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Stein’s Latest: Rockets, Barnes, O’Neale, Hunter, Bogdanovic, Jazz, Murray

January 16th, 2024 at 6:58pm CST by Dana Gauruder

The Rockets are pursuing frontcourt options to give Most Improved Player Award candidate Alperen Şengün some help, Marc Stein reports in his latest Substack post. They’re danging Victor Oladipo‘s expiring $9.5MM deal and Jock Landale‘s contract, which isn’t guaranteed beyond this season, as enticements. Houston is also seeking another shooter and has shown interest in the Kings’ Harrison Barnes, according to Stein.

Here are more tidbits from Stein’s story:

Barnes could be on the move, despite signing a three-year, $54MM extension last offseason. However, the Kings would prefer to get an impact player using Barnes as part of the package. They’ve had discussions with the Raptors regarding a potential Pascal Siakam deal. The Kings have also made Kevin Huerter and Davion Mitchell available but have no interest in dealing second-year forward Keegan Murray.
Stein suggested a couple of days ago that the Cavaliers might pursue Royce O’Neale to fill their 3-and-D need. He now hears that the Nets forward is indeed on Cleveland’s list of targets. The Hawks’ De’Andre Hunter could also be a target to watch for Cleveland, but his contract — he’s in the first year of a four-year, $90MM extension — would make the Cavs’ future cap issues more challenging. O’Neale will be a free agent after the season.
The Pistons had some exploratory discussions with a number of teams regarding swingman Bojan Bogdanović. However, it’s not a certainty they’ll deal him, says Stein. They may want to keep him around to help avoid setting the NBA record for the worst all-time season record, currently held by Sixers (9-73).
The Jazz’s surge up the Western Conference standings has made it tougher to predict what their front office will do in the coming weeks. Kelly Olynyk and Jordan Clarkson are the veterans most frequently mentioned as potential trade pieces but the chatter regarding John Collins has died down since he became the team’s starting center, according to Stein. Top exec Danny Ainge will still likely listen to trade pitches for virtually any player on the roster.
Dejounte Murray‘s list of potential suitors includes the Spurs, Lakers, Nets, Knicks and Pistons, Stein reports. The Hawks, as previously noted, are looking to replenish their draft assets after they gave up three first-round picks (two of their own) and a pick swap to acquire him from San Antonio in 2022.

Southeast Notes: Butler, Ntilikina, Hayward, Murray

January 16th, 2024 at 5:26pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Heat forward Jimmy Butler was able to play 40 minutes on Monday after missing 11 of the previous 12 games with a toe and calf injuries. Butler supplied 31 points in the overtime win over the Nets.

“I got my rhythm as I was coming back,” he said. “Guys were looking for me, got out in open court.”

It was only the ninth time all season that the Heat’s top three players — Butler, Bam Adebayo and Tyler Herro — all played in the same game, and the seventh time all season they finished the game, Tim Bontemps of ESPN notes.

“We just have to keep playing basketball the right way with or without myself, Tyler, and Bam in the lineup,” Butler said. “We’ve always found a way to win games. We will continue to do so. But I like the idea of us three being on the court at the same time.”

We have more from the Southeast Division:

Frank Ntilikina has yet to make his Hornets debut, but that should change soon, according to Roderick Boone of the Charlotte Observer. The guard is currently in the advanced stages of his rehab and on-court work. He suffered a non-displaced fracture in his left tibia in the preseason finale. Ntilikina had a non-guaranteed deal but the team chose to keep him past the league-wide January 10 salary guarantee date. “I want one thing: “I just to get back on the court with these guys. I feel like everybody out here trusts me, the coach, my teammates,” Ntilikina said. He’s listed as questionable to play Wednesday against New Orleans, Boone tweets.
Another injured Hornets player, Gordon Hayward, will need more time to recover from his latest injury. Hayward has missed the last nine games with a strained left calf and has only been able to do light work, Boone reports. “It’s a tricky situation with a calf strain like that,” Hayward said. “I’m not there yet, so it’s not like there’s a timeline or anything. But it is getting better.” Hayward’s $31.5MM salary will come off the Hornets’ books after the season, if he’s not dealt in the coming weeks.
Hawks guard Dejounte Murray is well aware of the trade rumors enveloping him. Murray told Andscape’s Marc J. Spears “I love my teammates,” adding that he tries to keep the chatter out of mind. “I know what the main goal is. The main goal is today,” he said. “Today, I’m an Atlanta Hawk and that’s all that matters. Help do my job and try to get a win. That’s the most important.”

