NBA free agency predictions come home to roost

Gosh darn it, I’m a man of my word. Before the 2016-17 NBA season, I made five semi-bold predictions that I was absolutely certain would come true. When, uh, zero of those predictions actually came true — by the thinnest of margins, I might add — I still looked back at my errors with admirable bravery.

In late June, I delivered another batch of five stone-cold-lock predictions about what would happen in the NBA free agent season. If you want to look at the glass half-empty, I missed three of those five predictions. But how about you look at that glass half-full. I’m improving, baby.

1. Sean Marks will throw a RFA offer of over $50 million at Jonathon Simmons.

Well, I missed this one on multiple levels. For one, the Spurs withdrew their qualifying offer to Simmons in mid-July, flipping him from a restricted to an unrestricted free agent. A day later, Simmons was a member of the Magic on a three-year, $20 million deal — with only $13.3 million of that guaranteed.

I’m still surprised Marks and the Nets didn’t jump into the mix on Simmons, especially if that price was the going rate. What my prediction really missed, though, was that free agency in the summer of 2017 was the equivalent of a glass of milk before a 9:00 PM bedtime. This is compared to the all-night NBA spending bacchanal of 2016.

July 2016 had to be the most fiscally irresponsible month in league history, and more than one team — see the Trail Blazers, Wizards, Lakers — really kneecapped their own futures in those few short weeks. Marks turned in one of the NBA’s best offseasons by patiently fitting both 2016 contractual mistakes (i.e. Timofey Mozgov) and still-blossoming prospects (i.e. D’Angelo Russell) into Brooklyn’s neat and tidy cap sheet. Accordingly, my prediction was a big miss.

2. Mason Plumlee will get more guaranteed money than Luc Mbah a Moute.

Plumlee hasn’t signed yet, so this prediction is technically still in the air. However, Mbah a Moute signed a deal so ridiculously below his value, I feel comfortable weighing in. Plumlee is still a restricted free agent, having received a $4.59 million one-year qualifying offer from the Nuggets, which we can safely assume is the floor for his 2017-18 salary. Mbah a Moute, meanwhile, could only get the $2.1 million one-year veterans’ minimum with the Rockets. Houston was immediately praised — and rightfully so — for filling out their rotation with such incredible value.

This was kind of an anti-prediction: I predicted something would happen that didn’t make sense. Somehow, I nailed it.

It’s one thing if the market doesn’t want to pay for defensive specialists like Mbah a Moute. But I got real befuddled when Andre Roberson’s three-year, $30 million deal with the Thunder came across the ticker. Mbah a Moute is a below-average offensive player, but Roberson is always blatantly left wide-open by opposing defenses. And he was deemed nearly 15 times more valuable. You tell me.

3. The Lakers trade Luol Deng to a rebuilder with more patience.

I predicted this right after the Lakers traded Mozgov and Russell to the Nets, so it’s not like I just named the wrong over-paid Lakers veteran here. This one’s pretty simple: I missed it.

Still, Magic Johnson & Co. showed signs of impatience with the bizarre one-year, $18 million deal for Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. That’s probably a fair price for KCP — it’s just hard to see how that short-term deal fits with the Lakers’ long-term rebuild. I understand the priority is to create massive cap space for next July. But couldn’t the Lakers also do that while trading for toxic contracts and collecting some draft picks along the way?

4. The Kings’ most expensive move gets consensus A grades.

I thought the Kings’ biggest move would be a toxic-contract type, but the team ended up bringing on George Hill for three years and $57 million ($40 million guaranteed). I love this move. Dollar for dollar, the value is phenomenal.

What did the NBA critics think? Sporting News gave it an A-, the Washington Post gave it a B, Sports Illustrated gave it a B- and RealGM gave it a C. So we’ll say it was a consensus B grade, meaning I was technically wrong but on the right track.

The main critique of the deal was Hill would be taking up precious minutes running the offense that should be going to lottery pick De’Aaron Fox instead. It’s a fair point. However! Our same blogosphere absolutely blasted Sam Hinkie for never bringing aboard established veterans to help out the Sixers’ own super-young prospects. I don’t think it’s fair to throw shade at both of these rebuilding strategies.

The bigger point here is the Kings are finally putting together something interesting.

5. The Sixers will invest less than $50 million in veteran free agents.

Although something could totally happen with the team’s remaining $15.12 million in cap space, right now it looks like I nailed it. The team’s budget this summer ended up being $34 million, with $23 million of that going to J.J. Redick and the other $11 million going to Amir Johnson — a move I really like — both on one-year deals.

Next: Another Michael Jordan record falls

This NBA prediction was quite a bit less bold than I thought it was, though. With so much money flying around each July, I assumed virtually every team spent over $50 million each summer. Last year, the Sixers were one of eight teams to spend under $50 million, and in this year’s slow-paced summer a full 20 teams have spent below that mark.

Whatever. Still nailed it.