July 6 came and went and the Brooklyn Nets trade sending Nick Claxton to Chicago and Julius Randle to Brooklyn didn’t get officially approved. The reason was mundane: a late add to the trade, the Bulls Mouhamadou Gueye, couldn’t be dealt until July 9 because he had been acquired by the Bulls on April 9 and couldn’t be moved for 90 days under the CBA rules.
Then July 9 came and again, nothing. While the delay only currently affects rookie Joshua Jefferson’s availability for the Vegas Summer League
— the Nets acquired his Draft rights in that deal, the reasons why nothing happened this time are not so easy to explain. Is it possible that the trade is being expanded or that the Nets are trying to determine how the trade will affect other issues going forward? It’s not that they are having second thoughts.
First indication that things weren’t going to happen quickly came from John Gambodoro of Arizona Sports Radio 98.7 in Phoenix. He indicated Thursday that there are more legalistic reasons for the further delay and they involve other deals that the Nets are not part of…
However, Jake Fischer of The Steinline suggested that may not be the only reason. He said the delay could mean the Nets are reviewing their cap space, etc., and other financials. He put it in the context of various teams’ pursuit of Peyton Watson, the 6’9” Denver Nuggets power forward who’s a restricted free agent and has been rumored to be a Nets target.
Brooklyn does still possess the cap space to furnish Watson with an offer sheet in his desired salary range, but I’m told that the Nets have been internally assessing how to utilize their available spending power before officially completing their multi-team trade with Minnesota, Charlotte and Chicago that will bring Julius Randle to Barclays Center and transport LaMelo Ball from the Hornets to the Timberwolves.
The Nets have not been keen, though, on plying Watson with an offer sheet in that $25-plus million range. It’s a ballpark, remember, that stems from Nuggets swingman Christian Braun’s five-year, $125 million rookie scale extension last October.
If Brooklyn did value Watson in that range, Denver surely would have seen an offer sheet for the 23-year-old by now. Unless the Nets’ stance changes, Memphis’ offer sheet to Quinten Post that Golden State declined to match would remain the lone offer sheet tendered to a restricted free agent to date this offseason.
That’s a bit more specific than Fischer’s comments two days ago when he said that the Nets were nothing more than a “conceptual suitor” for Watson indicating that Sean Marks & co. weren’t that interested in the 23-year-old at least at the price tag he preferred. (Fischer also stated that while the Clippers pursuit of PWat is complicated by the still unresolved Kawhi Leonard scandal, the Atlanta Hawks may be ready to enter a sign-and-trade discussion.)
Of course, Fischer’s comments today may have little to do with Watson, that the Nets may be looking at other possibilities. For example, the Nets have yet to officially sign Moe Wagner. They can pay the 6’11” center either out of cap space or wait till they exhaust their space on something (or some things) then sign him out of the $9.4 million room MLE they have access to. According to a report by Mike Scotto, Nets and Wagner agreed to a two-year, $19 million deal so his first year would fit neatly in the MLE. Timing, it should be noted, is critical to managing cap space. The Nets currently have or could easily access up to $25 million.
They could clear money here and there. Malachi Smith, the rookie guard, is in the second year of a two-year, totally non-guaranteed deal. It seemed odd that he didn’t travel to Sacramento or Las Vegas as part of the Summer League development even though he’s one of the Nets younger players.
Indeed, on Friday, Smith posted a promotion for his annual youth camp in his hometown of Belleville, Ill. He contained no reference to the Nets, not in the text or in the accompanying photos…
Then, there’s the big ticket: extending Michael Porter Jr. Porter is eligible — and has been eligible for weeks — to sign an extension up to four years and $234 million. No one expects the deal to reach those heights but there’s been speculation that he could wind up with a deal for four at $160 million that would include a jump in his salary next season from $40.8 million to $49 million then a drop-off in years after that.
That contract signing could easily be the final inking of free agency.
There’s no indication that MPJ wants to leave and a number of indications that the Nets would like to keep him. It’s not just that he averaged 24.2 points, 7.3 rebounds and 3.0 assists and shot 46/36/86 last season. He has also become a mentor to the team’s youngsters. Just last week, video of him hosting four of last year’s rookies at the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri in May recirculated…
And as noted, he recently hosted Watson, his former Nuggets teammate, on a yacht in the Mediterranean. Does that mean anything other the two, who have been close, remain friends?
We’ll have to wait and wait and wait to see…