Atlantic Notes: Dolan, Embiid, Sixers, J. Porter

January 16th, 2024 at 4:00pm CST by Luke Adams

Knicks owner James Dolan has been accused of sexual assault, according to reports from Ben Sisario of The New York Times and Marjorie Hernandez and Selim Algar of The New York Post.

Dolan’s accuser, Kellye Croft, filed a federal lawsuit on Tuesday claiming that he pressured her into unwanted sex with him and that he coordinated an encounter with Harvey Weinstein, who allegedly sexually assaulted her. Croft worked as a masseuse on a 2013 tour headlined by The Eagles that also featured Dolan’s band, J.D. and the Straight Shot. The incidents with Dolan and Weinstein are said to have taken place in 2013 and 2014.

One of Dolan’s attorneys issued a statement saying that there is “absolutely no merit” to the allegations: “Kellye Croft and James Dolan had a friendship. Mr. Dolan always believed Ms. Croft to be a good person and is surprised she would agree to these claims. Bottom line, this is not a he said/she said matter and there is compelling evidence to back up our position. We look forward to proving that in court.”

Asked today about the lawsuit, commissioner Adam Silver didn’t have much to tell reporters so soon after the publication of the reports, as Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN tweets. “I saw the article and don’t know anything else about it other than I read the article so we’ll stand by and wait to find out more information,” Silver said.

Here’s more from around the Atlantic:

Sixers star Joel Embiid, who returned on Monday from a three-game injury absence, said he’s not worried about meeting the 65-game requirement to qualify for end-of-season awards such as MVP. “It doesn’t matter how many games I play,” Embiid said (story via ESPN.com). “The goal is to be healthy the rest of the year.” Embiid isn’t on the injury report for Tuesday’s contest vs. Denver, so it appears he’ll square off on the second night of a back-to-back set against fellow MVP Nikola Jokic and the Nuggets.
Gina Mizell of The Philadelphia Inquirer takes a look at how Daryl Morey‘s and Nick Nurse‘s time together in Houston laid the groundwork for them to reunite with the Sixers. Nurse tells Mizell that he believes his history with Morey has given him a leg up during his first year in Philadelphia. “Where the relationship enhances what’s happened is the speed at which we can move things along,” the head coach said. “Because we know each other, it’s not this, ‘Where’s this guy coming from?’ six-month process. That part I think has been a big plus.”
Jontay Porter didn’t open the season on the Raptors‘ roster, but the two-way big man has appeared in each of the team’s past seven games and earned his first start on Monday vs. Boston. Given how Porter has performed so far in Toronto, he could turn out to be a developmental win at a key position for an organization that has lacked those under-the-radar success stories in recent years, writes Eric Koreen of The Athletic.

Kings’ Mike Brown Fined $50K By NBA

January 16th, 2024 at 2:56pm CST by Luke Adams

Kings head coach Mike Brown has been fined $50K for “aggressively pursuing” a referee during the team’s Sunday loss in Milwaukee and for publicly criticizing the officiating after the game, the NBA announced today in a press release (Twitter link).

Brown was ejected in the fourth quarter of Sunday’s game when he confronted and berated referee Intae Hwang to express his displeasure with how the game was being called (Twitter video link via Sean Cunningham of Fox 40 Sacramento).

During his postgame press conference, Brown brought the team’s video coordinator and a laptop to show reporters specifically which calls led to his ejection (Twitter video link via Carmichael Dave).

“The referees are human, and they’re going to make mistakes, but you just hope that there’s some sort of consistency and there’s some sort of communication between the refs,” Brown said. “The refs tonight, they were great, they communicated with me all night. But in terms of consistency, you guys saw it right here. In my opinion, the consistency wasn’t here tonight.”

