Thunder GM indicates Kendrick Perkins won't be amnestied
There has been some talk Kendrick Perkins might get cut from the Thunder via the amnesty clause. But their GM says that's not likely.
OKLAHOMA CITY -- Kendrick Perkins was pretty confident during his end-of-the-season exit interview that he wasn't going anywhere, specifically because of the one-time amnesty clause.
Why? Because five minutes before he had it, he spoke with Thunder general manager Sam Presti.
And what Presti told Perkins then might've been the same thing he told the media on Saturday -- that his center wasn't going to be amnestied.
“Obviously I know that’s a topic that’s been talked about, and for us, the amnesty application is not something we really have ever considered as an organization,” Presti said. “I understand that it’s something that’s been talked about quite a bit, but organizationally that’s not something we’ve considered.
“We just haven’t considered using the provision,” he said. “I wouldn’t necessarily attribute that to any player on our team. Every team looks at the amnesty provision different depending on their circumstances, but it’s not really something that we’ve explored.”
Presti explained that the Thunder's line of thinking with the amnesty largely centers around the team neither being under the cap nor over the tax. He offered to explain the amnesty to all the reporters in the room, but prefaced it with this:
"I also don’t want to waste time on something that we’re not, or haven’t really considered,” he said.
Which obviously more than indicates the Thunder aren't thinking about amnestying Perkins. Not hard to read between those lines.
Perkins told reporters Thursday following the Thunder's five-game exit at the hands of the Grizzlies that he doesn't anticipate being on a new roster.
"I'm pretty comfortable and I'm pretty sure I'll be back here next year," he said. "They said they were going to amnesty me last year or trade me last year, but whatever. I know what I bring to the table, and I'm cool with myself. I'm going to go to sleep tonight."
Perkins, who is owed $8.9 million next season and $9.3 million in 2014-15, had one of the worst statistical postseasons in NBA history. He appeared in all 11 postseason games for the Thunder and averaged 19 minutes. In those 11 appearences, Perkins finished with a negative player efficiency rating. That's right, he had a -0.7 PER, which is the worst PER in NBA postseason history by a player playing 200 or more minutes. No one in NBA playoff history has ever had a negative PER with that many minutes.
There's also this: Perkins blocked just five shots, committed 24 turnovers while scoring just 24 points, and he finished with two more rebounds (41) than he had personal fouls (39).
“We think Perk has a lot of value to our team. He’s a member of a team that won 60 games and helped us to our third division title in three years," Presti said. "I don’t know that we can discount that. Obviously, I’m sure he would’ve liked to have had a better postseason, but I think that’s pretty universal for the whole group. And we accept that. No one’s running from the fact that we certainly feel like we should still be playing. But at the end of the day Memphis was the better team in that series and we tip our cap to them, and we go into the offseason looking at how we can improve.”
Presti, though, not only said Perkins won't be amnestied, but even defended his starting center.
“Look, I could sit here and read off a lot of internal metrics that would indicate his impact on the performance of the other team when he’s on the floor," he said. "I don’t think that’s what you guys want to hear. And certainly not something we need to trumpet in front of you. Look, he’s a guy that’s contributed to this team the past three years. He would like to play at a higher level in the postseason than he did. But at the same time, I think that could be said for a lot of our guys. I think he’s going to go back and work and improve. But he does things we value, against certain teams we have to go through on a nightly basis."
Perkins, 28, averaged 2.2 points, 3.7 rebounds and 0.4 blocks while playing 19.1 minutes in the Thunder's 11 postseason games.
