Hundreds of anti-government demonstrators have taken to the streets in several Georgian cities, calling for justice over a brutal police crackdown on a mass anti-Russia protest.
The rallies on Friday in the capital, Tbilisi, as well as the cities of Kutaisi and Batumi came a day after hundreds of people were injured when police fired tear gas and rubber bullets during a demonstration against a Russian legislator’s address in Georgia‘s parliament.
Many wore a red eye patch in support of two protesters who lost their eyesight after being hit on Thursday by rubber bullets in Tbilisi.
Al Jazeera’s Robin Forestier-Walker, reporting from Tbilisi, said tensions were running high on Friday.
“The violence was inflicted on so many people. Although the government is saying that the protesters attempted to storm parliament yesterday, many people believe that the response was completely over the top,” he said, adding that at least 240 people were injured.
“There is a lot of evidence to suggest that police deliberately fired [rubber bullets] in the faces and in the groin areas of some of those protesters and journalists as well.”
Thursday’s protests saw more than 240 people injured [Zurab Tsertsvadze/AP]
The crowd on Friday primarily called for resignation of Georgia’s Interior Minister Giorgi Gakharia, but also demanded snap parliamentary elections and the ruling party leader’s removal from power.
“We will do everything to oust this government that serves Russia,” said 32-year-old lawyer Demetre Saladze, who was among the protesters on Friday.
Engineer Vakhtang Kiriya, 28, vowed that the demonstrators would make the government answer for the actions of police.
“We will fight until [the ruling party leader Bidzina] Ivanishvili and his team flee Georgia,” he said. “They should get ready to board their jets.”
The protests have already forced the resignation of the parliament speaker, Irakli Kobakhidze, who was found responsible for inviting the Russian delegation and allowing Russian MP Sergey Gavrilov to chair a forum of legislators from predominantly Christian Orthodox countries.
“[People are angry at] how the authorities allowed the Russian delegation to come to Georgia when there are no diplomatic relations between these countries and for them to come in to the parliament and talk and the kind of language they used as well,” Forestier-Walker said.
Many wore a red eye patch in support of two protesters who lost their eye sight after being hit by the police rubber bullets on Thursday
[Irakli Gedenidze/Reuters]
Anti-Russian sentiments run high in Georgia as Russian troops occupy about 20 percent of the Georgian territory, including breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, since the break-up of the Soviet Union in 1990s.
In 2008, Russia and Georgia fought a brief but bloody war over South Ossetia.
Following the conflict, Russia recognised the independence of both separatist regions.
Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili called Russia “an enemy and occupier” and suggested Moscow had helped trigger the protests, while the Kremlin on Friday blamed radical Georgian politicians for what it called “an anti-Russian provocation”.
“Russia is our enemy and occupier. The fifth column it manages may be more dangerous than open aggression,” Zurabishvili posted on her Facebook page.
Responding to the anti-Russian protests, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin signed a decree on Friday, banning Russian airlines from flying to Georgia in response to the outcry against the visiting Russian delegation.
“From July 8, 2019, Russian airlines are temporarily banned from undertaking flights from the territory of the Russian Federation to the territory of Georgia,” said the decree published on the Kremlin website.
The Kremlin also said it was recommending travel agencies suspend tours to Georgia from Russia.
President Donald Trump’s apparent hopes that rhetoric and threats of military action would bully America’s adversaries into caving to his demands have yet to produce desired results. | Alex Wong/Getty Images
Faced with evidence of nefarious activities by such countries, and pushed by hawkish advisers to mount a military response, Trump keeps stepping back from the ledge.
President Donald Trump has long talked a big game when it comes to standing up to U.S. adversaries. He’s threatened “fire and fury” against North Korea, hinted at military action in Venezuela and warned that he could bring about the “official end of Iran.”
But, when faced with evidence of nefarious activities by such countries and pushed by hawkish advisers to mount a military response, Trump keeps stepping back from the ledge.
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The president’s latest move, canceling an imminent U.S. military strike against Iran after Tehran shot down a U.S. drone, risks creating a “Boy who cried ‘wolf!’” scenario: Trump’s future threats may not be taken seriously and adversaries could dangerously miscalculate how he will react, former U.S. officials and analysts across the political spectrum warned.
“President Trump’s handling of rising Iranian provocations in the Persian Gulf is undermining American global credibility — which is the currency for foreign policy and the bedrock of deterrence — and our vital interests,” said Michael Makovsky, chief executive of the right-leaning Jewish Institute for National Security of America.
Trump came to White House 2½ years ago from the bombastic world of New York real estate and the illusionist stage of reality TV. But his apparent hopes that rhetoric and threats of military action would bully America’s adversaries into caving to his demands have yet to produce the desired results, despite Trump’s claims to the contrary.
When those same countries have pushed back, the president — reluctant to actually engage in a new war — has regularly tried to minimize what happened. This past week, for example, he suggested that Iran had mistakenly shot down the U.S. drone. He also downplayed recent attacks on oil tankers that the U.S. blames on Iran as being “very minor.”
“Trump is caught between his aversion to military entanglements and his need to look tough, and he’s also caught between his own cautious instincts and some of his advisers’ excessively bellicose ones,” said Rob Malley, head of the International Crisis Group and a former Obama administration official. “When those factors are in tension, he looks for a way — any way — to minimize the contradiction.”
Trump’s decision to cancel the military strike on Iran went against the recommendations of several top officials, including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, CIA Director Gina Haspel and national security adviser John Bolton, according to The New York Times.
Instead, Iranian leaders said Trump sent a back-channel message to them via the country of Oman requesting talks, according to Reuters. And on Twitter Friday morning, the president put a humanitarian spin on his decision.
“We were cocked & loaded to retaliate last night on 3 different sights [sic] when I asked, how many will die 150 people, sir, was the answer from a General. 10 minutes before the strike I stopped it,” Trump said.
Many responded to the move with relief, including some of the most outspoken opponents of Iran’s Islamist regime who applauded Trump for exercising caution.
“Don’t get into a shooting war with regime on their timeline and on their terms,” said Mark Dubowitz, head of the hawkish Foundation for Defense of Democracies, which has pushed for pressuring the government in Tehran through heavy U.S. sanctions.
But even persistent Trump critics happy to see him call off the strike acknowledged that his unpredictable nature, and his obvious disagreements with his own top aides, undermines U.S. credibility.
“Trump’s message to Iran is clear: He wants to negotiate,” said Joe Cirincione, president of the Ploughshares Fund. “The problem is that the rest of his war cabinet do not. So Iran and the rest of the world cannot understand what the U.S. strategy actually is.”
During his first few months in office, Trump seemed more willing to back up his rhetoric with the use of military force. He ordered missiles to rain down on Syria after the U.S. determined that the Arab country’s strongman leader, Bashar Assad, was behind vicious chemical attack on civilians. Trump later ordered a second strike in Syria for similar reasons.
The moves were especially striking because it separated Trump from his predecessor, President Barack Obama, often a motivating factor for Trump. Obama chose not to attack Syrian assets after Assad ignored his warning not to use chemical weapons, leading to criticism that he was weak.
Now, after backing down himself, Trump faces similar criticism.
Still, Trump’s increasing reliance on rhetoric has, at times, arguably paid off.
He exchanged furious verbal fire with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, warning of raining “fire and fury” down on the young dictator and claiming that he has the “bigger” nuclear button. Kim, whose country has amassed a nuclear arsenal the U.S. has long sought to eliminate, called Trump a “dotard.”
Trump supporters argue that his rhetoric, combined with heavy economic sanctions he placed on North Korea, helped spur Kim to meet twice with Trump and reduce his nuclear-related testing. Trump now says he has a great relationship with Kim.
But while tensions with North Korea today are lower than during Trump’s first year in office, the two countries have made little progress on inking a nuclear agreement. More recently, North Korea has stepped up its anti-U.S. rhetoric, though it has spared Trump from personal insults so far.
North Korea has also resumed test-launching projectiles — likely missiles. Normally, such maneuvers would invite a tough U.S. rebuke, at least verbally. But Trump has downplayed the tests, saying the missiles are short-range. “I don’t consider that a breach of trust at all,” he said.
Trump also approved sanctions and other U.S. pressure on Venezuela’s strongman leader, Nicolás Maduro, whom the U.S. president has said he no longer recognizes as the country’s legitimate leader. Trump has in the past also suggested the U.S. military could play a role in Venezuela.
But as the pressure campaign has failed to work against the Venezuelan autocrat, Trump and his aides have all but stopped talking about the crisis in the Latin American country, where many citizens are desperate for food and basic medicines.
