After being let go by the Warriors this offseason, Andrew Bogut may joining the team that helped end his run in Golden State.
ESPN’s Marc Stein said Friday morning that he believes both Bogut and recently waived point guard Deron Williams will sign with the Cavaliers in the coming days.
Marc Stein thinks both Bogut and Deron Williams are going to sign with the Cavs pic.twitter.com/1woqYaCdno
— Jake Montero (@jakemmontero) February 24, 2017
Bogut was traded by the Mavericks to the Sixers on Thursday. The Sixers are believed to be interested in a buyout of Bogut’s contract, something that would make him a free agent, and eligible to sign with any team other than Dallas in the coming days.
Initially it was believed that the Warriors would be ineligible to re-sign Bogut, due to CBA stipulations that restrict a player from rejoining a team that traded him within the same calendar year. A loophole was found by Adrian Wojnarowski and Bobby Marks of The Vertical, however, who discovered that the Warriors actually would be able to sign Bogut, due to the fact that he’s been traded by another team.
Sources: After an NBA review, @BobbyMarks42 interpretation is correct: Golden State is eligible to sign Andrew Bogut as a free agent.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@WojVerticalNBA) February 24, 2017
Whether or not the Warriors want to sign Bogut is a different question entirely, and many, including Stein, believe that Golden State is more interested in adding depth to the backcourt.
“The thing is the Warriors are really looking for guards in the buyout market,” Stein said on LeBatard. “I think they’ll at least weigh it, because they didn’t even think they’d be able to sign him. There’s some funky salary cap rules there that I won’t bore you with…They’re not really looking for another big, they’re looking more for either another point guard or a scoring guard so I think they’ll go the guard route and Bogut will go to Cleveland.”
The Warriors elected not to re-sign Bogut in the offseason in order to sign marquee free agent Kevin Durant. Bogut only played in 21 games with Dallas this season while dealing with a myriad of injuries, averaging 3.0 points, 8.3 rebounds and 1 assist in a little over 22 minutes per game.
Williams was waived by the Mavericks on Thursday due in large part to the emergence of rookie point guard Yogi Ferrell, and has made it known that he intends to sign with the Cavs once he clears waivers. Williams, 32, averaged 13.1 points and 6.9 assists this season but has been limited to 40 games because of injuries.