Thursday, October 29th, 2009...3:21 pm
Spurs Will Not Pick Up Option on Ian Mahinmi
Ian Mahinmi’s career continues down a challenging path. French language sources are reporting that the Spurs will not exercise their option on Mahinmi. I spoke with Bouna Ndaiye, Ian Mahinmi’s agent, and confirmed the French language reports.
What does this mean for Ian Mahinmi and the Spurs moving forward?
Much of what determines Mahinmi’s future with the Spurs will happen on the practice floor. The Spurs could still offer him a contract next summer. But he’ll have to earn it. If he fails to produce on the court, whether in practice or live games, his most aggressive suitors will come from Europe.
Ian Mahinmi must baby step his way to another contract, and those initial steps would seem to include practicing his way onto the active roster.
San Antonio’s best move may be to trade Mahinmi between now and February, something he might welcome. Ian Mahinmi needs to play to improve, and that’s impossible so long as he remains on the inactive list. Compounding matters, the athletic French center is out of D-League eligibility.
By not picking up his contract, the Spurs have further reduced his already modest trade value. That is, other teams will show great reluctance to swap assets, even marginal assets (a second round pick), with the Spurs if they have no guarantee Ian Mahinmi will stick with them beyond the season.
The Spurs’ frontcourt is not terribly difficult to project. Tiago Splitter is the obvious offseason target, and Matt Bonner stands a good chance of receiving an extension from the team. Theo Ratliff and Marcus Haislip will have to give the Spurs incentive to go with them for another season.
In other words, it’s reasonable to project a frontcourt of Tim Duncan, Antonio McDyess, DeJuan Blair, Tiago Splitter and Matt Bonner next season. But Duncan and McDyess are old enough that taking a long careful look at a promising young but not pulled-together big like Ian Mahinmi makes sense, especially as a deep reserve who is already system-smart.
Put differently, there isn’t much tape on Ian Mahinmi. His best chance at earning another NBA contract is leaving it on the floor during practice and, on those night’s he’s not inactive, in garbage time. Let him give the Spurs reason to mea culpa and divvy up a new contract. But it’s on Ian Mahinmi to force the Spurs in that direction.
Some fans are tossing around the words “bust” and “failure” in description of Ian Mahinmi. But that isn’t quite right. Mahinmi is talented, but unproven. He’s a player who must make good on the promise of greater things. He’s 23. There is time. But, as the Spurs have just reminded him, the clock started ticking a few months ago.
13 Comments
October 29th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
I found your blog on google and read a few of your other posts. I just added you to my Google News Reader. Keep up the good work. Look forward to reading more from you in the future.
October 29th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
I really hoped he would shine this year. I just don’t think our system and his style mesh very well, I see him in a high tempo system like golden state.
October 29th, 2009 at 6:06 pm
I think the spurs are smart enough to recognize progress, even if it is just at practice. Maybe i’m jaded by past success, but if they let him go without offering a contract, i’m going to assume he was running in place and wasn’t improving. I don’t think a 5 min stint every 10 games would improve his game more than the day in day out grind of practice. I really want him to succeed because we need youth but some bigs just never get it. But his story is repeated over and over in the NBA. “Young big with tons of athleticism. Player x has all the tools and if he can figure out how to put them together, he’ll shine.” Same old song.
October 29th, 2009 at 6:48 pm
I think in certain situations he could still be a trade asset, especially a team like Houston that has a year to experiment w/unproven talent and would still be able to keep their cap flexibility for next offseason. Other teams like the Clippers, Minnesota, etc could all be teams w/similiar goals.
October 29th, 2009 at 7:31 pm
He needs to drop the bad habits that keep him from becoming a NBA caliber big man. He has bad hands, is not very strong, and a weak finesse game. During the pre-season the Spurs tried to get him offense in different ways and received little production.
At this point I think some time overseas would be best. He’s not NBA ready.
October 29th, 2009 at 8:15 pm
woulda liked to see him become a part of the system sooner or later rather than real trade bait like bonner.
October 29th, 2009 at 9:54 pm
I like Ian, but I think it’s a good move by the Spurs. His trade value is slightly hurt. But this gives some flexibility around February or next year’s off season.
I wrote an article about Ian earlier this month. You guys might wanna check it out!
October 29th, 2009 at 10:57 pm
Unless a trade is already in the works, I think it’s a bad move by the Spurs FO, since it looks like they’re quitting on him while not securing the highest return on their investment. Picking up the option would have meant a higher trade value, which is basically the best the Spurs can get right now if they think Mahinmi isn’t going to contribute any time soon (again, unless a trade is already in the works with a team that wants cap relief asap for the 2010 summer).
October 30th, 2009 at 5:18 am
I believe they didn’t extend his contract BECAUSE they couldn’t trade him. Given that, I think not extending is now the smart move.
They don’t know enough about him to promise him more money. Not extending could give him more motivation and keep him hungry.
Also, Spurs are known to lower player’s value for whatever reason - so I expect this. If anything, it allows them to resign him if he shows progress in practice at a price they like, mainly because no other team will offer him a contract since they don’t know what he has to offer.
Obviously, this isn’t a sign of confidence in him right now and his future is tenuous. However, if the Spurs are in need for another post player this Summer, this gives them the option of resigning him then when they know more about whether or not Splitter is coming, Theo is retiring, Bonner is resigning, and a variety of other factors I can’t consider right now.
October 30th, 2009 at 6:14 am
did anyone see our frontcourt leave our feet last night. noah and thomas played above our bigs all night and this will be a problem for the whole year. haislip and mahinimi would have matched up much better last night then the slow legs of duncan, ratliff, mcdyess. i agree with not excersising mahinimi’s option considering he didn’t impress anyone this summer, but a year with the spurs and the tutelage of veteran bigs could really make him better.
October 31st, 2009 at 9:04 am
Ian is a bust considering he was a first round draft pick. He hasn’t developed into the player he should be…could he change that? Of course, but for now…he’s a wasted project/first round pick. There were other players the spurs could have picked up in the first round that year. He should have been a 2nd round pick at best.
October 31st, 2009 at 8:34 pm
give him some minutes……….. then he will show you that he deserves on the roster……….
April 22nd, 2010 at 10:25 am
[...] assumes that the Spurs have given up on Ian Mahinmi, but I hope not. A regular season rotation (one that actually allows Tim Duncan rest) of Duncan, [...]
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