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2025 Free Agents - Day'Ron Sharpe

Sharpe is a physical big that plays extremely hard every minute he's on the floor. He is an elite offensive rebounder, as he led the league in offensive rebounding rate as a rookie and has never finished below the 97th percentile for his position, according to Cleaning the Glass. He's a strong defensive rebounder too, and despite not having overwhelming size he gets a high number of blocks and steals. From a scoring perspective, Sharpe has struggled to be efficient. He has only hit 62% of his shots at the rim, which is a pretty poor number for a big man. He hasn't been good on non-paint attempts either. He overall just needs to improve his touch around the rim. Sharpe does have good feel as a passer though. He has a good assist rate, and can make the right reads when he gets the catch as the roll man in pick-and-roll situations. He can also operate a bit from the elbows and find cutters. Defensively, Sharpe gets blocks and steals, but still needs development to become a real difference-maker on that end. at 6'10" with a 7'0" wingspan, he isn't huge for a center, so he needs to rely more on being in the right spot consistently to be a great rim protector. He isn't the most switchable defender either, as he's okay moving laterally but he isn't someone you want switching out onto the perimeter unless it's a late-clock situation. Sharpe will still only be 23 years old as a free agent in 2025. He has shown improvement and gotten more minutes each season thus far, and if he continues to do that he could become a starting-level center going forward. If not, he may be stuck in a high-end backup role.

Summary

Sharpe will be a restricted free agent with a $12.1 million cap hold, $6 million Qualifying Offer, and full Bird Rights. I wouldn't expect Sharpe' QO to come into play, but I wouldn't completely rule it out considering it may not be that much lower than his market value starting salary and the Nets could play hardball with him as a restricted free agent. If a player has a smaller cap hold than his starting salary, his team can use cap space to sign-free agents before using Bird Rights to re-sign its own free agents. The Nets could take advantage of this rule if they end up operating under the cap, but it's unlikely that Sharpe's starting salary would be high enough for this to matter. Depending on how close the Nets are to the luxury tax after free agency, or how much cap space they need after re-signing him, if Sharpe is brought back by the Nets on a multi-year contract they could benefit from frontloading his contract, as it could give them additional flexibility in the future. Other teams will have multiple ways to sign Sharpe as even teams without cap space could use the Non-Taxpayer MLE or Room MLE to sign him to an offer sheet or outright as an unrestricted free agent (it's unlikely that the Taxpayer MLE or B-Annual Exception would be enough since they are below his QO amount). However, Sharpe being a restricted free agent would lower his interest among teams, as they will worry that the only way to pry him away from Brooklyn would be to overpay him.

Cap Considerations

Jalen Smith (3 years, $27 million, 2024) Jock Landale (4-3 years, $32 million, 2023) Zeke Nnaji (3+1 years, $32 million, 2023)

Player/Contract Comparison

Potential Teams: Nets, Wizards, Pelicans, Bulls, Raptors

Predicted Contract: 4-year, $40 million with the Nets

Last updated: 9/25/2024

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