Thaddeus Young – Indiana Pacers
According to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowksi, Thaddeus Young is considering exercising his player option to decline the final year of his contract with the Indiana Pacers, which would mean he’d be leaving $13.7 million on the table. That would make Young an appealing power forward on the open market.
Typically when players opt out of the final year of their contracts, it is because they believe they can get more money elsewhere. Young is not in that boat. He turned in a fairly decent season, but power forwards who average 11.8 points and 6.3 rebounds, while just shooting 32 percent from three, aren’t often going to be offered a contract worth more than $13.7 million.
So why consider opting out? Young just turned 30 on June 21st, and it is likely that he is wanting to get one more longer term contract under his belt. The higher you get over 30 years old in the NBA, the less likely you are going to receive a longer term contract with high guaranteed money. My belief is that Young played just well enough last season that he is confident he can receive at least another three-year contract worth around $10 million annually.
According to recent reports, a player that could potentially be of interest to the Utah Jazz may be throwing himself into the free agent mix.https://t.co/C6U0vhjYNK
— The J-Notes (@TheJNotes) June 12, 2018
Self-proclaimed Pacers lover, Jared Woodcox, wrote an article just a few weeks ago discussing the idea of targeting Young in free agency, accessible via the link in the tweet above.
While there isn’t much upside in the 30-year-old power forward, you are getting a known commodity. The Jazz would be getting a player who has always been known to put his team first. Favors is likely a tick better on the defensive side, but Young is a versatile defender, who can guard multiple positions due to his size, length and athleticism.
He actually reminds me a bit of Paul Millsap defensively. He may be slightly undersized, but he has long arms and is smart. He is elite at racking up steals, and last season he averaged 1.7 takeaways per game. Per Cleaningtheglass.com, Young has been in 95th percentile or better for steal percentage among bigs.
Offensively, he is a solid finisher around the basket, and he can take opposing players off the bounce better than Favors can. Also, I love that left hand. For some reason that is incomprehensible to me as a right-handed human being, left-handed players are just so crafty around the basket.
He is far from a lights out three-point shooter, but he has absolutely shown more stretch abilities than Favors. Last season, Young shot just 32.2 percent from three, but he is just one year removed from shooting 38 percent. I expect the Jazz to give Young a serious look if he indeed opts out and is open to joining their ranks.