The NBA Groupon Games: Which Players Are the Next Free-Agent Steals?
1. Bismack Biyombo
I’m leading a movement to relocate the last starving residents of Waiters Island onto the Biyombo Archipelago. Biyombo has earned his punch-line reputation as perhaps the NBA’s least competent offensive player. He has one move: Catch the ball near the rim and dunk.
If he catches the ball too far from the basket, or if a help defender gets in his way, he is helpless:
Click for article and gif
Click for article and gif
Look at the floor an instant before Biyombo launches that hopeless hook: Three teammates are wide open beyond the arc, raising their arms, begging for the ball.
This is sadly indicative of what is perhaps Biyombo’s most damaging limitation: He cannot, or will not, pass. He has 19 assists combined over the last two seasons. He has assisted on fewer than 2 percent of Charlotte’s baskets while on the floor in each of those two seasons, putting him in rare historic territory. Being a finisher first is fine, especially for a range-less big man with hops, but even those types need at least basic NBA passes in their bag for moments when help converges.
Mastering the simple kickout dish could also help Biyombo trim his ugly turnover rate, since he wouldn’t stumble into charging calls, traveling violations, and fumbles.
If a team can teach Biyombo to read the floor just a bit better, he could become something in the NBA. He has already improved in small ways. He doesn’t flat-out drop the ball as much as he used to; his hands have softened from granite to limestone. He is an explosive leaper in traffic and faster than almost every center in the league. He sucks in extra defensive attention on his rolls to the rim, opening up shots for teammates dotting the perimeter:
Click for article and gif
Charlotte sports the league’s saddest rotation of outside shooters, and it’s tempting to imagine how Biyombo might fare for a team that could surround him with more shooting. The Hornets have scored a respectable 102.3 points per 100 possessions when Biyombo shares the floor with Marvin Williams, the only 3-point shooter in Charlotte’s frontcourt rotation, and collapsed whenever Biyombo plays alongside any other big, per NBA.com.
He has hit a career-best 58 percent from the line this season, and he’s a creative screen setter who toggles between laying the wood and darting into the lane before really setting a pick.
Biyombo is a proven rim protector on defense, with the wheels to defend stretchier big men on the perimeter — a rare combination:
Click for article and gif
Opponents hit just 45.6 percent of shots at the basket this season with Biyombo nearby, a stingy mark, and that number was even lower last season — 39.1 percent, the best mark in the league among rotation bigs, per SportVU data.
Biyombo can get a little out of control defending in space, and he’s never going to have a post game or any sort of range. Opponents are free to play small against the Hornets with Biyombo on the floor, since a wing player can guard him without worrying about Biyombo posting up. That’s a real liability, and one that could become more glaring as smart coaches go small at every chance.
But Biyombo is a force at the basket, and he could develop into a threatening pick-and-roll dunk machine. Nabbing Biyombo at $3 million or $4 million per season might turn into a bargain, especially after the cap leaps in 2016-17. That kind of salary is already a team-friendly price for a backup big who can start in a pinch, provided the right kind of personnel is around him.
Even the most plugged-in execs are cautious in projecting contracts for this summer, the last one before the biggest cap jump in league history. Teams and agents will negotiate in a weird netherworld between the projected cap for next season, around $68 million, and the potential $90 million cap coming in 2016-17. The league’s average salary, and perhaps the midlevel exception,2 could jump to $7.5 million or so in just two years. Teams want good contracts now, but agents don’t want to sign contracts that will look silly in 2017.
Could you get Biyombo at $4 million? Most people think so, but no one is sure. The Hornets have to tender Biyombo a one-year, $5.2 million qualifying offer to retain matching rights, and executives are nearly unanimous that Biyombo won’t get that kind of money on the open market.
