Minnesota Sports Forum

longstrangetrip wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

bleedspeed177 wrote:http://www.foxsports.com/north/story/minnesota-timberwolves-amile-jefferson-melo-trimble-091817

Thibs cheated...neither of these guys were on the list to vote for!

Kind of a big yawn...gotta hope neither of these sees the floor after we get back from China. Zgoda reported that Cunningham would make his decision before today, so I assume he told Thibs he was going elsewhere.

These were deals that were reported weeks ago. They probably just made them official now so that likely has nothing to do with any of the other FAs we may or may not get.

Thx for that, monster...I do remember some discussion about Trimble a few weeks ago.

I count 16 bodies on the roster now (ESPN shows 17, but they have not yet removed Rush). Under the new 2-way contract rules, do we still have room for 2 more contracts, or are we now filled up?

If I remember correctly you can have 20 total guys signed for training camp and that was before 2-way contracts so I don't know if those guys would count towards that number. Either way they have plenty of room to sign a couple more guys. I think Bazz gives them 12 guaranteed salary guys. I was under the impression that MGH had a decent amount guanateed (like 275k) but I'm not sure. It's been reported that he had better offers so I have made the assumption he is a legit possibility to make the roster not just the camp fodder long shot type.

Amile Jefferson seems like a guy that could turn into the next Costello type of player (how exciting! Lol) where he really impresses in lower levels in terms of productivity. By all accounts he is absolutely a team first guy and does a lot of the dirty work. It sounds like he actually has some decent old school post game so he might be able to make some teams pay for guarding him with a some smaller players. My guess he ends up in Iowa either as an affiliate player or gets a 2 way contract. Once teams make cuts there will be a flood of possible options for those last few 2-way deals. This site says there are only 15 of those spots left although you could see a team being really impressed with a guy and giving him an NBA roster spot if they have one.

https://2ways10days.com/nba-two-way-contract-tracker-c8d2dffe7be7

I'm still confused. My understanding is teams can have 15 signed players plus 2 2-ways. Basketball-reference says we have 14 signed players:
https://www.basketball-reference.com/contracts/MIN.html

I think we also have just one 2-way contract, so doesn't that mean we have just one more full roster spot plus one 2-way? So, if Cunningham says yes today, I think we would be done (except for one more 2-way), right? I understand we can sign some camp bodies too, but it looks to me like we have only room for one more player on the regular roster.

I'm pretty positive you can have 20 people signed through camp and then it needs to be brought down to 15 players then 2 two way contacts (17 total)

Teague
Tyus
Trimble
Butler
Crawford
Wiggins
Bazz
MGH
Brown (2 way)
Gibson
Dieng
Belly
Jefferson
Towns
Patton
Aldrich

So currently we have 16 signed for camp, so 4 more players can be signed for camp. Probably Cunningham, A Pg, two way contact and random body

kekgeek1 wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

monsterpile wrote:

longstrangetrip wrote:

bleedspeed177 wrote:http://www.foxsports.com/north/story/minnesota-timberwolves-amile-jefferson-melo-trimble-091817

Thibs cheated...neither of these guys were on the list to vote for!

Kind of a big yawn...gotta hope neither of these sees the floor after we get back from China. Zgoda reported that Cunningham would make his decision before today, so I assume he told Thibs he was going elsewhere.

These were deals that were reported weeks ago. They probably just made them official now so that likely has nothing to do with any of the other FAs we may or may not get.

Thx for that, monster...I do remember some discussion about Trimble a few weeks ago.

I count 16 bodies on the roster now (ESPN shows 17, but they have not yet removed Rush). Under the new 2-way contract rules, do we still have room for 2 more contracts, or are we now filled up?

If I remember correctly you can have 20 total guys signed for training camp and that was before 2-way contracts so I don't know if those guys would count towards that number. Either way they have plenty of room to sign a couple more guys. I think Bazz gives them 12 guaranteed salary guys. I was under the impression that MGH had a decent amount guanateed (like 275k) but I'm not sure. It's been reported that he had better offers so I have made the assumption he is a legit possibility to make the roster not just the camp fodder long shot type.

Amile Jefferson seems like a guy that could turn into the next Costello type of player (how exciting! Lol) where he really impresses in lower levels in terms of productivity. By all accounts he is absolutely a team first guy and does a lot of the dirty work. It sounds like he actually has some decent old school post game so he might be able to make some teams pay for guarding him with a some smaller players. My guess he ends up in Iowa either as an affiliate player or gets a 2 way contract. Once teams make cuts there will be a flood of possible options for those last few 2-way deals. This site says there are only 15 of those spots left although you could see a team being really impressed with a guy and giving him an NBA roster spot if they have one.

https://2ways10days.com/nba-two-way-contract-tracker-c8d2dffe7be7

I'm still confused. My understanding is teams can have 15 signed players plus 2 2-ways. Basketball-reference says we have 14 signed players:
https://www.basketball-reference.com/contracts/MIN.html

I think we also have just one 2-way contract, so doesn't that mean we have just one more full roster spot plus one 2-way? So, if Cunningham says yes today, I think we would be done (except for one more 2-way), right? I understand we can sign some camp bodies too, but it looks to me like we have only room for one more player on the regular roster.

I'm pretty positive you can have 20 people signed through camp and then it needs to be brought down to 15 players then 2 two way contacts (17 total)

Teague
Tyus
Trimble
Butler
Crawford
Wiggins
Bazz
MGH
Brown (2 way)
Gibson
Dieng
Belly
Jefferson
Towns
Patton
Aldrich

So currently we have 16 signed for camp, so 4 more players can be signed for camp. Probably Cunningham, A Pg, two way contact and random body

Whoops...I forgot Muhammad, because my site hasn't updated for him yet.

