July 5 free agency open thread

Kyle Lowry is returning on a 3-year, $100-million deal – reaction

Serge Ibaka re-signs on 3-year, $65-million deal – reaction

P.J. Tucker signs with Houston on 4-year, $32-million deal – reaction

Patrick Patterson signs with Oklahoma City on 3-year, $16.4-million deal – reaction

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The Toronto Raptors’ four unrestricted free agents have found homes. Two are back, two are outbound, and the Raptors will now look to find a 15th man to help making up for some of the lost versatility and defense. Or they won’t, yet. They still need to shed salary unless they plan on spending well into the luxury tax for a team that doesn’t figure to go further than the second or third round of the playoffs. They’ve said they’ll spend into the tax, but doing so exorbitantly would seem unlikely. The hard part about their situation is that it makes it difficult to go looking for targets while we wait, because until the salary-shedding shoe drops, we don’t know if they’ll be operating with just the veteran minimum, with a taxpayer mid-level, or maybe even the non-taxpayer mid-level. The trade domino is the big one, but who knows if it’s happening?

And so we wait. And update with anything that comes in throughout the day.

As for how to pass the time, I will try this starspins free game, after asking how to choose the best no deposit slot?

Resources & Required Reading

If you haven’t yet, go and read my free agency primer, which goes into a lot of the details about the Raptors’ cap situations and what they can and can’t do. Some other links:

Contextualizing earlier reports of Kyle Lowry’s dissatisfaction
The “right” direction for the Raptors is a matter of perspective, and nobody is really wrong in wanting one path over another
A salary cap Q&A as a follow-up to my primer
The Raptors can find ways to shed salary, but they might be hard to stomach
An explainer on the new two-way contracts and how the Raptors might use them
The Raptors probably won’t be big free agent players, but just in case, some interesting names on the market and a look at Masai Ujiri’s free agent track record

As a quick refresher, this is what the Raptors’ cap sheet looks at right this second, based on the assumption that Ibaka’s deal is completely back-loaded and that Lowry’s deal contains $100 million in back-loaded cap hit:

If Lowry’s cap number only comes in at $90 million over three years and is completely back-loaded, his cap hit for this year could drop by about $3.09 million, which would be a pretty enormous deal. They’d still need to dump salary, but they’d be within one big contract of getting under the tax line. We probably won’t know for sure until the moratorium ends on July 6.

(Notes: I’m displaying this just a little different from yesterday. I’m also excluding De Colo/Thompson from the tax number since their cap holds won’t count but do effect the salary cap. VanVleet has a higher tax number than cap number, too [equal to Powell’s].)

To help calibrate with the new CBA and rise in cap, here’s a chart containing all of the maximums and exception amounts, based on the new $99,093,000-million salary cap (note that for the minimum salaries, those deals can run longer if cap space is used, but they max out at two years if a team is using the minimum player salary exception):

Here are a few other very useful resources:

Raptors rumors

A reminder: There is a ton of information to sort through this time of year. Some of it will be legitimate, some of it will be misinformation. Always consider the source, their track record, and why a player/agent/team may want information out in the world.

Wednesday

Nothing. Like, less than nothing.

Where things stand – End of Tuesday

Kyle Lowry is back on a three-year deal worth a reported $100 million. Bruce Arthur reports that only $90 million of that is guaranteed, but we’ll have to wait to see the contract breakdown before adjusting his cap number, in case the non-guaranteed portion is built into likely bonuses.
Serge Ibaka is also back, on a three-year, $65-million deal.
P.J. Tucker has signed with the Rockets. It hurts.
Patrick Patterson is headed to OKC on a three-year deal. I wrote about it more here.
The Raptors were once in on Amir Johnson but he signed in Philly.
Toronto is trying to shed salary to lessen their tax hit and improve flexibility. There’s nothing imminent there. Indiana signing Darren Collison likely ended any chance of Cory Joseph being flipped there.

Reported agreements/close – Wednesday

The following deals have either been reported as done or in the finalization stages. Until noon on July 6, nothing is absolutely locked in (remember DeAndre Jordan?), but if it’s on this list, it’s done per a reporter on the trusted list.

Dion Waiters, Heat, 4 years, $52M (Adrian Wojnarowski/Michael Scotto)
Nick Young, Warriors, 1 year, $5.2M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Indiana waived Monta Ellis (Shams Charania)

Reported agreements/close – Earlier

Steph Curry, Warriors, 5 years, $201M (Shams Charania)
Blake Griffin, Clippers, 5 years, $175M (Sam Amick)
Gordon Hayward, Celtics, 4 years, $128M (Gordon Hayward/Shams Charania)
Jrue Holiday, Pelicans, 5 years, $126M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Otto Porter, Nets, 4 years, $104M (Offer sheet) (Shams Charania)
Kyle Lowry, Raptors, 3 years, $100M (Michael Scotto)
Paul Millsap, Nuggets, 3 years, $90M (Shams Charania)
Serge Ibaka, Raptors, 3 years, $65M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Danilo Gallinari, Clippers, 3 years, $65M (Adrian Wojnarowski (3-team sign-and-trade)
Jeff Teague, Timberwolves, 3 years, $57M (Marc Stein)
George Hill, Kings, 3 years, $57M (Shams Charania)
Kevin Durant, Warriors, 2 years, $53M (Marcus Thompson)
Joe Ingles, Jazz, 4 years, $52M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Patty Mills, Spurs, 4 years, $50M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Andre Iguodala, Warriors, 3 years, $48M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Tony Snell, Bucks, 4 years, $46M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Cristiano Felicio, Bulls, 4 years, $32M (Shams Charania)
PJ Tucker, Rockets, 4 years, $32M (Shams Charania)
Taj Gibson, Timberwolves, 2 years, $28M (Shams Charania)
Zach Randolph, Kings, 2 years, $24M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Shaun Livingston, Warriors, 3 years, $24M (Chris Haynes)
JJ Redick, 76ers, 1 year, $23M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Kyle Korver, Cavaliers, 3 years, $22M (Shams Charania)
Langston Galloway, Pistons, 3 years, $21M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Darren Collison, Pacers, 2 years, $20M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Patrick Patterson, Thunder, 3 years, $16.4M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Amir Johnson, 76ers, 1 year, $11M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Nene, Rockets, 3 years, $11M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Ben McLemore, Grizzlies, 2 years, $10.7M (Chris Haynes)
Justin Holiday, Bulls, 2 years, $9M (Shams Charania)
Jodie Meeks, Wizards, 2 years, $7M (Shams Charania)
Michael Carter-Williams, Hornets, 1 year, $2.7M (Rick Bonnell)
Wayne Selden, Grizzlies, 2 years, TBD (Michael Scotto)
Daniel Theis, Celtics, 2 years, TBD (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Jose Calderon, Cavaliers, 1 year, $2.3M (Jeff Zilgitt)
David West, Warriors, 1 year, $2.3M (David Aldridge)
Omri Casspi, Warriors, 1 year, $2.1M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Mike Scott, Wizards, 1 year, $1.7M (Adrian Wojnarowski)
Ron Baker, Knicks, TBD, TBD (Ron Baker on Twitter)

Trades

The Nuggets sign-and-trade Danilo Gallinari to the Clippers, Atlanta receives Jamal Crawford, Diamond Stone, and a first-round pick, and Denver gets a second-round pick.
The Pacers are trading Paul George to the Thunder for Victor Oladipo and Domantas Sabonis. Seriously. (Ramona Shelburne first)
The Wolves are trading Ricky Rubio to Utah for a first-round pick. (A whole mess of people at once)