It’s a significant penalty for Brown relative to other fines that players and coaches have received for criticizing the officiating, which suggests that the league wasn’t pleased by the Kings coach’s on-court outburst — or by the extra preparation that preceded his postgame comments and the visual examples that accompanied them.

By comparison, Raptors head coach Darko Rajakovic was fined $25K for a postgame rant ripping the officiating earlier this month.

Scotty Pippen Jr. Signs Two-Way Contract With Grizzlies

January 16th, 2024 at 2:42pm CST by Luke Adams

2:42pm: Pippen has officially signed with the Grizzlies, the team announced today in a press release (Twitter link). He’ll be eligible to appear in up to 26 regular season games for the club.

2:30pm: Former Lakers guard Scotty Pippen Jr. has agreed to a two-way contract with the Grizzlies, agent Erika Ruiz tells Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN (Twitter link). According to Wojnarowski, it will be a two-year deal, covering not just the rest of this season but 2024/25 as well.

Pippen, the son of Hall of Famer Scottie Pippen, spent his rookie year in 2022/23 on a two-way deal with the Lakers after going undrafted out of Vanderbilt. He logged just 32 total minutes in six games at the NBA level, but played regularly for the South Bay Lakers, averaging 22.2 points, 5.3 assists, and 3.7 rebounds in 28.3 minutes per game across 35 NBAGL appearances in the Showcase Cup and regular season.

After spending training camp with Los Angeles again this past fall, Pippen was waived ahead of the regular season and returned to South Bay. He has put up 20.2 PPG, 5.9 APG, and 5.3 RPG with a .485/.329/.846 shooting line in 17 G League games this season.

The Grizzlies had a two-way slot available after promoting Vince Williams to their standard 15-man roster last week. Pippen will join G.G. Jackson and Jacob Gilyard as Memphis’ two-way players.

Once Pippen officially signs, Memphis will have a full roster of 15 players on standard contracts and three on two-way deals. However, as we outlined earlier this afternoon, the Grizzlies are in position to fill out their roster beyond the standard limits due to a series of injuries that will make the team eligible for hardship exceptions.

Clippers To Host 2026 NBA All-Star Game

January 16th, 2024 at 2:02pm CST by Rory Maher

JANUARY 16: The NBA officially confirmed today in a press release that the 2026 All-Star Game will take place at the Intuit Dome, the Clippers’ new arena.

JANUARY 12: The Clippers are “on track” to host the 2026 All-Star Weekend at owner Steve Ballmer‘s new Intuit Dome, though the NBA is still finalizing the plans, multiple sources tell Shams Charania of The Athletic and Stadium (Twitter link).

This year’s All-Star Game will be held in Indianapolis (Pacers), and the Warriors will host the event in 2025.

The Intuit Dome, which is located in Inglewood, California, is still under construction. It’s set to open for the 2024/25 season. Both the Lakers and Clippers currently play their home games at Crypto.com Arena, but it’s obviously far more famous for the Lakers than the Clips.

Former Microsoft CEO Ballmer is the wealthiest owner in the NBA and has shown a willingness to spend in multiple aspects of the Clippers business, including the team’s payroll and new arena. Star forward Kawhi Leonard just signed a three-year, $152MM extension two days ago, and Paul George is “optimistic” about his own extension talks.

The Clippers were 3-7 at one point in the immediate aftermath of the James Harden trade, but they’ve gone 21-6 since to currently hold a 24-13 record, good for the No. 4 seed in the West.

Grizzlies Expected To Qualify For Multiple Hardship Exceptions

January 16th, 2024 at 1:41pm CST by Luke Adams

As we explain in our glossary entry on the subject, an NBA team that qualifies for a hardship exception is permitted to add an extra player to its standard roster beyond the usual 15-man limit. In some cases, if a club’s roster is especially injury-plagued, that club can be granted multiple hardship exceptions and is allowed to sign multiple replacement players to 10-day contracts.

A team qualifies for a hardship exception when it meets all of the following criteria:

It has at least four players unavailable due to injury or illness.
All four of those players have missed at least three consecutive games.
All four of those players are expected to remain sidelined for at least two more weeks.

