CRISIS: Malik Beasley Future In Doubt Ahead Of Free Agency As Gambling Investigation Is Dropped

CRISIS: Malik Beasley Future In Doubt Ahead Of Free Agency As Gambling Investigation Is Dropped

in today’s episode of Locked on Pistons podcast we have some breaking bad news malik Beasley is he now gone from the Detroit Pistons just a day ahead of free agency how is that going to impact the Pistons we’ll break it all down today’s episode locked on Pistons podcast let’s go you are Locked on Pistons your daily Detroit Pistons podcast part of the Locked on Podcast Network your team every day studio welcome back to another episode of the Lockdown Pistons podcast per usual I am your host Coug Hill i’ve been covering the Detroit Pistons with the Lockdown Network for the last four years i’m a credential media member over the last three years i appreciate all of you guys supporting the podcast being an everyday today’s episode though is brought to you by FanDuel this is just going to be great right now new customers get $150 in bonus bets and your first $5 bet wins today’s episode we’ll be talking about all things salary cap all things you need to know heading into free we a friend of the podcast Kyle Mets joining us to break it all down with us he’s a salary cap guru we’re lucky to have a Pistons salary cap guru within our community not every community has one and Kyle’s big time with that so we’ll break it all down with him but sadly we’ll talk about like I said we’ll talk about NAW coming up we’ll talk about their cap flexibility what they’re going to do over the cap under the cap all that kind of stuff but we have to start with the biggest news of by far like by far the offseason like maybe even I almost maybe maybe not to the other rest of the NBA fan base but in the Pistons fan base this is bigger than even the championship what just happened like so today Sham Sherenia let’s just get into it he reported and we’ll let Kyle talk to me but I have to give this eulogy um but Malik Beasley all jokes aside is it Sham Sharen reported that he is being investigated by the US District Attorney’s office for gambling during the NBA season on and on specifically prop bets during the 2023 2024 season and without diving too far into it really I don’t really want to get too deep into that all you need to know based off that is if he is found guilty of doing this his NBA career immediately is in jeopardy if you look at Jonte Porter his career done terry Ozir is being investigated it’s a little different because Terry Ozir’s under contract so they just let him keep playing beasley is a in is upcoming free agent just in 24 hours from now if he is found guilty his career is very much in jeopardy at all and this is one day before the Pistons enter free agency where he was expected to be offered a three-year $42 million contract a full MLE and now with that news there’s no way not just the Pistons but any team is going to be touching a player or giving out any kind of money guarantee to a player that just may be gone completely in two months not only just because of the money you’d commit but because of the resources you would then lose to improve your team in other ways if you if you give it to someone who may just be gone in a month so the the Pistons aren’t going to touch him until this investigation is over no NBA team is going to touch him until the investigation is over and finds him hopefully innocent which I what Pistons fans would love to hear but as of right now just an absolutely huge blow out of nowhere just a huge blow out of nowhere that Malik Beasley who hit over 300 threes this past year for the time being it’s just gone indefinitely like there’s you just you can’t touch them you can’t you can’t sign him you can’t resign him it’s it’s just over with which is it’s huge uh it’s it’s a it’s bad it’s not great at all and I’m we’re not going to talk about whether he’s innocent or guilty because that doesn’t really matter whether he’s innocent or guilty isn’t isn’t you know doesn’t matter what matters is the fact that the investigation’s going on so now that forces everyone to just stay away from him so no matter whether he’s innocent and guilty in a month two months whatever the investigation’s over that has no impact on what the Pistons are now going to have to do which is pivot away from Beasley so Kyle if you have any thoughts that you just want to say on the whole situation the terrible news that just dropped before we get into the whole impact on the salary cap go ahead yeah I remember someone tweeting about this after I think Rosier stuff came out and there is some some vague tweets about Beasley being next and that we were all collectively holding our breath at that point as it was um and so one this makes sense with some of the rumors about some of the other free agents and we’re going to talk about that here in a few minutes but it kind of makes sense of some of that the news that you’re seeing um but I have to believe that the the organization already knew about this to some degree um even the way even the way the language was they were in discussions for that three years 14 million like the business could have already signed him to that like and offered it to him so like clearly there was a hey we’re comfortable with this framework maybe depending on how this falls out you know like and so I don’t think they’re surprised by this um or at least not they’re not just finding out