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The San Antonio Spurs waived Jimmer Fredette, the team announced Wednesday. 

For some reason, this comes as a surprise, or news. It should not be. 

It's true, the Spurs are in need of perimeter shooting. Their roster has been reconfigured with more frontcourt players and their guards aren't particularly knockdown shooters from the outside. It's true that Fredette remains one of the best pure shooting prospects of the last 10 years. However, the reality is that Fredette simply isn't an NBA rotation player. 

The Spurs were Fredette's fourth stop since being drafted by the Kings (10th overall!) in 2012. The Kings traded down for the pick to take him, adding John Salmons, which didn't exactly work out great, although they did use Salmons to acquire Rudy Gay who has been phenomenal for them. Fredette has been unable to crack rotations in any of the stops he's had, because he's small, slow defensively, and unable to create his own shot. 

Fredette wasn't bad with the Pelicans last season, he gave them some good minutes. But the brilliant scorer who would set the nets on fire with unbelievable shots that Fredette was in college has never really appeared. More alarming, for his career, he has a defensive rating of 113, which means teams have scored 113 points per 100 possessions when he was on the floor. That's a hazmat zone. 

Still, this isn't to say that Fredette is definitively not an NBA player. He's a borderline NBA guard who can play spot minutes. The Pelicans, actually, could really use him at this point with Jrue Holiday's minutes restriction and the injuries to Tyreke Evans and Norris Cole. However, the fact that the Spurs elected to keep Rasual Butler (who was great for the Wizards last year and is a true NBA vet, however) should show that Fredette's specialty simply isn't good enough to cover for his other concerns. 

Fredette was a legend coming out of college. His senior season was worthy of legend. What's happened in his NBA career doesn't take away from that, and really, Fredette's resilience and determination to make his NBA career work is a testament to his work ethic. His problem isn't that he's unwilling to put it together, or to put the work in, or to play the game the right way. He's accomplished more in his basketball career than most could ever dream of. He's also made over $8 million, so there's that. 

Again, Fredette can hang on and very well could build a long NBA career for himself. The bigger point is to recognize what he is, and quit hoping for Jimmer-Mania. That was left at BYU. The NBA is a whole other world. 

Jimmer Fredette has reportedly been waived by the Spurs. (USATSI)
Jimmer Fredette has been waived by the Spurs. (USATSI)