LaMarcus Aldridge will kick off a whirlwind week of free agency by meeting with both the Lakers and Rockets on Tuesday night in Los Angeles, according to reports.
Free agency begins at 9:01 p.m. Pacific time (12:01 a.m. Eastern), and Aldridge won’t waste much time. After meeting with the Lakers and Rockets on Tuesday, he’ll proceed to visit with the Spurs, Mavs, Suns and Raptors on Wednesday and finally with the Knicks on Thursday, reports Ramona Shelburne of ESPN.com.
That list doesn’t even include Portland, which still hopes to keep their star power forward and will presumably offer Aldridge the max with a 5th year — which no other team can. The belief is that Aldridge is still at least considering the Blazers, but he simply doesn’t need a formal meeting to know what their franchise has to offer, considering he’s spent his entire nine-year NBA career there.
If you consider the Blazers still in the mix, then Aldridge’s busy week will have him linked to eight teams in total — or 28 percent of the entire league! It seems Aldridge is definitely open to doing his due diligence, rather than already having made up his mind.
Shams Charania of RealGM notes that Aldridge’s mother, Georgia, will join him in the meetings. She lives in Dallas and maintains a close relationship with her son, potentially making a return to the state with one of the Texas teams an attractive option.
So what will Aldridge do? At this point, “sources” are all over the map. Los Angeles Times reporter Ben Bolch says Aldridge is leaning toward the Lakers, while Yahoo’s Marc J. Spears hears the Spurs are the frontrunner and that Tim Duncan and Tony Parker will join the recruiting pitch.
Meanwhile, esteemed league insider Adrian Wojnarowski of Yahoo! Sports and Fox Sports 1 says the Blazers are “still very much in it” for Aldridge, noting that they can give him a 5th year and extra $27 million in guaranteed money that other teams cannot. Shelburne, however, believes the chances of Aldridge staying with the Blazers are “very unlikely.”
If winning is Aldridge’s top priority, as some reports have said, the Rockets (56-26 last season) and Spurs (55-27) would seem to be the best positioned teams of the eight in the mix. But both currently lack the requisite salary-cap space needed to make Aldridge a max offer and would need to move at least one significant piece to accomodate Aldridge’s salary, whether it be through a under-the-cap signing or a sign-and-trade with the Blazers.
With the Spurs, the salary they’d likely have to drop would be big man Tiago Splitter, due to earn $8.5 million next season. For the Rockets, it would be Trevor Ariza, who will make $8.2 million in 2015-16. Both Splitter and Ariza are key pieces, so neither the Spurs nor Rockets are likely to move them without a verbal commitment from Aldridge.
So if Aldridge truly wants San Antonio or Houston, he and his agent likely need to inform them early in the process so those teams can make the multitude of other moves required to clear room.
The good news for those teams is that Aldridge does seem intent on moving quickly, with six of his seven meetings complete by the end of July 1. As a result, a commitment as soon as this week from possibly the top free agent on the market wouldn’t be a surprise.
LEAGUE EXECS QUESTION MARKET FOR DWYANE WADE
Even above Aldridge, the biggest available name on the market is Miami Heat legend Dwyane Wade. Locked in a dispute with Miami’s front office, Wade declined his $16-million option for 2015-16 (which the Heat hoped he would exercise) and decided to join this summer’s free agency in hopes of landing a longer-term contract, or at least leveraging the Heat into upping their offer.
But according to ESPN‘s Chris Broussard, league execs say there is “not a robust market” for Wade because of his age (33) and persistent injury problems. Wade has missed at least 13 games in each of the last four regular seasons, including a 20-game absence in Miami this past year.
When healthy, Wade remains a force. After all, he trailed only LeBron James and Kyrie Irving in the East’s scoring race this past season. But that “when healthy” is a major caveat, and it remains to be seen whether any team would commit to him on a three-year deal for major money, as he desires.
