NBA Beat: There’s no guarantee
Mike Monroe
For one class of NBA players, Saturday is the most significant date of the entire season.
It is on this date that the contracts of all players still on any team’s roster must be guaranteed for the remainder of the season.
For players in the NBA for the first time — the Spurs’ Anthony Tolliver and Malik Hairston, for example — this is a date that can live in infamy, or in their memory banks for as long as they live.
There are many factors that drive these guarantee-day decisions. Many teams like to have the option that an open roster spot gives them to sign another player at a later time. Waiving a player who isn’t contributing much gives teams already at the league limit of 15 players roster flexibility.
Then there is the economy. More teams are expected to lose money this season than last. Trimming a few hundred thousand here and there puts a smile on the faces of any team’s bean counter.
Most of the players on the nervous list have NBA minimum contracts, but even for rookies, that is $442,114. The minimum for veteran players increases for each season of experience to a maximum of $1,262,275 for players with 10 or more seasons.
Here are some of the non-guaranteed players who figure to be counting down the days to Jan. 10, avoiding eye contact with their respective general managers all the while:
Austin Croshere, Bucks
The 12th pick in the 1997 draft, Croshere (above) has played in only 11 games this season. He has remained in the league for 11-plus seasons because of his shooting ability, but he has made only 40 percent this season. The fact he hasn’t played since Dec. 20 is what really seems to make him vulnerable to being waived before his $1.262 million deal has to be guaranteed. (Even if the Bucks are on the hook for only $797,581, thanks to an obscure rule that applies to veterans with three or more years of service who sign one-year minimum deals).Ñ
Juwan Howard, Bobcats
Howard is the lone remaining member of the fabled Michigan “Fab Five” still hanging around the NBA, but he is taking up the same $797,581 salary cap slot in Charlotte that Croshere occupies in Milwaukee. He has appeared in only six games for a young team Larry Brown is trying to reshape. He got in during garbage time Friday, but didn’t do much. His saving grace could be a great at ude, the sort of thing Brown respects.Ñ
Sean Marks, Hornets
New Zealand’s gift to the NBA was a very popular Spurs teammate during his two seasons in San Antonio, but he has made only 32.6 percent of his shots in just 14 games with the Hornets. For a 7-footer who never has been an interior banger, you have to shoot a higher percentage to stay in the league.
Jake Voskuhl, Raptors
Conventional wisdom holds that marginal 7-footers have longer leashes than shorter players, but Voskuhl may be at the end of his. He has appeared in only six games since signing his one-year minimum deal Dec. 14. Grabbing eight rebounds in the Raptors’ blowout of the Rockets on Friday night increased his average to 2.8.
Josh Powell, Lakers
Powell has been hanging around the fringes for four-plus seasons, but it is no coincidence that the only team for which he ever was a significant contributor was the Clippers. He has played in only 15 of the Lakers’ 31 games, despite the fact they have had more than their share of blowout victories. His $854,957 contract is only partially guaranteed.
Shaun Livingston, Heat
Click on Livingston’s bio page on NBA.com and the photo shows him in a coat and tie. Sadly, his NBA legacy could be as one of the most talented players with a career scuttled by injury. The Heat may want to keep him around, hoping he can improve, but he has appeared in only four games this season. The Heat, who only partially guaranteed his $854,957 deal, may deem him too expensive to keep.
seriously all those teams under the cap will end up getting a bonus of $2m at the end of the season anyway from the NBA due to other teams paying the luxury tax round up altogether and evenly redistributed to teams who manage to stay under the cap as an award.
If cut this is particularly sad since he came out with some much talent. He will be IMHO the poster child of why not to come out early. Physically under developed and therefore unable to handle the rigors of everyday NBA Life. From what I've heard his injury was due more to lack of pjhysical strength and conditioning than just an "injury" though it was one of htose really wierd ones. He was a boy in a man's world unlike LeBron when he came out. That dude was physically mature and ready for the pounding the NBA will give out.
To me, he's the poster child of why players should come out early. He got 4 years guaranteed money, something like $10-$15 million before taxes. Sucks that he got hurt, but that freak accident could have happened in college and he'd have nothing to show for his basketball career.
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