If a team has five players who meet those criteria, it can qualify for two hardship exceptions; six players who meet the criteria would result in three hardship exceptions.

The Grizzlies have dealt with a banged-up roster all season long and were awarded a pair of hardship exceptions simultaneously earlier in the season. Memphis used them to sign Jaylen Nowell and Shaquille Harrison to 10-day deals.

Those exceptions expired once the roster got a little healthier, but the injury bug is doing a number on the Grizzlies again as of late, putting the team in position to once again qualify for multiple hardship exceptions.

Currently, the Grizzlies have four players who definitely meet the criteria: Steven Adams, Brandon Clarke, Ja Morant, and Marcus Smart. Adams and Morant are out for the season, while Clarke and Smart are still at least several weeks away from returning, and all four players have missed at least the past three games.

Once Desmond Bane misses his third straight contest on Thursday in Minnesota, the Grizzlies will have at least five players who meet the hardship criteria, since Bane is expected to be out for at least six weeks. That means Memphis will be in position to add at least two players via hardship exceptions.

It may not stop there — Derrick Rose has missed the past seven games due to a hamstring issue and his return timeline is unclear. If the Grizzlies aren’t counting on him to be back within the next two weeks, he’d meet the hardship criteria too. On top of that, Jake LaRavia is expected to be out for at least three weeks, so once he sits out a third consecutive game on Saturday, he’d fit the bill as well.

It’s unclear exactly how many hardship exceptions the Grizzlies will qualify for once the dust settles, but it certainly looks like the club is in position to begin supplementing its 15-man roster with temporarily fill-ins on 10-day contracts. It won’t be a surprise if Memphis signs a couple free agents for depth purposes at some point this week.

Categories:
Memphis Grizzlies

New York Notes: Thomas, Dinwiddie, DSJ, Walker, Brunson, McBride

January 16th, 2024 at 12:35pm CST by Luke Adams

Following his eighth game since being moved from the Nets‘ starting lineup to the bench, Cam Thomas was asked after Monday’s loss to Miami whether he has gained a feel for the rotation patterns and whether he’s gained a “comfortability” with them. Thomas quickly replied with a blunt “no,” then paused for a few seconds before continuing (Twitter video link via Erik Slater of Clutch Points).

“I mean, it could change,” Thomas said. “I’m just doing my job. I’m just doing what I need to do when I get out there to produce. No, I don’t really have no comfortability coming off the bench or starting. Whatever (head coach Jacque Vaughn) wants me to do, that’s what I’m gonna do.”

Thomas subsequently clarified that he meant he doesn’t feel any complacency, according to Brian Lewis of The New York Post.

Thomas has had a few big nights since moving back to the bench, including scoring 26 points last Thursday and 23 on Monday. But he has also had 0-for-11 and 0-for-7 performances during that eight-game stretch and is shooting just .339/.263/.700 since being removed from the starting five. Brooklyn has lost seven of those eight contests.

Here’s more on the NBA’s two New York teams:

Veteran Nets guard Spencer Dinwiddie continues to start, but played a limited role for a second straight game on Monday, logging just 20 minutes after playing only 16 on Thursday in Cleveland. As Lewis of The New York Post notes, Dennis Smith Jr. has been one beneficiary of Vaughn’s rotation tweaks — Smith played 32 minutes on Monday. “I’ve always talked about this being performance-based,” Vaughn said. “I thought Dennis had a good attack for us defensively. We’re just in a position right now where you have to perform, and that’s across the board. So that’s a challenge to the entire group from the beginning of the game to the end to be locked-in and to give everything you have on both ends of the floor.”
After Lonnie Walker scored 20 points in 25 minutes in last Thursday’s loss to the Cavs, Jared Schwartz of The New York Post wondered if the Nets might need to make more room for the veteran wing in the rotation. However, Walker has gone scoreless on 0-of-8 shooting in 21 total minutes in his other three appearances since returning from a hamstring injury.
Knicks point guard Jalen Brunson missed a second consecutive game on Monday due to a calf contusion, but his return doesn’t appear far off. Head coach Tom Thibodeau suggested that the issue is more about “pain tolerance” than concern about the risk of re-injury, writes Stefan Bondy of The New York Post. “It’s day-to-day,” Thibodeau said. “It’s a little better today. When he’s ready, he’s ready.”
With Brunson unavailable, Miles McBride got another start at point guard and set a new career high in points for the second time in three days, putting up 20 in a loss to Orlando. However, he blamed himself for the loss, citing his game management in a fourth quarter in which the Knicks scored just 16 points, per Bridget Reilly of The New York Post. “I’d say it’s my fault as a point guard. I needed to get everybody where they needed to be and manage the game a little bit better at the end,” McBride said. “… I gotta make sure I get everybody where they need to be and take control.”