about it when Sean was tweeted it so that’s my my one thing I saw that kind of going off on Kiss’s Twitter today the other thing I would say is um I you know I think there’s room here to because it’s ongoing and even because of some of the ways it was like the agent came out and said he’s doing his job right to protect his agent or maybe it was the lawyer that came out and said this but I could see a world in where the Pistons decide hey let’s give him5 million we have his non-bird rights we can sign him up to $7 million another one-year deal let’s keep him on the roster let’s you know maybe we don’t play him just in case things like you know until the investigation is over but maybe you know and just in case his NBA career isn’t over and he gets banned for life like let’s get him under contract let’s use that 15th roster spot to keep him in house we can if it goes well we then get his early bird rights next summer which lets us sign him to like $15 million contract which puts him you know like you can kind of go the same route and it’s actually easier to resign him long term again should they do that with all this stuff maybe not but I could see a world in which if they’re already interested and they probably already had an inkling this could be a thing maybe they go that route later into the off season if they choose not to go to the cap room route which we’ll talk about but that’s my other maybe they do this we’ll see what happens but they might be able to afford to do that yeah i feel like at the very like my I believe because the Pistons were asked to give a comment and they said no we don’t have anything to like just no comment they said nothing my What I feel like is maybe the Pistons had like an inkling of like knowing that maybe there’s some whispers like “Hey did you hear that maybe they’re looking at this.” To where they maybe heard “Okay there’s some whispers about this so let’s just talk about it.” I don’t feel like at least I don’t feel like they expected to be dropped today like investigations actually happening like I don’t expect I don’t think they expected the bomb of yeah it’s not just whispers we’re full on investigating he might be gone i don’t know if they were expect but I do agree with you they had to have at least heard like whispers of hey sounds like maybe there was something going on here like something like that had they had to know something um right but like you mentioned that was something I was going to mention as well is that I don’t know if they do it now but I do agree with you that maybe in like two months if the investigation is over and you know uh hopefully he’s innocent for Pistons fan’s sake um Pistons are like okay we’ll bring you back in on this one-year deal because now we’ve already used all our assets we’ll bring you back in the one-year deal we’ll we’ll hand handle you fan handsomely next offseason and we’ll give you that long-term contract then because by then everyone’s couch space is gone everyone you know no one has
you know no one’s going to The point is here no one’s going to invest any kind of commitment to a guy they think might be gone completely from the NBA in a month from now so the best best case scenario for Beasley is that when this investigation is over he’s innocent and then he can sign a one-year contract with somebody and then get paid again you know long term next off seasonason but um
yeah well just be clear so I don’t get jumped in the comments or on Twitter i wasn’t saying they should give him $7 million
no yeah right
they should if if they’re going to do that they give him a minimum to keep his rights so that next year they can pay him off the NBA average and so that cost him basically nothing because then if they sign him to a minimum then it comes out that he’s done they just cut him doesn’t hurt him at all um but you do that last after you’ve done all your other moves so they could even do it before the investigation resolves if they’re just trying to you know keep options open and and to put a show of like loyalty to him hey we’re going to take care of you while you figure this out like we’re going to until it’s proven innocent like you know they could they could decide to stand by him in that sense give him a minimum keep him under keep his rights i don’t know that they’ll do that but they could so that’s all I’m saying
right yeah I completely understand i read another thing and like I said I don’t I really don’t want to have to go too far into this but like I I cover the team and we kind of have to like we don’t really have a choice but to like address it i was just reading something earlier that they kind according to the report they have a very specific time of when they think it happened a very specific prop bet in which it happened at like it and another person I saw another reporter suggest that usually these kind of things they don’t drop this kind of bombshell if we’re going for an investigation unless they feel like they really have something
so it’s
it’s tough looking yeah not looking good
