NBA free agency officially begins at midnight eastern time tonight, at which point teams are permitted to talk to and negotiate with other clubs' free agents. However, no free agent contracts can be signed until July 11th, due to the July moratorium. Our explanation of the July moratorium is one link you'll want to check out as you prepare for the 2012 free agent period. Here are a few more:
With the draft just two days away and free agency beginning this weekend, there are a number of different ways you can follow Hoops Rumors to keep tabs on the latest NBA news and rumors this summer.
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If you prefer to receive updates only on roster moves such as signings, cuts, and trades, you can follow our transactions-only feeds via RSS and Twitter.
If you want to keep tabs on all of Hoops Rumors' stories and updates, you can follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook, or subscribe to our feed through your RSS reader of choice. However, if you prefer to only receive news about your favorite NBA team, we have you covered. Below are links to our Facebook, Twitter, and RSS pages and feeds for all 30 teams.
At this point in the calendar year, it's hard to gauge exactly how much money NBA teams will have to spend in the offseason. Most decisions on team and player options are still to come, draft bonuses aren't on clubs' books yet, and the amnesty period is on the way. Still, we can get a sense of which teams will have the flexibility to spend this summer by taking a look at the guaranteed contracts that have been signed for next season. Listed below are the current guaranteed salary commitments for all 30 NBA clubs. Keep in mind that the 2012/13 salary cap and luxury tax thresholds are expected to be about the same as this year's — $58,044,000 for the cap and $70,307,000 for the tax.
Lately we've heard about the interest the Blazers have in signing former draft picks Joel Freeland and Victor Claver, the Rockets maneuvers concerning Donatas Motiejunas, and other news about international players signing in the NBA. Teams commonly draft international players with no intention of signing them immediately, "stashing" their rights away until they're ready to play in the NBA. Teams can retain draft rights to players for as much time as they want as long as they're playing professionally outside the NBA, so it's useful for teams that want to build assets for the future and avoid carrying a rookie (and his salary) on the bench.
We've put together a list of teams that hold the rights to international players who have been drafted since 2005.
As we've outlined before, there are a number of different ways to follow Hoops Rumors via Facebook, Twitter, and RSS. If you don't want to follow all the site's updates, you can follow team-specific or transaction-only Facebook, Twitter, and RSS feeds. Although we don't have Facebook pages or Twitter feeds for specific players, you can also easily follow all our updates on your favorite player.
Hoops Rumors passes along the latest news and rumors on NBA player movement 365 days a year, but those aren't the only updates you'll see on the site. On our right sidebar, you'll find a number of additional features and featured posts. Here's a rundown of a few of them:
Draft position largely determines how much first-round picks make with their first contracts, but it has little to do with the deal that comes after that. Player values can change drastically over the life of a rookie scale contract, as the 2007 draftees demonstrate. Since rookie contracts last no longer than four seasons, 2007 is the latest class in which most of the draftees have signed their second NBA contracts.
With the NBA postseason nearing its end and the draft and free agency fast approaching, there are a number of different ways you can follow Hoops Rumors to keep tabs on the latest NBA news and rumors this summer.
The NBA's current 1000-combination lottery system has been used for each draft since 1994. The format wasn't identical every year — the number of possible outcomes assigned to each team used to be slightly different, and from 1996 to 1998, the expansion Raptors and Grizzlies were ineligible to win the first overall pick, altering the lottery process. But essentially, the NBA draft lottery is in its 19th season in its current form.
With 2012's lottery scheduled for tonight in New York, let's take a look back to see how the first overall pick has been won in past seasons. Listed below are the winning teams, their place in the lottery standings, their odds at the first overall pick, and the players they selected….