National Basketball Association

Roundtable: Five takeaways from free agency

Published Jul. 10, 2015 4:45 p.m. ET

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Our NBA correspondents — D.J. Foster, Fred Katz, Andrew Lynch, Michael Pina, Jordan White and John Wilmes — react to all of the free agency madness that has transpired over the last 10 days.

D.J. Foster: The San Antonio Spurs. It seems like we've discussed the possibility of a major free agent joining San Antonio's veteran core for years, and it finally happened. LaMarcus Aldridge extends the Spurs' title window, and he should form a scary one-two punch with Kawhi Leonard for years to come. Add on David West signing for the minimum, and it's hard to argue the case for any other team having a better offseason.

Fred Katz: The Spurs. Obviously. How could anyone believe anything else? San Antonio retained Danny Green for a discounted price. It did the same for Manu Ginobili. It will do the same for Tim Duncan. And, oh yeah, it also signed a top-five power forward in LaMarcus Aldridge and somehow got West to take a minimum deal after turning down a $12.6 million option. The Spurs are a machine.

Andrew Lynch: The Spurs. They got Aldridge, and that's going to be awesome. West will look good in black and silver. Ending the Tiago Splitter experiment before more good money was thrown after bad was a win, too. But it's the Spurs' own free agents that make this an easy win. Tim Duncan is back. Manu Ginobili is back. Gregg Popovich gets to play the "We lost because we made mistakes" card again. It's good to be the Spurs.

Michael Pina: San Antonio locked up Leonard and Danny Green (with great contracts), lured four-time All-Star Aldridge from Portland, convinced West to sign a minimum level contract after he turned down $12 million and brought back Tim Duncan and Manu Ginobili for at least one more title run. They lost Marco Belinelli, Tiago Splitter, Aron Baynes and Cory Joseph to other teams, but the cost is perfectly justifiable. On paper, the Spurs are now the favorite to win it all in 2016.

Jordan White: Hands down, the Spurs, and not because they won the Aldridge sweepstakes. They also got West for the veteran's minimum and re-signed Green at an incredible bargain.

John Wilmes: The Spurs. They've built something principled, strong and cohesive over two decades — basketball foundation so good that it didn't need to be sexy or have free-agent appeal. An irony has begun to kick in, though, and their stolid, stoic, workmanlike ways have become something of great allure. Swapping Splitter, Joseph and Baynes for Aldridge and West (at a mega-bargain that allows them to avoid onerous luxury tax amounts) makes them clear favorites for the title next year and beyond.

Foster: The Kings. Trading last year's first-round pick (Nik Stauskas), a 2018 first-round pick and giving Philadelphia the right to swap first-rounders for two years just to clear cap space in order to sign a toxic player no other team wanted to touch in Rajon Rondo? That's mortgaging the future to top out at mediocrity, maybe. The Kings stayed the Kings.

Katz: The Mavericks. Is there any other answer? It's not Dallas' fault, but the Mavs committed to DeAndre Jordan, and once he bailed, the market was too thin for the team to look anywhere else. When Zaza Pachulia is your consolation prize, you have a problem. And when you spike up a deal to Wes Matthews, who's coming off an Achilles tear, just because another free agent left you hanging, you're only adding to the problems.

Lynch: The Portland Trail Blazers. Technically, it stretches to the Nicolas Batum trade to the Charlotte Hornets, which was the harbinger of this summer's misery. Sometimes, the NBA is as simple as a zero-sum game, and San Antonio's gain is Portland's loss. Matthews' recovery from a torn Achilles is no sure thing, but his loss to the Mavericks hurts, too. Oh, and in case you missed it, Robin Lopez is on his way to play for the Knicks. This is Damian Lillard's team now, but it could be a while before it's Lillard's title contender.