yeah it’s it’s it’s really tough and we’re just talking about the cap situation like we haven’t even talked about like obviously his impact on the floor this is a team he activated prime Klay Thompson this past year it was one of the best shooting seasons we’ve ever seen for a team that struggled in the half court offense he was literally their their life draft for the majority of the year for this half court offense he was the one movement shooter you we’re about to talk about Nquil Alexander Walker maybe Santi Alama whoever but all of that was with the idea of Malik still going to be here you’re adding that to Malik not oh now Malik’s gone and now you have to get this not only do they have to just improve the team i feel like now they’re going to have to find someone that can replicate at least the type of threes he takes the movement shooting and it’s it’s just it’s just really I’m I’m I’m lowkey happy that it at least happened the day before free agency instead of like two days after you give him the contract and now bomb you know bomb drops and it’s like oh well like
now what so it’s I mean I guess that’s at least one positive way to look at but this is this this is really tough for Pistons fan malik was fantastic for them it’s this was this one’s going to be tough but Kyle unless you have anything else you want Chip and we can go to the ad and then we’ll get come back and talk about one day ahead of free agency what what the Pistons going to do
yep
all right nil Alexander Walker seems like he’s at the top of the Pistons wish list santi Alama can they get him from Memphis now with Malik Beasley potentially just being gone what way do they go do they go over the cap do they go under the cap what’s the most flex flexible way for the Pistons to operate here now we’ll talk about all that coming up and man this is this one right here is going to be great summer sports are in full swing whether you’re all about baseball under the lights or golf on the green or high stakes soccer action or maybe some prop bets FanDuel is the best way to make every game even more exciting you’re already following the action why not make it a little bit more thrilling with FanDuel you can get on the game with your friends are getting sunburnt at the beach i’ve been using FanDuel sadly for the last few years since it became legal in Michigan uh it’s absolutely fun to use i love it it’s it’s a lot of fun obviously soup is self-explanatory super easy to use but most importantly super fun to use maybe a little too fun to use but whether I’m placing the same game parlay or watching a bet ride into the ninth inning FanDuel makes it feel like I’m part of the action new to FanDuel new customers can bet just $5 and get $150 in bonus bets if your first bet wins again if you’re new to FanDuel just place $5 and if your first bet wins you’ll get $150 in bonus bets open the FanDuel app today or visit fanuel.com to get started unless you are a professional athlete if you are a professional athlete stay away but if you are not and you’re like me FanDuel is a lot of fun i love it i use it all the time you guys should too open the FanDuel app today or visit fanduel.com to get started with FanDuel that that that was probably you know one of my favorite not favorite ad breaks ever appreciate
potentially top five top five uh ad read for you in your career for sure
i appreciate all of you guys making locked on pissed your first listen every single day freed available on all your podcast platforms if you haven’t already hit that subscribe button to the YouTube channel we’re less than 20 subs away from 11,000 subscribers so hit the subscribe button over there if you haven’t already i appreciate all of you guys um or leave us a five star five star review my goodness on whatever podcast platform you’re listening to us on but moving on from the Beasley news or or really not really moving on from the Beasley news I guess the first thing we’ll address is Kyle now that this you know it sounded like it felt like the Pistons were going to operate as over the cap team because they were going to have the cap holds on on Malik be able to give him that MLE um non- taxpayer MLE they’ll be able potentially resign Dennis Shruder with even though it sound like he’s going to Sacramento now with Beasley and everything that’s going on and it sounds like the Pistons are ready and Shruder put out some interesting Instagram post and then we got an interesting report from Stein that makes it sound like the Pistons are wanting to give some of these pack up point guard minutes to Ivy anyway so they’re okay with letting them so it just seems like shooter’s also gone should the Pistons operate and open the cap should they try to create cap space what’s the positives and negatives to both now at this point if there’s even a negative to going under the cap now yeah so it definitely all this new stuff definitely makes it a lot more 50/50 in my mind i know that a lot of the conversation up to this point with some a lot of the national guys has been oh it could be either way like they could go this way they could go this way i’ve always felt like it was a no-brainer to stay over the cap if you’re really going to maximize what you’re trying to do and having cuz cuz frankly we’ve gone over this before but right now they can only really make $16.9 million in cap room by waving and renouncing everyone including Beasley that’s the starting number you can maybe get close to 25 if you send out um tech in a salary dump um the thing for fans
and we did get a report just want to back you up here we did get a report from Mike Scott today that apparently the Pistons are trying to dump Tech’s contract according to him so that sounds like that may be something they’re trying to do but go ahead just wanted to back you up
