Top Free Agent Decisions: The Central

It’s Friday, June 29th and the countdown to free agency moratorium is on. Teams and players have decisions to make, some on deadline and others not. Everyone is anxiously awaiting the clock to strike midnight. July 1 is the day negotiations can officially begin between both parties, which really kicks the summer off officially.

Basketball Insiders has gone through ranking the player pool by position already. Now, we’re doing a division-by-division breakdown on the highest tier talents available. Our team’s already covered multiple, so we’re going to continue that with the Central Division.

Lance Stephenson — Indiana Pacers — $4,180,000 (Salary Last Season)

Is Lance Stephenson headed elsewhere? This past week, the Pacers declined the veteran swingman’s $4.3 million team option, making him an unrestricted free agent.

Indiana reportedly wants to keep its options open and see who is available for now, but there’s a chance that the two parties could re-negotiate a deal to keep Stephenson there. Our own Simon Hannig reported interest from the team side of things recently.

Jabari Parker*— Milwaukee Bucks — $6,782,392

As the Mike Budenholzer era in Milwaukee is set to begin, there are questions about whether or not Jabari Parker will be a part of it. Currently waiting on a qualifying offer with the deadline coming at 11:59 p.m. today, the 23-year-old and the Bucks have an interesting situation.

According to Zach Lowe of ESPN, the organization is reluctant to extend the $4.3 million QO because it fears Parker will accept the one-year deal, which would result in a $20.3 million cap hold and little flexibility for Milwaukee moving forward. Why is that such a big deal? Because Khris Middleton is expected to require a big payday in the summer of 2019 if an extension isn’t worked out.

Zach LaVine* — Chicago Bulls — $3,202,218

Over 24 games with the Bulls coming off a major knee injury, Zach LaVine proved that he has plenty of bounce left. It was an encouraging sign to see him getting up for dunks and having that explosion attacking the basket. He was definitely rusty as a shooter in his short stint, but there was enough evidence to show his value.

Chicago is rumored to have tendered LaVine a $4.3 million qualifying offer, which would make him a restricted free agent. As of now, there is already a team out there who is interested. First reported by Bulls beat writer K.C. Johnson, the Sacramento Kings—who have up to $26.7 million in cap space—are intrigued by the four-year guard.

It will be interesting to see what Chicago decides to do if the Kings follow through and sign LaVine to an offer sheet. Remember—the Bulls are able to match whatever deal comes his way, but if the dollar figures are more than they’re willing to pay, they’ll have to discuss whether bringing him back in the fold is worth it.

LeBron James** — Cleveland Cavaliers — $33,285,709

The summer of LeBron James has been an absolute mess.

As expected, it’s been full of a ton of over-analyzing, conflicting reports with different sources coming from various media personalities. Steve Kyler addressed the latest on the potential of landing with the Los Angeles Lakers on Thursday, and more news came out recently.

Joe Vardon of cleveland.com reported on Friday morning that LeBron’s agent Rich Paul informed the Cavaliers that he will not exercise his player option and become an unrestricted free agent.

Interested teams are able to offer him a maximum contract for four years and $152 million. Cleveland has the advantage over the others monetarily, considering the organization can lay out a supermax deal worth $205 million over five years.

As far as what he’s going to do as an unrestricted free agent, it’s probably wise not to waste your energy trying to figure it out. He’s kept mum on the matter for a while as he always has. James is a secretive person and doesn’t want to be the first guy to make a move. He prefers not to be the domino that makes the rest fall.

So until you see or hear it from LeBron himself—probably via Uninterrupted—take every bit of information with a grain of salt. In the meanwhile, he’ll just keep enjoying his time off and cliff jumping with the James Gang.

*Qualifying Offer
**Player Option

As you can see, aside from LeBron, there isn’t much of a franchise-altering star in this group, but there’s certainly a talent that has the potential to give a team a big boost in talent. There are starting-caliber players available that could be on the move.

We’ll have to wait and see how it all plays out. Free agency is almost upon us.