Pina: The Mavericks went base jumping without a parachute. After believing they had Jordan locked up for the next four years — a seven-foot bridge to the franchise's post-Nowitzki era — Dallas got screwed in the worst way possible when Jordan slapped them with a painful #WellActually and decided to stay in L.A. Mark Cuban's plans in the short- and long-term revolved around Jordan, and they are crushed. The Mavericks owe the Boston Celtics a 2016 first-round pick that's top-7 protected, too, and since Dallas isn't good enough to make the playoffs, it might as well hit the reset button. Jordan not only had the Mavs penciled into the playoff picture but also gave them a legitimate shot at Kevin Durant next summer. Neither will happen now.

White: The Los Angeles Lakers. While they rebounded nicely, signing Brandon Bass and Lou Williams and trading for Roy Hibbert, that does little to wash out the bad taste of their big-time flops with the likes of Aldridge and Greg Monroe. The Lakers' prestige apparently isn't what it used to be. Runner-up: The Sacramento Kings, where no one wants to go.

Wilmes: The Lakers whiffed on big names and subsequently threw money at what was merely still available. Hibbert, Williams and Brandon Bass do not a contender make, and the latter two will eat into future cap space the team should be preserving for a much more impressive class, next summer, which includes Durant. L.A. seems still hitched to Kobe's wagon as they struggle in vain to put a competent roster around him as he decays, and if they don't start cutting the cord soon, they'll be stuck with financial decisions they made to support his glory until well after injuries force him to retire.

Foster: There were a lot of good veteran bargains (West and Mike Dunleavy, in particular), but I thought the Rockets got the best value on a player about to enter his prime with the Patrick Beverley deal (4 years, $23 million). Beverley will never be a star, but he's one of the league's best on-ball defenders and he's the type of low usage, spot-up three point threat the Rockets need next to James Harden.

Katz: West. The 12-year vet is hardly the best player to change teams, but he is the best one to do it on a minimum deal. He may not be what he once was when he was an All-Star-caliber power forward in New Orleans and the early years in Indiana, but he still has all those Spursian traits — screening, mid-range shooting, physicality — which will fit into Popovich's schemes seamlessly.

Lynch: West. It's tough to find a bigger bargain than a player turning down over $11 million to play for the minimum. West won't get a ton of minutes — no Spur does, after all — but San Antonio will make the most of him, because that's what the Spurs do. If teams will try to emulate the Warriors next season and switch more on defense, a player who can do work from the post is once again a valuable asset to have on the roster. West fills that niche and more.

Pina: The Toronto Raptors signed Bismack Biyombo to a two-year, $6 million contract that every team in the league should be extremely jealous of. He's 22 years old and already one of the world's best shot blockers — $3 million per year for an athletic backup center with high upside is an absolute steal.

White: I'll go again with Green. An elite 3-point threat, a terrific defender and top-level role player (that is not a slight in the least bit) that could have commanded a DeMarre Carroll or Reggie Jackson-type contract.

Wilmes: Dunleavy. The Chicago Bulls' starting small forward was the secret ingredient to their lineups last year, and the team played their worst ball of the season while he was injured. At three years and roughly $14.5 million, he's a steal. The Bulls are lucky that he values what they provide and offers them such a discount, because their sloppy divorce from coach Tom Thibodeau suggested a murky future for their dealings with NBA talent. Dunleavy's contract is one blessing their capologists will be happy to count.

Foster: Aside from Sacramento's trade with Philly, the New Orleans Pelicans spending a combined $80 million on Omer Asik and Alexis Ajinca stands out. With the way the league is trending, Anthony Davis can and probably should play center in a pace-and-space offense similar to what new head coach Alvin Gentry ran with the Warriors. Asik is a great defender, but his complete inability to catch and finish around the rim or spread the floor makes him a liability more often than not. These signings might have made sense in the old NBA, but not now.