right and yeah and the thing people need to remember though with that is there are like incomplete roster charges which is almost $2 million so really by dumping tech you’re only you’re only making like six and a half million maybe so like it would be much more versus if you trade him outright you can bring back a $16 million player in so by keeping him and trading him in a single deal you can create 8 million more in spending power versus only creating six million in cap room so that’s where I’m wondering again I’m not an insider but if it were me I think there’s a lot of mechanisms where they can stay over the cap and and create just as much spending power as getting under the cap and trying to bring guys in with cap room that being said there are benefits to both and it just depends on who they’re going after um that’s kind of how I would say it before we get into specifics um so just as you’re you know playing around with salary dumps and things remember every time you get rid of a player you have to subtract their salary by like $2 million functionally if it’s not in the deal you’re bringing the player in until they’re over 12 roster spots and then you’re good but that’s that’s where it comes in
all right so let’s go ahead and let’s You say depends who they want to go after well let’s go ahead and segue into that according to multiple reports from Mark Stein Jake Fischer I believe Scott also uh reported this there’s a lot of reporting going on that Nil Alexander Walker is the Pistons top target it’s who they’re wanting to go after it’s the top guy they’re pivoting towards like you mentioned earlier maybe the Pistons did know about this beforehand and that’s why they it was reports early on even a few days ago that Nquille was their top target maybe that was the case who knows but that seems all the reporting is pointing towards he’s their top target and with the Temples now extending Julius Randall and Nas Reed before free agency he’s basically gone from Minnesota it sounds like and it’s Atlanta and Detroit according to reports so if the I guess the first question is if they are to go after Nikquil Alexander Walker and it sounds like it’s probably going to take more than just the mid-level exception what do you think is the best way to go about trying to acquire him yeah and the simplest way I’ll put it this simplest way is to go the cap room route and just create the space for it if he needs more than the midle um I think the more elegant solution is trading someone like tech you can get up to about 16.8 million we’ve talked about this before for Aldama um if you sign in trades you send Tech out to a third team and then you take in Nquila Alexander Walker and you can give him like a four fouryear $72 million contract um the first year is 16.8 but I think that’s around what 18 million or something per year um so I think that’s a really elegant solution because it keeps your non- taxpayer available it create it keeps some other avenues open and you don’t have to renounce every anybody to do that um and then the the trick with that is you have to send tack to a third team basically or it hard caps the Minnesota Timberwolves at the second apron which they may not want to do um and so that’s where that gets
tricky what would be the benefit to the third team so like do you send this do you send a second with tech to that third team to you know to you know help facilitate the deal is that how that would work
yeah it’d be the equivalent of a salary dump um so yeah maybe you send a second or two if you how it depends on how bad you want Nquille Alexander Walker right like if it’s like we really want him and this is the deal that needs to get done i mean we saw we saw teams getting a first round pick this year for salary dump for the first time in a long time so that just tells you how the how desperate people are to get out of that second apron um and so you’d have to probably pay up for that but Tech isn’t a terrible player either i think I think teams will like him he just had a bad year and they’re going to use that against so the Pistons have no leverage really but when a push comes to shove like someone’s probably going to want a large motion shooter that can sometimes put the ball on the floor even if he didn’t look good last year like some tanking team is going to be like he can fill minutes for us or a playoff team he can be our 12th guy off the bench whatever so like he’s an expiring it shouldn’t cost too much but that’s I think my favorite solution but again that requires other teams to be involved and since there is a lot of movement though that cap room to dump people is going to dry up quick so there might be premiums you’re paying on that
