Summary

Dieng quietly put together a nice two-half season stretch (going back to the 2020 trade deadline) for Memphis. He shot 38% from three, per Cleaning the Glass, and finished better inside than he ever had in his career.

 

On defense, his block and steal rate was near the top of the league, and overall looked like a solid backup center as the Grizzlies' bench units often thrived. However, Dieng was bought out for a reason, and did not make a real impact with the Spurs.

 

Dieng is already 31 years old, so there will be a real question of how he ages. Despite having some decent stretches of play in recent seasons, Dieng was a poor value the second he signed his 4-year, $63 million extension that began in 2017. Even as a solid backup center, Dieng may still only get minimum offers this summer.

 

Cap Considerations

Dieng will be an unrestricted free agent with a $1.7 million cap hold and Non-Bird Rights. This means that the highest starting salary the Spurs could offer him using the Non-Bird Exception is $2.9 million. This should be enough to retain Dieng, since he settled for the minimum to come to San Antonio. Alternatively, the Spurs could use their Mid-Level Exception or Bi-Annual Exception to re-sign Dieng if he demands more than $2.9 million, or use cap space if they operate under the cap.

 

Other teams will have multiple ways to sign Dieng as even teams without cap space could possibly use any of the Non-Taxpayer MLE, Taxpayer MLE, or possibly even the Room MLE or Bi-Annual Exception to sign him. There's also a chance that Dieng only gets minimum offers.