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Henderson did not play professionally last year as he sought to recover from the hip injury that had derailed his career, on which last summer he had a third surgery in six years. The surgery, which involved replacing worn-down bone with metal caps, had previously been performed on Tiago Splitter, so it was not without NBA precedent. Unfortunately, Splitter recover to play only a handful of minutes before retiring early, so the precedent is not strong. When he was healthy, Henderson, never a high-volume or high-efficiency outside shooter, scored well at the NBA level through probing, cutting, curling and open-court athleticism, which he flanked with some effective perimeter defensive decision-making. All of those things rely upon a good level of athleticism, though, and Henderson will need to prove he has that back in order to get back in.
Gerald Henderson SG, 6’5, 215lbs, 29 years old, 8 years of experience
Henderson had a career best three-point shooting season in terms of both rate and efficiency, yet neither is high. But he flanked it with career lows in usage rate and rebounds. Henderson is plenty solid but plenty unremarkable, a sometime slasher and sometime spot-up shooter with average defence and a reasonably reliable hand at fill-in handling and playmaking. He also though has an unguaranteed $9 million contract and hip arthritis. So he will surely be waived.
Player Plan: Unguaranteed $9 million contract for 2017/18. His play has not merited that much money, and although there is not much else to do with the money at the present time, selective aggression in picking up unwanted contracts elsewhere along with pacifying assets throughout the season can still be the approach, just as it has been prior, until such time as the core needs paying.
1) Arn Tellem has signed players to rookie contracts that start at 100% and use incentives to get to 120% in previous years; he did this only last season with Gerald Henderson, and in 2008 with both Danilo Gallinari and Anthony Randolph. He knows the rules and has played by them before.
Henderson's rookie year was a poor one. He did not get much opportunity, averaging only 8.3 minutes per game in only 43 contests, but he also didn't play well when he did. Henderson shot only 36% from the field and 21% from three point range, defending fairly well and getting to the line at a decent rate but not contributing offensively outside of that. I still believe that the open-court and better spaced NBA game will benefit Henderson in the long run, and he certainly is not as bad as he showed in his rookie year; however, playing on a team behind a 39mpg shooting guard and a 41mpg small forward, opportunities will be hard to come by. (Good old Larry. At least you got to the playoffs. Screw everything else.)