all right so we have questions i I I let everybody know that we were recording uh ahead of free agency today so everyone could get their question so I do have questions here from people asking but I wanted to stay on this topic we’ll spend the whole third segment I promise answering all of you guys’ questions you guys sent in but the next part of this is I want I want to mention is we’ve heard the Pistons also interested in Asante Aldama we’ve heard them maybe interested in Jake Laravia even though Jake Laria would cost way less than you know Alama I don’t think that’s you know too crazy to have to worry about um and like we mentioned with Beasley it felt like to me they were wanting to add Nquille to Beasley with this team and then Ivy take some of the backup point guard minutes now with Beasley gone it see they’re going to have to address I feel like multiple spots unless they truly are just so high in Chaz Laneir where they’re like “Oh he’ll just come in and he’ll take some of those spots,” which I don’t think is the case but it I mean maybe in some crazy world they’re that high on them i I guess it’s not impossible um with them now needing a movement shooter and still needing a backup for but also seemingly going all in to kill Alexander Walker if the Pistons were to sign him to or sign and trade him or I’ll let you go and pick whichever route but let’s just say his contract’s around 1819 million that he comes back to do the Pistons have any flexibility still is there any way for them to still go after Asanti Alama in free agency is there any way for them to go after maybe a Duncan Robinson who just declined his option with Miami like if they do go after kill Alexander Walker and it costs more than the MLE is that basically the move is like are they is that it are they are they stuck or are they still can they still make moves well yeah they would still have the non- taxpayer MLE so if they do that let’s and another option we talked about maybe on a Twitter space a couple days ago was Dennis Schroer going to the Kings can you work that into a deal where you sign and trade Schroeder so then you can immediately pull Alexander Walker up to 22.8 million in that in that scenario if if Schroeder gets the their ML to the Kings that wins everybody they get their player the Pistons get nilog walker without using their exception you pay a kings a second and you pay many a second just to get it done and now you have the mid the mid-level still to use and then you still have tech to use if you want to go get alama at $17 million a year um or se that same thing that 40 or 72 million so there’s lots of flexibility the pistons have way more than I think people realize if they stay over the cap there’s a lot of mechanisms now they’re complex and they require other teams and so they may not all work um quite frankly they might be able to get one of those things to happen but they technically have the mechanisms to do that especially if Nikil Alexander Walker is a sign and trade scenario where they’re dumping somebody else because then they can use that non-t taxpayer to bring in Duncan Robinson who is exactly one of the people that I I’m not ever high on him but again you need a movement shooter that’s what he does um and so the question is do you have room for Ivy NAW Duncan Robinson and Cade and then you know Sasser is just kind of your fifth guard at that point your THA is probably gone at that point um but they can also use THJ in a sign and trade and bring in a $27 million player um so Anthony Simon scratches your itch right they can they can technically do a swap there with the Celtics or send him to Atlanta into their trade exception lots of flexibility and I know we’re we’re tight on time we want to get to questions so I can’t go through all those but maybe we’ll hit some of the questions but yeah so anyone who’s worried about that there’s plenty of options and I still think they have more I think they have more flexibility above the cap the one thing I’ll say is if they go under the cap they still have the room exception for 8 million um and so that’s another route if they like a lar would fit perfectly in that room exception so if they go to the cap room get Nikquila Alexander Walker with the cap room and then they use the room exception on Larabia and they fill the rest in with minimums so that’s that’s So again you can see they have a lot more flexibility over the cap if they’re able to get teams to play ball
right so I was just about to say it seems like they definitely have more flexibility over the cap to operate that way i hope that they’re able to get some signing trades done then i that sounds like the best case scenario for them um and they do have a lot of seconds too there is one year where they have like I don’t have it i should have it pulled it up but there’s one year specifically where they just have multiple seconds so they have second rounders to play with here to make stuff happen i don’t envy Traan and Michael Blackstone at all right now this was not a scenario I have to believe they thought was actually going to drop the day before free agency this is and it’s crazy you hope you hope that they were they did know about this before because I can only imagine having it dropped the day before free agency and being like “Oh my god scratch everything we have to figure out now a game plan of how we’re going to attack this now.” This is now I feel so bad for Traion this is backto-back offseasons now where he’s probably going to feel rushed i know last year I was told many times that he felt kind of rushed new coach new front office free agency draft all happened real late he thinks this year he finally has an easy off seasonason then the day before free agency we have this drop so it’s like I don’t envy him i kind of feel bad for him but coming up we answer all of your guys’s comment questions that you guys sent in for Kyle to answer consider or concerning I should say the salary cap and free agency that starts Monday at 6 pm Eastern time I believe we’ll talk about all those questions and answer all of them coming up so I want to thank you guys again make locked on Pistons your first listen of every single day we are