As is always the case, it’s hard to compare a president’s reactions to various national security scenarios. Each has unique characteristics. North Korea is a nuclear-armed state, for instance, making the prospect of a war exceptionally dangerous. And while Venezuela is less of a threat, a U.S. military move there could infuriate other Latin American countries in the Western Hemisphere, even if they dislike Maduro.
Iran poses perhaps the trickiest of all the cases, given its proximity to so many U.S. allies like Israel, its role in the international oil market and its ability to use proxy militias against U.S. targets throughout the Middle East.
Trump pulled the U.S. out of the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran negotiated under Obama. He’s promised to negotiate a better, more comprehensive deal with Tehran, one that covers Iran’s non-nuclear military activities as well as its nuclear ones.
But to date, Trump has offered little in the way of carrots for the Iranians to come to the negotiating table. Instead, he’s heaped U.S. sanctions on Iran, labeled one of its most powerful military units a terrorist group and deployed military assets to the Middle East.
And while Trump has pulled back from a military strike Thursday night, the risk remains of a military confrontation between the two countries.
One trigger point looms: Iran has said it would resume parts of its nuclear program by the middle of next week. That move is a response to Trump’s decision to pull the U.S. out of the nuclear deal, which had offered Iran relief from international sanctions.
If Iran takes any more military action against the United States or its allies in the Middle East, Trump might feel compelled to react with a military strike of his own. The crisis could spiral from there.
“Tehran has called his bluff, but they haven’t yet achieved what they want and need — mitigation of economic pressure. So they have every incentive to continue escalating,” said Suzanne Maloney, a Brookings Institution expert on the Islamic Republic.
New Orleans Saints receiver Michael Thomas is asking for an average annual value of $22 million on a contract extension, a lower figure than his initial asking price, according to Jeff Duncan of the Times-Picayune.
Duncan noted the Saints are sitting in the neighborhood of $18 million per season in negotiations.
Any contract north of $18 million per season would make Thomas the highest-paid receiver in football. Per Over The Cap, Odell Beckham Jr. of the Cleveland Browns currently owns the top AAV among wideouts ($18 million per season).
Beckham’sfive-year, $95 million extension—which he signed with the New York Giants in August 2018—also established a new bar for receivers in terms of fully guaranteed money ($41 million) and total guarantees ($65 million).
Since being drafted in the second round in 2016, Thomas has been among the most productive receivers in the league. The Ohio State alum has started his career with three consecutive seasons of 90-plus catches and 1,100-plus yards, finding the end zone 23 times.
No receiver has caught more passes than Thomas (321) through the first three years of a career.
His numbers have improved each year. He is coming off a season in which he hauled in an NFL-high 125 catches for 1,405 yards (sixth in the NFL) and nine touchdowns (tied for 10th).
As Pro Football Focus noted, the 6’3″, 212-pound Thomas was one of the top pass-catchers in the slot last season:
According to Pro Football Focus’Austin Gayle, Thomas’ contested catch percentage of 58.54 over the past three seasons ranks second in football. Meanwhile, his drop rate of 2.76 percent is the third-lowest among receivers with at least 200 targets since 2016.
Thomas’ strong start to his career has not gone unnoticed. He has earned a pair of Pro Bowl nods (2017 and 2018) as well as a first-team All-Pro selection (2018). And he just turned 26 years old in March.
Thousands of Algerians have rallied in the country’s capital, Algiers, keeping up their call for a political overhaul as authorities detained a high-profile businessman and the head of the state bank on charges of corruption.
Demonstrators returned to central Algiers on Friday for their latest weekly rally, brandishing the Algerian flag that has been a mainstay of the protests that ended the rule of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika in April.
The ailing leader stepped down on April 2 under pressure from the army after mass protests that began in February, demanding an end to his 20-year rule and calling for his ruling elite to be held to account for corruption.
In Friday’s protest, huge crowds demanded the departure of interim President Abdelkader Bensalah and Prime Minister Noureddine Bedoui, who they see as part of the old guard that has run the North African country since independence from France in 1962.
Some also carried the Amazigh colours despite a ban on the minority’s flag imposed this week by the army chief, General Ahmed Gaid Salah.
“No to regionalism, we are all brothers,” the protesters chanted.
They also held up banners directed ruling elite, saying: “Thieves, you have destroyed the country.” Others read: “Algeria is a free and democratic country”.
Police earlier arrested dozens of demonstrators, especially those carrying the Amazigh colours, from around the capital’s main post office, the epicentre of demonstrations since they first broke out in February.
On previous Fridays in recent weeks, those detained have been released at the end of the day. There was no comment from the authorities.
‘Suppression of free expression’
Some protesters denounced the confiscation of the Amazigh flag.
“It’s a suppression of free expression, a violation of identity and a provocation attempt,” a protester said in central Algiers.
The Amazigh make up around 10 million of Algeria’s 42.2 million population.
Algeria‘s constitution, adopted in 2016, recognizes the Amazigh language along with Arabic as the North African country’s official languages.
In a speech on Tuesday, Salah contended that those who oppose the army were “enemies of Algeria”, resisting calls by the protest movement and an association of trade unions for a maximum one-year political transition overseen by new and independent interim institutions.
He warned that any political transition outside the existing constitutional order was tantamount to suppressing “all state institutions … and the destruction of the foundations” of the state.
Although a wave of anti-corruption investigations have been launched, demonstrators have kept up calls for the entire government surrounding Bouteflika to quit.
“Gaid Salah is scared of the [proposed] transition because he would not be able to control everything”, protester Salim Hassani said in Algiers.
Another demonstrator, Ahmed Meshdall, said, “It is not in the interests of Algerians to destroy the institutions.”
“A transition provides a path to elections without the mafia” currently in power, he added.
Authorities have postponed a presidential election previously planned for July 4 because of a lack of candidates, with no new date set for the vote.
The latest high-profile arrest is businessman Hassan Larbaoui, the director of a private company called Global Group, which runs a car assembly plant set up in joint venture with South Korea’s Kia Motors.
The court of first instance in Algiers ordered Larbaoui to be arrested, along with the head of state bank Banque Nationale d’Algerie (BNA) and two industry ministry officials, state radio reported.
Larbaoui’s legal representative was not immediately available for comment. BNA declined to comment.
President Donald Trump’s campaign manager Brad Parscale is determined to prevent leaks from damaging the president’s momentum — even if it means blacklisting chatty high-dollar donors from events. | Andrew Harnik/AP Photo
The president’s 2020 team is taking unusual steps to prevent more leaks, including restrictions on high-dollar donors.
When Naples, Fla., resident Joseph Fogg III, a longtime GOP fundraiser, arrived last month at the Trump International Hotel in Washington for a donor conference benefiting the president’s reelection campaign, he was asked by the organizers to place his phone inside a lockable pouch.
Only after leaving the hotel’s Presidential Ballroom, where top Trump surrogates and Vice President Mike Pence privately addressed well-connected GOP donors, could Fogg retrieve his phone from the Yondr — a magnetic device familiar to high school students who’ve grown accustomed to placing their phones inside before class, but surprising to some of the president’s richest supporters — by tapping it on an unlocking base controlled by the fundraiser’s organizers.
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“We gave $1 million last year and we still had to put our phones away,” said Dallas businessman Doug Deason, who has co-hosted fundraisers for Trump and attended an intimate roundtable with him ahead of an April donor event organized by the president’s flagship super PAC, America First Action.
Both the Trump campaign and America First began using the pouches at donor gatherings in recent months to prevent attendees from documenting sensitive strategies that are often discussed, and to cultivate an environment where Trump and his aides feel they can speak candidly. A GOP official familiar with the move said donors were previously asked to place their phones in bins outside fundraising events, but this approach allows them to keep their phones with them.
The strictly enforced ban — even those who’ve made multimillion-dollar contributions to pro-Trump outside groups must obey it — is one of many tactics Trump allies and campaign officials are deploying to ensure the president’s reelection operation is decidedly less leaky than his administration. Their effectiveness, however, came under scrutiny this month when several media outlets obtained internal polling numbers that showed Trump trailing potential Democratic challenger Joe Biden in a handful of 2020 battleground states in March.
Three of the campaign’s pollsters — Brett Loyd, Michael Baselice and Adam Geller — were fired as a result of the leak, despite insisting they had no reason to share two-month-old data or violate their lucrative contracts. A person familiar with the decision, who requested anonymity to speak about previously unreported internal matters, said Baselice and Geller are expected to land deals with America First after a 120-day “cooling-off period” that federal election rules require before someone can jump from a campaign to a super PAC. The pro-Trump outfit plans to start conducting its own polling closer to the general election.
