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Summary
I was a little bit surprised that the Nets declined Temple's $5 million team option last offseason, but considering the Nets were well into the luxury tax and that they had a good amount of depth, it wasn't egregious. However, some of that depth was lost in the James Harden trade, and the Nets could have certainly used Temple, who played well for the Bulls.

He's a slightly-below average shooter, but defends well and generally makes the right play on both ends. Temple will be 35 years old this summer when he hits free agency, so I don't expect him to get any long-term offers, but he should end up with a solid one or two-year contract.
 
Cap Considerations
Temple will be an unrestricted free agent with a $6 million cap hold and Non-Bird Rights. This means that the highest starting salary the Bulls could offer him using the Non-Bird Exception is $6 million. This should be enough to retain Temple. Alternatively, the Bulls could use space  or their Mid-Level Exception if they operate over the cap, to re-sign Temple if he demands more than $6 million.
 
Other teams will have multiple ways to sign Temple as even teams without cap space could possibly use any of the Non-Taxpayer, Taxpayer, or Room Mid-Level Exceptions to sign him. There's also a chance that Temple ends up settling for the minimum.

Potential Teams: Clippers, Bucks, Mavericks, Trailblazers Warriors

Predicted Contract: 1-year, $5 million with the Clippers

Actual Contract: 3-year, $15.5 million (3rd year nonguaranteed) with the Pelicans

Temple was re-signed by the Bulls but included in the sign-and-trade for Lonzo Ball. Overall, he got a similar value to what I expected.

Last updated: 8/19/2021

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