What was suppose to be a quick parting and turned into a long drama, will finally be over, as the Detroit Pistons are reportedly going to give Kemba Walker his unconditional release.
The Pistons have 16 guaranteed NBA contracts but must get down to 15 before the start of the NBA regular season. It does not take a basketball wizard to figure out which player is going to be set loose.
Kemba Walker, 32, a four-time All-Star and an All-NBA player as recently as 2019, will be officially out of the league, waiting for a team that might need a point guard.
The strange turn of events occured due to something that the Pistons, and Walker’s previous employer, the New York Knicks, had not calculated – no NBA team would want Walker, even at a minimum salary.
It all seemed so simple back on June 28. The Knicks, in a salary dump, sent Walker and his $9.1 million contract, to Detroit as part of trade. The Pistons had no interest in Walker as a player, so they offered to immediately buy him out, offering him his salary minus $2.7 million, which is the veterans minimum he would get with another team, so he would lose no money on the deal.
So sure were both clubs this would occur, in a subsequent trade, the Knicks sent $6 million to Detroit to pay for the buyout.
And following all of that: crickets.
There were occasional rumors of the Phoenix Suns or Walker’s old club, the Charlotte Hornets, being interested, but nothing came of them.
Outside of Cade Cunningham and Jaden Ivey, Walker was probably the most talked about member of the Pistons this summer. It just seemed like such a mystery to fans: why was he still on the roster? It made no sense.
As summer turned into fall, the answer became obvious: No one else wanted Walker, and thus no one to pick up the $2.7 million difference, so he just stayed on the roster.