“There was always a conversation that some would end up at the super PAC,” this person said, noting that the pollsters’ firings have been widely discussed over the past week by aides inside the campaign who have raised objections to the reason for which they were dismissed.
Two veteran pollsters who were involved with Trump’s 2016 campaign, Tony Fabrizio and John McLaughlin, were retained by the campaign. Fabrizio was behind the 17-state poll that showed Trump lagging behind Biden in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Florida, and issued a statement describing reports about the leaked data as “misleading” because the poll was conducted using “the most unfavorable turnout model possible.”
Campaign aides and Fabrizio now claim the latest internal polling shows Trump with sizable leads across some of the 17 states they have surveyed. “The president’s new polling is extraordinary and his numbers have never been better,” Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale said in a statement.
Along with officials at the Republican National Committee and America First, Parscale is determined to prevent further leaks from damaging the momentum he believes Trump possesses — even if it means blacklisting chatty high-dollar donors from events.
“We’ve banned some donors from events who we know have spoken to the press,” said Kelly Sadler, a former White House official who now serves as spokeswoman for America First. Sadler declined to identify on the record which donors have been banned.
The same rules apply to staff of the super PAC, who were warned that the mere suspicion of leaking will cost them their jobs.
“When Linda [McMahon] took over in April, she addressed the group and said, ‘If there’s a leak out of this organization, you will be fired. They are damaging to the president and you better believe you will be out of this organization,’” Sadler recalled, adding that America First has “not had a leak since she came on board.”
The Trump campaign, meanwhile, does not have a clear-cut policy set about leaking, although aides have been asked to sign nondisclosure agreements, according to an official familiar with the policy.
Part of the reason for the hypersensitivity, several officials said, is that those involved in the president’s reelection effort have witnessed — some firsthand — the reputational damage caused by sensitive leaks out of the White House. The problem has dogged the West Wing since its earliest days, when intentional leaks from warring factions were par for the course and Trump aides repeatedly accused career officials of trying to sabotage the president.
Sadler herself landed at America First after she was quietly dismissed from the White House for making a disparaging joke about the late Sen. John McCain that leaked from a communications staff meeting. And earlier this year, Trump was accused of slacking off and prioritizing TV watching over his official responsibilities when a White House official leaked three months of his private schedules to Axios. Another leak that appeared to come from Trump’s orbit, about a meeting that his eldest son Don Jr. took in June 2016 with a Russian lawyer offering dirt on Hillary Clinton, continues to cause a headache for the president, nearly two years after the story first broke.
“What a disgraceful breach of trust,” declared White House director of Oval Office operations Madeleine Westerhout when the president’s schedules leaked in February. The daily rundowns don’t show “the hundreds of calls and meetings [Trump] takes everyday,” she claimed.
Unlike the campaign’s immediate dismissal of three of its pollsters, the White House has been slower to identify and punish leakers. Describing leakers as “traitors and cowards” after Sadler’s comment leaked last May, Trump vowed to determine which individuals have been behind the breaches that have caused his administration such embarrassment. Little has come of the effort, and some journalists have even pointed out that Trump himself will often call reporters to share information anonymously.
There are others involved in Trump’s reelection campaign, though, who claim the anti-leaking precautions are mostly in place to protect the president from himself.
One Republican close to the White House said Trump’s unrehearsed style in the presence of donors leaves him susceptible to “a Mitt Romney moment” if steps aren’t taken to prevent people from capturing audio or video of his remarks. Romney faced intense criticism just weeks before he lost to former President Barack Obama when, in a leaked video from his remarks to a private audience, he suggested that 47 percent of Americans would automatically vote for the incumbent Democrat because they did not take responsibility for their lives or pay income taxes.
Trump has raised eyebrows at previous donor events for praising Chinese President Xi Jinping for getting rid of term limits (”He’s now president for life … Maybe we’ll have to give that a shot some day,” he told GOP donors at Mar-a-Lago in March 2018) and for suggesting at an event earlier this year that Democrats “hate Jewish people.”
In an interview with Jacob Davey of Complex, Beckham revealed that he didn’t think remaining with the Giants would have allowed him to blossom into the player most expect him to be:
“I can’t wait to get going. I just felt with the Giants I was just stuck at a place that wasn’t working for me anymore. I felt like I wasn’t going to be able to reach my full potential there; mentally, physically, spiritually, everything I felt capable of doing, I just couldn’t see it happening there. So I think allowing me to be in an environment where I can be myself and give it a different approach, I feel like my football will benefit. I’m just excited about being able to play football again and not have to deal with all the other stuff and politics that came with my previous role.”
After spending the first five years of his career with the Giants, OBJ was traded to Cleveland this offseason for a first-round pick, a third-round pick and safety Jabrill Peppers.
After New York selected him with the No. 12 overall pick in the 2014 NFL draft out of LSU, Beckham registered at least 90 catches, 1,300 yards and 10 touchdowns and was named to the Pro Bowl in each of his first three NFL seasons.
An ankle injury cost Beckham all but four games in 2017, but he bounced back to appear in 12 games last season. Even though he missed four contests, Beckham still finished with 77 grabs for 1,052 yards and six scores while also throwing for two touchdowns on trick plays.
While Beckham was always productive, he often made headlines for other reasons. Beckham’s sideline tantrums were heavily covered, and he made no shortage of controversial comments to the media as well.
Specifically, Beckham did little to stand up for quarterback Eli Manning during an interview withESPNlast season in which he was asked if Manning was to blame for the Giants’ offensive struggles:
“I don’t know. Like I said, I feel like he’s not going to get out the pocket. He’s not — we know Eli’s not running it. But is it a matter of time issue? Can he still throw it, yeah, but it’s been pretty safe and it’s been, you know … cool catching shallow [routes] and trying to take it to the house. But I’m, you know, I want to go over the top of somebody.”
Manning is poised to start for the Giants this season, but they selected quarterback Daniel Jones with the No. 6 overall pick in the 2019 NFL draft to be his successor.
In Cleveland, Beckham will catch passes for 2018 No. 1 overall pick Baker Mayfield, who turned in a highly productive rookie season with a 6-7 record, 3,725 passing yards, 27 touchdowns and 14 interceptions.
With Beckham, Mayfield, wide receiver Jarvis Landry and running backs Nick Chubb and Kareem Hunt on offense, the Browns may be on the verge of building an offensive juggernaut, and OBJ clearly feels he is now better positioned to reach and maintain elite receiver status.
State Department data shows that Kelly Craft spent 21 consecutive days outside of Canada. | Stefani Reynolds/Getty Images
Democratic senators on the Foreign Relations Committee are awaiting more information from the State Department to determine whether U.S. Ambassador to Canada Kelly Craft’s travels, and other frequent absences from her post, were for official business or for personal travel.
Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), a senior Democrat on the committee, told POLITICO he expects committee Republicans will wait to schedulea markup for Craft — President Donald Trump’s choice to replace Nikki Haley as chief envoy to the United Nations — until after she provides those records.
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“That’s important,” he said, “that we go through the proper vetting.”
At Craft’s confirmation hearing on Wednesday, a chart displayed on the Democratic side of the committee dais highlighted in red the 300-plus days that Craft was outside of her country post, based on information provided by the State Department. That amounts to roughly half of her tenure in Ottawa.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) told POLITICO he suspects “many of those days away are justified,” but added that the panel should have a “stricter accounting” of which days she was working when she was outside of Canada.
“She’s got to provide some more answers on her absences,” Murphy said, adding, “What she’s provided so far doesn’t seem to meet the mark.”
Cardin said the State Department hasn’t indicated when it expects to provide the committee the requested information. The Department did not comment this week when POLITICO asked whether and when it would submit more detailed records to the committee.
Committee Chairman Jim Risch (R-Idaho) said Wednesday he expects to schedule a markup on Craft’s nomination “pretty quick,” though he noted the panel will have to wait for her to answer questions senators submit for the record.
Questions continue to crop up about some of Craft’s absences.
Craft presented her credentials to Canada’s governor general — the Queen of England’s representative — on Oct. 23, 2017, formally beginning her ambassadorship. Information the State Department provided to the Foreign Relations Committee shows Craft left Canada that same day, a Senate aide told POLITICO.
