The 2023 NBA free agency market is already booming and has fans glued to their Twitter feed waiting for the latest Woj bombs to drop. With players inking deals with new teams left right and centre, it’s easy to get lost as to who got the most from their money.
Below are the teams who are winning the early goings of the 2023 free agency period so far.
***Note: We already covered the Lakers previously. Click here for their full article.
Phoenix Suns
The Suns are already early winners of the offseason after trading for Bradley Beal from the Washington Wizards. However, Beal’s arrival limited the Suns’ financial capabilities this offseason. Fortunately, they’ve still been able to pick up a few decent players.
Potentially completing the Suns’ loaded starting line-up would be Eric Gordon, who averaged 11 points, 2.1 assists, and 1.7 rebounds last season. Gordon signed a $6.5M two-year deal with the Suns, essentially taking cents on the dollar for a chance at a championship. He’ll likely take over the starting small forward spot to complete a starting lineup alongside Beal, Devin Booker, Kevin Durant, and Deandre Ayton.
Another decent pick-up by Phoenix is Yuta Watanabe, who signed a one-year deal worth $2.3M. While he only averaged 5.6 points last season with the Brooklyn Nets, his 44.4% three-point shooting can help the Suns’ lack of firepower off the bench. He finished tied for fourth-best in three-point shooting percentage last season, and gives Phoenix some depth to their rotation.
The Suns also added Damion Lee, who shot 44.5% from three last season, and Keita Bates-Diop, who shot 50% from the field last season. The team also signed Drew Eubanks and Chimzie Metu to smaller term deals as well.
At one point it was hard to envision Phoenix fielding a roster beyond their “Big 4” with how much money they had tied up in that quartet of players. But on a limited budget, the Suns front office gets full marks for adding some NBA level pieces to their bench.
Miami Heat
Sure, the Heat lost Gabe Vincent to the Los Angeles Lakers and Max Strus to the Cleveland Cavaliers, but that doesn’t mean they won’t pick up players to replace those losses.
While both had nice runs in the postseason, there weren’t many in NBA circles talking about their value on the open market until the Eastern Conference Finals last season. Evidently the Heat felt comfortable letting someone else foot the big money contracts both ultimately received, and will continue to roll with their “Heat Culture” mentality to create the next unknown stars from within their organization.
Thomas Bryant, coming off a championship-winning playoff run with the Denver Nuggets, signed a $5.3M two-year deal with the Heat. In 18 regular-season games with the Nuggets after being traded by the Lakers, Bryant’s numbers plummeted to 4.6 points and 3.3 rebounds in limited minutes for a deep Denver squad. If anything, this adds a big body beyond just perennial All-Star candidate Bam Adebayo, allowing the team to have some different looks to their offense in 2023-24.
Josh Richardson, who the Heat previously traded for Jimmy Butler, is making his return to South Beach after signing a two-year contract worth $5.9M. Kevin Love will also return to Miami next season, along with a few two-way players.
What could make the Heat an even bigger winner this offseason is the fact they’re currently the odds on favourite to add Damian Lillard via a blockbuster trade with the Portland Trail Blazers. How the Heat can pull this off is another story.
Indiana Pacers
While the Pacers only made one major signing since the opening of the free agency in Bruce Brown Jr, getting a free agent to sign in Indiana at all is a nice change of pace for the club in recent years. Not to mention they also managed to keep their star playmaker after Tyrese Haliburton signed a $260M five-year contract- the biggest any Indiana player has received in the modern era. He averaged 20.7 points, 10.4 assists, and shot 40% from 3 last year.
Meanwhile, Bruce Brown Jr. was a key contributor for the Denver Nuggets last season- averaging 12 points, four rebounds, and 1.1 steals off the bench during the 2023 playoffs. He’s reportedly a great locker room presence, and could act as a “glue guy” for the Pacers higher end players.
Adding Oshae Brissett on a team friendly 2 year $4.6M deal was another tidy piece of business by the Indiana front office. The 25 year old knows his role within the team, and won’t be expecting to see huge minutes as a piece of the Pacers’ rotation. Not to mention it keeps the team’s core of Canadian players intact for another few seasons as well.
And finally, adding former slam dunk champion Obi Toppin to the roster for a pair of future 2nd rounders is a low risk, high reward type move as well. The 23 year old saw barely 14 minutes of action per night last season with New York, so there’s likely some untapped potential still in there. A high-flying 6’9” athlete who can jump out of the gym, Toppin figures to play the 5 when the team wants to go small, and can hold down a starting position if the team wants to slow play the development of Houston forward Jarace Walker.
At a minimum he gives them depth, and a path to easing Walker into NBA action. At his max, they could catch lightning in a bottle without having given up much in terms of draft capital or assets.
-Iggy Gonzales
Photo: Erik Drost. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license.
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