Let me see if my understanding is correct. It seems like there are four types of contracts:

2-way: Brown
Unguaranteed: MGH
Partially guaranteed: Trimble, Jefferson
Guaranteed: 13 players

So, here are my questions:

1) Are you allowed to have 15 fully guaranteed contracts plus 2 2-ways once the season starts?

2) Are partially guaranteed and unguaranteed contracts exactly the same for purposes of roster construction...i.e. neither one counts toward the 15 allowable players on the roster?

If the answer to both my questions is "yes", then we indeed do still have room for 2 more guaranteed contracts and 1 more 2-way contract. But if the partially guaranteed contracts count toward the 15, then we are done signing players this year. Sorry about my lack of knowledge in this area.

Guaranteed, partially guaranteed and un-guaranteed all count towards your allowed number of contracts. What you are struggling with is that you are allowed to have more than 15 contracts in the offseason. You only have to get down to 15 shortly before the season begins. Which is why you frequently see these unknown players signed for the sole purpose of being training camp fodder.

You can even have more than 15 guaranteed contracts during this time frame. It just means you need to trade some of them, or eat the cost by waiving them, to get down to 15 before the season begins.

Thanks, Tim...I get it. It sounds like what the Wolves do in the next few days will signal what they think about MGH, Trimble and Jefferson. If they are successful in signing Cunningham (all reports say they may hear today) and one other player, that will tell me that they never thought of those three as any more than camp fodder. What confused me was the partially guaranteed nature of Trimble and Jefferson;s contracts. But now that I know they can be cut at any time, I understand how we have two more slots available in our 15.

Well, there goes Cunningham to New Orleans. Who's got next?!?

60WinTim wrote:Well, there goes Cunningham to New Orleans. Who's got next?!?

Not surprising. He'll start there now that Solomon Hill is injured.

That team could be terrible . . . or interesting.

Davis and Cousins are both so crazy talented, but it just doesn't seem like a good fit.

And signing Rondo and moving Holiday to the 2 . . . I just don't get it.

But they got the two last guys a lot of us wanted, Tony Allen and now Cunningham. Other than that, they have absolutely no depth though.

Damn, I was really hoping to get one of those two guys, Allen or Cunningham.

SameOldNudityDrew wrote:Damn, I was really hoping to get one of those two guys, Allen or Cunningham.

NO got them both but they had more need than anyone. They had basically nobody. Its kinda sad it was so hard for them to get those guys. You would have thought it was the Wolves type of a franchise with the Pels having to reel in guys with plenty of playing time available. They lucked out but that team is still cobbled together.

longstrangetrip wrote:Thanks, Tim...I get it. It sounds like what the Wolves do in the next few days will signal what they think about MGH, Trimble and Jefferson. If they are successful in signing Cunningham (all reports say they may hear today) and one other player, that will tell me that they never thought of those three as any more than camp fodder. What confused me was the partially guaranteed nature of Trimble and Jefferson;s contracts. But now that I know they can be cut at any time, I understand how we have two more slots available in our 15.

I don't think adding a Player of Dante's ability means anything about those guys. Dante is likely a legit NBA rotation player for a good team and was one of the best remaining FAs available.

Tim did a good job getting you through all that. Its complicated although nothing like all the crazy contracts and stuff of the NFL. lol

A couple more things consider. (ok it was more than that I got carried away)

MGH I has a partially guaranteed in contract in that if he stays on the roster he has part of his deal guaranteed till January. I would be pretty surprised if he didn't get some money up front like $50,000 or something also.

I believe $50,000 is the most you can guarantee a player and then waive him and have him back as an affiliate player on a G-league roster. That also applies to a player you bring to training camp and want to offer a 2-way deal. This isn't really that big of a deal for the affiliate players* as other teams can still come in and sign those players but its still a nice way to start building your G-league roster and you can also have the possibility of an NBA roster spot for them or a 2-way contact if you have one available.

* It looks like you can have as many as 4 affiliate players but being able to assign that many out of training camp depends on how many qualifying players you can sign.

Which brings us to the 20 man roster limit. The 2 way contract guys count toward the 20 player limit.

So lets say you want to bring in some somewhat promising players like Melo Trimble and Amile Jefferson what are some options considerations?

Sign them to an NBA contract straight up for $865,000 or whatever. You could also do a partially guaranteed deal that you can cut them and only owe them part of the deal if you cut them by January or whatever. You can sign them to $50,000 or less guaranteed and that means you can send them to the G-league as an affiliate player to help your club down there. Or they suck and you find someone better. A 2-way deal is another option. Lets say Melo Trimble was interested in one, but maybe you have some ideas of another guy. One benefit for Melo is if you guarantee him $50,000 to come to camp and then you sign him to a 2-way deal after camp he just earned an extra $50,000 (or whatever number it was at or below $50,000). Nifty. So both the player and the team could benefit by waiting.

Another fun thing someone brought up on Twitter is because Bazz is playing on a 1 year deal and the Wolves have his Bird rights he actually has give consent to be traded this season in addition to him having a 15% trade kicker. That's not a negotiation its just something that's in the CBA. It looks like if he did agree to a trade his bird rights would not go to the team he was traded to which likely would not be a good thing for him. A matched RFA also gets that right to decline a trade for the first year of their contract.

So we didn't get Dante, no big deal. Looking forward to training camp so we actually have something interesting to talk about.