State Department data also shows that Craft spent Monday, April 23, 2018 until Sunday, May 13, 2018 — or 21 consecutive days — outside of Canada, the Senate aide said. That period was largely dominated by negotiations on the revamped North American trade deal that was announced on Oct. 1, 2018, a person familiar with the matter told POLITICO.
Craft tweeted on April 27, 2018 that she was “home in Kentucky for the weekend.” Her social media activity throughout the following week included a tweet acknowledging Toronto on the day of a vigil in the city to remember victims of a van attack; retweets of various State-Department-affiliated accounts; and two tweets chronicling time spent at the May 5, 2018, Kentucky Derby.
“Having a great day at Churchill Downs with [American] and [Canadian] family and friends!” she tweeted on Derby day that year.
The State Department did not comment when asked about specific details of Craft’s absences from Canada.
Some Republicans defended Craft during the hearing, arguing that she shouldn’t be stuck at her desk in Ottawa and that traveling to promote the USMCA was a Trump administration priority.
Craft attributed much of her travel to trade talks, noting that she didn’t “enjoy living out of a suitcase” but understood how important the negotiations were to the White House. She also vowed during the hearing to submit complete records of her time away from post.
But Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), the committee’s top Democrat, said at the hearing that Craft’s travel seemed to become more frequent after USMCA negotiations wrapped up. Information released by Senate Democratic aides Wednesday demonstrated that she was away from Canada for an average of 20 days per month in the eight months following the end of the USMCA talks.
Democratic Sen. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire said Thursday that, when she talked to Craft privately this week, she “thought she had a very good answer to” explain her travel outside of Canada.
Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), also a member of the panel, said Thursday he intends to support Craft’s nomination. “I think she’s qualified,” he said.
Murphy said he has “policy concerns” with Craft’s nomination, but added that didn’t necessarily mean he’d oppose her.
“I certainly haven’t decided to vote against her,” he said, “and I think her ability to answer these questions will be impactful on my decision.”
Hall of Fame basketball coach Rick Pitino said Friday that he turned down an offer to return as president and head coach of Panathinaikos in the Greek League, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski.
Pitino released a statement Friday in which he thanked Panathinaikos and its fans:
Per Wojnarowski, Pitino added that he wants to pursue a job in the NBA as a head coach or in a player personnel or advisory role.
In his only season with Panathinaikos, Pitino led the team to a win over PAOK in the Greek Basketball Cup final.
The 66-year-old Pitino was the head men’s basketball coach at Louisville from 2001 to 2017. During that time, he led the Cardinals to 13 NCAA tournament appearances, three Final Fours and one championship, although two Final Four appearances and the national title were vacated because of recruiting violations.
Pitino’s tenure at Louisville ended in disgrace when the University of Louisville Athletic Association voted to terminate him because of his involvement in the recruitment of 5-star forward Brian Bowen, whose family was allegedly paid $100,000 by an Adidas representative to ensure his commitment to Louisville.
Prior to Louisville, Pitino was the head coach at Boston University, Providence and Kentucky. He led Kentucky to a national title in 1996 and had three other Final Four appearances with the Wildcats.
Pitino also has head coaching experience in the NBA, although his level of success fell far short of what he accomplished in college.
In two seasons as head coach of the New York Knicks from 1987 to 1989, he went 90-74 with two playoff appearances and one playoff series win. He then coached the Boston Celtics for parts of four seasons from 1997 to 2001. Pitino went just 102-146 with the Celtics, failed to reach the playoffs and resigned during the 2000-01 campaign.
Overall, Pitino is 192-220 as an NBA head coach.
There are currently no NBA head coaching openings, which means a player personnel or advisory job may be his best chance at returning to the NBA in the immediate future.
Finally, mercifully, after months of radio silence, we can talk about NBA free agency now that the draft is over.
Here’s hoping you read that with your sarcasm font turned on. Free agency has dominated every discussion over the past year or so. That’s how the league works now. Most of the moves on draft night were analyzed in terms of how they impact this year’s market—and rightfully so.
Imagining every team’s top target is a necessary exercise so close to the June 30 start date. Depth-chart outlooks are slightly clearer, and more concrete cap-sheet projections are beginning to take shape.
Plus, Thursday’s draft—and lead-up to it—most definitely shook things up.
The Utah Jazz’s priorities have shifted following the acquisition of Mike Conley. The Boston Celtics seem to be on the verge of losing both Al Horford and Kyrie Irving and are now one of this summer’s biggest mysteries. The Phoenix Suns have…weirded up their situation.
Forgive us for advancing free-agency speculation even further. Please also note that we’re not sorry.
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Harry How/Getty Images
Charlotte Hornets: Kemba Walker
Kemba Walker has said staying in Charlotte is his top priority, and that he’s willing to take less than the five-year, $221.3 million supermax for which he’s eligible to make it happen. Ergo, this isn’t complicated: The Hornets need to focus on keeping him.
This becomes more complicated if Walker ends up demanding the supermax. That’s a real conversation. Pretty much every cheaper iteration is not.
Giving Walker his regular full-Bird max (five years, $189.7 million) would vault the Hornets into luxury-tax territory. They cannot afford to care. Losing Walker sends the franchise into a full-tilt rebuild without a distinct cornerstone.
Charlotte can figure out how to cut costs later, or owner Michael Jordan can commit to paying the tax for the first time. The bigger question(s): Will Jeremy Lamb price himself out of town? And if so, who can general manger Mitch Kupchak get with the mini mid-level exception (or less) to replace his shot creation?
Outside free-agent target: Rodney Hood
Golden State Warriors: Kevin Durant (player option)/Klay Thompson
Kevin Durant’s Achilles injury and Klay Thompson’s torn ACL should not change the Warriors’ approach. Next year will be a slog with both stars missing most, if not all, of the season, but offering five-year maxes to each remains the smartest play. They can aim to resume dynastic dominance in 2020-21.
Golden State is apparently thinking along these lines, according to ESPN’s Brian Windhorst. That’s smart. Durant is still a flight risk, but a five-year, $221.3 million windfall has to hold more appeal after he suffered a devastating injury. Thompson’s return is a non-issue. He’ll be back if the Warriors don’t get cute during negotiations.
Filling out the rest of the roster will be a bigger problem. The Warriors project as a taxpayer even if Durant bolts. That leaves the mini mid-level exception. They have Kevon Looney’s Bird rights but need more help on the frontline assuming DeMarcus Cousins bounces. Adding another shot-creator, while a must no matter what, becomes mission critical should Durant head elsewhere.
Outside free-agent target: Austin Rivers
Milwaukee Bucks: Khris Middleton
Khris Middleton shouldn’t be a flight risk if the Bucks offer a four- ($146.5 million) or five-year max ($189.7 million). They seem prepared to go that far.
Trading Tony Snell and the 30th pick to the Detroit Pistons leaned out the 2020-21 cap sheet, ostensibly arming Milwaukee to bankroll the current core down the line without wallowing deep inside tax. This deal also carved out a more workable path to re-signing Brook Lopez.
Carrying free-agent holds for Middleton and Malcolm Brogdon (restricted) while waiving George Hill ($1 million guaranteed) gives the Bucks somewhere between $12 and $14 million in cap space, depending on what they do with their other non-guaranteed deals.
That’s noticeably more than the non-taxpayer’s mid-level exception ($9.2 million), and it should be enough to retain Lopez. Milwaukee can then go over the cap to hammer out deals for Brogdon and Middleton without regard for the luxury-tax apron.
Outside free-agent target if Lopez stays: Kyle O’Quinn
Outside free-agent target if Lopez leaves: Dewayne Dedmon
Orlando Magic: Nikola Vucevic
Having Mo Bamba on the docket would render Nikola Vucevic expendable if the Magic were in the middle of a rebuild. They’re not. They’re in that awkward territory between a youth movement and trying to compete.
Vucevic jibes with Orlando’s two timelines. He is working off his first career All-Star bid, can carry the offense on his own for smaller stretches, is an underrated interior defender and, above all, shouldn’t cost the moon.
Bigs outside the megastar tier are more prone to getting squeezed. Anthony Davis, Joel Embiid, Kristaps Porzingis (restricted), Karl-Anthony Towns et al. are the exceptions. Vucevic is closer to the rule.
Paying him a ton of money over the shorter term is fine. The Magic don’t need to overthink this unless Vucevic gets a massive three- or four-year offer from someone else. Even then, they might have to grin and pay it. Orlando isn’t a free-agent destination, and the Magic need to renounce both Vooch and Terrence Ross just to dredge up meaningful cap room.