Knicks Rumors: Grimes, Fournier, Robinson, Trade Rumors

January 16th, 2024 at 10:56am CST by Luke Adams

Quentin Grimes is a name to watch as a potential candidate to be moved ahead of the trade deadline, according to Fred Katz of The Athletic, who hears from rival executives that the Knicks are “actively fielding offers” for the third-year wing.

As Katz notes, the Knicks have made an effort to keep Grimes out of trades talks in the past, but the 23-year-old has taken a step back this year following a strong sophomore season in 2022/23 and has moved down the depth chart due to the offseason acquisition of Donte DiVincenzo. He’s playing just 19.8 minutes per night this season after averaging 29.9 MPG a year ago.

If they move Grimes in the next few weeks, the Knicks’ preference would be to attach him to Evan Fournier‘s expiring contract to bring back a player whose salary is in the neighborhood of $20MM, give or take a few million, Katz explains. The idea would be to acquire a quality player who could help immediately and whose contract could also be used – if necessary – in a deal for a star down the road. New York’s preference would be not to part with Grimes in a trade for a player who could walk in free agency this summer, league sources tell The Athletic.

No deal involving Grimes is imminent at this point, and the Knicks could also make a move with him this summer if he’s not traded at next month’s deadline, Katz writes.

Here’s more on the Knicks:

New York’s front office has been more interested in acquiring another ball-handler and facilitator rather than another center, according to Katz, who says the team is “increasingly optimistic” about Mitchell Robinson‘s chances of returning before the season ends — that optimism will influence how the club operates on the trade market.
With the Knicks not necessarily hopeful that a star-caliber player who fits into their plans will be available at the deadline, their ideal target would meet the following criteria, per Katz: He’d be someone on a tradable salary who is under contract beyond this season; he’d be able to run the offense when Jalen Brunson isn’t on the floor; and he’d be someone Tom Thibodeau can trust.
The Knicks haven’t been willing to put any unprotected first-round picks on the table in their trade talks so far, Katz reports, though they’re open to parting with protected first-rounders. New York controls four such picks from other teams, including Dallas’ top-10 protected 2024 first-rounder, which is the only one of the four likely to convey this year.

Bucks’ Jae Crowder Set To Return Wednesday

January 16th, 2024 at 9:31am CST by Luke Adams

Bucks forward Jae Crowder, who underwent surgery in November after suffering a left adductor and abdominal tear, has been cleared to return to action for Wednesday’s game in Cleveland, reports Shams Charania of The Athletic (Twitter link).

Crowder was a key part of Milwaukee’s rotation early in the season, averaging 27.9 minutes per night in his eight healthy games. He registered 9.0 points, 4.0 rebounds, and 1.9 assists per contest with a .543/.533/.600 shooting line in those eight games before sustaining his injury in his ninth appearance on November 11. He has missed the past 31 games.

The Bucks had the NBA’s fourth-best defensive rating in 2022/23 but rank just 19th in that category so far this season, so they’ll benefit on that end of the court from Crowder’s return. The veteran forward is a versatile defender with size who is capable of matching up with bigger wings.

Although Crowder started a couple games for the Bucks in the fall, he’ll likely come off the bench as long as everyone’s healthy, since the club has settled on a starting five consisting of Giannis Antetokounmpo, Damian Lillard, Khris Middleton, Brook Lopez, and Malik Beasley.