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Kemba Walker, Pistons finalizing contract buyout

HoopsHype
·4 min read
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Adrian Wojnarowski: Four-time All-Star guard Kemba Walker and the Detroit Pistons are finalizing a contract buyout, sources tell ESPN. Once Walker clears waivers, he’ll join free agency.
Source: Twitter @wojespn

What’s the buzz on Twitter?

Emiliano Carchia @Sportando
Kemba Walker, Pistons finalizing contract buyout sportando.basketball/en/kemba-walke… – 9:08 AM

Adrian Wojnarowski @wojespn
Four-time All-Star guard Kemba Walker and the Detroit Pistons are finalizing a contract buyout, sources tell ESPN. Once Walker clears waivers, he’ll join free agency. – 9:00 AM

Tommy Beer @TommyBeer
The wild part about the Burks/Noel trade is that it means NY may not have needed to dump Kemba.
By trading Burks and Noel and waiving Taj, NY would have been right at around $25 million cap space.
I’m that scenario, they could have kept the 13th pick and/or second rounders, etc – 10:40 PM

Omari Sanfoka II @omarisankofa
The Pistons have become significantly more asset-rich during the last week, thanks to the Knicks. A first (Jalen Duren), two seconds and two good role players in Alec Burks and Nerlens Noel (and Kemba Walker, who will be bought out). – 10:07 PM

Fred Katz @FredKatz
A lot of talk that moving Noel could take a first-rounder attached, especially after the Knicks used the No. 13 pick to move Kemba Walker last week. Ended up being two second-rounders attached to Noel and Burks. – 10:02 PM

Fred Katz @FredKatz
There was lots of talk for the past few weeks of the Knicks trying to move two of Kemba Walker, Alec Burks and Nerlens Noel. They could open up in the realm of $25M of room that way. Turns out, they moved all three and the 11th pick for no salary back. More than $30M in room now. – 9:58 PM

Keith Smith @KeithSmithNBA
That is a whole lot of money unloaded by the Knicks. Over $28M between Alec Burks, Nerlens Noel & Kemba Walker.
Detroit is eating up a lot of their available cap space, but it’s always possible they re-flip Burks or Noel to someone else.
This is gonna be a large deal when done. – 9:57 PM

John Hollinger @johnhollinger
Knicks also could operate as “over cap team” and retain full non-taxpayer MLE if Kemba, Burks, Noel lumped into one big 3-way sign-and-trade with Dallas for Brunson. Looks like Knicks could even start Brunson at $24.25M or less and generate a $9.2M TPE for Kemba. – 9:49 PM

Keith Smith @KeithSmithNBA
Things I am keeping an eye on:
-The Jerami Grant to POR from DET trade has not completed yet.
-The Kemba Walker to DET from NYK trade has not completed yet.
Neither are in danger of not happening, but makes me wonder if either deal could be expanding. Something to watch. – 9:47 AM

More on this storyline

 

Sources say that New York’s ability during Thursday night’s NBA Draft to offload Kemba Walker’s $9.2 million salary for next season, coupled with a growing belief that it can shed further salary to expand its offer when the marketplace officially opens next Thursday, has established the Knicks as a very credible threat to bring Brunson to Gotham. One source close to the process described that threat as “very, very, very real.” -via marcstein.substack.com / June 24, 2022

Keith Smith: Fun cap nerd trade mechanic stuff: -DET created a TPE for Jerami Grant of $20,002,500 by trading him into POR TPE for CJ McCollum -DET then acquired Kemba Walker using $8,729,020 of the new Grant TPE -NYK created a TPE for Walker, but both TPEs will go way for cap space on 7/1 -via Twitter @KeithSmithNBA / June 24, 2022

The Pistons, searching for a way to get back into the lottery, used the Knicks’ troublesome financial situation against them. New York has made it no secret that it would like to pursue Dallas guard Jalen Brunson in free agency, but needed to shed some salary in order to make a legit run, making Detroit the perfect trade partner. After failing in their attempt to pry away Ivey from Detroit, the Knicks pivoted. They used the No. 11 pick (Ousmane Dieng) to acquire three first-round picks from the Thunder. New York turned around and used draft capital to acquire Duren from the Hornets, who took the big man 13th overall. Then, the Pistons and Knicks agreed on a deal that landed Detroit its coveted target in Duren and had the Pistons happily take on the remaining $9 million on Kemba Walker’s contract. Per sources, Detroit will buy out the veteran point guard. -via The Athletic / June 24, 2022