free and available on all your podcast platforms if you haven’t already head to the YouTube channel at Lockdown Pistons hit that subscribe button or leave us a fivestar review on whatever podcast platform you’re listening to this on that’s another great way to support the podcast all right Kyle let’s get into some of these questions and uh get some answers here so this one’s from honest Ron Holland fan says “If Shooter leaves and Beasley leaves and we replace them with NAW and Aldama would you consider that a roster improvement would it be too hard to do it is it feasible to do so well we hit the second part of that already it’s pretty feasible um and they have a lot of second round picks like we said just to grease the skids on any deal they’ve got at least three second round picks in 27 28 and 29 so they’ve got lots of flexibility there um yeah if they if they lose Schroeder and Beasley and we he said NAW and Aldama I I mean yeah I think it’s definitely at least even um I still think you’re missing a volume shooter in that scenario and I think if that’s the moves I’m bringing THJ back for something
i was just going to say that could I I think that’s on the board now
right and that’s where staying over the cap again you get to keep all those cap holds so as long as THJ wants to come back like you could pay him and I would this is not answering the question but I know we’ve talked about this before i would give him basically a one-year deal at that point up to whatever would get you just below the tax line so that you can have that as salary matching for let’s say if Devin Booker says “Yeah I’m done with these kids get me out of here.” Then you don’t have to trade Tobias to go get him you have another $24 millionish contract that’s an expiring that you can send out tj is going to sign that every day because he’s getting paid you know for one year it’s the old JJ Reic thing that the Sixers did so um or New Orleans I forget who it was sorry um but anyway so yes it’s definitely possible i think they would need to make one more move either keep THJ or go get Duncan Robinson something like that yeah my answer would be for the roster improvement uh the argument here is the argument that you would be making here is that having a backup for and a point of attack defender with with Nikil Alexander Walker would offset the the drop off you’d get from the movement shooter now you still would theoretically want to go get a movement shooter but the argument there would be okay we have consistent 48 minutes of good foreplay now uh at the at the four position you got Alexander Walker at the point of attack defensively um you improve the the defense in the guard room that will offset a little bit of the you know the movement shooting that you lose with Beasley that would be the argument i think they like you said I think they still would have to go find some kind of movement shooter at least replicate the type of shots Beasley league takes so you can have that same kind of gravity and run that same kind of offense um this question is from Tony he says “If we use up our cap space to sign players that are not our own free agents do we still get to use the by annual exception?” No so the bianual exception is the only only for overthe cap teams which is another mechanism that I didn’t even talk about they can go get a backup point guard for $5 million using the bianual and that you can do a two-year contract with 5% raises um and so that’s a pretty good deal so let’s say Taius Jones looks at the market and says you know what maybe I’m not going to get starting money but I can come in and now I don’t think he’ll want that because they’re still clearly wanting to get Ivy some touches and Assar some touches which is why I don’t think they’re going to sign a backup like they didn’t last summer because they want to see they want that ball handling to be there but they can they have another five million if they’re over the cap to do to to get somebody but that’s only if you’re over the cap once you’ve used any cap room you lose access to that the only exception you have at that point is the room exception even if you end up over the cap afterwards all right next question is from Mottown what type of contract do we need to offer Nikquil Alexander Walker to keep him away from being an Atlanta Hawk and I want to add on to this question atlanta has that $25 million trade exception don’t they okay so couldn’t they they theoretically could probably offer him the most right they could just sign and trade that exception over would that be what how how it works if they really wanted to kill like that yeah and I think someone asked me on Twitter earlier today too so technically the Pistons can get to the same they like whatever unless the the Hawks really really want to pay him $25 million and the Pistons don’t like technically the Pistons can get up to 27 million if they do the sign and trade with THJ and dump him somewhere else now that will be very costly for them and potentially hard to do because THJ has to agree on the destination the team getting him has to agree to it and Nquille has to agree to it so that’s harder than the Hawks just saying “Yeah we want you pay him whatever send him here.” Like that’s it’s easier for Atlanta to do that but technically the Pistons can pay him them the same so it just comes down to where does Nquille want to be and and who wants to pay him the most i think that’s what