Wade’s starpower could help sell tickets with the Knicks and Lakers, but are those rebuilding clubs best served to use their cap space on an aging player with significant health risk? After giving up money to help get LeBron James and Chris Bosh to Miami, word is that Wade is looking for a new three-year deal starting around the $16 million/year figure he negotiated in his “1+1” deal last summer.
The odds are that Wade remains in Miami, where he’s been for his entire career. But his saga could go on for some time, because it doesn’t seem like the market is going to give him the leverage he desires.
OTHER NEWS FROM AROUND THE LEAGUE
University of Kentucky coach John Calipari has again taken to Twitter to deny rumors linking him to a potential NBA coaching vacancy.
According to Yahoo‘s Wojnarowski, the Kings have probed Calipari about his interest in taking over the franchise’s front-office and coaching jobs. Calipari has been communicating with owner Vivek Ranadive in recent weeks, Wojnarowski reported, but Calipari says the talks have only been about former Kentucky players on the Sacramento roster — such as star big man DeMarcus Cousins and new draft pick Willie Cauley-Stein.
Wojnarowski, however, says Calipari has listened to scenarios with which the Kings could offer him complete control of basketball operations to go along with coaching.
The problem likely comes down to money. Wojnarowski says the Kings have enlisted lawyers to study the contract of current coach George Karl, trying to determine if there’s a way to terminate him for “cause” and free themselves from near-$10 million of guaranteed money still owed to Karl. If they can’t, though — and Wojnarowski says the possibility of ousting Karl without pay is remote — there’s almost no way a small-market franchise like the Kings could pay Karl that much to not coach and also pay Calipari more than the $8 million/year he makes at Kentucky.
Because of that, even though the Kings probably need to ditch Karl to salvage the relationship with Cousins, it may be financially implausible. In the interim, the Kings remain in flux heading into a free-agency period in which they have significant cap space and could very much use some outside help.
Their timing couldn’t be worse.
The Lakers, Mavs, Bucks and Raptors all have interest in restricted free agent swingman Iman Shumpert, reports Alex Kennedy of Basketball Insiders.
The Cavaliers can match any offer Shumpert receives, and LeBron James is known to be a fan. But the Cavs have new and larger contracts with James, Kevin Love and Tristan Thompson to negotiate, so it wouldn’t be a shock to see one of those team tests owner Dan Gilbert’s resolve to pay all of the aforementioned three and match a high offer on Shumpert.
The 25-year-old Shumpert, who averaged 8.0 points in 25 minutes/game last season with the Cavaliers and Knicks, is known as one of the league’s better perimeter defenders.
The Thunder traded the contract of Luke Ridnour to Toronto along with cash to create a $2.85 million trade exception, remarkably making it the fourth time the veteran point guard has been traded within the past week alone.
To complete the trade, Toronto sent the draft rights of Tomislav Zubcic to the Thunder, reports Darnell Mayberry of The Oklahoman.
Incredibly, Ridnour might still be moved yet again, considering his contract doesn’t become guaranteed until July 11 — which is after the league moratorium ends on July 9. His non-guaranteed contract could again prove useful if Toronto needs it for salary-matching purposes in a trade.
Now a 12-year veteran, Ridnour averaged four points and two assists in 14.5 minutes/game with the Orlando Magic last season.
Ben DuBose is a veteran sports reporter who has followed the Houston Rockets and the NBA since Hakeem Olajuwon was Akeem Olajuwon. He writes for both SheridanHoops and ClutchFans, an independent Rockets blog. You can follow him on Twitter.
I thought Aldridge said definitively he wouldn’t be returning to Portland (the blog said it was 99.9% sure, before saying it was definite)?
Can’t see where DWade is above LMA, at an injury ridden age 33. Why would Lakers really be interested?
Waiting to see if Cavs are trying hard to retain Kevin Love. They will be loaded at Center/PF next year if everyone is healthy, which means less minutes for Love. However, its likely someone will be injured. The big question is how badly LeBron wants Kevin back.