Outside free-agent target: Darren Collison
Philadelphia 76ers: Jimmy Butler/Tobias Harris
Running it back should be more attractive than ever to the Sixers. Their four-star core only appeared in 21 games together through the regular season and playoffs, and Golden State’s expected regression, coupled with the rampant uncertainty in Boston and Toronto, opens the door for Philly to burst onto the intimate title-favorites scene.
Jimmy Butler is the top priority if the Sixers are forced to choose. He is their most reliable closer, and his transition to pseudo-point guard during the playoffs proved to be huge. Maybe he takes a haircut on a five-year deal, but Philly doesn’t have the runway to mess around. Offer him the full boat, and be done with it.
Rounding out the rotation with a backup big, another playmaker and shooters will take precedence after the Sixers tackle the futures of Butler, Tobias Harris and JJ Redick. The latter’s price point will be a guiding force if Butler and Harris get penciled in for maxes. Philly has scenarios in which it keeps all three and retains access to the full MLE.
Outside target: Danny Green
Toronto Raptors: Kawhi Leonard (player option)
Congratulations to the Raptors. They won the NBA title and, equally important, made the Los Angeles Clippers sweat Kawhi Leonard’s free-agency decision in the process, per Windhorst.
Plenty of people still believe he’s going to L.A. Windhorst also added that Leonard may give the New York Knicks a meeting. Whatever. The Raptors have made their case, and it is a damn good one. Leonard is their everything unless he leaves.
And if he does, they have a decision to make: Do they start over or try to retool around Marc Gasol (player option), Kyle Lowry and Pascal Siakam?
Leonard was acquired under the guise Toronto would blow it up without him. It isn’t that easy anymore. Siakam is fast-tracked for stardom, and while the Raptors (probably) won’t have real money to spend this summer, they’re in line for squeaky-clean books in 2020 and 2021.
Outside target if Leonard stays: Garrett Temple
Outside target if Leonard leaves and they don’t rebuild: Dorian Finney-Smith (restricted)
Outside target if Leonard leaves and they start over: Youthful projects (Rondae Hollis-Jefferson, Stanley Johnson (restricted), Furkan Korkmaz, etc.)
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Atlanta Hawks: Dewayne Dedmon (Early Bird)
Absorbing the salaries of Allen Crabbe and Solomon Hill effectively nuked the Hawks’ cap space, along with any idea that they’d become major free-agency players. They can drum up around $13 million in spending power if they renounce Dewayne Dedmon, but they’re better off keeping him.
Atlanta needs a very specific big man to pair with John Collins up front—someone who can space the floor around his dives to the basket and protects the rim without tripping over himself when coaxed into defending outside the paint.
Dedmon is that player. Nearly40 percent of his field-goal attempts last season came as catch-and-fire threes, on which he shot 38.1 percent, and he is a functional deterrent around the basket.
A Collins-De’Andre Hunter frontline has massive appeal in smaller lineups but will struggle to hold up on defense. Dedmon, 29, is a good placeholder in the meantime. Atlanta is interested in bringing him back on what The Athletic’sShams Charaniacalled a “balloon one-year deal.”
Signing a short-term agreement poses some risk for Dedmon, but the Hawks can make it worthwhile if they push it two seasons and use his early Bird rights to offer a starting salary up to $12.6 million.
Top outside free-agent target: Maxi Kleber (restricted)
Cleveland Cavaliers: David Nwaba (non-Bird restricted)
Luxury-tax concerns will follow the Cavaliers into free agency whether they trade JR Smith’s partially guaranteed deal ($3.9 million) or waive him themselves. Owner Dan Gilbert has not shied away from expensive bottom lines in the past, but this summer is different.
Cleveland isn’t a contender or anything close to it. Burning the mini mid-level exception ($5.7 million) is harder to stomach unless an impactful young player unexpectedly falls into that price range.
Keeping David Nwaba should top the Cavaliers’ to-do list. Acquiring talent is the general goal, but they need wings and defensive spunk more than ever after getting Darius Garland and Kevin Porter Jr., both guards, at Nos. 5 and No. 30, respectively. (Any Dylan Windler fans out there?)
Nwaba is a force despite standing only 6’4″. He matches up with positions 1 through 3 and has shown he can hold his own one-on-one versus bigger wings and small-ball 4s. His shooting is far from polished, but he canned 35.7 percentof his wide-open treys in 51 appearances last season. Cleveland isn’t going to do any better for the money it can offer.
Outside free-agent target: Stanley Johnson (restricted)
Memphis Grizzlies: Delon Wright (restricted)
Selecting Ja Morant at No. 2 does not invite the Grizzlies to let Delon Wright walk. He is the crown jewel from the Marc Gasol trade, and they have room for another backcourt body after dealing Mike Conley to the Jazz.
Wright’s limitations as a jump shooter shouldn’t scare off Memphis. He played beside other guards during his time with the Raptors, fared extremely well firing on the catch in 2017-18 and has always been a willing mover and shaker off the ball.
His defensive portability also keeps in theme with the rest of the Grizzlies roster. They traded up for Brandon Clarke on draft night, still employ Jae Crowder for now and already have Kyle Anderson and Jaren Jackson Jr.
Scoring against them in the half court will be a chore if Wright comes back. If nothing else, his capacity to match up at both guards spot is a godsend for Morant’s defensive learning curve.
Memphis might want to think about reeling in another playmaker, but Anderson and Wright are solid secondary options next to Morant. Landing a combo big is more pressing even if Jonas Valanciunas stays put.
Outside free-agent target: Kevon Looney
Minnesota Timberwolves: Tyus Jones (restricted)
Picking up Jarrett Culver (No. 6) was a good move by the Timberwolves. He should be a defensive monster at both the 2 and 3, with the bandwidth to shimmy up to the 4 on occasion. Some have doubts about how his lack of explosion will impact his half-court shot creation, but he’s dangerous when he generates some separation.
Point guard remains the Timberwolves’ biggest issue, and they might as well look in-house to address it.
Karl-Anthony Towns hasn’t been shy about recruiting D’Angelo Russell. He better brace himself for disappointment. The Timberwolves will be working with the non-taxpayer’s mid-level exception unless they shed a ton of salary.
That money can net an outside option, and Minnesota needs one of those, but the pickings are slim. The Timberwolves don’t have the cap space to bid on rival restricted free agents, and many of the mid-end options aren’t worth significant investments.
Darren Collison is a name to consider, but he turns 32 in August, and Minnesota doesn’t look poised to win now. Tyus Jones is only 23, with plenty of room to grow on offense. He may never be a reliable playmaker out of the pick-and-roll, but he’s at least a tough-nosed defender who fits the Timberwolves’ (apparent) timeline.
Outside free-agent target: Reggie Bullock or Darren Collison
Washington Wizards: Tomas Satoransky (restricted)
More than half of the Wizards roster is entering free agency, and they’ll need to be prudent about who they re-sign.
John Wall‘s recovery from a ruptured left Achilles tendon willcost him mostof next season, and Bradley Beal’s future could be up in the air depending on who Washington hires as its general manager. This isn’t a roster that warrants many reinvestments.
Tomas Satoransky is above the Wizards’ ambiguity. He gives them an added layer of playmaking in Wall’s absence and has enough experience working off the ball to mesh with whatever form this core takes in the long run. Not one of Washington’s other rotation staples posted a higher assist rate on drives, and Satoransky averaged as many points per spot-up possession as Joe Harris.
Failing an over-the-top offer sheet from another admirer that threatens to muck up the Wizards’ long-term payroll even further, he is a player they should consider borderline indispensable. Almost all of their other free agents are replaceable, and they can keep costs down by targeting youthful fliers on their second and third chances who don’t cut into Rui Hachimura’s reps at power forward.
Outside free-agent target: Mario Hezonja
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Brooklyn Nets: Kyrie Irving
This isn’t so much a suggestion as a submission to the inevitable. The Nets and Kyrie Irving have been dancing around and toward one another for the past few weeks, and it doesn’t seem like their dalliance rests on the acquisition of another star.
“Two high-ranking sources told me whatever qualms any teams might have about adding Kyrie Irving without Kevin Durant, the Nets are all-in,” the New York Post‘s Brian Lewis tweeted. “One would think they’d love both, but Brooklyn is still very interested in Irving with or without KD.”
Two max stars is still the plan. After already sending No. 17 and Allen Crabbe to the Hawks, the Nets shipped No. 27 to the Los Angeles Clippers, creating even more flexibility and grabbing a 2020 first-rounder in the process.
