Good morning. Let’s basketball.
Good morning. ‘The Decision 3’ is coming to a theater near you.
That and more in Monday’s NBA newsletter.
YOU CAN’T ALWAYS GET WHAT YOU WANT: Paul Flannery hits us with a special Summer Shootaround focused on the NBA Draft, with a key essay on what the Celtics didn’t do. Despite the best-laid plans of Danny Ainge and buckets of assets, the price was just too high.
IT'S TIME: We now shift violently into free agent mode. The NBA free agency period officially begins at 12:00 a.m. on Wednesday morning, though as you'll see we're already getting plenty of news and rumors. Basketball Gods be good and the important stuff will wrap up by July 20 or so.
OH FUN: LeBron James will opt out and become a free agent again. He does plan to re-sign with Cleveland but he’s going to wait a few days to see how the team does in terms of retaining Kevin Love and J.R. Smith. So, basically, after ensuring Tristan Thompson (whose agent is LeBron’s friend, Rich Paul) gets paid, he’s now ensuring J.R. gets paid. FUN!
Can you imagine if LeBron started taking meetings with other teams?
MEETING TIME! DeAndre Jordan will take meetings with four teams: the Clippers, Lakers, Mavericks and Knicks. The Bucks might squeeze in there, too.
THIS WILL NOT BE RARE: Greg Monroe plans to sign a two-year deal with an opt-out in 2016. This is going to be dead common sense from the players’ perspective due to the salary cap explosion. But teams can fight it by offering more dough. Hence, the promise of a cash infusion soon is boosting current salaries on an individual basis. The market works in amazing ways.
LAND OF THE RISING SUNS: The Suns plan to lock up RFA Brandon Knight to a five-year, $70 million deal, which is more than I thought he’d pull after a rough finish to 2014-15. But I think he’s a really solid prospect and will pan out.
WEST’S NEXT STOP: David West is going to meet with the Knicks. Huh.
I WONDER WHERE HE’S HEADED: Paul Pierce is opting out. DUNH DUNH dunh.
MANU IS THE COOLEST: He’ll announce whether he’s returning to the Spurs in an Argentine newspaper.
I CAN’T BELIEVE JRUE DID THAT, PHILLY! So, the NBA fined the Sixers $3 million for failing to disclose Jrue Holiday’s injuries when trading him to the Pelicans in 2013. (Remember, the Pels gave up Nerlens Noel and the pick that became Dario Saric for Holiday.) Now the Sixers are trying to get money from the Lakers over Andrew Bynum.
YES. SO YES. A breakdown of Dirk Nowitzki playing baseball.
AMAZING: The New York Times published a piece called “The Obtuse Triangle” on the complexity of the Triangle offense, complete with a Snowfallesque animation of said complexity.
IT BEGINS: Jahlil Okafor drops his Sixers jersey like it’s trash. Because it is trash. Because the Sixers are a trash team.
THE ID OF KOBE: “Friends come and go, banners are forever” is so, so sad.
LET THE RECORD REFLECT ... that Carmelo Anthony is saying nice things about Kristaps Porzingis in random Instagram comments.
10 YEARS LATER: Brian Fleurantin has a really good retrospective on the age minimum, which is now 10 years old.
MEANWHILE IN SACRAMENTO ... Here’s a nice roundup of Vlade Divac’s candid comments in the wake of the draft. He acknowledges there is a communication problem between himself and George Karl.
GOOD JOB BAY AREA SPORTS TEAMS: Love wins, like most of these teams here.
THAT FEELING WHEN ... you look over and it’s Kevin Durant destroying your life at Pop-a-Shot.
Happy Monday. See you next time.
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