..but at least he didn’t have to deal with training camp. From the Minneapolis Star-Tribune’s Steve Aschburner.
It was a little more than a year ago that Latrell Sprewell made his notorious “family to feed” remarks, which were accompanied by his “why would I want to help them win” remarks, which followed by a few days his “smack in the face” remarks about the Wolves’ refusal to meet his contract-extension demands.
One year later, with a new NBA season underway, Sprewell is unemployed.
We anticipate that a FEMA relief operation will descend upon the Sprewell compound any day now to feed the hungry kids.
No team came at Sprewell in the summer with its available salary-cap space and no one even dangled its full midlevel exception of about $5 million. That left him fishing for partial exceptions or, ultimately, the 10-year veteran’s minimum salary of $1.14 million.
“The market’s changed a great deal,” said Kevin McHale, Wolves vice president of basketball operations. “Things happen very fast.
“Cap space is usually used on young players and projects. Midlevel is used by about half the teams — and half of those split it up, so you’re talking six or eight contracts at ‘full’ midlevel. After that, you’re down to the veteran’s minimum.”
Over the summer, the Nuggets and the Lakers were mentioned as possible spots. Last week, Sprewell’s name surfaced as a possibility in Orlando or Miami.
It is possible that Sprewell dragged his heels on a deal just to avoid the preseason.
That’s what Wolves center Michael Olowokandi thinks. “I’m pretty confident that he’s trying to fine-tune the details of what he’s going to be doing,” said Olowokandi, who stays in touch with Sprewell. “Spree is pretty meticulous in everything he does, be it practicing, his businesses, his gadgetry, whatever it is. I’m pretty confident he’ll be somewhere . . . sunny.”