Katz: It pains me to say it, because he's in the first tier of Most Likable NBA Players, but Matthews signing a four-year, $70 million deal with the Mavericks could be a regrettable decision. If Matthews is healthy, this contract is understandable. But Matthews is coming off a torn Achilles, one of the toughest — if not the single toughest — injuries to come back from. If he's not what he used to be once returning or his body starts to fail him as a result of the injury, Dallas could be upset it ended up ponying up four years and all those dollars.

Lynch: Rondo signing with the Sacramento Kings. I said it in the free agency roundtable, and I'll say it again: Giving Rondo anything close to $10 million a year is bad use of cap space in today's NBA. He can't shoot, and he's terrified of drawing free throws, because he can't shoot those, either. So let's give him $9.5 million? There will be a honeymoon period where Rondo throws picturesque entry passes to DeMarcus Cousins. It will fade. And things will get bleak after that.

Pina: The Sacramento Kings gave the Philadelphia 76ers Stauskas, a top-10 protected first-round pick and swap rights on two future first-round picks so they could unload Jason Thompson and Carl Landry's contracts, open up some cap space and have the mere possibility of adding a legitimately good free agent or two. What did the Kings do? They signed Rondo and Marco Belinelli and were publicly humiliated by Matthews and Monta Ellis, who both reportedly spurned larger offers from Sacramento for contracts with the Mavericks and the Indiana Pacers, respectively. This might be the most hilariously lopsided trade of the last five years.

White: Reggie Jackson's $80 million deal. Jackson is fine, pretty good. Does a good (and not that good) three months mean he's a starting point guard? And what of Brandon Jennings? The Pistons say they can play with each other, but seeing as how each player prefers to have the ball in their hands the majority of the time, they may not be able to play together well.

Wilmes: I'm much less impressed by the Milwaukee Bucks' acquisition of Monroe than most. Monroe will essentially displace John Henson in the front court. This might sound good if you're one of the many people who've never heard of Henson, but Monroe is older, far more expensive and a markedly worse rim-protector. It seems Jason Kidd has been pulling the Bucks' personnel strings, and he's on a bad streak with them. First, he sent Brandon Knight off for Michael Carter-Williams, and now he's overpaying for a caliber of center he arguably could have developed internally as head coach. We might have the next Doc Rivers on our hands, as Kidd appears to be getting in his own way, handling the market with more of an eye to reputation than proper attention and analysis.

Foster: Home is where the heart is. Aldridge went back to Texas, Paul Pierce returned to Los Angeles, and Jordan almost went back to his home state as well. That's two years in a row the title chase has been heavily impacted by a free agent returning to their roots (hey, LeBron) and it's certainly something to keep in mind with Durant's free agency on the horizon next year.

Katz: Everything we thought we knew about the offseason is wrong. Role players are worth $12 million a year. Big names like Aldridge and Monroe want to go to small markets like San Antonio and Milwaukee. The Knicks are operating like an intelligent, calculating organization trying to rebuild. What the heck is happening to the league?

Lynch: Security matters. The possibility of elite players taking short deals or opting into final years of contracts was one of the major storylines heading into free agency. Other than Dwyane Wade's one-year deal, the league's stars chose long deals and the guaranteed money. The notion of the incoming TV money is alluring, but there's also a potential lockout on the horizon, and injuries are always a concern. It might cost a few players in the long run, but can you really blame someone for taking $100+ million?

Pina: In a bit of a shocker, no stars (except LeBron) were willing to gamble on themselves, take a short-term contract and re-enter free agency over the next two years. Doing so would've allowed a much higher payday because the salary cap is about to explode. But everyone from Jimmy Butler and Leonard to Jordan, Aldridge and Kevin Love were instead satisfied taking long-term max contracts now. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

White: The opportunity to win, the stability of the front office, the culture, and the overall structure of a franchise means more than the size of the market.

Wilmes: That it's a players' market. The cap will continue to rise next season, and eager general managers will throw more money at talent. A favorable television deal, a players' union that's suddenly prickly and a lot of desperate executives make for the best financial climate that pro ballers have seen.