Renouncing D’Angelo Russell would now give them nearly $70 million in cap space—just shy of what it’ll take to max out both Durant and Irving ($70.9 million). They can make up the difference by offloading one of their (many) smaller salaries in exchange for future draft compensation or as part of a larger trade.
Landing Irving won’t feel like a huge win without getting another star. (Brooklyn has more than enough room to sign a second max player with seven to nine years of experience.) The Nets can always re-up Russell, but his defensive fit with Irving figures to be untenable. And yet, letting him walk would be weird if he’s not being replaced by another star.
Either way, the Nets should remain locked on Irving. He is an upgrade over Russell and someone other stars have a history of wanting to play alongside. (Jimmy Butler, anyone?)
Non-max target: Nikola Mirotic
Los Angeles Clippers: Kawhi Leonard (player option)
Kawhi Leonard will be nothing if not harder to poach after winning a title with the Raptors. That won’t stop the Clippers. It can’t. They spent the entire year linked to his free agency and have plenty of cap space.
They might as well shoot their shot.
It helps that the Clippers have the flexibility to sign Leonard and another bigwig. They’ll have to reroute Danilo Gallinari to max out a second player, but Al Horford’s presumed departure from the Celtics paves the way for a more affordable option.
As Marc Stein of the New York Times wrote: “The belief making the front-office rounds tonight is that Al Horford already knows there’s a four-year contract worth in excess of $100 million waiting out there for him June 30…knowledge that led to Horford’s talks with the Celtics dissolving.”
The Clippers can juuust about get to that level without trading Gallinari if they renounce all of their own free agents and waive their non-guaranteed contracts. They can also still flip Gallo for around $10 to $12 million in cap relief and keep Patrick Beverley’s hold on the books.
Point being: They have a bunch of different avenues to explore, as well as the strongest non-Raptors sales pitch to throw at Leonard.
Non-max target: Al Horford
Los Angeles Lakers: Kemba Walker
Whether you believe the Lakers botched the timing of the Anthony Davis trade doesn’t much matter. ESPN’s Ramona Shelburne reported that they didn’t understand the implications of completing the deal on July 6 instead of 30 days after the No. 4 pick signs. Her colleague, Adrian Wojnarowski, heard the timing was intentional.
Once more: This doesn’t matter for our purposes. The Lakers are still doing everything they can to stretch out their cap space. Worst-case scenario, they complete the Davis trade, offload and renounce everyone other than him, LeBron James and Kyle Kuzma and enter free agency with around $30 million in room.
Maxing out Kemba Walker will cost more ($32.7 million), so it remains important that they wedge their way into the trade that sent the No. 4 pick from New Orleans to Atlanta. This is ongoing as of Thursday night, per ESPN’s Dave McMenamin. Figuring out a way to include $3.7 million in additional salary—Isaac Bonga, Mo Wagner and guaranteeing about $200,000 of Jemerrio Jones’ contract—allows them to complete the Davis trade after using max cap space.
In the event the Lakers fail, they can at least get close enough to Walker’s max for a meeting. Maybe he takes slightly less to chase rings. Or, again, perhaps Los Angeles will have his full salary available.
Others will no doubt want the Lakers to chase Irving or Leonard. They are both ideal. Walker feels more realistic. Irving is heavily linked to both New York teams, and the Leonard sweepstakes appears to be a two-team race between the Clippers and Raptors.
If either one expresses a desire to join Davis and James, the Lakers must of course shift focus. For now, they need to meld ambition with plausibility. Walker can approximate the Irving-James partnership from Cleveland and might be more open to playing third wheel after making just two postseason appearances in eight years with the Hornets.
Non-max target: Seth Curry
New York Knicks: Kevin Durant (player option)
Kevin Durant’s Achilles injury doesn’t give the Knicks license to pivot into an alternative—mostly because they don’t have one.
Davis is a member of the Lakers. They might lose Irving to Brooklyn. The consideration they may get from Leonard feels like a smokescreen. They’ve never really been linked to Butler. Walker and Tobias Harris could be options, but neither completely turns the franchise’s fortunes.
Durant still can.
Next year will be a wash, but New York won’t have nothing to show for it. RJ Barrett, Kevin Knox, Mitchell Robinson, Dennis Smith Jr. and the other kids will get tons of reps while losing enough to guarantee the Knicks earn higher-end lottery odds. They’d then go into 2020-21 with a (hopefully) healthy Durant, more seasoned youngsters, another top pick and, if they play it correctly, gobs of cap space.
And who knows, bagging Durant now might still help them woo another star. At the bare-naked minimum, after snagging another high lottery pick while he rehabs, they’ll have the ammo to pursue whatever disgruntled A-lister hits the chopping block next summer.
Non-max target: Noah Vonleh (non-Bird)
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Boston Celtics: Malcolm Brogdon (restricted)
Look, I’m not quite sure what the Celtics are doing.
They had a solid draft, exiting with Romeo Langford (No. 14), Grant Williams (No. 22), Carsen Edwards (No. 33) and Milwaukee’s 2020 first-rounder (top-seven protection, via Phoenix). And they can now get to more than $33 million in room if Al Horford and Kyrie Irving leave as expected and they renounce most of their other free agents.
Still, so many questions remain.
Are they gearing up to chase a big fish? Which marquee name is signing with them if Horford and Irving are already gone? Can either of those situations be salvaged? Will the Celtics merely parlay their flexibility into new contracts for Marcus Morris, Terry Rozier (restricted) and another big before calling it an offseason?
Something larger appears to be afoot. Sending Aron Baynes to Phoenix doesn’t make much sense otherwise.
Without knowing what that something might be, allow me to propose Malcolm Brogdon. He can play off one of Boston’s many ball-handlers but run the offense in a pinch, and his length holds up on defense against both guard spots and some wings.
It’ll probably take a max offer for the Bucks to blink. The Celtics can live with that price tag. They might even be able to max out Brogdon ($27.3 million) and keep Morris’ or Rozier’s hold if they shed some other salary. (Guerschon Yabusele to start.)
Milwaukee may match anyway, but that’s not the end of the world. Boston doesn’t seem like it’ll be in play for superstars. Temporarily tying up cap space isn’t a big deal—especially if it results in inflating the payroll of a conference rival.
Dallas Mavericks: D’Angelo Russell (restricted)
The Mavericks are looking to dump Courtney Lee’s expiring contract, according to 247Sports’Mike Fisher, which suggests they prefer to court a no-brainer max candidate. But Russell is someone they can afford without greasing the wheels of a salary dump.
Floating cap holds for restricted free agents Dorian Finney-Smith, Maxi Kleber and Kristaps Porzingis will leave Dallas with just under $28 million in room. Russell’s starting max salary checks in at $27.3 million. The financial symmetry is perfect.
Russell is not. The Mavericks defense will be a problem when he shares the court with both Luka Doncic and Tim Hardaway Jr. The offense should be flames.
Doncic and Russell are rock-solid complements. There will be some overlap, but two off-the-dribble attackers are a must for today’s game. Porzingis is not overwhelmingly ball-dominant, so he alleviates some of the functional tension, and Russell has experience playing away from the rock. He has more to offer as a cutter, and he put down 39.4 percent of his catch-and-shoot threes last season.
By the way: Porzingis can be the pick here. Dallas has to keep him after forking over Dennis Smith Jr. and two first-round picks while sponging up Hardaway and Lee. But restricted free agents are inherently difficult to steal. The Mavericks will keep him if they want him.
New Orleans Pelicans: Maxi Kleber (restricted)
The Pelicans wanted to trade the No. 4 pick for a big man to pair with Zion Williamson. So, they did.
In a deal that might wind up becoming part of the Anthony Davis blockbuster process, New Orleans sent Solomon Hill, No. 4 (De’Andre Hunter), No. 57 (Jordan Bone, who was shipped to Detroit) and a future second-rounder to Atlanta for No. 8 (Jaxson Hayes), No. 17 (Nickeil Alexander-Walker), No. 35 (Marcos Louzada Silva) and Cleveland’s 2020 first-rounder (top-10 protection).
Hayes and Williamson form an uber-explosive frontline, but they’ll be an offensive work in progress out of the gate. New Orleans needs another big to space the floor.
Maxi Kleber is among the best possible answers. He splashed in35.3 percentof his treys on 5.2 attempts per 36 minutes last season and was even deadlier after Jan. 1, draining41 percentof his triples amid a bigger role.
