NBA Rumors Round-Up
NBA Rumors: Duncan Considered Retirement
Jeff Hawkins is an award-winning sportswriter with more than four decades in the industry (print and digital media). A freelance writer/stay-at-home dad since 2008, Hawkins started his career with newspaper stints in Michigan, North Carolina, Florida, Upstate New York and Illinois, where he earned the 2004 APSE first-place award for column writing (under 40,000 circulation). As a beat writer, he covered NASCAR Winston Cup events at NHIS (1999-2003), the NHL's Chicago Blackhawks (2003-06) and the NFL's Carolina Panthers (2011-12). Hawkins penned four youth sports books, including a Michael Jordan biography. Hawkins' main hobbies include mountain bike riding, 5k trail runs at the Whitewater Center in Charlotte, N.C., and live music.
All posts by Jeff HawkinsUpdated27 Oct 2023
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“There was some hesitation there,” Duncan admitted.
In the end, Duncan’s rationale was simple: An NBA career can only go on for so long, and he didn’t want to tempt the regret of leaving a season on the table.
“It came down to, I’m not going to be able to do this again,” Duncan said Friday, at his 18th annual Spurs media day. “So as long as I’m feeling I can (play), and I feel good about it, this is where I want to be.”
At the San Antonio Spurs’ media day, Tim Duncan admitted that he seriously considered retirement this past offseason. He wrestled with the decision for nine days until ultimately deciding to opt in to the final year of his contract just before the deadline to do so.
It’s very possible that this will be the final year of Duncan’s career, which is unfortunate since he’s one of the best players in NBA history. Over the course of his 17-year career, Duncan has been dominant. Not only has he won five championships, he has never even missed the playoffs.
He also has three Finals MVP awards, two NBA MVP awards, 14 All-Star selections, 10 All-NBA First Team selections, eight All-Defensive First Team selections and many other individual honors.
Duncan has averaged 19.9 points, 11.1 rebounds and 2.2 blocks throughout his career.
Last season, Duncan showed that he could still be an elite post presence at 38 years old, averaging 15.1 points, 9.7 rebounds and 1.9 blocks. This year, he will once again be a huge contributor for the Spurs, in what may be his farewell tour.
The New Orleans Pelicans announced today that guard Tyreke Evans is expected to miss 3-5 weeks with a strained right hamstring.
The New Orleans Pelicans dealt with a ton of injuries to core players last season, and this isn’t how they wanted to start their 2014-15 campaign.
Last year, Anthony Davis, Ryan Anderson, Eric Gordon, Jrue Holiday, Tyreke Evans and Jason Smith missed a combined 202 games and the team was never really able to play at full strength.
“Tyreke injured his hamstring playing pickup basketball out of town last week,” stated general manager Dell Demps in the press release. “He is back in New Orleans rehabbing with our medical staff. Hopefully, he will be cleared to play before the season-opener.”
Evans appeared in 72 games for the Pelicans last season and averaged 14.5 points, 4.7 rebounds and five assists in 28.2 minutes per game. Hopefully he can be available sooner than later so that the Pelicans can get a break from the injury bug.
And then, four days after Granger committed to Pat Riley and Erik Spoelstra, James committed to a return to the Cleveland Cavaliers. Able to rescind or even restructure his two-year, $4.2 million agreement, Granger kept his commitment.
“It’s two-fold,” he said. “Yeah, I think everybody would like a chance to play with LeBron. But in the same aspect, a guy like me, who’s trying to reestablish myself, him leaving isn’t a terrible thing for me. It gives me an opportunity to play more, affords to do more of what I used to do. My initial reaction was to come to play with him, but once he left, it still was a good situation for me.
“I reassessed a little bit, myself and my agent. But at the point where I was at, it was more about me reestablishing, rather than the money or something like that. I’ve made a bunch of money. I just want to reestablish myself as the player that I was previously.”
As Danny Granger said, he’s hoping that this can be a bounce-back year for him after dealing with a number of injuries in recent seasons.
Even though he could’ve backed out of his agreement with the Miami HEAT when LeBron James decided to leave for the Cleveland Cavaliers, he decided to stay because he felt it was the best situation for him to play and salvage his career.
At media day, it came out that Granger had knee surgery two months ago, so hopefully that doesn’t further limit him this season. He hasn’t been held out of Miami’s practices so far, which is a good sign.
Last year, he averaged just 8.2 points and 3.2 rebounds in 41 games off of the Los Angeles Clippers’ bench.
Miami is hoping that he can somewhat return to form this season. At $4.2 million over two years, he was low-risk, high-reward signing considering he was an All-Star and leading scorer for the Indiana Pacers just three years ago.
