With the Pan Am Games right around the corner, Venezuelan point guard Greivis Vasquez has been rather busy with media tours. As one of the premier athletes representing his country in this summer’s competition, Vasquez will be front and center in his NBA home of Toronto.
Which is why this comment a tad awkward. (Here’s a link to the original tweet in Spanish).
Greivis Vasquez in a press conference in Venezuela said the Rockets and the Timberwolves are interested in him, as per @basketvinotinto
— Sportando (@Sportando) June 22, 2015
Vasquez made a number of passive-aggressive comments regarding his role throughout the season, but he was a consummate professional. It’s no great secret that the addition of Lou Williams undercut his responsibilities. Williams nabbed Vasquez’s role as Sixth Man and transformed the look and style of the bench. Vasquez’s numbers tumbled as a result, although some of that is on him as well. He had a down shooting year as compared to 2013-14.
After the season, Vasquez was one of the team’s harshest critics. But he made some excellent points. He said that the team needed to rethink its offense to something with more balance and he told the Toronto media to stop asking about Paul Pierce.
Vasquez is on the books for $6.6 million next season, which is a fair price for the 28-year-old. He’s still a rather serviceable backup guard with the ability to play both 1 and 2, so there’s no reason why Masai Ujiri would want to dump his salary for the sake of cap space. But given his price and production (including some truly, spectacularly awful on-ball defense), expecting a huge return is unrealistic. The Rockets have an obvious need at point guard and the Timberwolves could use some Ricky Rubio insurance, but Vasquez isn’t necessarily valuable enough to fetch significant pieces in return.
However, liquidating Vasquez’s salary will give the Raptors even more cap flexibility this summer. They’re already close to freeing up max cap room and Vasquez’s departure could conceivably bump their cap room to over $24 million (I gotta double check the math there). However, with Lou Williams also drawing significant interest in free agency, having Vasquez doubles as insurance.
Vasquez averages 9.5 points, 3.7 assists and 2.6 rebounds in 24.3 minutes per game last season. He shot 37.9 percent from deep and posted a PER of 12.6.
(dap to Canis Hoopus)
UPDATE: If the Raptors do move Vasquez to the Timberwolves, it’s unlikely that the Raptors will take Anthony Bennett in return, although the salaries do match. Bennett is eminently available, probably because he’s been one of the worst players in basketball since he was drafted.