Most of his minutes in Dallas have come at the 4, which only makes him more intriguing. He’s sneaky agile defending on the perimeter, but he has the size to man the 5 and live to tell the tale. Opponents shot 55.7 percent against him around the rim this past year—a top-25 markamong 165 playerswho challenged at least 150 point-blank looks.
Executive vice president of basketball operations David Griffin might have bigger names on his mind. The Pelicans have straightforward access to max room if they want it. Bet on their additional flexibility being divvied up among multiple guys. Their post-AD product is tantalizing, but a relative unknown. Now isn’t the time to make the singular home run swing, and Kleber can log time next to either one of their frontcourt cornerstones.
Phoenix Suns: Tomas Satoransky (restricted)
Here’s how Sam Cooper of The Timeline Podcast nutshelled Phoenix’s draft-night activity: “The Phoenix Suns swapped Jarrett Culver [No. 6], TJ Warren and the 32nd pick for Cam Johnson [No. 11] and Dario Saric.”
To be fair, the Suns also carved out cap space…just not as much cap space as initially expected…because they also acquired Aron Baynes and Ty Jerome (No. 24) from the Celtics for Milwaukee’s 2020 first-rounder (top-seven protection.)
This is a shaky sequence of events at best. The Suns yet again lack direction. And they still want for a point guard. Johnson can shoot the lights out, and Jerome can make plays for others off the dribble. Neither immediately lightens Devin Booker’s workload.
Signing Tomas Satoransky would help. He is a setup man with the size of a wing who doesn’t monopolize possessions. The Wizards pumped in114.3 points per 100 possessions last season whenever he and Bradley Beal played without John Wall. Satoransky and Booker can work together in that same vein.
Prying him out of Washington will cost a pretty(ish) penny. The Suns have that kind of cash. They’ll enter the market with more than $11 million in room if they renounce all of their own free agents except for Kelly Oubre Jr. That’s a good starting point. If they need to dig up more, they can look at Josh Jackson dumps.
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Chicago Bulls: Patrick Beverley
Patrick Beverley is pushing 31 and makes the most sense on a contender, but he’s down to play with his hometown Bulls anyway.
“I’m a Chicago kid,” he said, per the Chicago Tribune‘s K.C. Johnson. “So of course I’m open to playing for the Chicago Bulls if that’s a team that’s interested in me. At the same time, any decision that is made, it’s never personal. It’s always business. I have to make the right decision for me and my family.”
Beverley has never earned more than $6.5 million in a single season. That helps the Bulls. A fatter salary should carry weight with him, and they can eke out more than $20 million in cap space.
Drafting Coby White at No. 7 might compel Chicago to prioritize a wing on the open market. That’s more than OK. But rookie floor generals face steep learning curves, and the Bulls havemade it crystal clear they don’t view Kris Dunn as a long-term solution.
Paying Beverley above market for the next two or three seasons makes too much sense. Chicago has to think harder if he demands a four-year pact, but his fit is no doubt worth the short-term bag. He doesn’t need the ball on offense, so he won’t infringe upon White’s development or Zach LaVine’s touches, and his defensive tenacity will set an on-court and behind-the-scenes tone that gets head coach Jim Boylen’s juices flowing.
Another target: Tomas Satoransky (restricted)
Indiana Pacers: DeMarre Carroll
Coming up with a pick for the Pacers was wildly difficult after their trade for TJ Warren. He essentially removes all ball-dominant wings who aren’t point forwards from the equation, forcing us to reckon with a market that doesn’t have much of what Indiana needs most: an attacking playmaker who gets to the line without incinerating their floor balance.
The Pacers can afford Malcolm Brogdon, Kyrie Irving, D’Angelo Russell or Kemba Walker if they renounce all of their free agents. That’s not their style. Indiana is not a first-choice destination, and the team has seldom wrapped up cap space in free agents.
Ricky Rubio is on the radar, per The Ringer’s Kevin O’Connor, but he’s an awkward fit. The Pacers need an off-the-dribble scoring threat to keep defenses on tilt. Rubio is selfless to a fault, and his shaky jumper makes him schemable.
Parsing the free-agent ranks doesn’t yield an obvious, mid-end answer. Tomas Satoransky is interesting but a little too reluctant to look for his own offense on the bounce. Jeremy Lamb was intriguing, but he’s a question-mark passer, just like Warren.
DeMarre Carroll is not the first, second or 25th name that springs to mind here. He doesn’t check all the boxes. He shouldn’t be initiating pick-and-rolls, isn’t launching a bunch of off-the-dribble shots and should get more time at the 4 than the Pacers are probably willing to give unless they trade Domantas Sabonis. But he keeps the ball moving, spaces the floor at both forward spots and has been shockingly effective at getting to the charity stripe.
Here’s every player over the past three seasons with a free-throw attempt rate above 30 and turnover rate below 12 who has swished at least 350 three-pointers: Mike Conley, Kevin Durant, Paul George, Damian Lillard, Karl-Anthony Towns and…Carroll.
Signing Carroll alone doesn’t fix much, if anything. But he is an outlet the Pacers can pay while bringing back Darren Collison and rolling the dice on a should-be inexpensive ball-handler (Jeremy Lin?). That beats the nuclear scenarios in which they concede death for an imperfect acquisition anyway.
Another target: Jeremy Lamb
Sacramento Kings: Al Horford
Remember: It never hurts to try.
Al Horford probably doesn’t want to take on the role of “Old head on a plucky upstart” after slogging through Boston’s shoddy locker room, but he wants to get paid, and boy, can Sacramento pay him.
The Kings have an almost effortless $60-plus million in space following Harrison Barnes’ decision to enter free agency. Maxing out Horford (four years, $164 million) takes that flexibility too far, but they comfortably beat his four-year, $100 million price range.
Getting into a 33-year-old Horford for the next four seasons is a risk. He’s worth the trouble. He fits beside both Marvin Bagley III and Harry Giles, and his no-frills demeanor should set a good example for one of the NBA’s youngest cores.
If a four-year investment is too rich for the Kings to back, they could always offer him a three-year, $100 million deal. He extends the shelf life of his earning potential without sacrificing money in the short term, and Sacramento consolidates its risk by one year.
Another target: Malcolm Brogdon (restricted)
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Denver Nuggets: DeMarre Carroll
Denver needs a combo forward even if Michael Porter Jr. is healthy. Juan Hernangomez is still best suited at the 4, and the Nuggets’ other “wings” don’t have the size to play above the 3 spot.
DeMarre Carroll fits the bill. He can defend both forward slots, and his low-usage offense slides seamlessly into Denver’s system.
Close to half of his looks last season came on spot-up threes, and he can work in the occasional off-the-dribble play. His fluctuating outside clip is a concern; he shot just 34.9 percent on his catch-and-fire treys. But he dropped in 40.5 percent of his wide-open triples and will get even cleaner looks on the Nuggets.
Staying under the luxury-tax apron is crucial to entering Carroll’s market. He probably isn’t signing for the mini mid-level exception. The math will be tight if Denver picks up Paul Millsap’s $30 million team option, but not impossible.
Aside: It turns out the Nuggets have a thing for trying to reboot damaged draft stocks. One year after taking once-upon-a-time-No. 1-pick Porter with the 14th overall selection, they scooped up Bol Bol at No. 44 from the Miami Heat. That’s a pretty big, albeit no-risk, flex.
Alternative target: Trevor Ariza
Detroit Pistons: Rodney Hood
Kudos to the Detroit Pistons for stockpiling wings. They acquired Tony Snell from the Bucks and drafted Sekou Doumbouya at No. 15.
They still need more. Doumbouya is an offensive project, and Snell, while a good three-point shooter with an occasionally aggressive defensive motor, shouldn’t be tasked with making plays off the dribble.
Rodney Hood can be. He isn’t on the verge of grazing a fringe-star stealing, but he has the tools to blend the line between shot-creator and complementary marksman. He converted36 percentof his pull-up threes during the regular season and helped the Portland Trail Blazers in the playoffs with situational attacks on the basket and spot-up jumpers.
Detroit is free to play it safer. Someone like Darius Miller can tee up standstill threes all day, and lower-end dice rolls such as Danuel House Jr. (non-Bird restricted) and Iman Shumpert will come cheaper. But Hood is more of a complete package at his peak. The Pistons should keep him in mind even if they wind up only having the mini MLE.
Alternative target: Darius Miller
San Antonio Spurs: Marcus Morris
San Antonio did not deepen its combo-forward pool on draft night.
Luka Samanic (No. 19) is an outside-in big who should be able to switch across multiple positions. Keldon Johnson (No. 29) is a high-energy wing who shot 38.1 percent on 118 three-point attempts at Kentucky, but he doesn’t have the size to hang at the 4. (Truthfully, he might have the strength.)
