Sports
NBA Rumors: Gary Trent Jr. Won't Take Minimum Contract to Join Nikola Jokić, Nuggets – Bleacher Report
Free agent Gary Trent Jr. would not accept a minimum contract to play with Nikola Jokić and the Denver Nuggets, according to Harrison Wind of DNVR Sports.
Wind added that there is not “much interest on Denver’s end anyway.”
You can rule out Gary Trent Jr. as an option for the Nuggets in free agency, I'm told. He's not going to take a minimum contract and I don't think there would be much interest on Denver's end anyway.
Trent averaged 13.7 points, 2.6 rebounds, 1.7 assists and 1.1 steals per game in 71 appearances for the Toronto Raptors last season.
The Nuggets could still be hoping to find a replacement for Kentavious Caldwell-Pope after losing him in free agency to the Orlando Magic.
Those numbers were a dip in production for Trent, who averaged 17.9 points per game through his past two seasons with the Raptors.
He still shot 42.6 percent from the field, making 39.3 percent of his shots from deep while attempting 6.4 three-pointers per night.
Trent played the 2023-24 season on a $18.56 million player option, but could be set to move on from Toronto after the Raptors announced extensions for Scottie Barnes and Immanuel Quickley.
TSN’s Josh Lewenberg reported Monday that the Raptors originally offered Trent an annual salary of approximately $15 million to remain in Toronto, but that the guard’s representatives reportedly asked for a raise to an annual value approaching $25 million.
Toronto’s $15 million offer “is no longer on the table,” Lewenberg reported, so Trent will need to find that money elsewhere.
“With the market drying up, one league insider suggested Trent would be ‘lucky’ to get the mid-level exception, valued at $12.5 million,” Lewenberg wrote.
Shams Charania and Jovan Buha reported for The Athletic that Trent was a name “to watch” for the Los Angeles Lakers, but that the Lakers would need to move salary just to offer Trent the $5.2 million midlevel exception.
If Trent is not willing to accept a minimum deal, that rules out a whole host of suitors that are hard-capped after the first wave of free agency.