvoyant when it comes to their predictions — they haven’t accurately identified a Rookie of the Year winner since Kevin Durant in 2007/08. Still, it’s an interesting exercise, and one that occasionally results in a dead-on prediction, like when last year’s rookie class named Donovan Mitchell the steal of the 2017 draft.
Here are a few of the most interesting responses from this year’s rookies about the 2018/19 class:
- Deandre Ayton (Suns) and Collin Sexton (Cavaliers) are viewed as the co-favorites for the Rookie of the Year award this season, with each player earning 18% of the vote. No other rookie had more than a 9% share of the vote.
- Opinions were a little more divided on which player would have the best long-term NBA career, with Wendell Carter Jr. (Bulls) narrowly earning that title by receiving 13% of the vote. Interestingly, reigning EuroLeague MVP Luka Doncic (Mavericks) wasn’t picked by a single player for this question.
- No. 48 overall pick Keita Bates-Diop (Timberwolves) was named the steal of the 2018 NBA draft by his fellow rookies, edging out 14th overall pick Michael Porter Jr. (Nuggets) and 18th overall pick Lonnie Walker (Spurs).
- Trae Young (Hawks) is widely considered the best shooter and play-maker in this year’s class. Jevon Carter (Grizzlies) earned the most votes for best rookie defender, while Zhaire Smith (Sixers) is viewed as the most athletic rookie.
- Be sure to check out Schuhmann’s full piece for the rest of the rookie survey results.
Andre Roberson‘s 2017/18 season was cut short because of a ruptured patellar tendon and the Thunder are not rushing the defensive-minded wing back on the court, as Nick Gallo of NBA.com details. Oklahoma City realizes how crucial Roberson will be to their postseason success.
“I’m really excited for him to get back on the floor. I think we all know at this stage how important he is to the team and just what his size and length, and I think just his fiber in general, what it means to the team,” said GM Sam Presti.
Here’s more from the Northwest Division:
- The Roberson-Russell Westbrook–Paul George trio had the fifth-best defensive ranking in the league last season, Gallo notes in the same piece. “There was crazy potential there,” Roberson recalled. “We kind of finally started to figure it out, figured out how to play off of each other, and things were clicking.”
- Despite an ESPN forecast panel that gave the Wolves just a 12 percent chance to keep Jimmy Butler beyond this season, Michael Rand of the Star Tribune is still optimistic that the two sides can find common ground on a long-term deal. Rand also advises readers not to worry too much about the rumors of Butler teaming up with Kyrie Irving on a rival squad.
- The Nuggets are the only team in the Northwest Division that has traded away its own first-round pick, as Luke Adams of Hoops Rumors detailed this week. Denver sent the pick to Brooklyn in the Kenneth Faried deal.