Re-signing Rudy Gay, an Early Bird free agent, has become an absolute must. It isn’t enough. The Spurs need another double threat up front—and preferably someone who is more of a 2-3-4 hybrid.
Suggesting Marcus Morris errs on the side of ambition. The second half of his season failed to inspire, but his performance in the aggregate might earn him more than a $9.2 million starting salary.
Morris shot45.5 percentfrom floater range this season,51.4 percenton drives in general and buried 39 percent of his spot-up threes. His your-turn, my-turn offense isn’t ideal for San Antonio’s system, but he’s not an incapable or unwilling passer. His defensive profile is both inconsistent and everything the Spurs need. So while they should be prepared to pivot, they should also be prepared to give Morris a look.
Alternative target: Al-Farouq Aminu
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Mitchell Leff/Getty Images
Houston Rockets: Thabo Sefolosha
Thabo Sefolosha is not Jimmy Butler, who the Rockets are “expected” to aggressively chase, according to the Houston Chronicle‘sBrian T. Smith. This tends to happen when teams don’t have cap space or clear paths to manufacturing some: They’re forced to set their sights lower.
Houston has an outside chance of grinding out enough distance between itself and the luxury-tax apron, which would put the non-taxpayer’s mid-level exception in play. Counting on that flexibility is a stretch. And even if they get it, they aren’t in a position to spend it on one guy.
Looking at Sefolosha is a payroll-proof move. He shouldn’t command much, if anything, more than the minimum, and he upgrades the Rockets’ frontcourt switchability.
Over 85 percent of his possessions were played at the 4 last season, during which time the Jazz posted a 96.1 defensive rating, and he drained 43.6 percent of his threes. He might only be good for 15ish minutes per game, but he makes Houston better.
Another target: Reggie Bullock
Miami Heat: Justin Holiday
Miami needs more secondary ball-handlers and wings in general. Drafting Tyler Herro takes care of the former—according to Tyler Herro.
“Since I got to Kentucky, I continued to improve in every aspect of my game,” he said, perMassLive.com’sAnsarKhan. “A lot of teams haven’t seen what I can do with the ball in my hands. I think I can play in the pick-and-roll, make threes off that.”
Perhaps the Heat will give Herro the long leash he’ll need to showcase his creation. But they’re a veteran team with playoff aspirations (for now). And even if they give him extensive run, he’s not much of a wing defender.
Justin Holiday is no airtight stopper himself, and his stock took a nosedive once he was traded to the Grizzlies. But he was a competent pick-and-roll initiator while with the Bulls and has the wingspan to defend the traditional wing spots.
Also: The Heat cannot be too choosy. They forecast as a luxury-tax team unless they lop off chunks of salary. They’ll need to cross their fingers for Holiday to fall inside a price range that is unlikely to include them peddling their entire mini mid-level exception.
Another target: Kentavious Caldwell-Pope
Oklahoma City Thunder: Garrett Temple
Anyone in line to make more than the league minimum may be too lucrative of an investment for the Thunder. They made Steven Adams, Andre Roberson and Dennis Schroder “very available” ahead of the draft in hopes of skirting the luxury tax, according to SI.com’sJake Fischer.
Significantly tapping into their mid-level exception could be out of the question. That doesn’t bode well for their offseason spending. They can still change course, but cost-cutting may be their default mode after paying the repeater tax.
Finding wings who can handle the ball and knock down threes on a beggar’s dime is a special brand of challenging. The Thunder didn’t help their immediate prospects by adding Darius Bazley in the draft. His shot selection will take time to straighten out, and they don’t have the margin of error necessary to give him creative license.
Garrett Temple does not solve all the problems. His ball control is iffy when tasked with running plays in volume; he coughed up possession 25 percent of the time when initiating pick-and-rolls with the Clippers and wants for an attack mode.
The Thunder’s pecking order is better suited to his skill set. They have Paul George and Russell Westbrook to run the show. Temple can be a spot playmaker who spends most of his time launching threes off the catch. He’s shooting 36.3 percent from beyond the arc since 2015-16 and knocked down 37.8 percent of his standstill threebies this past year.
Another target: Darius Miller
Portland Trail Blazers: James Ennis
Portland needs wings who can hit off-the-bounce jumpers. Sophomore-year Anfernee Simons will fill part of the quota if he’s given a more prominent role. Nassir Little, selected at No. 25, might do the trick in time, but he should be limited to catch-and-shoot looks until he plays more under control. (We also all know head coach Terry Stotts isn’t leaning heavily on a newbie.)
Addressing this void will be tough. Re-signing Al-Farouq Aminu drags the Blazers over the tax line, and they’ll be awfully close to it if he leaves.
Mini-MLE targets won’t do everything Portland needs. We can’t even be sure general manager Neil Olshey will throw around the full amount. James Ennis is a hedge against the Blazers’ price range. It shouldn’t take the entire MLE to get him, but he offers better than minimum value.
Ball-handling isn’t his specialty, and his career three-point splits are both wild and bogged down by tiny sample sizes. But he is a reliable enough set shooter, and his defense on the wings saved the Sixers more than a few times during the playoffs. Portland might get away with playing him at the 4 for small bursts.
For those who want the Blazers to target a center while Jusuf Nurkic recovers from compound fractures in his left leg: I hear you. But bigs are easier to scrounge up on a tight budget. Ditto for reserve guards. Combo forwards and wings are scarcer finds.
Another target: Markieff Morris
Utah Jazz: Wilson Chandler
Utah is only confined to the bargain bin because its main attraction is already in the bag. Mike Conley arms the offense with the second from-scratch creator it has needed for years, and the Jazz are scarier for it.
But breaking bread with the Grizzlies chewed up most of their cap space and Jae Crowder. They now have the room exception to dangle unless they waive Derrick Favors and a versatility-sapping void up front.
Crowder was paramount to the small-ball 4 lineups that have proved so effective over the past two seasons. Without him, the Jazz have Joe Ingles and Georges Niang as their primary options in those situations. They can also re-sign Thabo Sefolosha.
Wilson Chandler won’t incite too much excitement as an alternative. He is 32, a suspect shooter and has battled injuries off and on for much of his career. But he’s affordable, and more importantly, he wants to play the 4.
“I’m more comfortable at the 4,” he said in March, per the Los Angeles Times‘ Broderick Turner. “Most of my career I’ve always played the 4. But right now we’ve got [Danilo Gallinari] at the 4, so it’s just a matter of fitting in.”
Both the Clippers and Sixers notched monster offensive ratings with Chandler at power forward. Los Angeles’ defense wasn’t so hot, but Philly’s survived.
The Jazz are at least as suited as the Sixers to navigate Chandler’s minutes at the 4, and they shouldn’t be chased away by his wild-card shooting. Crowder was hardly a beacon of consistency, and Chandler nailed 40 percent of his spot-up threes and 45.3 percent of his wide-open treys last season.
Dan Favale covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter (@danfavale) and listen to hisHardwood Knockspodcast, co-hosted by B/R’s Andrew Bailey.
Security forces deployed at the scene cordoned off the site [Khalid Al-Mousily/Reuters]
Several people have been killed in a blast at a Shia Muslim mosque in Iraq‘s capital, Baghdad, according to police and security sources.
The explosion hit the Imam Mahdi al-Muntadhar mosque in Baladiyat neighbourhood during Friday prayers, near the massive and densely-populated district of Sadr City.
The attacker was wearing an explosive-laden belt targetting the mosque, Police Captain Ahmed Khalaf told Anadolu Agency.
He said 10 people were killed and dozens wounded, while other news agencies’ reports quoting unidentified security sources put the death toll to at least seven.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility.
Iraq has witnessed a rare period of relative calm in recent months after decades of back-to-back conflict, including years of sectarian violence that regularly saw dozens killed in explosions in Baghdad.
In 2017, Iraq declared victory against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL or ISIS) group, which had also carried out mass attacks against civilians in the capital.
The improved security situation has led officials to dismantle the concrete blast walls, barbed wire and checkpoints that had become ubiquitous in Baghdad.
But occasional hit-and-run attacks have continued.
Last month, at least eight people were killed and 15 wounded in a suicide bombing at a market in eastern Baghdad.
In November, explosions in several Shia-majority districts killed six people, most of them civilians.
Many wore a red eye patch in support of two protesters who lost their eye sight after being hit by the police rubber bullets on Thursday
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