The hottest and freshest NBA free agency and trade talk
The Jake Fischer Latest dishes on what to look for next after a wilder-than-anticipated start to the summer marketplace
Free agency was supposed to be the snooziest segment of the NBA offseason.
Yeah, right.
All we saw Tuesday on the first full day of free agent business was:
🏀 Milwaukee coming from nowhere to convince Myles Turner to leave Indiana when the entire NBA was anticipating his return to the Pacers.
🏀 The Bucks abruptly waiving-and-stretching the contract of Damian Lillard — on the first day of Lillard's original two-year, $122 million extension signed with Portland — to create much of the needed financial flexibility to commit $107 million over the next four seasons to Turner.
🏀 Memphis announcing that Jaren Jackson Jr. has sustained a turf toe injury that, in the best-case scenario, will sideline him for only three months. The injury bulletin was issued 24 hours and change after the Grizzlies essentially opened the marketplace by committing to a five-year, $240 million contract extension with Triple J via renegotiation-and-extension.
🏀 Then we got word Tuesday night that the legendary Red Panda fell from her unicycle and sustained a left wrist injury at halftime of an Indiana/Minnesota WNBA Commissioner's Cup title game that was already missing the injured Caitlin Clark. (My 2019 profile on the legendary halftime performer still ranks as the story I'm most proud of for the entirety of my career.)
Let's proceed to the latest from my notebook on restricted free agents like Golden State's Jonathan Kuminga and Josh Giddey, dish some updates on a number of big men in the news — naturally including Deandre Ayton — and not only attempt to project what happens next but reveal some behind-the-scenes machinations involved in the business that has already been completed:
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