Gary Dineen/Getty Images
Health and post-injury performances aren’t all that’s dragging down the value of these contracts, but they’d be far less problematic, verging on complete non-issues, without them.
Boston Celtics: Gordon Hayward
Contract Value: 3 years, $98.1 million (2020-21 player option)
Gordon Hayward has found more of a groove as a member of the Celtics’ second unit.
In just under 26 minutes per game since the swap, he’s averaging 12.1 points, 5.1 rebounds and 4.4 assists while slashing 44/40/100. Equally important, Boston is a net plus in the time he’s played without Kyrie Irving.
Filling those minutes has remained a headache for the Celtics all year. The offense continues to sputter without Irving overall, but having both Hayward and Jaylen Brown come off the bench has punched Boston’s ticket into survival mode.
Baby steps of any kind are important. Hayward is working off a lost 2017-18 that included two surgeries in a seven-month span. His progression back to All-NBA candidacy isn’t supposed to be instantaneous. He could be a much different player by the postseason, or by the start of 2019-20.
That comes as only a smallish consolation prize for the Celtics. They’re now in Year 2 of paying Hayward superstar money without a matching return. That stark of a discrepancy grates on even the deepest teams.
Trade-deadline buyers desperate for an infusion of name recognition no doubt bite if Hayward hits the chopping block. It shouldn’t take a sweetener to get off his money. But the Celtics would still have to sell awfully low.
Denver Nuggets: Will Barton
Contract Value: 4 years, $53 million (2021-22 player option)
Mason Plumlee could potentially go here. His contract is short (two years, $27 million) and he’s playing well, but the big-man market is weird. Centers making starter money are tough sells when they play backup minutes, and the league doesn’t have a lot of opening-lineup vacancies at the 5.
Will Barton’s recovery from surgery to address core and hip injuries spares Plumlee from the difficult-money gauntlet. Though he’s expected to return soon—he is week-to-week and should be back well before the All-Star break, per Mile High Sports’ T.J. McBride—Barton has appeared in only two games this season.
It will take a string of A-OK outings from the 27-year-old bounce house for his contract to become a legitimate trade chip. Even then, with so many teams in line for cap space this summer, rerouting a sizable contract that runs through 2021-22 doesn’t profile as a mindless task.
To the right buyer, following a return absent an extended grace period, Barton would be an asset. For now, while miles from immovable, he’s not soliciting more than buy-low overtures.
Miami Heat: Dion Waiters
Contract Value: 3 years, $36.3 million
Left ankle issues have kept Dion Waiters off the floor since last December, and the Heat don’t yet have a timetable for his return, per the Miami Herald‘s Barry Jackson.
Getting him back on the court wouldn’t change everything. Waiters’ contract qualified as an overpay the moment he signed it. His standout 2016-17 became a flash in the pan after 30 appearances last season, and Miami’s half-court offense isn’t set up to house an inefficient over-dribbler who has seldom excelled at drawing fouls or finishing around the rim.
Then again, if he were playing, Waiters’ sub-$15 million pay grade wouldn’t be as easy to single out.
James Johnson (three years, $46 million), Tyler Johnson (two years, $38.5 million) and Hassan Whiteside (two years, $52.5 million) are all on bad-money deals. Waiters’ combination of contract length and absence is all that’s sheltering them from this exercise’s wrath.
Justise Winslow’s poison-pill contract is a potential alternative. His outgoing value is $3.4 million, while his incoming hit sits at $10.6 million. That $6.2 million represents a hurdle, but it’s navigable. The Heat have too many other bad deals to get caught up in such a manageable difference.
Philadelphia 76ers: Markelle Fultz
Contract Value: 3 years, $30.4 million (2020-21 team option)
Rookie-scale players are usually immune to this type of blowback. Cost-controlled contracts are designed to be decongestants and financial safe havens. They are very rarely expensive stumbling blocks.
Markelle Fultz has set the precedent for exceptions. He’s not your typical rookie-scaler. He’s making almost as much as this season’s non-taxpayer’s mid-level ($8.6 million), and his 2020-21 team option is worth $12.3 million.
First-overall picks are supposed to outplay that value. Fultz isn’t even playing. He’s out indefinitely while undergoing physical therapy for thoracic outlet syndrome.
Overlook his latest extended absence, and neither the Sixers nor prospective trade partners have much to go on. Fultz has made just 33 appearances since being drafted in 2017, and on those rare occasions he’s actually played, he’s looked like a shell of the transcendent cornerstone Philadelphia believed it drafted.
Teams will still deal for him without demanding a sweetener. The chance to reboot a 20-year-old once billed as a probable superstar is worth that much. But after giving up two first-rounders to get him, Philadelphia is asking for more.
Sources told Philly.com’s Keith Pompey that “the Sixers don’t want to part ways with Fultz unless a first-round pick is packaged in a deal for him. And they’re not talking about a late first-rounder, either.” This is both understandable and unrealistic.
For all the Sixers’ immediate expectations, a single trade isn’t transforming them into championship favorites. Watching Fultz flirt with his ceiling elsewhere would hurt more than not capitalizing on his lackluster market value now. And yet, when they cannot guarantee his stock won’t improve, their stance on this matter is anything but an open-and-shut case.
Toronto Raptors: Norman Powell
Contract Value: 4 years, $42 million (2021-22 player option)
Welcome to the 287th consecutive season of Norman Powell Breakout Watch.
Injuries and fluctuating play have derailed what was once Toronto’s top prospect. Powell lost his starting job to OG Anunoby last season while missing time with a hip issue, and he was being deployed in eighth- or ninth-man capacity this year before suffering a left-shoulder injury.
Serge Ibaka (two years, $44.9 million) and the currently sidelined Jonas Valanciunas (two years, $44.9 million) might be harder to move in certain instances. But they’re both playing well on shorter-term contracts.
Powell is the bigger wild card. Teams with more gradual timelines will take a stab at grooming a 25-year-old who’s hitting 40.9 percent of his threes, but we’ve seen this movie before. Powell’s offense comes and goes, and reclamation projects are much less attractive when they’re on contracts without an end in sight.
from Viral News Updates https://ift.tt/2LsbV74
0 Comments