Nerlens Noel Sues Super Agent Rich Paul

 New York Knicks' Forward Nerlens Noel is reportedly suing his former agent Rich Paul for breach of contract and breach duty claiming he lost $58 Million in potential salary. This is coming after Rich Paul filed a grievance with the National Basketball Players Association over unpaid commission of $200K, from Noel’s previous one year deal with the Knicks' last season. 

In the lawsuit Noel claims during Free Agency in 2017 Paul supposedly advised Noel to take a one year $4.1 million qualifying offer instead of the 4 years $70 million dollar contract the Dallas Mavericks were offering. This with the idea bet on yourself and you can likely make even more money when he would become an unrestricted free agent the following season. The most important distinction is that Paul did not become Noel’s agent until free agency was underway. Noel fired his initial agent with hopes of the following summer Paul would be able to get him a lucrative deal.

During the 2017 season Noel broke his hand and missed half the season. Once free agency came around that summer he ended signing for the minimum and playing the Oklahoma City Thunder for the next 2 seasons making just $3.7 million combined. Noel claims in the lawsuit teams reached out and Paul would not pick up the phone and also felt as though he wasn’t made a priority during the free agent process.

I believe this was a case of just receiving bad advice and also a bit of bad luck on the part of Noel. Because with him breaking his hand the season he was scheduled to go into free agency. This likely made some teams weary because he has always  had nagging injuries which would likely mean he would never play a full season. Unfortunately he doesn’t have the skill set of Kevin Durant, or Kawhi Leonard who even though they were injured still received max deals in free agency. The one thing to take from this cautionary tale is don't leave money on the table especially when you have some history of injuries such as Noel who came into the league with a torn ACL from his only year at Kentucky.   

NBA SCHEDULE HAS ARRIVED

 The NBA released their schedule this week for their historic 75th Season. 

The league will begin the regular season on October 19th and compete in the usual 82 game season. There are many great matchups that will occur this season. I will give you my 2 most  anticipated matches in this upcoming season. On Christmas Day you have the usual 5 game lineup featuring some great match ups. This will be one of the best NBA Seasons ever.

1. Milwaukee Bucks VS Brooklyn Nets

On opening night the NBA Champions face off against the Brooklyn Nets. The Bucks beat the Nets in an excellent 7 game series. The Nets experienced some unfortunate injuries to star players Kyrie Irving during the series, and James Harden struggled as he hobbled while trying to play through a hamstring injury. This will be a great match up as both teams will be healthy. We will get a preview of how the NBA Champions will fare against the team many people pick to win the NBA Championship in the Brooklyn Nets.   

2.  Los Angeles Lakers vs Brooklyn Nets

On Christmas Day the prime time match up will be the Lakers vs the Nets.

This will be seen as a potential NBA Finals preview. This game is a must watch especially with the addition of Russell Westbrook being added to the Lakers team giving both teams a big 3. This game will be one of the highest rated games of the season. The matchup i am looking most forward to is Kyrie Irving vs Westbrook. 

The NBA season will be one for the books. It will be great seeing teams plate especially if we can avoid any major injuries this.

Schroder's New Deal!!

 On Wednesday August 10th it was reported that Dennis Schroder signed a 1 year deal with the Boston Celtics for just $5.9 million. This comes after during the season Schroder rejected the Los Angeles Lakers offer of 4 years for $84 Million. This deal would have kept Schroder under contract with the Lakers.  Schroder decided to take his chances in Free agency in hopes of getting close to a $100 million contract. Not only did he not get close to that he ended up settling for the veteran minimum.

Schroder made a huge miscalculation especially when his numbers across the board this year were all essentially his career averages. IF he had the same he had in Oklahoma City in 2019 where he posted career highs for most major categories including 3PT field goal percentage  and regular field goal percentage. Over the course of the year you can see that Schroder played as though he was hunting for his next contract instead of playing winning basketball.

If Schroder played basketball that contributed to winning he would have been able to get a multi year contract this off season in my opinion. Also when playing with LeBron James, if general managers see you playing non winning basketball  they may play against you. The Point Guard market dried up quickly once free agency began and Schroder unfortunately was forced into a minimum contract. 

With that being said, Schroder is the common story of when betting on yourself goes wrong.
This happens more often than not so when you decide to take a risk be sure that you are certain things will work out for you. Lastly, hopefully Schroder or his representation is able to accurately evaluate his market worth based on the other teams in the league and not just his own opinion. 

Men's Team USA WINS GOLD!!!

The United States (US) faced off against France in the Men’s Basketball Gold Medal game. This was a rematch in which the United States were looking to avenge their only loss during the group stage of the Olympics . The US made it to the Gold Medal game by defeating Spain and Australia. For France their road consisted of them going through Italy and Slovenia, who was led by Luka Doncic.

The  game was highly contested Kevin Durant finished with a game high 29 points. This includes 21 in the first half. The other key to the game was the US team's tenacious defense forcing 18 turnovers. In the US’s 87 to 82 Victory Durant surpassed 100 points in his 3rd straight Olympics. In addition, Jrue Holiday and Khris Middleton became the third pair of teammates to win both the NBA Finals and The Olympic Gold Medal in the same year. They joined Kyrie Irving, Lebron James, Michael Jordan and Scottie Pippen as the only other players to do so.

The biggest takeaway from this basketball tournament is that the United States does still have the best talent in the world. However, the rest of the world is catching up when you speak of some of the better countries and the talent that they produce. Also when you think about the process of the selection of the Olympic team the US is just a collection of star players put together without having any continuity created. Other countries put together the team usually have them together a year prior to Olympics usually in the FIBA World Championships which helps when they play in the Olympics. If we take a similar process where we keep the team together then we don’t have to go through growing pains when you hit the biggest stage.