it comes down to and then maybe it’s Ro right if it’s Atlanta says we you can start and the Pistons are like you can kind of be our sixth man or you you know I mean like what’s going to happen there like are you going to pay him almost $20 million to come off the bench like is Ivy cool with coming off the bench you know that starts to get you start to get into some weirdness there so Atlanta might be a more attractive situation but then you have Dyson Daniels there too so it it’s hard to say what what Nquille wants i know Tan’s high on him i think he was the one that pushed a trade for him when he was in New Orleans so like so there is some ties there that might work in the Pistons favor so from a money standpoint they can technically get there it’s just easier for Atlanta to do it how much they have to pay him I don’t know what that number is but I can’t imagine more than $20 million a year is what it will take i think if you’re in the 18 to 19 range and you’re offering him 25 to 30 minutes in a major role even if it’s not starting I think that might get it done
yeah I I think I agree and also two things real quickly one Traan did have like a full interview that I remember it was just put on Twitter today um a full interview where he’s just talking nothing but love about Nikil Alexander Walker about how much he likes him it was when he was with New Orleans still so he is a fan of Nquille that’s so it makes sense they must have some ties um the second question here or the second thing I want to say ties into the next question that we have this one’s from Richard he said “After Jabari Smith just signed the five-year $122 million extension how do you believe this could impact Ji and J’s extension my question is the exact same thing jabari you just signed that extension literally I think like an hour and a half ago before we started recording jabari Smith of the Houston Rockets i believe it’s around 20 what is it 25 24 25 million uh annually for him um that’s someone that was in the same draft class this is the same draft class as Ji and JD so how do you think that could impact the Pistons uh in extension talks it’s probably the floor right um because I don’t know that you could have it would be hard to argue that he’s been better than those guys um but he’s on a better team so his role is limited so like they could kind of maybe argue that but I I think both of those those guys and you’re gonna say at the very minimum and it’s easy for JD more i think it affects JD more than it does Ivy um because it’s just totally different positions um but it’s definitely the floor for those guys like they’re not going to accept less than 24 million annual value at this point but I already didn’t expect them to accept that like I always thought that this is going to be closer to between 25 and 27 for Duran um based on the percentage of the cap and some other guys that have signed in the past um so but yeah I think that definitely starts the floor for the market
yeah I I agree i before this I really did not want to pay I of my opinion I did not really want to pay either of them over 25 million but now with Jabari who like you said Ji and JD will both try and maybe be able to make an argument that they’ve just been better than Jabari uh to this point and he just got paid this again like you mentioned you know the Pistons could probably make the argument that yeah but he’s in a minimer role for a team that just won two or one you know the second seed if we were in that kind of position maybe your guys’ role would be also limited a little bit more limited you guys won’t have the same numbers whatever negotiations whatever um but for him to be in the exact same draft class and sign for this JI and JD especially I think it definitely I agree with you i think it impacts JD the most because he is a big man they kind they don’t play the same positions but they’re closer here and JD just played for a team that won playoff games in the East i think that he he would have an argument for this i I I think I agree with you now that this would definitely be the floor 24$25 million for either of them um the last question I this is the question I have we’ll wrap it up here what do you think happens we are I think what is it uh three so that’s three hours 12 hours 15 what are we like 21 hours 20 hours away from free agency starting
20 and a half 20 and a half
uh 20 and a half hours away what do you foresee what do you think is going to happen here for the Pistons oh man uh
we won’t hold to it yes we absolutely know of course of course uh what do I think is going to happen uh I can tell you what I think should happen but I think what’s going to happen um is they’re going to probably move for Nikil Alexander Walker i think they’re going to make a push for him i hope it’s not by going under the cap because that will be just it’ll it’ll be that much harder to build out the team but knowing how costly it is he talked about how costly it was to try to trade up how costly it might be to try to dump salary um you know that would include those signing trades that so I think the problem that I’m having is in the years past the Pistons have all these options and mechanisms and they never use them we sit here and we talk all summer about oh they can do this and they can do that and capers like me get excited and they just end up you know doing the the bare minimum so I’m a little I’m a little gunshy to say they’ll