Sports
Ranking the Top 2023 NBA Free Agents Still Available – Bleacher Report
NBA free agency is mostly in the rearview, but but there are still a number of potential difference-making guards, bigs and wings available.
As always, the remaining free agents are sorted by past production, how they fit in the modern NBA and plenty of subjectivity on how they’ll do going forward.
To see who the 10 best free agents remaining are, scroll below.
Terrence Ross’ career appeared to be on life support for much of 2020-21 and 2021-22.
He was a reserve floor-spacer who hit just 31.4 percent of his three-point attempts over those two seasons, and defensive metrics were very much out on him.
The 32-year-old wing showed signs of life in 2022-23, though. He shot 36.8 percent from deep and had a 30-point game after joining the Phoenix Suns midseason.
For a team in need of experience and at least the hope of more shooting, Ross could make some sense.
At 24 years old, Jaylen Nowell still has a little time to develop in the NBA.
He has decent (not great) size for a wing, at 6’4″ tall with a 6’7″ wingspan. And last season, he averaged a career high 10.8 points per game, while shooting 54.2 percent on two-point attempts.
However, his three-point percentage falling to 28.9 during the 2022-23 season is a bit of a concern. If he can somehow re-capture the form that allowed him to shoot 39.4 percent during the 2021-22 season, he’ll obviously have a lot more value.
Whatever team signs him, at this point, probably isn’t looking for a sixth or seventh man. But anyone in the market for a little bit of upside in a potential floor spacer might be interested.
Injuries have almost completely derailed T.J. Warren’s career.
In his last fully healthy season, he averaged 19.8 points and 1.4 threes, while shooting 40.3 percent from downtown in 2019-20.
Over the next two seasons, he only appeared in for total games. Then, in 2022–23 he appeared in 42 games, averaged 7.5 points and shot 32.8 percent from three
With his 30th birthday coming in September, and a robust injury history in place, it makes sense for teams to be concerned about signing him.
However, before the injuries, Warren had the kind of game that seemed like it would age gracefully. He wasn’t overly reliant on side-to-side burst or above-the-rim athleticism. Instead, his scoring was buoyed by a strong in-between game, savvy, push shots and more of a bag that you might see in the YMCA than the NBA.
A team looking for an experienced bucket-getter could be interested in Warren for a veteran minimum deal.
Willy Hernangómez experienced his biggest role in the NBA as a rookie in 2016-17. Since then, he’s sort of floated in and out of rotations for the Charlotte Hornets and New Orleans Pelicans.
He’s not the best defensive big man (far from it), but he’s generally productive when he’s on the floor. Over the course of his career he has averaged 7.3 points and 5.8 rebounds in only 15.0 minutes.
For every 75 possessions played, that’s 18.1 points and 14.2 rebounds.
A team in need of a third center with the potential of being sort of a heat-check guy in the low post should give him a look.
After a promising rookie campaign in 2021–22, Ayo Dosunmu sort of leveled off this past season as a starter for the Chicago Bulls.
In 80 games, Dosunmu averaged 8.6 points, but his two-point percentage dipped a bit and his three-point percentage plummeted to 31.2.
He didn’t show much development as a playmaker either, though that may have been difficult to come by on a team with ball-dominant wings like Zach LaVine and DeMar DeRozan.
Still, Dosunmu is only 23 years old, and he did show promise as a floor-spacing nominal 1 in lineups with big-time scorers during that rookie season.
There are plenty of reasons to think he can bounce back.
At 23 years old, Darius Bazley may finally be figuring out his best position in the NBA.
Over his first three seasons in the league, he was overly reliant on a three-point shot that was not doing him many favors. During that stretch, 42.0 percent of all of his shot attempts were threes, but he only made 30.5 percent of those attempts.
In 2022-23, that three-point-attempt rate dropped to 29.0, and he played approximately 84 percent of his minutes as a center.
As a small-ball 5, Bazley can use his quickness and athleticism to outmaneuver burlier big men.
This could be a feasible path forward to a steady role for a good team.
Hamidou Diallo, who turns 25 years old this month, is an explosive 6’5″ athlete with a 6’11” wingspan.
Over his last two seasons with the Detroit pistons, he has found a way to leverage those physical traits into a very strong two point percentage for a guard or wing (56.9 percent on all twos and 72.1 percent within three feet of the rim).
He’ll likely never garner All-Defense buzz, but that length and athleticism can be a weapon on that end of the floor as well.
If he ever figures out how to shoot threes (his career percentage from deep is only 27.4), there might even be a path to a starter’s role for a decent team.
Kelly Oubre Jr. is far from the most efficient scorer, but he just put up a career-high 20.3 points in 2022-23.
And his 6’7″ frame and 7’3″ wingspan continue to make him an intriguing possibility for teams that deploy switch-heavy defensive schemes.
He probably shouldn’t be in the kind of starting, high-volume role that the Charlotte Hornets gave him last season, but as a potential heat-check scorer off the bench, he can bring some upside.
If he can ever figure out how to hit threes at an average rate, all the better.
At 6’7″, P.J. Washington may seem a little undersized for a big man, but his 7’3″ wingspan helps there. And he may be quick enough to pass for a wing against certain lineups.
In his natural position as a 4, Washington’s ability to hit threes (he’s a career 36.6 percent shooter from deep) gives him value as a floor spacer who can drag bigger guys away from the paint.
And a sprinkling of a couple assists per game forces defenders to play him honest wherever he catches the ball.
But where Washington really starts to set himself apart from other three-point-shooting power forwards is with the defensive counting stats he’s able to pile up.
Washington has career averages of 5.2 defensive rebounds, 2.1 threes, 1.2 blocks and 1.1 steals per 75 possessions. Robert Covington and Jaren Jackson Jr. are the only players in NBA history who match or exceed all four marks. If you add Washington’s three-point percentage to the qualifiers, he’s alone.
Christian Wood finally earned a starting role from the Dallas Mavericks in mid-December. Over his next 16 games, he averaged 20.3 points, 9.4 rebounds, 2.4 blocks, 2.3 assists and 2.3 threes, while shooting a respectable 36.7 percent from deep.
He looked like a borderline ideal pick-and-roll (or pick-and-pop) option to play alongside Luka Dončić, but an injury knocked him out of that starting spot. And his role was totally nebulous from that point to the end of the season.
Now, despite averages of 16.8 points, 8.2 rebounds, 1.5 threes and 1.0 blocks over the last four years, Wood remains unsigned.
Bouncing from team to team (he’s played for seven in seven years) may suggest he’s difficult to fit into a team philosophy. And he’s not a proven anchor on defense.
But in an NBA that still puts plenty of value on scoring and bigs who can shoot, there has to be a place for Wood, even as a volume scorer off the bench.