actually use them but I’m going to go out on a limb and say Michael Blackstone works his creativity and at least swing Schroeder going to the Kings into a sign and trade for Nquil Alexander Walker um and getting him close to 20 million a year and then um at that point I think there’s some smoke in Aldama but I think Aldama will probably end up with well staying with Memphis when push comes to shove or we’ll end up somewhere else cuz I just I don’t believe that the Pistons will actually be able to pull off two signing trades and do all that fun stuff and then they probably bring back um THJ and that’s and they’ll probably there’ll be probably some that we that we aren’t expecting that we’ll bring in but it probably won’t be a huge name um and then they’ll keep their flexibility for next year like they want to and then I hope I hope I hope they one one year overpay THJ if that’s the route they go so they have more trade deadline flexibility all right I lied that’s not my last question you just brought something else this is but this is a easy one this is an easy one um with everything that happened with Beasley do you think they should consider bringing back Shruder or do you feel like the bridges might be burner did get the Instagram stories or lives whatever it was from Shruder where he sounded like you know I wanted to come back but they’re they’re not waiting for me blah blah and then we got the report from Stein that says that the Pistons have been bracing for this because they want Ivy to take up some of those backup point guards they’re kind of okay with him leaving with Beasley now out do you think that’s something that could happen or do you feel like that you know maybe Bridges are burnt here i read that when I listened to the video and not didn’t just read the text on it i heard it the way it sounded to me was like I want to be there i’m waiting on them to give me a contract like he’s like “They’re not waiting on me i’m waiting on them.” That’s how I heard it again the bridge might be burned and if Sacramento’s offering him more that’s that’s probably where he’s going but I think if they came to the table and said “Hey yeah we want you we’ll pay you $12 million to be our backup.” Like I don’t think he’s I don’t think he’s sweating that i that’s how I read it was I’m I’m waiting for them to give me a contract because I want to be here and if I don’t come back it’s because they didn’t give it to me in time and I had to take my money when I could so that’s kind of how I read it um rather than I want to shop around and they’re not going to wait for me to do that that’s so that’s kind of how I heard it so I don’t know if it matters i don’t think that they will quite frankly because they went into last season with this same kind of like we want to see what we have in these ball handlers so let’s give them a shot they can always go back out again at the deadline and find someone where they can you know get later in the free agency and find a backup point guard with the one of the exceptions so we’ll see tjan said he wanted to bring back a couple of the vets you know I think he probably included Beasley in that and maybe THJ but maybe not so it’s I’m I’m really interested to see what he’s going to do i hope it’s creative and fun so we actually have more to talk about and not just let’s run it back but you know
let’s run it back fan club wins that is what it is uh all right we’ll wrap it up there thank you Kyle for coming on go ahead and let everybody know they can find you on Twitter yeah it’s Kylemets23 on on X and sometimes Blue Sky um and then tomorrow I’m hosting uh with Pistons Jack we’re doing a live stream for the free agency starting at 600 PM Eastern so if you want to follow pre- agency along with us that’s what I’ll be doing that tomorrow so come pull up have fun you know we don’t take ourselves too seriously but we’re going to we’re going to react to everything and hopefully we get to react to a Lori market and trade to the Pistons or Trey Murphy
whatever you know that would that would be some crazy fun for sure uh but appreciate you man again for coming on giving us some insight before free agency i appreciate all of you guys for making Lacton Pistons your first list of every single day being everydayers i appreciate all of you guys hit that subscribe button at the YouTube channel leave us a fivestar review whatever podcast platform you’re listening to is on free agency starts tomorrow we’ll see what happens going to be interesting until next time I’ll see you guys later peace out everybody

Breaking news rocks the Detroit Pistons’ free agency plans as Malik Beasley faces a gambling investigation. How will this unexpected twist reshape the team’s offseason strategy?

Host Ku and salary cap expert Kyle Metz dissect the Pistons’ options in light of the Beasley bombshell. They analyze potential free agent targets like Nikeil Alexander-Walker, explore complex salary cap maneuvers, and discuss the ripple effects on contract extensions for Isaiah Stewart and Jaden Ivey. The conversation covers the Pistons’ pursuit of cap space, sign-and-trade scenarios, and predictions for their free agency moves.

Tune in for insider insights on how the Pistons navigate this sudden shift in their roster-building plans and position themselves for future success.

SUBSTACK: kukhahil.substack.com

PLAYBACK: playback.tv/watchpistons

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